From A Certain Point of View: The Empire Strikes Back by various (Part 3/8)

From A Certain Point of View: The Empire Strikes Back by various (Part 3/8)

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In this third set of five short stories, we get two from the perspective of Imperials (Veers and Piett), one from a naturalist on Hoth, a much longer story about Wedge and Wes rebuilding Red Squadron, and a cute but nonsensical comic strip. The most fascinating thing about these five were the two from Veers and Piett--each sees the back of Vader's exposed head and each has a totally different reaction to the revelation that Vader is scarred and damaged physically. I never thought before about how seeing Vader's exposed skull could lead to such insanely different perspectives. As for me, if I saw him like that I would just be terrified, like he was more of a boogey man than I had even dreamed of! The Red Squadron story is a bit of a side-shoot but it provides the space battle that people always yearn for. And the naturalist story was not what I had hoped for but was still a delight regardless. In other words, this collection continues to please!!

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"The Truest Duty" by Christie Golden

Remember how I said not all the Imperial-sided stories include a crisis of faith? Well, here ya go!! General Maximilian Veers shows what it means to be Imperial to your core. As the narrative puts it, "Years of service in the Empire's military had shaped and claimed him, body and soul." And he is loyal to Vader every single difficult step of the way, believing that he will never let the Sith Lord down. "If the elite troopers aboard Vader's flagship, the Executor, were known as Vader's Fist, then Veers liked to think of himself as Vader's Dagger: silent, elegant, and lethal." Interestingly enough though, "Veers was perfectly well aware that Darth Vader was not a god. On more than one occasion, while reporting to the Dark Lord when he was in his meditation chamber, Veers had caught a glimpse of Lord Vader donning his helm. There was only a man in there; one who had suffered horribly, whose skin was nothing but angry red scar tissue. He had bled, had burned; had felt agonizing pain. And he had endured. Veers did not know the man Darth Vader had been, before the helm and armor and glowing red lightsaber, but it did not matter to him. Darth Vader was who had been born from that unimaginable suffering. He was no stranger to violence or malice. And all Lord Vader demanded of those who served was respect, obedience, and success." 

It's amazing how incredibly different this view on the human side of Vader is when compared to Piett's view on it. Where Veers recognizes the power and strength required to overcome such an intense hardship, Piett pities what he sees as a broken man. They're both right in a sense, but I definitely wouldn't let Vader know even if I did pity him. 

Although he has a zealotous view on Vader and serving him, Veers still makes several good points about leadership in general that are just plain good sense. "There were those who led, and those who followed. Sometimes a person was one, sometimes the other. It was important, Veers had learned, to excel in either role." "All powerful beings relied upon the obedience and willing service of others equally remarkable." "There would be time to mourn the fallen later, when those still living had achieved what they had died for." All these "mottos" along with his perspective on Vader's physical brokenness, put Veers on another tier for me, he's smart, sharp as a tack, and knows the importance of doing the job right! If I wasn't a huge fan of Veers before, I certainly am now!!

We get some details on AT-ATs as well, since these are Veers's babies. "Forty armed and armored troops were ensconced within the transport's belly, and stationed along with Veers in the front-facing command center were TK-5187 and TK-7834 (Lastok), the finest gunner and pilot Veers could find." TS-4068 was the captain of the squad in Veers' own AT-AT. Hard to believe there are so many troopers in the bellies of these beasts since we only ever really see the cockpits...question: how do the troopers get down from the belly??...

Even at the end of the story, after the cockpit of Veers' AT-AT gets rammed by a Rebel snowspeeder-on-fire, he focuses on not failing Vader (while trying to survive his grave injuries). "No. I must not fail Lord Vader. He stopped resisting the pain and welcomed it instead. As Vader would. As Vader must have once. His mind flashed to the glimpses of the man inside the helm. His lord had not just survived unbearable torment but used it to reshape himself. Become the stronger for the suffering." So will Veers survive near-death??? Will he actually be able to grow in strength and conviction as a result of his injuries as Vader did??? I don't know if we'll ever find out...

