Grievous watches as WanThir grabs a nearby remote for the projector that he had just turned off, and the venerable general carefully presses the device's buttons to turn the projector back on, then switch over to local public broadcast frequencies. Is there something on the HoloNet News that I need to see? It scrolls across several channels, but it eventually stops on a channel, which, to Grievous' surprise, seems to be showing a local sport. Did he suddenly forget how to change it?
"There has been," WanThir begins, his voice wavering with a hint of uncertainty, "a lot that I've wanted to teach you, and I haven't been quite sure how to verbalize it."
Grievous stares closer at WanThir, still trying to figure out what he's trying to say and what this bizarre broadcast of armored Meerians wrestling about a vast field has to do with anything. WanThir, in turn, nods towards the display, continuing, "We may not have had as much experience in live warfare as you, but one thing we know well is this sport of Beezfitrar, which was designed by our ancestors as an exercise to train soldiers."
Grievous still pays little attention to the broadcast and debates to what extent it would be possible to have his droids decapitate WanThir right about now. Comparing all of my galaxy-spanning conquests to a game? Can he be any more insulting? "We haven't been merely sitting on our hands during this peacetime; in fact, we've learned quite a bit," he continues.
"You've learned how to play a game," Grievous shoots back, doing his best to learn forward and look menacing even as Chiv pulls him back. WanThir pauses, as if he suddenly lost the script for his carefully planned presentation.
"You're a brilliant warrior, Grievous," he finally replies, "You're fierce, you have no fear, you're strong, you're fast, you're tough. But leading other warriors is an entirely different challenge, and you've done little to show that you're up for it."
One of the lieutenants next to him chimes in, "Don't forget the last operation that you planned- The one that gained us nothing, while costing us a good chunk of our best men, droids, and vehicles. You'd be in a Republic prison right now if we didn't sacrifice even more men to go save you."
The memory of that incident still leaves Grievous fuming, and he'd personally beat up the man for his mockery if only he had functioning limbs. "I've succeeded in countless battles before!"
"Perhaps your past successes let you grow too much pride," WanThir suggests. "All the confidence in the world won't get you anywhere if it's misplaced. How often you've criticized LilVas's lack of confidence, and yet her brainchild worked to perfection last night. It was our most successful moment of the past several weeks."
"I'd rather die than stoop to the level of that cowardly rholeng," he retorts, hoping that WanThir is smart enough to understand the meaning of his Kaleesh curse from context.
"If you're sincere about that, then there's little we can do," WanThir retorts, "Because it's not hypothetical. You need to start doing something differently if you want to achieve results which are any different than what's been happening over the past few weeks."
Perhaps he's right that something has to be done to reverse this trend. Could it be that there's more to these defeats than luck? I've already sworn that I'd do anything to avoid dying like this. Could now be the time that my oath is being called into effect? Could this be the dishonor that I must bear in order to survive? Perhaps WanThir is wrong, but either way, it couldn't hurt our chances if I were to simply listen.
"What, then, do I need to do differently?" he asks.
A brief smile cracks WanThir's face, and he responds, "It's the same thing I told you when we last met. You need to learn how to cut your losses and accept a draw instead of digging yourself a deeper hole." WanThir begins fiddling with the remote as he pauses his speech.
Grievous looks away from the palti, up at the ceiling, and he considers his predicament. They could all be in significantly better shape had he not tried to assassinate General Keldon and Kuallue, and he could be in a better situation still had he simply fled Bandomeer when he had the chance. Yet, on how many other occasions had his bold strategies brought the Jedi or the Yam'rii to their knees?
WanThir snaps him out of his thoughts, continuing as he gestures to a frozen display on holoprojector, "Take this recent play from the Beezfitrar game as an example. The offense, in the dark colored uniforms, is trying to advance the ball to your right before the defenders can tackle the ballcarrier."
Grievous notes the teams, of about a dozen players each, are lined up in formations on opposite sides, facing towards each other, with a misshapen ball placed between them. The palti presses a button and the hologram resumes. One of the offensive players tosses the ball between his legs to a teammate behind him, and both sides erupt into a blur of motion, not unlike how a battle can devolve into sudden chaos once the first shot is fired.
Defenders swarm toward this player with the ball, but six large offensive players stand in their way and block their efforts, all while four other offensive players advance downfield, chased by defenders. After a few seconds, a defensive player pushes his blocker right into the face of the player with the ball, forcing him to run away, which subsequently puts him near the grasp of another defender. At the last second before he can be tackled, he throws the ball far away from the field and out of sight.
