#marinith

[contentment-of-cats]

The Card Game at the End of the Galaxy.

They got the Lady as repaired as one could hope. The damned whales apparently used the refined Clouzon fuels to come back here to die after spawning. The Chimaera's crew had been too busy dying or with damage control to see the beasties having it off in hyperspace. Grace and Little Gods only knew if she'd hold together making the jump, but with the materials of other crashed ships, they'd been able to put her back together.

Shipwide Communication: All Hands

ALL ESSENTIAL PERSONNEL INDICATED FOR COLD SLEEP HAVE RECEIVED THEIR THORACIC PORTS AND BACTA TREATMENT.

PREPARATION FOR NON-EMERGENCY COLDSLEEP:

Your groups will be called by MOS and rank. Do not wait in the medbay corridors. 

No food after 00:00 - clear liquids only. Take the intestinal prep at the same time.

At 06:00 leave your quarters wearing the hooded jumpsuit provided. Your possessions will be stored away for you.

In the staging area wait to be called with your group. Please do not bring anything with you such as datapads, reading material, or your personal comlinks.

We will soon be home. 

They will soon regret it.

Long live the Empire. 

CMDE Albus Marinith, ISD Chimaera FLAG, 7th Fleet, 

GADM Mitth'raw'nuruodo, ISD Chimaera FLAG, 7th Fleet

~

They were good soldiers and sailors of the Empire, and rather than await a lingering death from starvation and thirst - or eating dead whale meat (barf) - his Humans got to work. Thrawn, of course, didn't know this. He was in and out of coldsleep, medbeds, bacta tanks, and surgery. His Humans were as determined to save him as they were to get home. They were shocked silly when three crones suddenly appeared on the auxiliary bridge, and the Three Mothers almost joined their sisters before Thrawn stopped them. 

They had something to offer - and they wanted something in return.

A way to communicate with the galaxy far, far away. A way to rally the resources needed to return home. The hyperlanes were purgill migration routes, the purgill one of the oldest species not just in the galaxy, but in the universe, and a species eating itself out of existence. They came here to spawn, then die, their bones filled with Clouzon, the ships that ran on it the only way for them to get home. With a ring based on the old Jedi fighter hyperspace rings, the Chimaera could fly again. It would take the Mothers back to Dathomir, and the crew of the Chimaera back home.

It was go time.

They found a way to mine the bone belt, then vaporize the bones in a plasma engine, collecting the gasses. The Chimaera's chief engineer's last act had been to shut down the core with his bare hands in a breached engine room. In the weeks that it took to minimally refuel, the air turned stale as vital systems starved. Then, nursing the core back to full power - and holding their breath - engine by engine, they fired the Gemon-4 ion engines and moved slowly into the atmosphere.

Thrawn awoke just in time for the descent.

More devilry, but it could not be helped. Three rickety old hags weighed against the remaining Chimaera crew. 

So they are here now, his loyal crew. Almost all sleep in their stasis units in the catacombs. The Chimaera is vacuum tight and as spaceworthy as possible. Bridger will be stranded. 

Hammerly shuffles the cards, the chrono counting down to 00:00. Pyrondi has a pile of worthless chips and heckles Lomar and Agral that she's cashing in when they get home. Yve doesn't do goodbyes, and is sitting this one out. Marinith is finishing his last commands and a glass of his Corellian whisky. 

Thrawn brings a bottle and takes a seat. "Deal me in, Flag Captain Hammerly."

"Ready to lose your pension, sir?" Pyrondi chirps with her characteristic confidence.

"Hold onto your chips, Commander Pyrondi." Card games such as Five Card Fool Me involve strategy as much as luck. "Remember last time."

She tried to bluff the table with a pair of deuces and fooled everyone but him. 

They talk about what they're going to do when they get home. Some of the acts involve improbable uses for Bridger's head, but most are typical leave activities. They talk about visiting family, partying, indulging in food and drink, or hobbies. 

"What are you planning to do, sir?"

"Apparently, Commander Lomar, I need to plan on posting your bail." Thrawn let a small smirk flit across his face, making the others eye their cards nervously. "Don't worry about the courts martial. I've had enough of them that I can talk you through."

The runup to coldsleep has seen some remarkable behavior in the name of stress relief, and Thrawn has long looked the other way on fraternization. Waking up in a pile of warm and naked Humans has been comforting these past months. They have never disdained his injured body, and many bear scars from horrendous wounds of their own.

Five minutes to 00:00, Hammerly puts the cards away and kisses them all farewell. Lomar and Agral follow. Marinith looks in and bids him goodnight. Yve's farewell is personal, warm, and heartfelt. Pyrondi tidies the room and Thrawn can feel her reluctance to leave.

"I'll look in on you in a few hours." 