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"A Naturalist on Hoth" by Hank Green

Not the thorough explanation of how in the world Hoth works as an ecosystem that I was hoping for, but an intriguing story nonetheless!! Warning: This one's going to be long because I find the subject so incredibly fascinating!! We learn about a naturalist, Kell Tolkani, who falls in love with Hoth and its eccentricities. As he puts it, "Of all of the things to fall in love with, this hostile, bitter rock was not the one I expected." He grew up in an Incom company town surrounded by kids who wanted to grow up to be pilots. But all he ever wanted to do was study nature. And his parents were all for it, because as he says, "The instability of the Clone Wars had been good for Incom, but bad for pilots, and if I didn't show interest in dying in a cockpit, they weren't going to push me." He went to a university on Corellia for his studies and was delighted to finally be surrounded by people that shared his "weird" interests.

From Kell's perspective, "starfighters looked clumsy and brutish compared with even the ugliest, lumbering sand slug or the most garish, invasive mynock. The complexity of nature far surpasses the most marvelous of human engineering. An ecosystem leaning on itself into a structure so magnificent that it can never be fully understood is a force so great that it both  tears and lifts me." I love how he's so driven by the intricacies and mysteries of nature as that was totally me in college and grad school!! And I adore this quote, "I've never felt [the Force], but I can see all of the folds and crevices where it must hide." So although not Force-sensitive, he witnesses the Force itself in all the beautiful wonders of nature! Sounds a bit like Yoda from the Rugosa short story, "Sharing the Same Face," in Clone Wars: Tales of Light and Dark.

His studies focused on sand slug physiology as "they were far better at absorbing and retaining water than any system devised by even the most innovative moisture farmers." Sand slugs are "striped dark and light blue, almost like a tropical flower" and are covered in "wet, sticky mucus." It turns out that the sand slugs occasionally burrow deep down in the sand, harden, and lose all color, "appearing to be nothing more than a dark brown pebble." But this little pebble then does something miraculous. It sends tendrils out from its body, shrinking its core down to only 50 mm across. Once it rains, these filaments soak up the water and retract, leaving a full-sized mucusy slug to once again roam atop the sand! Fascinating! 

At first, Kell figured the Empire could use this knowledge just as well as anybody (he was a teen when the Republic dissolved), but then Alderaan happened and he realized just how evil the Empire was. So when Rebels came a-calling, he joined up with a team that included a geologist (Tev, of a compact, furry species), a meteorologist, two soldiers (Xaime and Anita), and a commander (Habria). Their goal? To scout out Candidate 19.2 a.k.a. Hoth. In General Jan Dodonna's words, "an iceball planet in an actively forming solar system. It's treacherous. Constant meteorite impacts create thermal signatures that would make it easier to hide. However, it will be difficult to survive. It is frozen from equator to pole, with glaciers covering the majority of the surface." The meteorologist speaks up and notes that if the glaciers are water, there must be snow and thus water evaporating somewhere. And after Dodonna mentions possible big predators, the naturalist thinks, "There was no way an iceball planet would have the ecology necessary to support an apex predator." Yes!!! Exactly!!! I want to know how this works!!! And we get some answers but not a full explanation. I love how the naturalist thinks, after this reveal, "my interest in this mission had gone from Well, maybe I'll get to see some interesting lichen, to I need to get to this planet right now." So cute!! And I found it really interesting that the reason Hoth is surrounded by asteroids and is bombarded often by meteorites is because it is in a still-forming solar system. Love how much sense this makes!

Once there, they track a tauntaun through the wasteland and at one point the creature plays dead to get them off its tail, very interesting. And apparently tauntauns have extreme infrared radiation sensitivity--which is why it played dead. It knew the team was following it, even from far away!

So our explanation of how Hoth works revolves around the sapphire ice worm, a keystone species. "These worms can burrow through miles of glacier in search of food, and they leave behind small channels, smaller than the width of my finger. But as warm air rushes up and out after being heated by the interior of the planet, these tiny tunnels widen. Over decades, or even centuries, they become massive. They become a home for the entire subterranean ecosystem of Hoth. They build their world and have no idea that they do it." So then tell us about this subterranean ecosystem, you cowards!!! Alright, alright, I get it, we can't know everything and maybe the Rebels themselves didn't know all that much to begin with, but still...I need to know!!

