by Timothy Zahn
“I hoped to return home.”
“You were shipwrecked?”
“I was—” He looked at Eli. “Xishu azwane.”
Eli blinked. He was—? “He says he was exiled,” he told the others.
The word seemed to hang in the fume-scented air of the hangar bay. Eli stared at Thrawn, thinking back to the campfire stories of his childhood. The tales had spoken of Chiss unity and military prowess.
Never once had the stories talked about them exiling one another.
“Why?” Parck asked.
Thrawn looked at Eli. “In Basic, if you can,” Eli said.
The Chiss looked back at Parck. “The leaders and I disagreed.”
“Disagreed to the point of exile?”
“Yes.”
“Interesting,” Parck murmured. “All right. So that’s why you ran Colonel Barris’s men in circles. Now tell us how.”
“It was undifficult,” Thrawn said. “Your spacecraft crashed near my place of exile. I had opportunity to examine before following soldiers arrived. The pilot was dead. I took his body and hid it away.”
“And filled his flight suit with grass,” Barris put in. “Hoping we wouldn’t notice you’d stolen his equipment.”
“Nor did you,” the Chiss said. “Important most was that you would take the flight suit and rotted pyussh berries with you.”
“The berries?” Barris echoed.
“Yes. Rotted crushed pyussh berries are lure for small animals of night.”
Eli nodded to himself. Rotted—fermented; animals of night—nocturnal. It was as if Thrawn had had a fairly good Basic dictionary to work with but was missing some of the more technical words and had to improvise. His grammar was a bit shaky, too, again suggesting that he’d learned it out of books instead of from practical conversational experience.
Did that imply the Chiss had had only limited recent contact with anyone outside Unknown Space?
“So you strapped the gimmicked blaster power packs to the animals,” Barris said. “That’s how you got them past our sentry perimeter.”
“Yes,” the Chiss said. “Also how I later attacked soldiers. With a sling I threw more berries to their armor.”
“You then crashed a starfighter,” Parck said. “How?”
“I knew spacecraft would come to search. In preparation I had strung some…” He paused. “Ohuludwu.”
“Monofilament line,” Eli supplied.
“…monofilament line between treetops. The spacecraft struck.”
“And at that altitude, the pilot wouldn’t have time to recover,” Parck said, nodding. “It wouldn’t have done you any good to capture the fighter intact, by the way. They don’t have hyperdrives.”
“I did not want the spacecraft,” Thrawn said. “I wanted the pilot’s…” Again a pause. “Ezenti ophu ocengi.”
“Equipment and comlink,” Eli said.
“But you didn’t take his comlink,” Barris objected. “We checked the suit at the encampment. It was still there.”
“No,” Thrawn said. “What was there was the comlink from the first pilot.”
Eli nodded to himself. Cleverness, tactics, and maintaining control of the situation. Those were indeed the hallmarks of the Chiss, at least according to the stories.
But still: Exile?
“Ingenious,” Parck said. “And we thought we knew what had happened, so we never bothered to check the serial number. So when we discovered the first comlink was missing and locked it out of the circuit, you still had one that functioned.”
“So you killed a man just to get his comlink,” Barris said harshly. Clearly, he wasn’t as impressed by the alien’s resourcefulness as the captain. “Why did you keep attacking my men? For the fun of it?”
“I regret the loss of life,” Thrawn said gravely. “But I needed soldiers with fuller armor to come.”
“With fuller—?” Barris broke off. “The stormtroopers? You wanted stormtroopers to come?”
“Your soldiers wear helmets,” the Chiss said, tracing an imaginary brim around his forehead. “No good for me.” He touched a hand to his face. “I needed cover of face.”
“The only way you could enter the encampment undetected,” Parck said, nodding.
“Yes,” Thrawn agreed. “I used explosive on one, to obtain armor I could study—”
“How did you do that without anyone hearing the explosion?” Barris interrupted.