She nods, not trusting her voice, and goes. Thrawn would never betray her confidence that coldsleep terrifies her. They've all had the drills, starting with the academy, but this is going to be for a very long time. They don't have enough consumables for the length of time they'll have to wait. Thrawn and a core of stormtroopers will remain awake, with a few officers and specialists to wake when the Eye of Sion arrives.

The prep for non-emergency coldsleep is unpleasant, but he noticed them cutting back on rations and increasing fluids. When he looks in on Pyrondi, as promised, she's pale and fatigued in the aftermath. A weak smile from her and he enters, placing the do-not-disturb on the doorway. He's going to miss her as she sleeps. He will miss all of them. His Humans.

He stays until 06:00, going to medbay and finding everything ready. He nods at the medic to begin.

"Commander Agral, report to medbay."

"Commander Yve, report to medbay."

"Commander Lomar, report to medbay."

"Commander- Commodore Marinith, report to medbay."

Pyrondi is last, and it is for his own selfish purpose. Marinith gives him a knowing look.

The body, reactivating from a cold start, goes through hell. Hibernation sickness can last for weeks if one is not properly inducted. First come the scans to make sure of an empty digestive tract. A protective drink goes down, eye and nose drops are administered, a mouthpiece put in place. Then the thoracic port is hooked up to the infusion pump. There is nobody to see as he takes Pyrondi's hand. She's a good officer, one of his very best.

"Anesthesia in three, two, one. Commander, count backwards from ten."

"Ten. Nine. Eight. S-sevix. Fi-" 

Pyrondi's eyes haze, close, and are then delicately taped to protect them. The mouthpiece and airway tube are placed, then her exposed face covered with bacta patches. It doesn't look like her any longer. Thrawn starts to tuck her fingers into the mitt, then looks at the other four caskets waiting, lights blinking. It's not a Chiss custom, but he presses his lips to her warm fingers. 

"I'll see you soon, Commander Pyrondi." 

He tucks her hand back in, straightens and nods at the medic.

"Coldsleep prep dose underway… now." He can't see the warmth drain from her face, but he can see her in infrared when he blinks his nictitating lid. She changes until her body gives only a cold blue signal. "Patient is stable. Beginning induction."

He waits. She or one of the others waited for him - there every time he woke up. 

"Induction successful for Pyrondi, Commander, Senior Weapons Officer, female, twenty-six years of age."

The casket closes, carbonite gas filling the space, the light flashes and then settles into a steady red. 

Thrawn nods to the medic, one of the few crew members left awake.

"We'll take good care of them, sir."

"Dismissed."

When the troopers come to take the five caskets, Thrawn turns and walks away.

Now all he has to do is wait.

[merry-chissmas]

Tro'owmis unexpectedly finds Thrawn.

My first fic of Chissmas, and it’s a short one because work has me by the short ones-

[contentment-of-cats]

WiP Bit 24

Thrawn has not been to see him. Ezra's admission that he tried to calm Pyrondi down using the Force repulsed Thrawn at gut level. In a way, Ezra could reluctantly see why. It was interference with someone's actual physical brain, their soul itself. Even Marinith expressed that if Ezra ever dared to do anything of the sort, he'd be disintegrated so fast he'd enter his next life leaving his mother like a shot torpedo.

That the Imperial captains seemed to know they had Force users in their ranks made Ezra deeply uneasy. Marinith was one such. The man's mind was like hitting a solid wall, and Marinith hitting him was like being hit by a wall and warned not to do it again, boy.

A new prison coverall popped out of a slot, and Ezra stripped down to get hosed. At least he was clean and fed. Bored out of his mind, but alive. The brig cells were utterly silent, not even the shipwide announcements reached him, no change of watch sounds, no klaxons, no nothing. The worst thing was that his sense of direction was completely screwed, and he couldn't sense more than a ship's length away. It was as if this part of space existed to mindfuck Jedi. Maybe Sith, too, as the Emperor never came this far out. Maybe even Thrawn didn't know where they were.

He greeted Marinith with, "The food here sucks."

Then came a voice he really didn't want to hear. "Then suck space, Haimo'dyk."

Pyrondi.

"Whatever you just called me-"

"Malignant spirit."

"-I'm not that."

The petite officer stepped out from behind Marinith and gave him a grin that was less a smile than a wolf showing her teeth. "The Grand Admiral says that if you tamper with my mind again, I get to kill you. My choice of method."

Ezra raised his hands, backing up and sitting down. The bridge crew, the ones from the main watch, they were terrifying. All of them with untapped potential, trained in their specialties, all of them true believers not so much in the Empire as much as they believed in Thrawn.

"No murdering the cadet, Senior Lieutenant.

"Sir."

Cadet. That sounded ominous.