A cool connection is Kell telling Commander Habria in regards to Han leaving on a tauntaun to go find Luke, "'He'll need to closely monitor the animal's vitals if they both want to make it back alive.' My commander then repeated my concern to him, louder, and abbreviated, 'Your tauntaun'll freeze before you reach the first marker.' The man had nothing kind to say in reply." Haha!! a.k.a. "Then I'll see you in Hell!"

As time goes by, the naturalist has his own crisis of faith involving him as part of the human species. He sees the carelessness with which some of the Rebels, including Han, treat the tauntauns and this does not sit well with him at all! So, with his profound fascination with Hoth at his side, he decides to forego escaping with the rest of the Rebellion and stays behind on the iceball to continue unraveling the mysteries it holds. "When the war is over, send someone for me. I'll be in the worm caves with the tauntauns. It's where I belong." Ahhh!! This would so be me...except for wanting to stay somewhere so freaking cold haha.

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"The Dragonsnake Saves R2" by Katie Cook

This one was the comic inclusion for this volume and it was cute, but weird. The Dagobah Dragonsnake is chilling under water when R2 splooshes in and frightens him. He hears Luke calling for his droid, grabs the droid in his teeth, and spits him back up on land...followed by a heart in a thought bubble...wait, huh??? He even looks like he's either waving or blowing a kiss to R2...I just don't get it. But the last panel is adorable regardless.

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"For the Last Time" by Beth Revis

Here we get Admiral Piett's point of view just after his promotion and Ozzel's demise. It's interesting to get Piett's perspective because in a story later in the book starring Rae Sloane, we get a completely different take on the man, one that's not so flattering.

Piett thinks, "There were two types of men, just as there were two types of power. It was one of the first lessons Piett had learned as a junior officer serving under Grand Moff Tarkin himself: People are ruled either through fear or through a false sense of security. The men who had been given their power like a piece of candy to an obedient child--those men thought they were secure. But the men who took their power knew how to make a fist. Those who believed themselves safe were weak. Those who lived in fear were strong." So it is blatantly clear that Piett sees himself as a man with true power who knows how to take advantage of various situations to his benefit. He believes he deserves his newfound position whereas Ozzel did not. I'll give him this, the narrative does explain that, "He had planted the seeds to make Ozzel dismiss Hoth, thanks to an influx of dead ends piling up on his desk from Piett's own subordinates. He had moved those holo-chess pieces." Very intriguing...so as where it would appear on the surface that Piett was handed command "like a piece of candy to an obedient child," perhaps he did maneuver and take it...

But the real crux of this story is Piett seeing the back of Vader's exposed head and the man realizing that he pities the dark lord...something that makes him honestly sick. "Raw, wrinkled skin was streaked with red veins and painful-looking welts. A tall neckpiece seemed to do the work of Lord Vader's spine, supporting the bulbous mass of flesh stretched over the patchwork skull. Piett's calculating mind  counted more than a dozen electrode-bolts screwed into the neckpiece, connecting to Lord Vader's nerves." "He's a walking corpse, Piett thought." "What turns a man into such a monster? What makes a man choose this over death? Death seemed easy. [...] But this way of living...Why would Lord Vader choose such pain?" Whereas Veers (see my review of the "Truest Duty" above) took this reality as strength and power that Vader possessed more strongly than anyone else alive, Piett on the other hand thinks, "But the pale white flesh with a waxy sheen, so much like a rotting cadaver... That had made Lord Vader a man. Mortal. Pitiable. Weak." Yikes!!! Piett better be really careful with what he thinks and feels around Vader, cuz I'm definitely gonna go with Veers on this one!! Piett even thinks about how perhaps he could usurp Vader since his power of fear over Piett was now gone. Yeah, dream on, Piett, dream on...