"What happens when the ball is thrown?" Grievous asks as WanThir pauses the holoprojector again.
"If no one catches it, like what happened there, then the next play will begin at the same spot as the previous one, neither side gaining or losing any ground," WanThir explains.
"A draw," Grievous remarks. I can see how WanThir felt that this would make an object lesson. But could it really be applicable to the war?
WanThir nods, "In a sense, yes. Though the offense only has a limited number of plays to advance the ball before the teams switch sides, so gaining nothing is generally considered successful for the defense. But even more successful for the defense would have been if they tackled the Patlonmeet before he had thrown it, then the offense would've lost ground."
Turning a loss into a lesser loss. That would've been like if I retreated from Bandomeer rather than letting our forces become trapped here. "The Patlonmeet?" he inquires, completely unfamiliar with the term that sounds like it's from Meerian.
"Yes, the offensive player who is best at throwing the ball. If one of his teammates downfield, the Deelvitten, didn't have any defenders around him, he would've tried to throw it to them in order to gain ground," WanThir elaborates.
Grievous replays the event in his mind, noticing how the defenders were blanketing all of the Deelvitten to prevent any of them from catching the strange-looking oblong ball. "Why not attempt to throw it closer to one of them?" he asks, pointing towards one of the players who had stopped in a small gap within the defensive coverage.
WanThir elaborates, "Gaining something rather than nothing would've been good, very true. But in this game, as in our war, free opportunities are exceedingly rare. Everything has a consequence, whether you can see it or not. In this case, the cost of the defense catching the ball is very high. Had the pass been… intercepted, the other team would take over possession and get the chance to advance it the other way."
Already, Grievous can see the variety of strategic decisions that impact this Meerian custom. I wouldn't have wanted to throw that away, my instinct would be to attack the defense and try to keep the play alive. But would it be worth it? And could the decisions of such a contrived event translate into helping us?
The holoprojector switches to another event, the same sport, but with different teams, to his surprise. "What is this now?" he inquires. Can't they focus on one battle at a time?
WanThir nods, "Our sports are unlike most of what you offworlders play. Remember that at its heart, this is an exercise to prepare soldiers. War is a very drawn-out affair, and Beezfitrar is no different. Our players battle it out for not just hours or days, but weeks. And so, there is time in between the plays, just as we now take time to recover in between our battles with the Republic. While the players recover and the coaches strategize, the broadcasts switch to a variety of other games around the planet."
Waiting was never exactly Grievous' strong suit, and he still considers that the first four months of the Clone Wars, which he spent hidden on the sidelines, were some of the hardest. Just as the past month has been. The Meerians are known to be something of a ponderous people. I wonder if the ability to handle this is simply in their genetics. Or can it be learned?
"Does it bore you having so much time between events?" he asks, feeling a pang of guilt that perhaps his sincere question came across as sarcastic and condescending to their sport.
If WanThir took any offense, it doesn't show, and he kindly responds, "Well, nowadays, I usually have plenty else to keep me busy with, and I barely have time to watch at all."
One of the soldiers next to him interjects, "I've played often leading up to the siege. Our regiment still uses it as an exercise, and let me tell you, impatience can be motivating. Remember that succeed or fail, you're going to have a lot of time to reflect back on what you did. Let your excitement build, like a spring ready to unleash, and be disciplined in not letting it cut loose too early. Spend the time envisioning that future play, and you'll be extra prepared for when it happens without having to waste energy waiting."
The last suggestion is uncomfortable to Grievous. It sounds awfully like trying to find peace in a situation where his passions were kept in check. Dooku always taught him to seize opportunities by the horns and forge his own victory rather than letting it come to him. But perhaps planning can be a sort of victory of its own.
The Babteer Pil allow their words to sink in as Grievous considers them, watching more plays from around the sport on the holoprojector. He occasionally asks questions, learning the sport's mostly Meerian terminology, like "mesram," (literally meaning trench) referring to the imaginary line on the field that separates the offense and the defense. The off-duty players remain in a camp called the "hintar," drinking from canteens, eating canned foods cooked over a fire, and studying game plans that are written on flimsiplast, all with barely any technological devices in sight. They drag their tents, their supplies, and their equipment to follow the action from a distance.
It certainly harkens back to a simpler era of warfare, where grit, physicality, and athleticism mattered more than technology. Ronderu, my beloved, you would be proud. She was always more an athlete than he, better skilled in close quarters. While the cybernetics imposed upon him have helped him to reach towards her skill in melee, they've also pushed him even further from the raw primitivism that she used to her advantage.
