Galaxies Apart
Fifteen
The Death Star was designed to house almost one million crew. Most of this complement, however, consisted of Imperial troops. This Death Star was intended for use as the ultimate invasion staging post; capable of housing enough of a force to storm an entire enemy world and bring it completely under the Impieral heel, with the ultimate deterrent to the native population proving to be too difficult built-in. Destroyed worlds didn't generate credits.
Merely in order to function, to have enough crew to keep the reactors running and the weapons firing, the Death Star was quite able to make do with merely a thousand or so crew. This was the number which filled it now, mostly composed of commando battalions and the top-level scientists responsible for its creation. The invasion force was not due to be added until after the Victory day unveiling.
The man who presently sat in the centre chair felt a thrill of excitement course through him. He'd been waiting for this moment for a very, very long time. Around him his associates seemed to have caught the general mood of quiet exultation. Against all expectation, against all precedent, all odds…
The commander glanced to the figure on his right, and nodded. He thumbed the communication button.
He was going to enjoy this.
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"Fleet Admiral. Communication from the Death Star. It's Commander-"
"Patch it through."
The screen flickered to life, displaying a lean and bearded face. Pellaeon failed to recognise the officer, though that wasn't surprising; doubtless this man was an Imperial commando, an elite spy.
"Fleet Admiral Thrawn," the officer inclined his head, "we have proceeded, as you yourself ordered, to board the Death Star. Our troops have full control of the Palpatine. All systems are functioning exactly the way we expected them to."
Thrawn didn't reply right away. Pellaeon shifted, confused and a tad embarrassed at this unfathomable impasse in the discussion. To his left he could hear the Admiral's breathing. Thrawn's eyes glittered.
"Anything else, Commander?" the Fleet Admiral asked.
The other man stared impudently back, seemingly not awestruck in the slightest by whom he was addressing. Pellaeon, always a stickler for protocol, began to resent this man's unabashed impudence.
"Actually, Fleet Admiral Thrawn, there is something else I must report, but before we get to that I think my associates would much prefer it if-"
He nodded to someone offscreen.
"Sir!" a technician blurted out from across the makeshift control centre. "The Palpatine has just-"
"Raised her shields and powered her engines," Thrawn finished for him.
The technician gaped. "Yes, sir," he confirmed.
Pellaeon turned his attention back to the Imperial commander, who was obviously enjoying this moment immensely. "Well done again, Admiral," he congratulated Thrawn. "A little late, but you get there in the end, don't you?"
Thrawn ignored him. "Commodore Jurstt!" he hollered to the milling crowd instead. The officer in question, a red-faced corpulent man, stuck a head up and shouted acknowledgement. Jurstt was the overseer of Imperial activity at the yards. He was, in Pellaeon's opinion, a glorified shift boss rather than a soldier.
"Don't be a fool, Thrawn," Madine said. "If you throw your Star Destroyers at us all you'll have is a massacre, and you know it."
"A massacre like the Jurisdiction?" Pellaeon bit back.
Madine regarded him coolly. "I save my tears for Alderaan, Captain."
Thrawn showed no interest in joining the debate. "Jurstt," he clipped, "I want you to send a Priority One signal to all Imperial ships in orbit: Do not, repeat do not engage the Death Star under any circumstances."
"The Death Star?" Jurstt repeated, uncomprehending. "What in the world are you-"
"It is now under the control of the Rebel Alliance."
Pellaeon's veins were running with ice even as his face was flushing with anger. After three years and one resounding defeat after another…the Rebel Alliance had done this? Had outsmarted the Empire's biggest security operation by being part of it?
"You'll never get past this sector, Madine," he spluttered, wishing he could reach into the screen and throttle the man here and now.
Madine smiled. "I admit it's something of a risk. After all, we're armed with nothing more than a fourteen-chambered superlaser and few thousand turbolaser batteries. How did we ever think we were going to succeed?"
