Her parents were brutally murdered in front of her, her friend was sniped, and later she was shipped to one of the Yam'rii camps. She thought it was over, little did she know, she was being shipped to another labor camp. The soil was infertile with little pieces of dying grass, the clouds were ominous, and there was blood spilled on the dead soil. Blood, but no bodies. She didn't even want to know where the bodies went. Like all of the ones that were spared, Lar'ita was marked with a number and had a tracking device put on her cheap uniform. She couldn't speak Kaleeshi, practice her religion, or speak freely at all. The Yam'rii taught her simple commands in Basic, although if she spoke more than what was taught, she would've been executed publicly for "getting smart". Baths were once a week, in unsafe showers with other Kaleesh.
For my final Kaleesh Week fic (I did one for all seven days!), I decided to go with a less literal definition of "species swap". Instead of the species of the characters being changed, it's their narrative roles that have been mixed up. Specifically those of Qymaen and the Kaleesh with Thrawn and the Chiss.
This is basically a retelling of my fic "Balrog", though from a completely different point of view. An AU of my Empire of the Hand AU, if you will.
@accursedkaleeshi
*****
Species Swap
“Captain, we will be emerging from hyperspace in five minutes.”
“Acknowledged.” On the bridge of the Democratic Star Destroyer Malevolence, Senior Captain Qymaen jai Sheelal steepled his hands in front of his face as he leaned forward in his command chair. His orders from President Amidala had been clear – eliminate the threat posed by the inhabitants of Naporar, who had been harassing the garrison on the planet for years. It hadn’t been much of an issue before – yet another example of a former Loyalist world resisting Democratic rule, like so many others across the Outer Rim and Wild Space. But word of this embarrassment had begun to leak corewards, and that simply would not do.
Still, he had been able to find little to no information on the “native” inhabitants, except they weren’t actually any more native to the planet than the Democratic forces – the Chiss instead being from a nearby system, the glaciated planet Csilla. Still, the name Chiss seemed familiar, though it could not place from where. There had been nothing in the Democracy's archives on the mysterious, blue-skinned humanoids but the most basic of information, no art, no native tales, nothing, not even from the old Sith archives from before the Droid Wars. It was almost like they had been purposefully removed …
The red, swirling mists of hyperspace faded back into the star-speckled void of real space. “Hail the planet, on all channels.” Qymaen ordered. “This is Senior Captain Sheelal of the Galactic Democracy to Chiss forces. You have this single warning: unconditionally surrender, or you will be destroyed.”
Privately, he hated to do so. If he had only had even a single weapon from this culture to study …
As expected he received no answer. The Kaleesh captain said nothing for a few, long minutes.
“Sir?” his Dathomiran executive officer, Commander Ventress, asked expectedly.
“Open fire.”
Qymaen closed his metallic gold eyes, regretting the order as he spoke it. There was something here, he was sure of it, but that was one mystery that would remain unsolved, because of him. Worst yet, he knew he would be ordered to move on to Csilla itself after Naporar was bombarded to glass …
He watched as his ship’s tubolasers did their job dispassionately.
“Senior Captain, we have an incoming transmission on emergency frequencies – it’s from Tovarskl,” his communications officer suddenly reported.
Torvarskl? Now? Qymaen raised his brow. He immediately rose from his command chair. “I will take it in my ready room. Commander Ventress, you have the bridge.”
What would Ronderu be doing comming now? That wasn’t like her. He and his wife had their own spheres – Navy and Army respectively. She never interfered in his military decisions, with good reason. He thought on his short walk to his ready room.
“Ronderu?” he questioned immediately as her hologram flickered into existence, “what is this about?”
“Qymaen, you can’t destroy the Chiss!” Ronderu insisted, in the direct, no-nonsense way he loved so much about her. “They’re Admiral Ar’alani’s species!”
Admiral Ar’alani, the infamous Droids Wars Loyalist commander. Qymaen had studied her tactics against the corrupt Old Kingdom when he had first joined the Democracy. The cyborg with the four arms and glowing red eyes, so skilled in Sith swordsmanship despite not being Force-sensitive herself – Ronderu had quite admired her skill – and a genius tactician. Qymaen regretted never having the chance to meet her in battle himself.
“Are you sure?” he asked, though he should have trusted her. Ronderu did not make mistakes when it came to sword wielders.
“Look here,” Ronderu shifed her hologram, to show a close up of Ar’alani cybernetic face, glowing red eyes peering out over the metallic lower faceguard, “there’s Ar’alani, of course, and this is apparently the current Chiss commander, Thrawn. You don’t know how much I had to dig to find this.” Another hologram appeared alongside the cyborg – one of an almost-human looking face, though shaded a blue that had nothing to do with the hologram.
With those same, piercing, glowing red eyes.
“Ronderu … thank you …”
“No time for that. Halt your bombardment!” Ronderu told him. “And comm. me after. Let me know how it goes.”
“I will.” Qymaen assured her as he turned off the external comm, and immediately pressed the button for the internal ship’s communications, “Commander Ventress, cease fire immediately.”
“Cease fire!” Ventress ordered the bridge crew without hesitation. The sound of turbolasers immediately ceased.
Qymaen returned to the bridge. Only then did Ventress inquire, with a simple “Senior Captain? Your orders?”
“Prepare a shuttle. I will be landing myself in the Chiss capital city. There’s someone down there I need to meet, for the good of the Democracy.”
“At once, Sir,” Ventress started issuing orders to their junior officers and a stormtrooper squad as Qymean boarded the turbolift, already scanning the information Ronderu had managed to uncover on the Chiss uploaded to his datapad.
Syndic Mitth’raw’nuruodo … you and I have much to discuss. Qymaen jai Sheelal thought as a plan began forming. President Amidala might not like it at first, but he was positive that this “Thrawn” would be a much better ally than an enemy – both to the Democracy, and to him.
*****
Role swaps:
Qymaen jai Sheelal/Grievous <> Grand Admiral Thrawn
Ronderu lij Kummar <> Xelarra
Asajj Ventress <> Commodore Karyn Faro
Admiral Ar'alani <> General Grievous (his role in the Clone Wars)
Padme Amidala <> Sheev Palpatine
Syndic Mitth'raw'nuruodo/Thrawn <> Bentilais san Sk'ar
I turned Qymaen and Ronderu into Gen Z college students for the hell of it >:3
Ronderu is Greenland Inuit and Qymaen is Iranian.
Qymaen has a YT channel about his katana collection and annoys Ronderu with it to the point where she makes the "woke up to my bf rambling about his katana collection" videos
"But what about their fighting skills?" Both do martial arts and Ronderu trained Qymaen at the beginning (it went how you expected)
"He isn't Slavic so why does he have a Slavic accent?" He was born in Iran, moved the Prague at age 8, lived there for a while, then went to the US for the same reason Ron did
I see Ron as a tank top girlie and Qy as a baggy shirt/sweater kind of guy (boy is drowning in the clothes because he's too skinny)
