Force Awakens AU-verse

[grandadmiralartcritic]

There's never enough time to prepare for a war you didn't (quite) know was coming. But given Milliways tends to stop time while a person is in it, Thrawn has taken his datapad full of files, after action reports, and star maps, and made his way into the bar proper.

And given that it is unwise to appear as if one is hiding, he chooses to occupy a table right at the heart of this multiversal cantina.

Caf is welcome, but food is most definitely secondary to absorbing as much information as he can.

Comments

[for_everyone]

Hera leans forward, resting her arms on the table.

"Like you're talking to someone who doesn't trust you and needs to be convinced."

[grandadmiralartcritic]

"I daresay you will be more rigorous than fully half the Chiss instructors of my childhood."

And young adulthood.

"Will we have an encrypted channel for accompanying diagrams and specs? If I am to give the most thorough accounting, of course."

[for_everyone]

Without any comment on that –

"If it's necessary, I'll figure something out."

[grandadmiralartcritic]

Thrawn merely nods, a quick, sharp acknowledgment.

"Understood."

[for_everyone]

She does let that sit for a moment, but then asks, "Do you understand?"

[grandadmiralartcritic]

"Full transparency."

His smile is thin.

"I am reasonably capable of explaining myself, else former Ensign Vanto would not have found so welcome a reception among my people. And as failure will see me back in a cell and useless sooner rather than later -- "

[for_everyone]

Hera closes her eyes, shakes her head. "I don't want you to be worried about that."

[grandadmiralartcritic]

"I would say 'aware' rather than worried."

That thin smile remains.

"But there are a great many restrictions I am prepared to accept without resistance, in order to -- "

Well.

" -- perform anything like my function."

[for_everyone]

"That doesn't give me confidence, Thrawn."

[grandadmiralartcritic]

He merely raises his eyebrows.

"Would anything, at this juncture?"

[for_everyone]

"I hope so."

Hera shakes her head, glancing down to her hands for a moment.

"If being useful was all you cared about, you could be just as useful to the First Order."

[grandadmiralartcritic]

"No," he says dryly, "I really could not. While the Republic has proved as fractious and fragile as I believed it to be, this First Order seems even less stable."

His nostrils flare very slightly.

"It will do my people no good, should they need a strong ally in the days to come. Your resistance at least has tenacity behind it. And, of course, you do not seem to look down upon those with blue skin."

[for_everyone]

"But the Empire did," she says.

"That doesn't seem to be a deal breaker for you."

[grandadmiralartcritic]

"I had my orders, direct from the Aristocra. That mission finished once you and yours mopped up the rest of the Imperials. I have received no orders since, nor will I."

All things have a cost.

"Thus my own judgment is what guides me now. I doubt that is comforting for you, but there is not much I can see at this time to ameliorate that. Save truth, perhaps."

[for_everyone]

"And what is that truth?"

Her voice is dull, thudding. Maybe too tired to be exasperated now.

"Because I doubt your judgment puts any value in the ideals of the Resistance or the First Order."

[grandadmiralartcritic]

"I wish," he says, very precisely, "to be of use. Should your Resistance choose to do that, I will serve your wishes as thoroughly and uncompromisingly as I served those of the Aristocra."

It will, by this point, be something of a relief.

"Until your side is victorious, or until there is no one left to muster a fight."

[for_everyone]

Flat –

"I don't believe that."

[grandadmiralartcritic]

"The more I try to convince you, the less believable you will find it."

His color has deepened back to its normal hue.

"My loyalty to the Chiss was bred in my bones. I have no such ties in this part of the galaxy, and it is such loyalty and such connections that has defined first the Rebellion and then, most likely, your Resistance. I have only my skills and the strength of my word, the latter of which, I suspect, will only be believed once there is action behind it. And that . . . is where the problem lies."

[for_everyone]

"I know what your loyalty is."

Hera looks up to him. Her voice has changed – no longer tired, but crisp, and certain. For a moment, the weariness she had seemed to carry with her since the war melts away, her eyes holding all the conviction they'd had in an interrogation room so many years ago.

"And I believe you think you're telling the truth now. But I don't think it's true. I think you will help us, as much as you can, for as long as you see the First Order as the greater threat to your idea of stability in this galaxy. And maybe that will never change. But if it does, the moment it does –"

It's the only moment she pauses, though she sounds no less certain for it. "– you will turn on me."

[grandadmiralartcritic]

"Then we appear to be at an impasse. No protestations from me seem as if they will sway you."

Thrawn spreads his hands, watching Hera out of his burning crimson eyes.

"I do not say that is unfair. Does this mean we will not be working together? Or is it rather, as they say, 'fair warning' that you will always be ready for whatever move I may make?"

[for_everyone]

"I wish I could say either of those."

That weariness starts to slip back in. "But we will work together, and I can't say that I'll always be ready for you."

[grandadmiralartcritic]

"Mmm."

Thrawn inclines his head again, smile wiped away as if it had never been.

"Perhaps the former will help improve your success rate with the latter."

It would certainly make things easier, on the whole. For a given value of 'easy'.

[for_everyone]

"I wouldn't trust that."

She sees no value in assuming she could always anticipate what Thrawn might do.

"But I can accept that I'm the one who should have this responsibility."

[grandadmiralartcritic]

"The battles ahead will be far too difficult for me to waste effort in attempting to slip my leash."

He misses challenges, viscerally and completely. And smashing the First Order into its component pieces will be a very great challenge.

[for_everyone]

She takes a breath, as though biting back one response. Instead -

"I wouldn't underestimate you."