He was right. The Palpatine had been constructed painstakingly to be the best, the most powerful ship that ever sliced the galaxy. All of the flaws of the original Star had been carefully corrected - it had no weaknesses.
The only danger that had been anticipated was a Rebel strike while it was still under construction in the yards; the sheer size of the reactor core meant that a few suicidal pilots might just have made it through the interior. That wasn't possible now.
With this ship, the Rebels had the power to take on the entire Empire once again, to pulverise entire worlds in an instant and vanish back into hyperspace, unreachable and indestructible.
They were at war.
"Let me talk to Ackbar."
"Don't be ridiculous, Thrawn. Do you think we'd risk smuggling the best military mind left in the Alliance aboard the Death Star in the middle of an Imperial attack?"
Thrawn remained impassive. "Don't presume to insult my intelligence, Madine. Not only would you risk it but you did risk it. I hardly think that particular peril compares with the rest of your plan today. We both know you haven't got what it takes to command the Palpatine. You're a covert operative, not a strategist."
Thrawn's voice dropped to an almost hypnotic level. "I want to talk to Ackbar. I know what he's planning. I know exactly what he has in mind. I want to tell him that it isn't going to work…"
He took a deep breath. Pellaeon frowned at the sudden pause; it was as if the Admiral were suddenly having difficulty with what he was saying. Like he was-
"…and to discuss our terms for surrender."
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Standoff.
The Palpatine hung in orbit around Sluis Van, easily visible from the surface as a perfectly spherical aberration in the sky. It had raised itself into space an hour earlier, rising majestically on its own power. The repulsorlift batteries and gravity dampening field had to be carefully managed from the yards so that Sluis Van didn't tear itself apart with the separation effect.
It had worked. The Death Star had ascended to space gracefully and without problems. Without opposition, for that matter. The Imperial contingent had maintained an extremely respectful distance throughout.
Madine could see the Star Destroyers. In typical Imperial style the ships had arranged themselves to act like a chaperon for the Palpatine, to be clearly in vision but never at what would be considered an aggressive proximity. Thrawn's doing, no doubt.
Madine had heard the stories about Thrawn (after all, he was a spy) and he didn't like what he heard. Thrawn was everything a typical Imperial wasn't; flexible, cunning, tactically brilliant and capable of completely and utterly destroying opponents who underestimated him. Madine was in no danger of doing that.
What was he up to now? This whole surrendering business was, surely, an elaborate trick. Madine was surprised that Ackbar had even delayed the Palpatine's departure from Sluis Van to listen to this madness.
It was suicide, in his opinion, to expose the Rebellion's greatest hope to the Empire's greatest asset for any longer than was strictly necessary. Had he been in charge, the Death Star would have blown out of here long ago; and he'd have been tempted to wipe Sluis Van and Thrawn off the face of the universe too.
No.
He forced the thought out of his head. That was the Empire in him talking. He was a Rebel now, a man of peace and of minimum force. Ackbar had made it abundantly clear to him that the Palpatine would never be used to arbitrarily destroy worlds which happened to contain Imperials.
We are not the Empire, he had said in that gruff tone, and we do not use their methods.
Madine had agreed in principle; after all, the murder of world after world had been what had swung him to the Rebel cause a few years back, had prompted him to make contact with the Alliance while undercover.
Over the next few months he'd quietly sounded out his colleagues in the commando corps, and had found to his amazement that the level of dissent was astronomical. People in his line of work, who were expected to get in behind enemy lines, could often find more to like amongst the enemy than their own side. He had spread the Rebel word among as many of his peers as he could - and had dealt quietly with those that had reacted differently.
With his allies secure in positions of power inside the elite units of the Empire, they'd been able to draft in Alliance operatives over the last few years. A few at a time, nothing suspicious, had gradually swelled into what amounted to an entire Rebel legion of troops inside the Empire, placed and ready to be activated when the time came.
That time had been nine months ago, when the Alliance had received word of the Empire's project here on Sluis Van. What had started off as a simple sabotage mission had gradually evolved into the most ambitious operation ever devised.