"You're so dependent on offworld trinkets," she told him. "My Lig swords, I can see, I can feel every point. Fighting using physical objects is in our blood, fighting using technology will always be alien." Qymaen shoved his rifle to the side as he embraced her closer, a finger carefully tracing one of the scars on her arm.
"I need what is alien in order to conquer," he confessed, "but I swear to you that my passion shall always lie with this. That is why you are the Dreamt One, and I merely the Dreamer." He gazed longingly up at her Lig sword, its impervium finish glistening in the moonlight from above.
He felt her head nodding against his shoulder as she affirmed, "It's the burden you must bear as the Dreamer. But oh, to be the Dreamt One, I have my own burden." Qymaen was going to ask her what exactly that meant, when he suddenly caught motion from outside their fort in the corner of his eye, and he reached for his Czerka Outland rifle…
…and the camp erupts into chaos as an opposing player approaches, the ball in hand. Players who had been studying the game plan, reading, playing cards, or resting all took up stations to defend the mestar, the line marking the edge of the camp. "Off duty players are required to remain 400 meters away from the mesram," WanThir explains, "but the Topteer offense just managed to sneak one of their players behind the entire defense to break away into the open field."
After a 400-meter run, the fatigued Deelvittan now comes up on a second line of defenders waiting for him. Not surprisingly, he is contacted almost immediately after entering into the opponent's camp, and he goes down.
"401 meaningless meters for LolPon," remarks one of the soldiers, "The Topteer aren't winning that one anyway."
Grievous counters, "Surely making their loss a bit closer can help the team build in the right direction for their next contest."
WanThir makes a sort of circle gesture with his right hand that Grievous hasn't seen before, and adds, "Actually, that's their last match of the season. But your sentiment isn't wrong, General. Losing does come in varying degrees of severity." The holoprojector goes back to replay how LolPon was able to break away from the defense, and Grievous tries to understand the footage, but it just looks like a baffling display of incompetence on the defensive side, and the quiet Meerian narration does little to help.
If this game is supposed to make one smarter, it surely hasn't done so in the case of that defense. They all just ignored LolPon as he ran right past them! Grievous lets out a raspy laugh as he sees an older Meerian not in uniform, presumably some sort of coach, yelling at the defenders who gave up the play, his hat falling off as he shakes violently.
"I'm glad that's not my belrat," one of the soldiers remarks, earning a chuckle from his peer before WanThir teases back that LilVas could manage such a display of rage towards them if it were needed.
Yet, the angry belrat clearly commands respect before his players. They're listening to his criticism sincerely, and you can see it in their body language. Perhaps that's why such gaffes are a rare exception, and they're likely en route to a victory.
"Hey, the Babteer are back," WanThir points out, as all three of the Meerians lean forward in their seats with anticipation. The broadcast loudens as the crowd shouts with anticipation, and the teams approach the mesram.
One of the soldiers even stands up and begins proclaiming something in Meerian before WanThir chides, "Easy, MelNet." This time, the Patlonmeet immediately hands the ball off to another player, but a horde of defenders crashes towards them. The play devolves into a gigantic pile of bodies right where it began, and eventually, a horn sounds to mark the end of the scuffle.
"That doesn't help at all," the one apparently called MelNet murmurs, rubbing his chin. Watching the replay, it seemed that the offense should've thrown the ball to get it behind an extremely aggressive defense. I can't blame him for being disappointed with them when the coverage was so sparse.
"You called them the Babteer?" Grievous asks, wondering if the name had any connection to the militia.
"Yes, indeed, the offense there is Selbar's team," WanThir explains, "We Babteer Pil and the Babteer beezfitrar team are both named for the same thing, a militia called the Babteer."
"And what does the 'Pil' mean?" Grievous inquires, trying to remember if he'd heard that word in any other contexts.
WanThir turns down the volume of the holoprojector, then responds, "That's a Meerian word meaning 'Two.' We are the second iteration of what the original Babteer stood for. You see, about 175 years ago, Selbar was built by Meerian revolutionaries who were tired of the corrupt offworlders controlling our people. If you've ever noticed that our town makes an ideal military fortress, that's because it was built for that very purpose. The Babteer were guerillas, striking at strategic targets to get back at Offworld Corporation, then returning to this fortress in the wilderness. It was successful, to an extent. Offworld never was able to take the city, and the constant attacks eventually forced them to the negotiating table. Conditions on Bandomeer slightly improved, until Offworld eventually found loopholes to violate the terms of the treaty, and other corporations like Vulca got their own hands into our affairs. Nonetheless, the Babteer have inspired us, and the Babteer Pil are now fighting to finish their work of freeing Bandomeer."
