Beyond - Legends Saga - OT Saga - ST Beyond the Saga Saga - Legends Thrawn: Remnant - a Thrawn’s War novella

Title: Star Wars: Thrawn: Remnant
Author: Sinrebirth

Genre: Space Opera
Time Frame: During the events of Ahsoka, late 16 ABY in Legends
Characters: Ensemble Cast across Legends and Disney Canon

Summary: After more than a decade trapped on Peridea, Grand Admiral Thrawn is poised to return to the galaxy at large. He will have to be a quick study, for since he has been in exile, the Galactic Empire has fell, Emperor Palpatine has been finally slain, and even a clone of Thrawn has been defeated. In a galaxy divided between the New Republic and Imperial Remnants, it is his clone's legacy which will cause him the greatest issue... can he overcome it?

Author's Notes: This book is to be read in tandem with Ahsoka season 1 and 2, the Black Fleet Crisis and New Rebellion. It is intended to end before the events of Hand of Thrawn: Vision of the Future.

Special thanks: @Delpheas and @darthbernael for proofreading and being a sounding board.

House Keeping!

1. Ben Solo is the fourth child of Han and Leia. He was born one year after Dark Empire: Empire's End, from Legends. This coincides with the Battle of Jakku in Canon. In that respect, all Canon post-Endor references begin from the Battle of Onderon, not the Battle of Endor. So anything set, for example, five years after Endor in Canon actually takes place in 15 ABY, such as Mandalorian season one.
2. The Yuuzhan Vong War lasted four years.
3. The Legacy of the Force novels take place in their original timeline placement i.e. 37 ABY, as mentioned in Betrayal.
4. Episode VII: The Force Awakens, takes place in 41 ABY.
5. The final death of a character in the timeline is considered their final appearance, so any contradictions will be smoothed out.

 

Back Page Blurb

As Grand Admiral Thrawn returns from Peridea he finds a galaxy that has much changed in the last decade. In the place of the Empire stands a New Republic, with Palpatine dead, and much of the galaxy standing independent, waiting to see the if the galactic order will prevail in the long term.

Five years after the Battle of Jakku, Thrawn must come to know his enemies and allies - Chief of State Leia Organa, Jedi Master Luke Skywalker, Captain Han Solo, yes, but he must decide what to make of Chancellor Mon Mothma, Grand Vizier Mas Amedda, Grand Inquisitor Tremayne, Admirals Ackbar, Pellaeon, Daala, Parck and Sloane.

For even opponents can be levers, and allies can be impediments - but his ultimate foe will be the Legacy of Palpatine, incarnate in the most surprising form… and Thrawn will discover that his dead clone may have created an enemy he cannot defeat…

 

Dramatis Personae

Ackbar; Admiral of the New Republic (Mon Calamari male)
Aktropaw; Great Mother (Dathmiri female)
Attinis Tremayne; Grand Inquisitor (human male)
Blackhole; Unknown
Borsk Fey'lya; Senator of Bothawui (Bothan male)
Gilad Pellaeon; Admiral of the Imperial Remnant (human male)
Han Solo; General of the New Republic (human male)
Hamato Xiono; Senator of Hosnian Prime (human male)
Klothow; Great Mother (Dathmiri female)
Lakesis; Great Mother (Dathmiri female)
Leia Organa Solo; Chief of State of the New Republic (human female)
Luke Skywalker; Jedi Master (human male)
Mara Jade; head of the Smugglers Alliance (human female)
Mas Amedda; Grand Vizier of the Galactic Empire (Chagrian male)
Mitth'raw'nuruodo 'Thrawn'; Grand Admiral (Chiss male)
Mon Mothma; Chancellor of the New Republic (human female)
Natasi Daala; Admiral of the Imperial Core (human female)
Rae Sloane; Admiral of the First Order (human female)
Voss Parck; Admiral of the Empire of the Hand (human male)
White Eyes; Unknown

 

Updating every Wednesday!

 

Who was Thrawn?

That was a question he found himself asking more often than not, in these wilds.

Wilds even to him, as he pushed the envelope of the Galactic Empire.