"Today, Bridger, you start getting an education. Today is an education in what you did, now that we have the full sensor logs pulled and sorted."

Marinith threw a datapad at his head, which Ezra caught easily. On it was Lothal from a system defense station, all the ships delineated in green for civilian traffic, yellow for commercial ships, red for Imperial ships, blue for customs and commercial stations, yellow for Imperial construction docks and supply depots. The date in the upper right corner was the day before the Purrgil.

"You can thank Agral, Barlin, Hammerly, Lomar, Pyrondi, and Yve for this little presentation. Major Partagaz supplied the logistics, and our analysis groups cleared it."

Marinith leaned in and tapped the green arrowhead, starting the play.

The civilian and commercial traffic cleared away, a running tally at the bottom of the screen showing the number of ships and the tally of the crew. The commercial and civilian stations were moved out of the way, and added to the tally. He had no idea how many ships were in Lothal's space, how many they crewed. All of them carried Clouzon in their hyperdrive engines, the stations all had refueling depots equivalent to the tankage of an ISD. Imperial stations moved next, the construction rings were towed to higher orbits and the Seventh Fleet vacuum packed Lothal. Nothing in or out.

The bombardment started.

The Purrgil arrived and latches on to the parked civilian and commercial ships first and tore them apart. Ezra heard a scream and realized it was him. The stations were next, Imperial and non-combatant alike filled with Clouzon. The Imperial refueling depot held enough to service the whole Seventh and any departing Imperial vessels. The fleet was next. Some ships torn to bits in atmosphere and falling immediately to the city below, others dragged in flames into vacuum. Some sucked dry and dropped back to the world below.

"Those ships deorbiting didn't have time to get anyone to the escape pods. The survivors were burned to death on re-entry," Marinith noted.

Two counters appeared, one tagging probably noncombatant deaths and combatant deaths. The Imperial count stopped at 1.25 million. The noncombatant counter was still running as deorbiting wreckage smashed through the construction rings, destroying them and adding more wreckage to the atmosphere. Fires started across the world below, crates appeared where there were once towns, bands of thick black smoke scrawled across the surface of the world like clawmarks. Where the wrecks entered water, huge impact waves washed out coastal areas, and likely killed everything in the water for klicks around.

The civilian tally climbed and climbed until the display suddenly went black. The green letters scrolled across the screen.

"Sensors offline 22:17:44."

The civilian estimated tally of deaths stood at 3.3 million.

"Not counting casualties, or those who will die in the coming weeks and months."

"You also removed Lothal's defense against pirates, slavers, wreck strippers, and whatever central government there was," Pyrondi added. "You left them wide open, unless the Empire sends in another fleet, emergency relief, and rebuilding support."

"Even then, people will die of wounds, die in the wreckage of their cities and towns, die from exposure to toxic substances, from disease, lack of emergency services and medical care." Marinith stood, straightening his tunic." More will die from hunger, exposure, contaminated food and water, civil unrest. The Jedi I remember could feel deaths as sensations in the Force. I guess your teacher left that part out."

Ezra looked at the datapad, but he didn't need to. Everything had been branded into his brain.

"Actions have consequences. These are yours." Pyrondi took the datapad from his unresisting fingers. "The lesson concludes for today."

Ezra stared at the floor between his feet as both walked out, the door clanging shut behind them.

[contentment-of-cats]

WiP bit 21

Ezra was moved from medbay to a detention block some days after Thrawn came to see him. The ceiling had the normal light rings and the not-normal disintigrator arrays. Any attempt at escape and bip! Your atoms would be cleaned up by the Chimaera's enviro system. His meals - a ration bar and a can of rehydration - came out of a slot in the wall. He stood to be hosed off by a nozzle in the ceiling. Then he had a visitor.

He wished it was Thrawn. Or even Pyro.

It was Captain Marinith.

Neat of uniform with the build of a beanpole, the man had greying red hair and icy-blue eyes. He was also one of the Force users Ezra sensed after Pyro almost fried him. If he thought he was going to throw the man off by dangling that bit of information, that balloon went pop a second later.

"Of course, you idiot. I've been in uniform for thirty years, worked with Jedi - and you are no Jedi - and was tested at their temple as a child." The man took a seat, crossing his legs so that the ankle of his left rested on the knee of his right. "If I were you, I'd be much more interested in the method of your execution. Right now feeding you to Sally is running neck-and-neck with taking you down to the hangar and dropping you out in hyperspace."

"Sally?" He had a feeling that he'd regret asking.

"The dianoga that lives in central waste processing."

Yep. Regretted it.

[contentment-of-cats]

Ar'alani keeps a promise to Eli and faces a part of her past she'd like to forget. A rescue mission continues for the lost fleet in a race against destruction.

Thrawn/Pyrondi, Pellaeon/Marinith, loads of OCS.