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It should all have gone differently. Yes, he was an admiral now, had surpassed his oft-ridiculed childhood dreams far beyond everybody’s imagination. The first admiral from Axxila in recent history (and possibly in forever). Who had the last laugh now? By all accounts, he should have been brimming with pride and joy, should have been in the officer’s mess buying rounds for everyone and doing his morning rotation somewhat worse for the wear. Should have been happy. But that was impossible. He had been off rotation for a couple of hours, but there was no chance of getting any sleep. Whenever he closed his eyes, all the unbidden images flooded him. Veers somehow looking small and lost in the medbay bed. Ozzel. Of course the man had been a thrice-damned fool, but, kriff, nobody deserved such a death. You’re next, Piett. His Lordship giveth and his Lordship taketh away.
So instead of trying to get some shut-eye, Piett had tried to write condolence holomails to the relatives of the deceased officers. He could’ve palmed this task off onto a hapless staff officer, but he owed it to those who lost their lives in the battle, even if junior officers only got the standard:
On behalf of the Imperial Navy, I regret to inform you of the passing of your [relationship] [rank] [full name], who valiantly gave their life for the Empire. The Imperial Navy will ensure that [rank] [surname]‘s sacrifice was not in vain.
Glory to the Empire!
Piett was not even expected to sign his name but did so anyway because, in the absence of any personal note, perhaps the fact that an admiral had cared enough to write the message himself would give at least a small comfort to a grieving family. For senior officers, naturally, personalisation and faux politeness were expected. Admirals’ wives would probably take offence at a standardised condolence message, and the last thing Piett needed now was a scandal because he had not observed the appropriately obsequious and fawning Core etiquette. And of course, he could hardly tell Mrs Ozzel her husband ‘died by force choking’. Thankfully, there were enough suitable euphemisms: stroke, heart attack, aneurysm, anaphylactic shock, you name it. Although, admittedly, it would be rather hilarious if Piett were executed by Lord Vader for failing to be polite. Stars, had his sense of humour always been this morbid, or was it just the lack of sleep talking?
Dear Mrs Ozzel,
With great regret I have to inform you of the passing of your husband, Admiral Kendal Ozzel. During a routine operation, Admiral Ozzel suffered a heart attack from which, despite the best efforts of medical personnel, he could not be resuscitated. On behalf of the Imperial Navy, please accept my sincerest condolences for your loss. Admiral Ozzel will remain in our thoughts.
Your obedient servant,
Adm Firmus Piett
The final version was probably still far too short, too impersonal, and bordering on rudeness, but Piett was sick and tired of drafting. Why was he expected to spend 15 minutes on Ozzel when the holomails for all of the junior officers had taken less time? And why was a competent junior officer not deserving enough of a ‘please accept my sincerest condolences’ whilst an incompetent fool of an admiral ‘will remain in our thoughts’?
Kriff, why had he signed up for this in the first place? He wasn’t sure whether he only meant the blasted condolence holomails (that had never in the history of the galaxy managed to comfort or console anyone); or whether this was another bout of what his mother had used to call ‘questionings’, back when Piett had been a small boy and ‘why?’ his favourite question.
Blast, questioning everything and running for the hills at the first sign of trouble was what silly youths did and, as he got rather rudely reminded every time he looked in the mirror, he was well past that age. So why was he suddenly more anxious than as a young man on Axxila, when he didn’t know where his next meal would come from? Perhaps because your commanding officer expects the impossible and executes anyone that can’t deliver. So far Piett had managed to be mostly competent (or at least not overtly incompetent in front of Lord Vader) but whether he’d be able to hack it as an admiral was another matter entirely. Realistically, there were only two outcomes: he either died a disgrace or lived long enough to be whisked away to some desk job on Coruscant.
Kriff, the possibility of being forced to deal with the Admiralty on a daily basis made death-by-force-choking seem appealing. No matter how much he polished his accent or adopted their mannerisms, most Coreworlders would forever consider him Outer Rim scum. Because you can take the boy out of the Rim, but you can’t take the Rim out of the boy. Just like how Ozzel had snickered when Piett had been introduced to him as captain, so would the Joint Chiefs laugh when he would be introduced as the new admiral of Death Squadron. Whilst the Empire had certainly made improvements on the Republic ethos of ‘made by the Core for the Core’, sometimes the Empire seemed light-years away from being a meritocracy. Far too often still, incompetent Coreworlders got plum naval postings because they were friends with some Moff or claimed to be a ‘personal acquaintance’ of his Majesty from days long past. That is how the galaxy is, Firmus, why have you not accepted that? Separated into the Have-its and the Have-nots. And you know which group you belong to.