He had been named, and renamed, and rebranded, and reborn... too many times.

From being born as Kivu'rawn'nuru - and thus, known as Vurawn - with a sister, and a brother, each of different sorts...

As Mitth'raw'nuru, and becoming Thrawn, and a further permutation to that new core name, his final name, Mitth'raw'nuruodo.

Paths bifurcated.

Had he ascended within the Chiss military, he would have abandoned his family name and became Raw'nuruodo, showing how he placed the Chiss Expansionary Defence Force above political fealty.

However, instead, he journeyed to Known Space, under the cover of an exile, to become Lieutenant Thrawn, later Captain, Vice Admiral, Admiral, and, finally, Grand Admiral Thrawn.

That name now defined him.

He was no longer Mitth'raw'nuruodo, nor Thrawn.

Grand Admiral Thrawn was his existence.

To his homeworld, he was a hero and a traitor both.

To the nation he swore to, he was a hero and a traitor both.

Within those two words he had created a world.

Within that world he brought others - those he could trust to join him in his personal war against the Chaos...

... and within definition, he lost himself, too.

A clone, or two, or three, and which was Thrawn, which was Mitth'raw'nurudo, which could have been Raw'nurudo, which could have been Emperor. To examine them individually was to merely embrace a remnant of the whole.

Grand Admiral Thrawn became the label for all.

Military genius and maverick and rogue all in one.

Who was Thrawn?

Time would tell.

 

Always a pleasure to hear how much you enjoyed something, my friend!

The more I wrote as Thrawn, the more I realised that his sense of self would have been fracturing as time went on, the longer he spent away away from Csilla, and the more layers and labels he placed upon himself. At some point he would encounter something that he could not so easily defeat… and those cracks would become his fulcrum.

Ha! Not the intention, but it works very well.

We all love/hate that woman. Palpatine too!

Thank you!

 

Chapter One: Crisis of Faith

Then

He had failed.

As the Chimaera was bodily carried by the purgills through hyperspace, emergency containment fields tried their best to keep a ship together -

He had failed.

They crossed the threshold of Known and Unknown, even beyond what Thrawn knew. Outside the galaxy, further and further -

He had failed.

The ship was abandoned above the graveyard of Peridea - drifting; crippled; broken in body and soul. The Chimaera had been slain.

He had failed.

And yet, he remained Grand Admiral Thrawn.

But it didn’t matter, because he had failed.

He remained Grand Admiral Thrawn.

They were stranded.

He remained Grand Admiral Thrawn, and he had failed.

The slow realisation of that became his crucible. The Force had thwarted him at Atollon, defeated him at Lothal. He’d been able to use Lord Vader at Batuu, to factor the Force and its usage into his plans at Sunrise. One could argue he had manipulated Emperor Palpatine, the most powerful Force user of the era, into allowing him to cultivate prestige and resources inside his Empire.

He thought he could manage the Force.

Was it hubris? Or arrogance?

Had his confidence crossed the line into ego?

—-

In the months before the Battle of Yavin; in the days after the Battle of Lothal...

Voss Parck was summoned to Coruscant.

Not just to High Command, but to the Imperial Palace.

To his Emperor.

He had not been informed as to why, merely that the Strikefast was to return to Imperial Center immediately. His Victory-class Star Destroyer - formerly a Venator-class that had served in the Clone Wars of the same name - was among the later Mark II variant, and as such swift. A fact that had pleased Parck to no end - what with the Rebels having wiped out a quartet of Mark I variants as recently as the Battle of Denab simply due to their sloth - and now his faster ship simply expedited his doom.

Because, nearly two decades ago, he had found a Chiss on the edge of the Unknown Regions. The man had ran circles around the crew, finally sneaking aboard as they withdrew from the distant world. Banking on the possibility that their newly anointed Emperor would have interest in the man, a former officer exiled from his homeworld for disagreements over whether to strike first, Parck had taken Mitth'raw'nuruodo - better known as Thrawn - to Palpatine. He had been correct, and promoted, and Thrawn entered the Imperial Navy, accepted for his tactical and strategic mastery.

