Thrawn Chimaera : Galactic Civil War

Chapter Eleven

The following days after her contact with Organa were truly dreadful. Ziinuuvitas was still worried about what Thrawn truly saw in her, doing everything she could do avoid the blue man... which meant she wasn't doing her job for the rebels, and probably neither for him.

But she tried. She refused the idea of breaking into his office, which was inside his private quarters anyway. She never even saw the light from his quarters, so there was no way she would do such thing. However, she could try to slice through her room, and each day she spent hours at night trying.

She had been tasked with overseeing the TIE Defender project, a secret thing on its way to be real, a pet project of Thrawn who had gained yet another argument after studying the profile of all TIE pilots that defected or tried. They had one thing in common: they all had previously complained about the lack of a hyperdrive and deflector shields, something they shared with the profile of others marked as possible defectors. She had studied those profiles herself- part of her imperial job as member of the ISB.

The new prototype would have three wings attached to the usual ball-shaped cockpit, and be equipped with deflector shields and a hyperdrive. It was still a prototype, but the results were impressive and alarming: the thing was much faster than the Rebellion's Y-Wings, and was also heavily armed, making it a fighter-bomber-interceptor thing.

It was brilliant.

The navigation panel seemed a bit catchy in her opinion, but she wasn't supposed to know a lot of those things, so she said nothing. Besides, if that made the piloting more difficult, it was a good thing for the rebels. Still, few of those could easily cause a lot of damage in a large area.

The other issue was, informing the Rebellion about those: it was impossible to steal the schematics, too much control in the room. But just telling them about it would create panic as they wouldn't have proper details to study. And panic could lead to mistakes, like trying to sabotage the production which would alert the Empire for a mole.
Letting them know too early would expose her soon or later.

She knew better than that, based on previous experiences. She had to come up with something solid before passing that information to them.

And in the meanwhile, she was there, trying the impossible while actively helping the enemy. She felt like a traitor, swimming alone in the crowd of strange cold faces that everyday passed by her.
Everything was both too big and small, the Imperial design overwhelming her senses.

One week passed. Operations in Lothal carried on, but there was no sign of the Phoenix Squadron for now. There were others, small folk, citizens attempting to protest that were all quickly silenced.

Two weeks, and now she also had to worry about her stims. They wouldn't last forever, as much as she tried to extend the time between each use.

The good thing was that Thrawn seemed to grant her wish of keeping distance from him: he probably read something on her braid, she thought, or something, that told him as much. Either that or he also didn't feel like dealing with her. Whatever it was, he had been putting a lot of distance, ignoring her as much as possible. Sometimes she had the impression he was watching her, but each time she dared to look and see if it was the case, she would find him occupied or not even there anymore.

It seemed he had also avoided giving her any work that involved dealing with him more than the absolute necessary, which was good, but on the other hand prevented her from getting closer to spy on him.

Was he upset? Maybe.
She certainly was, and as much as Ziinuuvitas hated to admit, they were not that different.

Something was off, this was strange, and she felt a heavy energy in the air. Yet in the end, the captain decided it was for the best, as long as it kept her cover. Their little argument after Ryloth was reason enough for him to send her away for insubordination, or worse if he wanted. She should never talk like that to any superior, even less glaring and talking against the way things are.