The palti beams with pride as he retells the history; clearly, he has indeed been inspired by the Babteer movement. Based on what I've seen, they all have one thing in common: Gaining absolutely nothing. Grievous had never put much thought into learning the history of his allies, but perhaps he should. Maybe the Babteer Pil could be utilized more effectively if he understood them better. And perhaps understanding this strange sport could give me a lens from which to understand its fans. "So, these revolutionaries who accomplished nothing are the namesake of both the beezfitrar team and the militia?" Grievous summarizes, gesturing to the hologram of the team, which is still replaying their gain of zero meters.
"Oh, not nothing!" MelNet counters, glaring angrily at the wounded General, who clearly struck a nerve. "Those men fought and died to wound Offworld Corporation, and those wounds are still there. If you think our enemies are filthy rich now, think about how much richer they'd be if the Wrelpont Foundry was still running or if Guyin Saa's corruption hadn't been exposed!" I knew these people were patient, but expecting a company to still be reeling from an incident that's over a century old is a bit much even for them.
The other soldier nods, but WanThir mostly ignores the comment and responds to Grievous, "In anycase, it's the ideal of what they were trying to do that we share. We are willing to fight for a free Bandomeer, just as the Babteer were."
"So regarding the third Babteer," Grievous asks, pointing at the hologram, "Why would they be so simplistic as to attack the middle of the defense when it is so crowded in that part of the field? Did that really have any chance of working?"
The soldier to WanThir's right chuckles, but the palti explains, "That's a fair question. I know the scoreboard is in Meerian, but at the bottom it says they're ahead 13-10, and there isn't much time left. They don't really need to gain anything in order to win this game, as it's already well in hand. Throwing the ball comes with risk, and running to the outside can risk losing a lot of ground. Such a momentum swing would be basically the only thing that would give the Temlisfit a chance."
Grievous nods, "So there isn't enough time for the Temlisfit to get the ball back and score?"
"Not quite that short on time," WanThir reneges, "but there's just over a day left to play, and even if they can get a stop on the next play, they have a long way to go with an offense that has only scored three points in the past five days."
MelNet chimes in, saying that, "If the Babteer can gain eight meters on this play, though, they'll keep their possession going, and the defense might not have to see the field at all in a meaningful way."
WanThir shakes his head, "I wouldn't count on that, because eight meters is a long way. The defense is playing so well; the Babteer should just take what they can get on the next play and then pim so that our defense has a long field to defend."
Grievous considers the two approaches. Obviously, his preference would be to attack and maintain control over the game by keeping the offense on the field, but it's hard to know which approach would be correct without knowing the specific percent chances involved. These sorts of problems are why they made strategy droids like B9-Z4.
As the broadcast switches away to other games, the two Meerians bicker back and forth about how to approach the play they call "peetrat dal," which he realizes is the fourth attempt that the offense has to advance past the sticks. WanThir explains helpfully to Grievous that if they can't convert now, then they would use the fifth peetrat to pim, which would advance the ball several hundred meters in the right direction but yield possession. Then the game would be out of the offense's hands. That conversation continues until at last, the broadcast returns to the Babteer-Temlisfit game, where the players approach the line.
The offense and defense both have lots of bigger players crowded close to the middle, likely expecting a straightforward run. The Meerians eagerly lean forward and make a few nervous hand gestures, and even the diligent Chiv looks up from his work. After a player motions toward the backfield, it seems like Selbar is ready for another sort of give-up type play on offense, to run and let their defense go win the game. However, Grievous smiles when he sees the Patlonmeet take the ball and get ready to throw, scanning the defense for gaps in their coverage. "Yes!" MelNet shouts, when he sees the design of the play, as three Deelvittan run routes deep downfield.
One of them, on the right side, makes a sharp cut to the outside, and his defender is left in the dust. LorsanTeeb winds up to throw to the wide open target in that direction…
…and gets completely demolished by a defender from his blind side, who knocks him violently to the ground. An eruption of Meerian curses fills the room as the ball floats haphazardly through the air, in the general direction of the target but at a fraction of the intended speed. A defensive player catches it and begins running it back with nothing but open field separating him from the offense's camp line 400 meters in the distance.