“It was as I began feedback noise from comlink,” the Chiss said. “The noise enclosed the noise of explosive. From the armor I learned how to kill the soldier without noise or observable damage. I took a second soldier and his armor and walked to the ship.”
“While we were moving your equipment inside?” Barris asked.
“I selected a moment when no one was inside,” Thrawn said. “With small branches I stood the armor upright and set it outside the doorway. An explosive inside destroyed it.”
“A distraction so that we wouldn’t realize there were actually two missing stormtroopers,” Parck said. “Where did you hide during the trip up?”
“Inside the second power generator casing,” Thrawn told him. “It is nearly empty, as I have used its parts to maintain the first.”
“I gather you’ve been here for quite a while,” Parck said. “I can see why you wanted so desperately to leave.”
Thrawn drew himself up. “I was not desperate. But my people need me.”
“Why?”
“They are in danger. There are many dangers in the galaxy. Dangers to my people. Dangers to yours.” He made an odd gesture. “You would do well to learn of them.”
“Yet your people exiled you here,” Parck pointed out. “Do they disagree with you as to the magnitude of these threats?”
Thrawn looked at Eli. “Repeat?” he asked in Sy Bisti.
Eli translated the captain’s question. “We do not disagree on threat,” Thrawn answered in his accented Basic. “We disagree on process. They do not accept belief in…ezeboli hlusalu.”
Eli swallowed hard. “They don’t believe in preemptive strikes.”
“So your people need protection,” Parck said, his voice subtly changed. “How would you do this, alone and without ships or allies?”
Eli frowned. An odd question, in an odd tone of voice. Was the captain fishing for information on possible Chiss allies?
Thrawn didn’t seem to notice. “I do not know,” he said calmly. “I will find a way.”
“I’m sure you will,” Parck said. “In the meantime, you’ve had a busy day, and I’m sure you could use some rest. Commander?”
“Sir?” One of the stormtroopers stepped forward.
“You and your squad will escort our guest to the deck officer’s office while suitable accommodations and refreshments are prepared,” Parck ordered. “Thrawn, I take my leave now. We shall speak again later.”
“Thank you, Captain Parck,” the Chiss said. “I will look ahead to it.”
—
Eli was in his quarters, working on the after-action report he’d been ordered to complete, when they came for him.
Eli had never been in the captain’s private office. He’d never even been in this part of the Strikefast.
And he’d never been in the company of this many high-ranking officers. It was like a board certification session.
Or a court-martial.
“Cadet Vanto,” Captain Parck greeted him. He gestured to a chair that had been set in front of the line of officers. “Be seated.”
“Yes, sir.” Eli sat down, fervently hoping that his shaking wasn’t visible.
“First, I want to commend you for your conduct during the recent action,” Parck said. “You behaved admirably under fire.”
“Thank you, sir,” Eli said. Though as he remembered it, he’d done very little except stay as clear of the fighting and confusion as he possibly could.
“Tell me, what do you think of our prisoner?”
“He seems very confident, sir,”
Eli said. Why were they asking him? “Very much in control.” He considered. “Except maybe when he was captured in the hangar bay. You may have caught him by surprise there.”
“I don’t think so,” Parck said. “He surrendered quite readily, with no attempt at resistance or escape.” He cocked his head slightly. “You seem to know something about his people.”
“Not really, sir,” Eli said. “We have stories about the Chiss—more like myths, really—that have been passed down through the generations. As far as I know, none of them has been seen on Lysatra or anywhere in the area for hundreds of years.”
“But you do at least have myths, which is more than we have in the Strikefast’s records,” Parck said. “What do these stories say about them?”
“They’re supposed to be great warriors,” Eli said. “Clever, resourceful, proud. Intensely loyal to one another, too. This exile…they must really hate the idea of preemptive strikes to do that to him.”
“So it would appear,” Parck agreed. “I see you’re on track at Myomar to become a supply officer.”
