Author's Note: This is my first time writing with Thrawn so please bear with me.

There was chaos and panic all around. People were shouting, children and babies crying and screaming for their parents. The very air seemed to taste of fear. There was a great explosion accompanied by dying screams.

Mitth'raw'nuruodo, better known by his core name as Thrawn, sat bolt upright in bed. He looked around, breathing heavily, only to realize he was still in his personal quarters aboard his flagship, the Chimaera. He was covered in a cold sweat, and his heart was racing.

It had been thirty-eight years since the destruction of the Outbound Flight, and yet his dreams were still occasionally haunted by it. It had been a needless massacre, done mainly to impress Darth Sidious, known better now as Emperor Palpatine.

It still haunted and bothered Thrawn. He had killed forty-nine thousand, nine hundred and forty-three innocent people that day all to try to gain favor of a man he would later come to hate. Yes, he hated the Emperor. The man had promised peace, security, prosperity, and equality. However, the Empire was oppressive, unstable, and, at least in his opinion, unfit as a form of galactic government. People had little freedom of speech about the actual Empire and Emperor himself, the bureaucrats were even more corrupt than they had been during the last days of the Old Republic, the Emperor was a tyrant, and the ruthless Darth Vader commanded the entire Imperial Navy and was the Emperor's second-in-command.

Thrawn shuddered at the thought of Vader. He had met him only a handful of times, but that had been more than enough. He was uncomfortable around the Emperor, but Vader... he felt true fear around Vader. He did, admittedly, respect Vader in some ways. The Dark Lord never gave his men an order himself would not do, he consulted the few he actually seemed to trust, he didn't expect them to be perfect like many other high ranking Imperials did, and he actually fought alongside his men right at the frontline. However, Vader took discipline to the extreme, often killing his own men, though Thrawn had to admit that it was rare that Vader ever killed one of his men simply because he was in a bad mood, though that did make him more likely to kill.

The Chiss shook his head. This was all in the past. Palpatine and Vader were dead. They had been dead for nearly ten years.

Now Thrawn was fighting the New Republic with Darth Vader's own children, Luke Skywalker and Leia Organa Solo, at the helm of the fledging government. Well, he had been fighting them, but an old and common enemy had returned.

Palpatine had returned as a clone.

Leia, knowing that they would need all the help they could get, had proposed an alliance with Thrawn. Neither of them wanted Palpatine back in power, but the New Republic was not fully prepared to face the Sith Master once more. Seeing no other option, they had turned to Thrawn, who understood Palpatine's ways better than anyone else aside from the Emperor himself. They would need a tactical mind like his if they were to be able to defeat Palpatine a second time. The Grand Admiral had agreed, and a reluctant truce was formed.

Sighing, he lay down and went back to sleep.

The next morning, a ship arrived. Thrawn waited in the hangar bay as it landed. The passengers came out, revealing themselves to be Jedi Master Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, and Chewbaca.

"Welcome."

As they walked through the corridors, they made an interesting group. Chewbaca the Wookie with his bowcaster, Han Solo in his pirate clothes, Corellian blood-stripes, a blaster at his belt, brown hair, and brown eyes, Luke Skywalker in his dark Jedi robes, lightsaber at his belt, blond hair, and sky blue eyes, and Thrawn in his white Grand Admiral uniform, black-blue hair, azure skin, and glowing red eyes.

As they stepped into Thrawn's quarters, Luke felt the Force leave.

"What?"

He reached for his lightsaber.

"That won't be necessary, Master Skywalker. There is no danger to you, it's simply my ysalamiri."

Luke then noticed the two furred lizards lounging nearby. He relaxed and slipped his lightsaber back to his belt.

Thrawn sat in his command chair and motioned to the chairs and couch he had had brought in for such an occasion.

"Please, sit."

They sat down, and Thrawn's com beeped.

"Yes?"

"Incoming transmission from Chancellor Solo, sir."

"Send it through."

Moments later a hologram of Leia Organa Solo appeared.

"Chancellor," Thrawn greeted, inclining his head in respect.

"Good day, Admiral. Palpatine has begun attacking ships on their way to and leaving Coruscant, military, civilian, medical, and so on. No ships are safe," Leia said, getting right down to business after the greeting.

Thrawn sat back, steepling his fingers, taking this in.

"He's trying to scare us. He's telling us he's not afraid to attack us."

Leia nodded.

"Yes, that's what we have come up with as well."

"We must show him we won't be so easily intimidated."

The others nodded in agreement.

"But just how are we supposed to do that? We're not ready to attack him directly yet."

The Chiss thought for a moment.

"I'll have to think about it."

"Very well. Luke, Han, and Chewbaca will stay aboard the Chimaera as my representatives. Inform me once you have something, and I shall do the same."

The hologram winked out, and Thrawn activated his comlink.

"Pellaeon, come here please."

"Right away, sir."

A few minutes later the vice admiral entered Thrawn's quarters. He stood an attention and saluted.

"Yes, sir?"

"Master Skywalker, General Solo, and Chewbaca will staying on board as Her Excellency's representatives. Please show them to the civilian deck and give them our finest guest quarters."

Pellaeon nodded.

"Yes, sir. Follow me, please."

Luke, Han, and Chewbaca followed Pellaeon.

A little later, Han and Luke were talking.

"What do you think of Thrawn?"

"He's not evil, if that's what you're asking, Han."

The ex-smuggler looked at his brother-in-law.

"He's just misguided. He believes in the Empire, but..."

"But?"

"But now that he's been working with us and seeing how the New Republic is, he's starting to doubt the Empire."

The older man let this process.

"You think there's hope for him?"

The Jedi nodded.

"If my father could be saved, then I'm sure Thrawn can too."