These thoughts didn’t make any objective sense, he knew that; by all accounts he had ‘made it’, but it still seemed as if someone could snatch his achievements away from him before he could say ‘banthabrain’. It wasn’t inconceivable that someone like him could achieve something as prestigious as an admiralship, thank you very much. Why then did it feel less like reality and more like a dream he could wake up from at any moment? A dream or a nightmare? Would things have turned out better if he had never pointed out the damn probe droid? If Hoth had never happened? At least in that case Veers would be his hale and hearty self again, rather than the shell he currently was. And would his own life really be so horrible if he woke up and found himself being a captain again? Had serving under Ozzel truly been a worse fate than whatever disasters his future promised? Kriff, even captaining a Super Star Destroyer was far above what anyone (except Lord Vader, it seemed) had thought him capable of. Why hadn’t that been enough for him? Why was he never happy with anything he achieved? Why did he always feel the need to be better, to strive for more? Why did he continue to have that hunger for recognition? Look where it will lead you: to your grave. Will you be happy then, Firmus? You should have stayed on Axxila, it would have been better for everyone.
What would his life have looked like, had he never joined the Empire? Would he still be with the Axxila Antipirate Fleet? Or would he have been a civilian with a regular old job instead? Would he have had a family? A partner? Children? Would he have been happier being just another obscurity on a backwater planet? Would he have become a radically different person? A person his current self would be ashamed of? Would he have been strong enough to resist or, as seemed to be the case for most men of his social background, would he eventually have been swallowed by the Axxilan underbelly of crime? Would he have become the part of the very things he fought today: spice runners, slavers, rebels? After more than half of his life in service to the Empire, it was very difficult to imagine an alternative Firmus Piett. There was no denying it, the Empire had shaped him, turned him into who he was today—for better or worse. It had given him a sense of purpose when he had been aimless, drifting, lost. It had given him hope, a chance to be someone, a future. It had given him camaraderie, friendships, a sense of belonging.
But you could have had all of that on Axxila. What has the Empire given you, Firmus, that the Antipirate Fleet never could? Somehow the Empire felt larger than life in a way the Antipirate Fleet never did. The sheer size of the Empire certainly played into that. But that was not all. Yes, the Antipirate Fleet had given him a sense of identity, but it was in the negative: he had been against pirates, rather than for something. With the Empire, it was entirely different, it was an identity in the positive sense: to be an Imperial meant valuing stability, security and order; and even though Piett did not always agree with everything that was being done in the name of these ideals, they were certainly worth striving for. So, if asked, he would naturally describe himself as a proud Imperial; that was of course the politically prudent answer (you never knew who was asking) but it was also a sincere answer. Naturally, the Empire was not without its flaws—he would be the last to deny that—but it was still an overall improvement over the Republic, especially for the Outer Rim. Outer Rim senators had never carried political clout in the Senate and worse, they had spent most of their time fighting amongst themselves rather than mount a united front to counterbalance Core interests. If one was charitable, the Republic had tried but hadn’t been able to control the Rim; if one was cynical, the Republic simply hadn’t cared. That was why, unlike his parents, young Piett had never seen himself a part of the Republic; he had simply been Axxilan, nothing more, nothing less. But the Republic was dead and gone, consigned to the scrapheap of history; and Axxila was far away.
The Empire was his past, his present, his future, his life, him. It had allowed him to rise above his roots, to believe in something greater than his homeworld, to transcend a predetermined life of crime. That’s why being reminded of his roots hurt so much; because it showed him that no matter what his head said, he remained Axxilan at heart; because it meant that origins still defined people; because it dragged him back down into the gutter he escaped from. To the blazes with those arrogant Coreworlders! He would serve the Empire as best as he could; and if others thought that he was best suited to do that as admiral of Death Squadron, then so be it. Was his promotion not evidence that the Empire could become a working meritocracy? Ultimately, did it really matter whether he died in battle or at the hands of Lord Vader? At least he could rest assured that he had lived and died on his own merits. How many people could say the same?