“Yes, sir,” Eli said, the change in subject momentarily throwing him off balance. “My family is in the shipping business, and they thought Imperial service would be a step up—”
“Have you had any training in teaching or tutoring?”
“Nothing formal, sir,” Eli said. Was Parck going to recommend he switch to a teaching track?
He hoped not. He’d spent his youth flying cargoes for his family, and he didn’t want to be stuck in an office or classroom somewhere.
For a moment the captain gazed at him. Then he leaned back in his seat and looked at the other officers flanking him. A wordless signal passed among them…
“Very well, Cadet,” Parck said, turning back to Eli. “As of this moment, you’re assigned as liaison, translator, and aide to our prisoner. You will also—”
“Sir?” Eli blurted out, feeling his eyes go wide. “But I’m just a cadet—”
“I wasn’t finished,” Parck said. “Along with translation, you’ll also be coaching him in Basic. He has the fundamentals, as you saw, but he needs a more extensive vocabulary and some correction with pronunciation and grammar. Any questions?”
“No, sir,” Eli managed. The surprises were coming way too fast. “Actually, yes, sir, I do. Why does he need to know Basic? Aren’t we putting him back on the planet?”
There was a quiet stir among the officers, and Eli had the sudden sense that he’d just crossed an invisible line. He tensed—
“No,” Parck said. His voice was calm, but there was an edge to it, as if this was a question he and the others had already hashed over. And hadn’t necessarily agreed on. “We’re taking him to Coruscant.”
“To—?” Eli clamped his mouth shut, visions of ancient kings parading defeated enemies through the streets flashing through his mind.
But surely that wasn’t what Parck had in mind. Was it?
“I believe the Emperor will be interested in meeting him and learning about these Chiss,” Parck said. There was something in his tone that suggested the explanation was as much for his officers’ benefit as for Eli’s. “I also believe that they could prove an important asset to the Empire. Do your myths include any suggestion of where their home planet might be located?”
“Just that they come from the Unknown Regions, sir. Nothing more specific.”
“Pity,” Parck said. “No matter. That will be another of your duties over the next few days: to learn as much as you can about him, his homeworld, and his people.”
“Yes, sir,” Eli said, feeling his heart doing bounce-ups. From lowly cadet to translator and tutor to a being straight out of Lysatra’s stories.
And the only downside was what it might cost his future.
Because he’d already seen that the Empire was a massive construct of giant, unforgiving machinery. If he strayed even a few degrees off his chosen career path, he might suddenly find himself relegated to some other track, something obscure that might send him to the core deck of a forgotten starbase and abandon him there.
Still, this little detour in his path should only fill a week or so while the Strikefast transported Thrawn to Coruscant. After that, Eli would return to Myomar with the other cadets, and with a story he’d be able to tell people for the rest of his life.
And really, what could go wrong?
—
“You seem amused,” Cadet Vanto said. He leans back in his seat.
“Amused?” Thrawn asked.
“Entertained with a feeling of humor,” Vanto said. He switches back to Sy Bisti for the explanation. “Was there anything in particular about this story that you found humorous?”
“I found the story quite interesting.”
“Some of my stories you find interesting,” Vanto said. Wrinkles form across his forehead. “Others you seem to find unbelievable. A few of them you find amusing. This was one of those.”
“I do not mean to offend,” Thrawn said. “But I myself am Chiss, and never have I heard of any of my people wielding such a power.”
“I’ll concede that one,” Vanto said. The wrinkles partially smooth out. “I told you right from the beginning that these stories are barely above the level of myths. But you asked to hear them.”
“I appreciate your willingness to share,” Thrawn said. “One may learn a great deal about a people by the stories they tell of others.”
“And?” Vanto asked. The wrinkles return. His head turns slightly to his right.
“I do not understand.”
“I ask what you have learned about humans,” Vanto said. His eyes narrow slightly.
“I misspoke. Apologies. I meant to say I could learn about one person, you, from the stories you choose to tell.”
