But It Was So Artistically Done - Blog Posts

The afterlife is very sacred to the Chiss. They live their entire lives in service to the Acendancy with the hope that they will be returned to the snow and ice that made them and return to watch over those who they set on the same path. Their students and prodigies.

Thrawn wouldn't pretend to have believed in the idea that after his death his spirit would be magically transported to land where everyone he had ever loved was, where he could watch his people grow, and be at peace. But he also wouldn't deny that he felt a need to protect the Acendancy and that he felt a deep connection to the cold snowy worlds. If he was a spiritual man he would say his soul longed for them. But Thrawn was never a spiritual man, instead he focused his days on protecting his people, his friends; teaching others so that they could do the same; and bettering himself. And in the final days he focused on making sure that his death wasn't in vain. That it meant something. And that final note didn't fall flat.

Thrawn didn't know what would come of him. An eternity burning as some humans believed, would certainly be torture for the Chiss. Wondering forever and ever on planes of ice alone with his thoughts, he couldn't say he would particularly enjoy that. He hoped for eternal darkness, the kind of rest you only get when you enter a deep dreamless sleep. He didn't expect the stories to be true.

He didn't expect to open his eyes and be greeted by soft white light.

Thrawn sat up, his arms coming to rest beside him, none of the sluggishness he had expected was there. There were no burn marks, no shrapnel, none of the telltale signs of the explosion that had taken his life. Or was it the assassin? The purrgil? He couldn't differentiate one moment of the past from another, it all slammed into one jumbled ball. Compared to the stark calm around him, it felt like a blizzard was tearing through his skull.

He held his head in his hands, rocking back and forth, muttering to himself in his mother's tongue, trying to calm himself with the luxury he so rarely allowed. The blizzard was getting stronger. Where am I? Where was I? Who was I? Who am I? What am I? The storm continued to grow and twist and turn. Wrapping him in it's embrace as he slowly began to sink into the soft snow beneath him. A hand reached out and touched his shoulder, and it all came to a stop. The wind was frozen. And his head was empty, for what seemed the first time ever. Looking up at the one who saved him, the face of a Chiss woman stood above. Some 50 odd years younger than she should have been, her bluish black hair slicked back, and an uncharacteristically soft expression on her face stood Ar'alani.

"Mitth'raw'nuruodo..." she whispered, stroking his shoulder. "Come," she held out her hand for him to take.

And he did.

Rising to his feet with her help, he could feel the years sliding off of him, the age, the horrors, until nothing was left except the man he had been years before. With no worries except for the safety of his family. As he rose, he began to see them around him.

The laughing figure of a woman ran past, followed by a gaggle of young girls.

"Vurika!" She passed by.

Ar'alani pulled him forward, to the feet of a middle aged Chiss. He had crinkles around his eyes, but a smile on his face.

"My boy."

"General Ba'kif," Thrawn whispered, hardly recognizing this version of his commander. The older man smiled and slipped an arm around Thrawn's shoulders.

"No status here, simply Ba'kif," Thrawn smiled, a sense of warmth blossoming in his chest. He began to look around, counting off the faces he recognized. Rik'ardok, Mak'ro, In'daro, Ali'astov, even Urf'ianico. There were non-Chiss there as well, though none that he could make out. He saw a man with brown hair and a crooked smile and began his way, before Ba'kif's hand pulled him back with a small bittersweet smile on his face.

"Wha..."

Ar'alani stepped forward "He's not here yet Raw," She explained before once again taking him in her arms and pulling him forward.

"Where are you taking me?" The two Chiss stayed silent, smiles on the both of their faces as they traveled through the comforting cold, surrounded by the voices of the dead. Then standing before them a stadium, an exact replica of the chamber where so many times he was called to explain his actions to the Aristocra, they stopped. He looked around with confusion, wondering what this was. Before the images began. Eli, Faro, Che'ri, every living prodigy of his sprung to live before them. Living out their dreams, and fulfilling their duties to protect their Acendancy. A smile on his lips, the young Raw turned from the spools of colour only to find another man in front of him, a wry smile on his lips. A grin broke out on his own usually stoic face.

"Hello Thrass."

FIRST DRAFT

OCC Thrawn, Thurfian redemption arc, random idea!

Coming Home

Snow drifted past them all, sticking to their shoes and hair. His nose stung with the prickle of cold, his shoulders ached, and his hands began to numb. But Eli did not notice as he looked up at the face of the former Grand Admiral who stood before him, his head bowed, hands clasped behind his back. His red eyes were closed as tears trickled down the planes of his face, and Thrawn was smiling. A feeling of relief settling in his bones.

A Chiss with a general air of distain and wariness moved forward, an embroidered cloak, a sun on each shoulder, secured with a golden tassel moved forward and into Thrawn's line of sight.

“Exile.”

His eyes lifted up, tears still flowing freely.

“Thurfian, Patriarch. You are the one who called for my exile. Rest assured that whatever lesson you wished to instill in me, I have learned tenfold. I wish only peace upon the Chiss. But I understand our ways.” He fell to his hands and knees. “But please, if you are to kill me, shoot me now, so that I may not know a single more day away from Her.” Thrawn's finger curled around the snow beneath his palms, as if to soak up as much of the cold of his mother world as he could.

Thurfian, the Chiss, took a step back. His red eyes widening by a fraction. His head tilted to the others, military and political leaders alike, before turning his eyes once again to the Chiss before him. His shoulders slumped.

“Mitth’raw’nuruodo …” he stopped, and took a breath, he squared his shoulders, “My brother, you will not die today.” Thurfian unclipped the cloak from his shoulders and…and placed it on Thrawn’s.

“Welcome home, Mitth’raw’nuruodo. Welcome back to Csilla.”

Excerpt from The Last Command by Timothy Zahn (1993):

 “But…It was so artistically done.”

Thrawn’s last line starts with the word “but,” almost as if under normal circumstances he would be furious that his plans had unraveled so spectacularly and without him knowing it. Instead, he says “but,” and he says it calmly, with a smile on his face. He can’t be mad, because to him, his opponent beat him with the same level of attention he put into his plans. Because it was masterful and because even he could not have predicted the genius of turning the Noghri against him and then silently infiltrating Wayland.

The irony here is that our heroes actually didn’t put that much thought into his defeat specifically. I would argue that Thrawn’s true opponent was Leia, as it was her skill in politics, negotiation and empathy that both turned the Noghri against Thrawn and got Mara Jade to reveal the location of Wayland. In a way, it was Leia’s art that Thrawn didn’t account for.

This line alone also makes me ask – what does Thrawn really care about? Looking only at Zahn’s Thrawn Trilogy and no other material, it is clear that Thrawn likes to win. He also likes to prove his worth, becoming one of the few high ranking, non-human imperial officials. But more than that, Thrawn loves art and psychology. He craves knowledge, surrounding himself by other cultures’ art in order to learn, to improve and to win.

So, did Thrawn really care about the Empire at all? What was his true motivation? There is little evidence in the trilogy to suggest that Thrawn cares a lot about ruling the galaxy or in reviving the Empire. In fact, Pellaeon even states at one point that Thrawn has created a new empire, different than the one before, with his ingenuity and proportional punishments for failure. So why is he doing it? Truthfully, I don’t think this question really answered in the trilogy, leaving it up to the readers to decide. But from his last line as he dies, I’d hazard to say Thrawn doesn’t care about the empire or superiority or anything of the sort. He cares only about the art of war. To him, war is a chessboard, a game for him to play. Sure, he loves to win but he can appreciate when he loses. And that is why he can’t be mad at his defeat. Because it was so artistically done.