In a matter of years, Thrawn became Grand Admiral Thrawn, and was given command of the 7th Fleet. A sector group of Imperial Star Destroyers charged with bringing distant sectors of the Outer Rim to heel. Skirmishing throughout the south-eastern quadrant, Thrawn defeated the piratical threat, Nightswan, ended the Ryloth Insurgency, nearly erased the nascent Rebel Alliance at the Battle of Atollon, and foiled an attempt from the Unknown Regions to steal Project Stardust from out under Director Krennic.

Too did he form a network of like-minded Imperials that applied themselves to victory, that didn't merely expect it. Rising stars such as Gilad Pellaeon, Eli Vanto, Corf Ferno, Morgan Elsbeth, Karyn Faro, Arihnda Pryce, Dagon Niriz and Ubrik Adelhard became attached to Thrawn's meteoric ascension. Voss Parck considered himself a beneficiary of that self-same ascent, having been made an Admiral off the back of Thrawn's repeated successes.

Parck had been proud to watch Thrawn rise up from the distance, as the Chiss time and time again overcome whatever challenge was before him, including detractors within High Command, the Senate, and even the Moff Council. However, as successful as Thrawn was, Parck hadn't been able to ascertain what the result of the Battle of Lothal was... only a single Star Destroyer, the Dark Omen, and a handful of escorts remained of the 7th Fleet, having not been present at the engagement...

But now he had been summoned to Coruscant.

Grand Moff Tarkin had refused his call, and the other Grand Admirals seemed to have shelled up and were avoiding him. Thrawn had recently exposed the treason of one of their number, so no surprises there. Grand Moff Tigellinus had been making noises in the Imperial Court about punishing Thrawn, so Parck assumed it was quite bad news.

When he was greeted by a black-robed variant of the Royal Guards rather than the traditional crimson - or even the blue-robed Senate Guards - Parck knew that it was bad. If Lord Vader was here too...

Parck strained his ears for the tell-tale sound of the breathing of the Dark Lord of the Sith, the terrifying construct that was somehow leashed to the Emperor, but didn't hear it as he was wordlessly ushered into the Imperial Palace. This particular Palace was a relatively recent construction, a pyramid that had been erected as an additional residence besides the former Jedi Temple. Lord Vader also had a fortress on Coruscant, though he often spent his time on distant Vjun or Mustafar - if he wasn't aboard the Devastator.

Parck’s analytical mind simply staved off his existential dread.

The Guards stopped and turned, framing the door that opened, and let him into the inner sanctum.

This palace was more shaded and metallic, rather than what he considered the typical regal Imperial tones. The Emperor did this often - twinned organisations to focus their energies against each other. Imperial Intelligence, COMPNOR and the Imperial Security Bureau had a complex overlapping jurisdiction, much as the Moffs, Senators and Admiralty had the same issues. Palpatine seemed to encourage it - on one hand addressing the Empire attired in his old Chancellor robes, with a hologram overlain over his features to evoke his former face, and on the other, he was a scarred man in a black tunic and cloak, even supported by a cane at times.

It appeared that Parck was seeing behind the veil today - the dark Empire within the reformed Old Republic. The shadow skeleton that made up the true government of the galaxy. His trepidation finally overwhelmed his analysis, and Parck took a deep, shuddering breath to still his nerves as the black-obsidian throne turned.

"Admiral Parck," came the Emperor's reptilian voice. Grave, grating upon the very nerves of his soul.

Parck swallowed and dropped to one knee. "Your Majesty."

"The Seventh Fleet has been all-but destroyed, and Grand Admiral Thrawn is no longer responding. The survivors have been led by Captain Pellaeon to rendezvous with the Dark Omen," Palpatine said, snarling the Captain's name. "Thrawn is gone, beyond my reach to punish... and I am now beholden to ignore this defeat, to not hand the Rebels a victory that they can advertise to the masses. The recent surge of rebellions in the Kwymar Sector and elsewhere have only recently been oppressed..."