And it had worked.
It had worked.
Madine shook his head, wondering how in hell they'd managed to pull it off. If he didn't already believe in the Force he'd sure as hell be a convert by now, he realised. It was a real, genuine miracle.
"I suppose it was," Ackbar agreed, startling Madine, who hadn't known he was thinking out loud. The Mon Calamarian blinked slowly, sitting in the command chair of the Palpatine. A chair that just wasn't built for a member of his species.
"I still think you should reconsider this, Admiral," Madine pleaded, gesturing to the planet below. "I wouldn't trust Thrawn as far as I could hurl him. He's dangerous."
"Have you forgotten your own boasts, Captain?" Ackbar addressed Madine with his new title, "We sit encased inside the pride of the Empire herself. Surely you don't think one man is capable of doing what three fleets could not accomplish?"
Madine wasn't convinced. "If there is, it's him."
Ackbar gave a short huff of disagreement, his whiskers trembling. "The Fleet Admiral has simply acknowledged the situation he and the Empire are facing. They fear that we will destroy Sluis Van and them along with it."
"Are you expecting him to surrender the galaxy's biggest Imperial shipyard over to you without resistance? It's not going to happen."
Ackbar had been with the Rebellion from the start. The Empire had taken a shine to his species' adeptness at tactical analyses, and in typical Imperial fashion had exploited this trait by scooping up the youngest and most promising Mon Calamari, making them slaves and making it clear that if they didn't perform, their families and their towns would pay the ultimate price.
Ackbar himself had managed to escape from Grand Moff Tarkin (he hadn't held that title then) some years ago. The Rebellion had tried to evacuate as many of his family as possible. Five had escaped, out of a village of three thousand.
Admiral Ackbar was not renowned for adopting a lenient attitude to the Empire.
"Do not forget the purpose of this plan, Captain," Ackbar warned him, "if Thrawn is willing to negotiate, we cannot afford to pass up the chance. He is, as you point out, one of the most respected voices in the Empire, is he not?"
Madine sighed. Ackbar had been a slave in the Empire, not an officer; he didn't understand the way things worked in the hierarchy the way Madine did. "Respected, but not influential. It won't-"
Ackbar waved his protests aside. "Your objection is noted, Captain, but we have no time. Now…" Ackbar sucked a reluctant land-dweller's breath, "…let us see what Fleet Admiral Thrawn has to say."
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"I don't believe what I'm hearing!" Commodore Jurstt threw his hands into the air, to make doubly clear his opinion. His round, porcine face had lone passed into the realms of crimson.
Pellaeon's assessment of him was correct. Jurstt had been overseer of Imperial activity at Sluis Van for the past thirteen years, a duty which consisted of keeping to schedule, keeping workers happy. He didn't have the mind for combat.
"Then I'll say it again," Thrawn reiterated, "the Rebels have us exactly where they want us. The Palpatine lies in orbit with a crew of Rebel troops and fully-functioning weapons. The meagre collection of ships at our disposal will be nothing more than cannon fodder to them. This entire planet is a prime target for destruction - the strategic value of Sluis Van is immense. That they haven't yet destroyed it tells me that they haven't stolen the Palpatine to use it as a weapon."
"What else would they steal it for?" the Commodore cried, "A battle moon engineered to produce nothing more than huge blasts of energy is hardly of much use as anything else!"
Thrawn was losing patience. "The Palpatine is of extremely limited use as a weapon. The ability to destroy a planet, a useful tool in winning a war? Nonsense," Thrawn scoffed, "in times of desperation, as a last-ditch gamble, the Star may be employed to stave off destruction. At any other time, however, it becomes little more than a catalyst for insurrection. The facts speak for themselves; after Alderaan, the Alliance doubled in size."
It made sense to Pellaeon. Jurstt seemed lost in thought at this revelation.
"The Emperor has failed to realise that Death Stars act as rallying calls against his own forces. Icons to inspire resentment in the masses. To him, they are castles in the sky; a living testament not to the greatness of what he has created, but to what he perceives as his own superior dynasty. They are nothing but a gargantuan exercise in vanity, a barrier against his obsolescence."
