The Last Command (star Wars: The Thrawn Trilogy, #3)

The Last Command, the final volume of the Thrawn Trilogy, is set in the Star Wars universe after Return of the Jedi. Grand Admiral Thrawn revitalizes the Empire using a secret cloning facility beneath Mount Tantiss on the hidden planet Wayland, where Spaarti cloning cylinders produce battle-ready soldiers in as few as twenty days. Force-blocking lizards called ysalamiri stabilize the rapid growth process. Thrawn also allies with Joruus C'baoth, an insane clone of a long-dead Jedi Master who demands that Luke Skywalker, the last Jedi Knight, his sister Leia Organa Solo, and her unborn twins be delivered to him as apprentices.

Thrawn opens a coordinated offensive across multiple systems, using diversionary strikes to conceal his true target: the agricultural world of Ukio. Cloaked cruisers hidden beneath Ukio's planetary shield fire in sync with Thrawn's Star Destroyer, creating the illusion that Imperial weapons can penetrate an impenetrable barrier. The terrified Ukian leaders surrender. C'baoth senses Leia near the planet Filve and recklessly diverts an Imperial task force to chase the Millennium Falcon, Han and Leia's freighter. Leia and Han escape with Rogue Squadron, an elite New Republic starfighter unit, but Leia senses a disturbing Force presence directing the Imperial forces. Thrawn confronts C'baoth and promises to send a commando team to kidnap Leia and the twins from the Imperial Palace on Coruscant, the New Republic's capital.

Luke, operating undercover on the Imperial-controlled planet Berchest, encounters smuggler chief Talon Karrde and confirms that clones are moving through the city. Karrde agrees to share intelligence with the New Republic. Luke follows the clone trail to Poderis, where Thrawn springs a trap, but escapes in a hidden X-wing fighter with damaged systems. He diverts to Honoghr, the devastated homeworld of the Noghri, small gray-skinned aliens the Empire has kept dependent through ecological sabotage. Luke discovers the Noghri are secretly cultivating clean land using techniques Leia provided and has a disturbing Force vision of Leia in danger.

On Coruscant, Mara Jade, a former personal agent of the Emperor known as the Emperor's Hand, awakens after a month of medical treatment, haunted by the Emperor's dying telepathic command to kill Luke. When Leia visits, Mara confesses her former identity and her intent to kill Luke. Leia suggests the compulsion may be a residual command implanted at the Emperor's death rather than Mara's own desire; Mara rejects this but is shaken. Shortly after, Thrawn's commando team infiltrates the Palace through a secret entrance the Emperor built. Mara detects the intruders and uses hidden passageways to flank them, telepathically urging Leia to feign surrender before attacking from behind. The kidnapping fails, but the dying team leader identifies Mara as an Imperial agent, leading to her house arrest. Thrawn considers this acceptable: Mara is now neutralized and unable to share her knowledge of Wayland.

Leia gives birth to twins Jacen and Jaina, discovering during labor that they share a deep Force bond. The New Republic suffers mounting losses as Thrawn's offensive continues. Karrde works to organize the galaxy's smuggling groups into a coalition. At a meeting on Trogan, Imperial troops attack and kill one of the smugglers, galvanizing several leaders to join. The attack is engineered by Niles Ferrier, a ship thief secretly working for Thrawn, but it backfires: Thrawn had ordered the garrison to leave the meeting alone, and the assault unites the smugglers against the Empire.

Mara reveals that the Emperor's storehouse on Wayland contains at least twenty thousand cloning cylinders. She cannot provide coordinates but believes she can reconstruct the route. Luke, Han, their friend Lando Calrissian, Chewbacca (Han's Wookiee copilot), and Mara depart aboard the Falcon without authorization, recognizing that Delta Source, a mysterious intelligence leak within the Palace, would compromise any plan discussed through official channels. Leia summons Noghri warriors to guard herself and the twins.

Thrawn deploys cloaked asteroids into orbit around Coruscant. Only 22 are real, but faked launches suggest nearly 300, effectively placing the capital under siege. General Garm Bel Iblis, a legendary commander who recently rejoined the New Republic, takes charge of the defense after Mon Mothma, the New Republic's chief political leader, personally requests his help.

On Coruscant, Leia, her aide and childhood friend Winter, Bel Iblis, and Ghent, a young computer hacker from Karrde's organization, work to identify Delta Source. After eliminating every human suspect, Leia notices that ch'hala trees lining the Grand Corridor shift color in response to sound. Technicians unearth an organic microphone system buried in the trees' roots, planted by the Emperor, invisible to standard security sweeps. The trees are removed, ending the leak.

C'baoth travels to Wayland and mentally enslaves Imperial General Covell, replacing the officer's personality entirely. He reveals his true ambition: to create armies of cloned minds he can dominate through the Force, since clones from the same template share nearly identical mental patterns. Thrawn also moves to fracture Karrde's coalition by planting forged evidence aboard the Wild Karrde, Karrde's flagship, implicating Karrde in the Trogan attack. At a subsequent smuggler meeting, Ferrier accidentally reveals his own involvement, and the smugglers turn on him. Karrde's credibility is restored.

The Wayland expedition treks through hostile forest toward Mount Tantiss. Luke trains Mara in Jedi techniques and corrects her understanding of the Emperor's death: Vader lifted the Emperor and threw him to save Luke, not the other way around. Near the mountain, Luke senses the ysalamiri field, confirming he will lose his abilities inside. The team negotiates passage with the native Myneyrshi and Psadans, enters through a rear air intake, and splits up: Lando and Chewbacca plant explosives in the cloning cavern while Luke and Mara ride an elevator to the throne room.

C'baoth waits on the Emperor's throne. He destroys the mountain's ysalamiri with a remote activator, restoring the Force, and reveals a clone of Luke grown from the hand Luke lost at Cloud City, wielding Luke's original lightsaber. The clone creates debilitating mental interference through Force resonance. Leia arrives with Karrde aboard the Wild Karrde, having deduced that ysalamiri enable the rapid cloning and that Luke will be powerless inside the mountain. She enters the throne room as C'baoth unleashes devastating attacks, collapsing sections of ceiling and blasting everyone with Force lightning. Mara uses the Force to snatch Leia's dropped lightsaber and strikes down the clone. The Emperor's voice in her mind falls silent: By killing Luke's clone, she has fulfilled the command, and the compulsion that has haunted her releases at last. She then charges C'baoth. Leia guides her telepathically through flying debris while Luke frees Karrde's vornskrs, Force-sensitive predators, to distract C'baoth. Mara delivers the killing blow.

At the Battle of Bilbringi, Thrawn has anticipated the New Republic's true target and positioned his fleet to ambush New Republic Admiral Ackbar's forces. Karrde's smuggler ships, already inside the shipyard posing as legitimate freighters, coordinate with Commander Wedge Antilles and Rogue Squadron to breach the orbital Golan II defense platforms. As the battle rages, Captain Pellaeon, Thrawn's second-in-command, reads an urgent report revealing the Noghri uprising at Wayland. In that instant, Thrawn's own Noghri bodyguard Rukh stabs him from behind, declaring vengeance for the Empire's treachery against his people. Pellaeon, unable to match his commander's genius, orders a full Imperial retreat.

The Wayland team escapes as the cloning facility's destruction triggers a cascading reactor failure that brings Mount Tantiss down. Luke gives Mara his father's original lightsaber as both a tool for her emerging Jedi training and a symbol of releasing the past. Mara accepts a role as liaison between Karrde's coalition and the New Republic, her identity no longer defined by the Emperor's commands but by her own choices.