Elsewhere included the Ghorman Massacre, and Operation Strike Fear, which had crushed various cells in the Tion Cluster... a wave of secessions which the Imperial Navy had brought to a bloody end. Several victories under their belt, and a handful of defeats, but the Rebellion was not over - it's leaders remained at large and a second offensive was expected. Whether from the so-called neutral world of Mon Calamari, or perhaps cultivated secretly by Alderaan and Chandrila. Parck felt his spine chill.

Were all their defeats to be lain at his feet?

"It behoves me to punish those officers that fell within Thrawn's sphere of influence within my Empire," Palpatine continued. "But Eli Vanto cannot be found, and so Gilad Pellaeon will serve as an object lesson - I will ensure High Command never promotes him beyond Captain. He will age into oblivion, until he retires, at which point I will liquidate him."

Parck nodded. Poor Gilad. He'd only recently managed to crawl his way back to Captain after losing the Battle of Merson during the Clone Wars - a defeat which no officer could have undone. The son of the Senator of Nubia, a pilot in Pellaeon's squadrons, lost a leg in that engagement, and he had made enough efforts to keep Gilad's rank low. A disaster involving the Eye of Palpatine had similarly slowed that ascent back to the captaincy.

"But what of you, Voss Parck. You brought Thrawn to me. His detractors want blood - a great many ships were lost with him, and his TIE Defender project is now discarded. I shall hand it to Grand Admiral Zaarin to resurrect, along with the TIE Avenger, in time, but Project Stardust is the focus now," Palpatine oozed irritation. "Super Star Destroyers and advanced TIEs and Darktrooper armies are symbols, and the Death Star will be the ultimate symbol."

He glowered at Parck. "Perhaps one day I will not even require an Imperial Navy."

Ice in his veins, the Admiral could only nod. "Perhaps, Your Majesty, but I would hedge that you are some years away from that."

Palpatine appraised Parck, and he absently wished he had been silent. "You are correct. Until the Death Star is complete, I must appear to fight this 'civil war', to politick, and to strategize... but it will not be for much longer," Palpatine's voice crowed. "The future is of more interest to me than the present. I have High Command to fight the irrelevant battles of this war."

"If I may, Emperor, how was Thrawn defeated? Lothal had no Navy, indeed, I am unaware the Rebels had recovered from the Battle of Atollon, notwithstanding their recent surge in activities." Following the ammunition given to them by our behaviour in suppressing civilians, he reflected. "It is unlike him to lose such an engagement so completely."

"Space whales," snarled Palpatine. "Purgills which the Jedi Ezra Bridger had befriended. They came to his aid and wiped out the fleet... survivors believe they even fled with the Chimaera in their grip."

"Was this retaliation for the assault on the whales in the Centrality?" Voss Parck tried to recall the group of aquatic analogs which could also jump into hyperspace. The StarCave they resided within was near Lothal, cartographically speaking.

"The Oswaft are related, but not the same creature," Palpatine affirmed, his voice rough, "and they were cowed at the Battle of ThonBoka...” A sniff. “The Oswaft have reduced the range of their hunting to the immediate vicinity of their territory, and not intervened in anything further since."

"I see," Parck said, grateful that his analytical mind continued to work even when sweat was beginning to form under his arms, let alone that his leg was starting to object to his continued kneeling. "So what can I do, Your Majesty?"

Palpatine leaned forward on his throne, linking his pale fingers. Parck was so transfixed by the mottled and torn and scarred face, and set within that skull the yellow eyes that seemed to have been burned from within, that he nearly didn't hear the next words his Emperor spoke. "The Hand of Thrawn."

"Thrawn's mapping expedition into the Unknown Regions, based from Nirauan," Parck supplied, as he un-muddled his mind.

"Yes," Palpatine said, hissing the last syllable. "It must continue."

"I do not have his knowledge of the region," Parck said, carefully.

"No, but Thrawn does," Palpatine oozed. "Or rather, his mind."

Parck was alarmed by the tone of the Emperor. "Your Majesty?"

"Over the years I have assembled Thrawn's data. His brain-waves... his blood," he sat back, smirking. "I intend to raise a clone of Thrawn up, and to have him operate in the Unknown Regions. Thrawn and I reasoned that the Court would eventually press for his exile, and so I would allow it, and furnish him with ships and crews to conquer the region."