"But surely the Rebellion-" Jurstt began.
"The Alliance is full of weak-minded fools," Thrawn said dismissively. "They will baulk in horror at the mere suggestion of using the Palpatine to turn the tide of the war – if they did so, they'd lose the perceived moral high ground they depend upon for recruitment to their cause. What the Rebels want is a bargaining chip, a negotiation tool. Notice how my offer for discussion is leapt on by the ranking officer."
"What do they hope to gain from us?" Pellaeon interjected. "They can't expect us to surrender on the strength of one ship alone, surely."
"No," Thrawn shook his head. "But they will expect us to grant them certain concessions," he smiled as he said that, if a smile constituted a baring of his teeth, "say a few sectors here and there, a few slave races liberated, credits, planets, ships…the list goes on. And if we refuse they will, presumably, threaten to haul the Palpatine from wherever they choose to conceal it and use it to punish us for non-compliance."
Pellaeon shivered. Something was bothering him about this whole idea. He couldn't quite pin it down.
"You mean they'll be bluffing?" Jurstt frowned, trying to wrap his uncomplex mind round the concept.
Thrawn paused again. "I wouldn't place that at one hundred percent probability," he relented, "the leaders may be weak but the Empire have made plenty of enemies who currently command the Rebel military. Ackbar is a prime example. It is not a situation I would like to see the Empire in."
Jurstt mopped his brow; the heat in the control room was intense. "Then why," he choked, frustrated at this verbal fencing, "have you opened negotiations with the Rebels for precisely this to happen?"
The Jurisdiction. That was it, Pellaeon realised. Thrawn had said that the Rebel leadership would never descend to arbitrary slaughter…yet just a few short hours ago they had cold-bloodedly murdered over one thousand people. It didn't quite fit in, somehow.
Thrawn was about to answer Jurstt's latest inquiry when the call came through from Ackbar and the Palpatine. Jurstt wisely decided to trust in the Fleet Admiral's judgement.
Pellaeon wondered what would have happened if he hadn't.
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"Admiral Ackbar," Thrawn spoke first, "I've been looking forward to dealing with you for some time."
If Ackbar caught the possible double meaning in that apparently innocent sentence, he hid it expertly.
"Fleet Admiral Thrawn," the Mon Calamari returned. Pellaeon had heard of Ackbar, of course, the bane of the Empire for the year or so that the Rebellion had actually started to cause some problems to the Imperial machine. An astute and instinctive commander, surprisingly voracious in his battle tactics. Like Thrawn in more than one way…and so unlike him in others.
"My congratulations, Admiral," Thrawn continued in his praise, giving no indication of sarcasm, "a superb operation performed flawlessly right under our very noses. You have won the greatest of the Empire's prizes. It now concerns me to ask what you will decide to do with the power at your disposal."
Again Ackbar ran Thrawn's words over in his mind, quite visibly. "I must say I'm very sceptical of your accolades, Thrawn. It's left you looking somewhat ridiculous, has it not? The brightest star in the hierarchy has his ship stolen out from under him by the defunct Rebel Alliance?"
Had Pellaeon not spent the last day with Thrawn, studying him, he would have sworn Ackbar's words had no effect on the man. However a slight glint in those ruby eyes and a tiny adjustment in the shoulders told him differently.
"There is no shame," he lied, "in being bested by good planning, Admiral. My compliments are genuine; you can believe them or doubt them as you will - you seem to be holding most of the cards from where I sit. Regardless, we need to talk about where to go from here."
"Very well, Thrawn," Ackbar nodded briskly, "I appreciate any honesty from an Imperial. I have in my possession a list of demands from my government-" he ignored Pellaeon's desultory snort, "-which I will now relate to you. If these demands are not met then the Alliance will have to consider employing the Palpatine for the purpose you Imperials designed it for - namely, the arbitrary annihilation of politically inconvenient worlds."