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"Rendezvous Point" by Jason Fry

This was the longest story so far and was quite enjoyable, although it was more of an off-shoot side story than anything--guess since there's no space battle in Empire Strikes Back they had to create one just for the sake of it. *sigh* It was a fun story but as happens with all written down space battles, I had a hard time following what was going on in the heat of the action--needless to say, I was extra excited about this Empire Strikes Back collection because there were no space battles to expound upon 5 different ways. Oh well, lol. We see Wedge and Wes Janson putting together a new Red Squadron post-Hoth-decimation of most of the available pilots. Their goal is to take out a pirate group that has commandeered some Rebellion ships. A woman called the Contessa is involved and I want to know SO much more about her but we only get a small snippet. She was part of a ruling family of her world that was overtaken by the Empire. The "liberated" people saw the Imperials as their saviors but they were of course enslaved. She still goes by Contessa to remind herself that even her power and privilege could not save her or her people from the tyranny and savagery of the Empire. There's also some really good humor in this one which was fun.

We start off with Wedge experiencing the great discomforts of the reality of being a starpilot. For example, his heat switch is stuck to full blast and he's sweating profusely in his cockpit, his clothes absorbing it all in an icky mess. And after talking to himself, his droid asks if he needs a diagnostic check. Haha!!

Then Wedge begins dwelling on the Battle of Hoth and all who were lost in the fight, including his best friend Hobbie. There's even reminiscing about Sabine's rescue of the two from Skystrike Academy! And we get some further insight into the actual moment of Wedge's decision to defect from the Empire, "He remembered reaching for his TIE helmet and realizing his hands were shaking. The idea of flying an Imperial fighter suddenly struck him as obscene. The Empire kept order, but that order was a product of terror. And it was training him to be an agent of that terror. That was the moment Wedge had vowed--first only to himself, then later to Hobbie--not to let that happen."

Another great bit of humor was Wedge and Wes discussing the sauna-like climatic conditions of working on Home One, a Mon Calamari ship. "Conditions humans and many other species considered comfortable struck Mon Calamari as borderline arctic and arid, leading to constant negotiations."

Members of the new Red Squadron include: Will Scotian (Red Eight), Bela Elar (a Twi'lek), Keyser Salm (Red Two), Barlon Hightower (Red Ten), Cinda Tarheel (Red Twelve), Sila Kott (Red Three), Ix Ixstra (Red Six), Grizz Frix, Penn Zowlie (Red Nine), and Tomer Darpen (Red Seven). Wedge and Wes discuss each of these pilots in turn and my favorite is Penn Zowlie--"'from some asteroid cluster on the edge of Wild Space. Spent his childhood jumping hoversleds and vac-skims from rock to rock.' [...] Janson grinned, 'Bush pilot from the back of beyond? Big dreams, runs off to join the Alliance? I just found the next Luke Skywalker.'" Love this so much!!

So the pirates' origin "'is probably the Vosch Cluster [...] They've blazed a hyperspace lane to the trade worlds around Caldra Prime and Caldra Tertius. We're right here in the middle.' Mothma nodded, 'The Vosch worlds were always poor, and then their economies were hammered by the Clone Wars. [...] and of course the Empire never cared. Little wonder they've turned to piracy.'" Such a sad reality of war and its hardships.

One thing that bugged me about this story was the fact that so many of these new pilots perished in the battle with the pirates...all so the Rebel fleet could stay in place, allowing those who had not yet found the fleet more time to rendezvous. So why were some peoples' lives more important than others?? This did not sit well with me at all.

Trivia: Wedge's astromech is R5-G8. Rogue Squadron pilots that died at Hoth include Zev Senesca, Kit Valent, and Hobbie Klivian. Hobbie and Wedge fought with Phoenix Squadron at Perimako Major and Distilon as well as Atollon and a dozen other worlds.

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Another great set of intriguing and engaging short stories!! Loving the different perspectives even within the Rebellion and the Empire--being on one side or the other does not make you a very specific kind of person, there's variety in the type of people on either side. The next set of 5 continues to excel!! And I cannot wait to share my thoughts on them!