“And what have you learned about me?” Vanto asked. His eyes return to normal size. His vocal tone lowers in pitch.
“That you do not wish to be here,” Thrawn said. “You do not wish to act as translator and assistant. You certainly do not wish to act as interrogator.”
“Who said I was an interrogator?” Vanto asked. His tone rises slightly in pitch and volume. The musculature beneath his sleeves tightens.
“You wish to return to your numbers and inventory lists,” Thrawn said. “That is where your talents lie, and where you desire your path to lead.”
“Fascinating,” Vanto said. His tone takes on a new, rumbling texture. The corners of his lips tighten briefly. “I suppose that as a big important military commander you find logistics and supply beneath your dignity?”
“Do you?”
“Of course not,” Vanto said. His torso stretches slightly upward in his chair. His voice takes on a fuller tone. “Because I know better. My family has done that kind of work for three generations. I’m just doing it for the Imperial Navy now instead of for my own family, that’s all.”
“I presume you are good at it.”
“I’m very good at it,” Vanto said. “Lieutenant Osteregi told me I’m one of the best cadets he’s ever had aboard. As soon as I finish my last term at the Academy, I’ll be guaranteed an assignment aboard a ship of the line.”
“Is what you wish?” Thrawn asked.
“Absolutely,” Vanto said. The fuller tone partially fades from his voice. “What I don’t know is why you care.”
“Why I care about what?”
“Why you care about me,” Vanto said. His eyes narrow again. His tone returns to the lower pitch. “You’ve been studying me—don’t think I haven’t noticed. You ask me to tell you one of the legends I learned as a child, then you ask about my home or background or childhood. Always small questions, always delivered very casually. What I want to know is why.” He folds his arms in a crisscross pattern across his chest.
“I am sorry,” Thrawn said. “I meant no harm. I was merely interested in you, as I am interested in everything about your Empire.”
“But why me?” Vanto asked. “You never ask about Captain Parck or Major Barris or
any of the other senior officers. Or even about Emperor Palpatine or the Imperial Senate.”
“They are not connected to my immediate survival,” Thrawn said. “You are.”
“With all due respect, you couldn’t be more wrong,” Vanto said. He shakes his head, back and forth, sideways. “Captain Parck could order you shoved out an air lock at any time. Major Barris could trump up charges or implicate you in something and have you shot. As for the Emperor—” The musculature of his throat tightens briefly. There is an enhanced infrared glow from his face. “He has absolute power over everyone and everything in the Empire. If he isn’t amused or pleased with you, you’ll end up dead.”
“Captain Parck seeks honor and promotion,” Thrawn said. “He believes me to be the path to that end. Major Barris dislikes me but will not risk angering his captain. As for the Emperor…we shall see.”
“Fine,” Vanto said. The musculature of his throat relaxes partially, but not fully. “Personally, I’d be a lot more concerned about him, but that’s up to you. But I’m still the bottom man on the roster. Why do you even care about me?”
“You are my translator. You hold my words in your hand, and their meanings. A misjudged translation will confuse or anger. A deliberate error could lead to death.”
“Krayt spit,” Vanto said. He makes a snorting sound through his nose.
“Forgive me?”
“I call krayt spit,” Vanto said. “You’ve picked up a lot of Basic in the past couple of days. You speak it as well as I do. Probably better—you don’t have a Wild Space accent people can make fun of. The last thing you need is a translator.”
“You make my case for me,” Thrawn said. “What is meant by krayt spit?”
“It’s a slang term for nonsense,” Vanto said. The left corner of his lip twists upward. “Especially nonsense that the speaker knows is nonsense.”
“I see. Krayt spit. I will remember that.”
“Don’t,” Vanto said. His tone is deep, the word sharply clipped. “It’s not polite. It also reeks of backwater places like Lysatra. Backwater means any planet that’s not part of the Core Worlds and the elite and powerful people who live there.”
“I presume there exists a hierarchy of worlds and the people who inhabit them?”