"And the occasional burst of mining," Thrawn added.
Ackbar made a noise that spoke volumes.
"First, the annexation of Sectors 11 through to 27 and the official recognition of this area as legally…"
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Admiral Piett took some comfort in the thought that at times like this, at least he didn't have Vader's vague promises of death in the event of failure to deal with. Right now he had enough to worry about.
The Executor had received Fleet Admiral Thrawn's scrambled transmission four and a half hours ago. The immense battleship had proceeded with all speed to Sluis Van since - they'd been heading that way anyway, to officially accompany the Palpatine to the Victory Day celebrations.
Now though, the Death Star that awaited them at the yards would be in the hands of the enemy.
Not even the Executor would be able to withstand the sheer power of the Star's superlaser; one Main Stage beam would finish the Super Star Destroyer, flagship of the Empire, forever.
Ordinarily Piett would have been inclined to seek a diplomatic solution; he didn't want the most talented cadets in the military to perish in one futile conflict against a hopelessly superior foe.
That had been until he'd read the entire transmission. Thrawn had not only detailed the situation, but had supplied battle plans. Plans which Thrawn was confident would bring down the Death Star.
Having read them, Pellaeon was confident they'd be original, if not assuredly successful. Still, a superior officer was a superior officer, after all…
"One minute until Sluis Van, sir," a technician called.
"Begin the preparations," Pellaeon replied.
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"…the sum of thirty-four million credits to be transferred to listed accounts. As reparations for an unjust war," Ackbar explained, before continuing, "the slaves of Kessel and Gerttok Seven-"
Thrawn flicked a switch. Pellaeon frowned - nothing had happened. Ackbar went on talking.
"I've just fed the Death Star a holo-loop of us listening to Ackbar," Thrawn informed those gathered, "according to my estimations Ackbar will go on in his demands for about another minute."
This small act of deception stirred the assembled Imperials. Commodore Jurstt jerked into life, suddenly curious and hopeful. This was more like the Thrawn everyone knew. Pellaeon felt the mood.
"You do have a plan?" Jurstt asked.
"Of course," Thrawn admitted, "I merely wished the risk of our actions being broadcast to the Palpatine minimised. Obviously our Rebel friends have quite the spy network here."
He stood.
"Gentlemen, in less than sixty seconds the Super Star Destroyer Executor will be dropping out of orbit. I want to give her as much protection as we possibly can - she's in for a rough time as it is."
Jurstt was already delegating. "Tell us what to do, Admiral."
Thrawn told them.
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From where Madine was sitting, the Imperials seemed about as riveted by Ackbar's lengthy demands as he was.
Thrawn in particular was every bit the Fleet Admiral-faking rapt attention, nodding every few seconds, head cocked to one side in intense concentration. His subordinates seemed less inclined to put on a show for the sake of politics. The middle-aged man to Thrawn's left was doing quite well, but the formidable bulk of Commodore Jurstt to his right had an unfortunate habit of scratching himself at points of emphasis.
So why, he wondered uneasily, were his undercover instincts, honed over years of dangerous missions, screaming for attention?
As usual it was up to his conscious mind to interpret exactly what they found so alarming. He studied the group intently, searching for any signals they might be communicating, or body language. Something wrong. Except for Thrawn's hollow expression and Jurstt's unfortunately obvious recurring itch, there was-
Recurring itch…
"Shields up!" he yelled, punching controls on his tactical console. Around him the bridge crew, composed of his own company and so used to obeying his every command, did as he asked. Admiral Ackbar had no such experience.
"What are you doing?" the Admiral demanded.
Madine pointed to the screen. "See for yourself."
Ackbar turned. Apparently oblivious to this sudden hostile gesture by the Death Star, the happy little group on the screen were still listening intently.
"I don't understand…" Ackbar began.
Proximity alarms shrieked. The viewscreen changed to show the terrifying needle of the Super Star Destroyer Executor, emerging from hyperspace.
Heading right for them.