"His intellect may not be inherited," Parck said, unsure. He remembered that the clones that fought for the Republic had not recalled Jango Fett's memories, for example. Though he also vaguely remembered a rumour of one clone that had claimed to be Jango Fett - and gone rogue, becoming, if those rumours were true, Mandalore the Resurrector, one of half a dozen such claimants during the Mandalorian Civil Wars.

"We shall have to see," Palpatine said, drily. "I am experimenting with such clones... with transferring the brainwaves to a duplicate. I am due to enter the testing phase, and why not begin with Thrawn."

Parck paused. It would be a high bar, but the Emperor expected results. "So this is why the events of the Battle of Lothal have been suppressed, even moreso than an ordinary defeat?"

A dark emotion fluttered across Palpatine's visage, and Parck wished he could have reworded that. The idea that the Empire was vulnerable to rogue Jedi, Separatist holdouts and Rebel scum, was, fundamentally, denied by every Moff, Admiral and Imperial in High Command. "In essence, yes," Palpatine said, after a moment. "Thrawn and those associated with him will be demoted, exiled, or left aside of the Empire. Thrawn's detractors will be let loose, and while I will protect those that I deem useful... his 'survival' will be a closely guarded secret... and that Thrawn is a clone will be kept to an even smaller number."

Palpatine glared at Parck. "Are we understood, Admiral Parck?"

"Of course," he said, gulping. "I will be your instrument in the Unknown Regions, and I will supervise Thrawn's clone."

A finger raised. "The clone is not to know. If he does, clone madness will be more difficult to stave off, though I do plan to raise him in a slower fashion... and I will periodically call him to Known Space to check his progress." Palpatine's eyes narrowed. "And yours, of course."

Parck nodded. "The Empire of the Hand, I believe, was Thrawn's name for the confederation he intended to weave with his former allies, yes?"

Palpatine looked dour. "Another reason why we require Thrawn's involvement... to secure those."

A pause. "His allies will likely recognise he is not him..."

"Which you will have to cover," Palpatine oozed. "I require it." He handed a datapad to Parck, whose knee was beginning to wobble. The Emperor chuckled. "Rise."

He stood, and took the datapad, and briefly glanced at the ships he would be assigned. The Strikefast, of course, as well as Admonitor, commanded by Captain Niriz, another ally of Thrawn in Imperial Court. A decommissioned Victory Star Destroyer, the Iron Fist, and the modern Imperial II Star Destroyer Reckoning, captained by Delak Krennal, which was a curious choice - he was notoriously anti-alien. Several Interdictors, too, such as the Corvus, Grappler, Red Claw, Maelstrom, and other Destroyers; Vanguard, Resolution, Grey Wolf, Sceltor...

"Whatever about the expeditions of Admiral Prittick? With the Visage and Unrepentant?"

Palpatine glowered. "We need to have an official mapping presence to distract from the unofficial."

Parck felt his cheeks warm. "My apologies, your Majesty, of course."

A wave of his hand, and the doorway opened behind Parck. He felt the hairs rise on the back of his neck as the mechanical breathing entered the room. He turned, and saluted. "Lord Vader."

"Admiral Parck," Darth Vader intoned, sweeping into the room and bowing to his Emperor.

"Do I need to repeat myself, Admiral?" Palpatine said, drily, ignoring the second-most powerful individual in the galaxy.

Parck hesitated. Was he not even to tell Lord Vader? It was impossible, surely, to lie to a Sith Lord? But he had his Emperor's order. He swallowed his fear. "I understand, Your Majesty."

"Good," Palpatine smiled, warmly, even, a politicians trick incarnate. "Dismissed. The equipment we discussed has already been delivered to the Strikefast... and I shall have Inquisitor Jerec keep an eye on the early stages of the project."

Again that fear.

Admiral Voss Parck resolved to resurrect Grand Admiral Thrawn as fully as possible...

But he would pray for the return of the real, irreplaceable Thrawn.