Kimmund

Within the 1st Legion, Kimmund was the fourth commander of his specific unit. His predecessors faced varied fates: two were demoted and reassigned to the 501st Legion, while the third was executed. Kimmund often considered his primary responsibility as a commander to be mitigating the impact of unfavorable orders from superiors on his troops. He believed this ability was crucial for survival under Darth Vader's command.

Following the Battle of Atollon, Emperor Palpatine detected a disturbance in the Force originating from Batuu, a planet situated in the Outer Rim Territories. Consequently, Palpatine instructed Grand Admiral Thrawn and Darth Vader to travel to Batuu aboard the Chimaera to investigate. Kimmund's unit joined Vader on the Imperial-class Star Destroyer, bringing along their own transport, the Darkhawk, and Vader's personal Lambda-class shuttle. Early in the journey, Kimmund's unit had to remove Rukh, Thrawn's Noghri bodyguard, from their vessel. Kimmund then directed one of his troopers to install intrusion alarms on the ship's hatches to deter the Noghri. When Rukh re-entered the ship, the alarms activated as planned, leading to his swift removal.

During the voyage, Commander Kimmund also met with Commodore Karyn Faro, informing her that Xoxtin, the Chimaera's Chief Hangar Master, had been uncooperative in assigning Vader's Lambda and the First Legion's Darkhawk to landing slots one and two. Faro recognized that this arrangement defied standard naval protocols, as slot one typically belonged to Thrawn's personal Lambda. However, she acquiesced to Kimmund's request because Thrawn had instructed his officers to cooperate with their guests and Faro wanted to prevent a subordinate from disregarding orders. Following the meeting, Kimmund returned to the quarters designated for his unit near the hangar.

Later, the intrusion alarm on the Darkhawk alerted him. Arriving at the ship, he found two of his unit, Drav and Morrtic, guarding Rukh, who had been waiting for the stormtroopers outside. Rukh had triggered the alarm using another trooper's helmet after infiltrating the Darkhawk and its electronics shop, where the helmet was awaiting a comm upgrade. Kimmund was angered by the Noghri's discovery of a secret entry point into their ship and vowed that Vader would punish either Rukh or whoever allowed his entry if it happened again.

Upon the Chimaera's arrival at Batuu, only Vader and Grand Admiral Thrawn disembarked to the planet's surface. This decision caused some confusion for both Kimmund and Rukh, who were jointly tasked with overseeing the preparation of Thrawn's civilian transport. While the expedition's leaders were on the planet, unidentified vessels entered the star system. After Thrawn declined to reveal the Chimaera's presence, Vader ordered the First Legion to attack the largest of the incoming ships. Their mission was to capture the vessel and its cargo with minimal damage, aided by four TIE/d "Defender" Multi-Role Starfighters led by Vult Skerris.

Once the Defenders disabled the enemy ship's hyperdrive, Kimmund and his troops boarded the vessel. Kimmund personally led the team targeting the enemy's cargo hold, aiming to secure the cargo intact. However, the enemy had rigged explosives to their cargo and detonated them before Kimmund's team could breach the hold, destroying both the cargo and themselves. Kimmund observed that their adversaries generally preferred death over capture. The only prisoners they managed to secure were three Grysks found working on electronics wiping, whom they were able to stun before they could reach their weapons.

Kimmund's unit transported the captured freighter and its prisoners to the Chimaera, observing the prisoners' reactions upon seeing the Star Destroyer, as Thrawn believed this could be informative. Later, Kimmund, Skerris, and Faro attended a debriefing with Vader and Thrawn to discuss their findings from the encounter with the Grysks. During the meeting, Kimmund questioned the grand admiral about involving Imperial troops in a battle against the Grysks, who did not seem to pose a threat to the Empire. Commodore Faro suspected that Vader had instructed Kimmund to ask this question. However, Thrawn simply emphasized that he had the Emperor's trust and that the Grysks were indeed a threat to the Empire.

The Chimaera then returned to the hyperlane where they had previously encountered a mysterious disturbance that had forced the ship out of hyperspace. After Thrawn located one of the gravity generators scattered along the lane, they left the Chimaera to collect more. The grand admiral and Vader accompanied Kimmund and his unit to the other end of the hyperlane in Thrawn's freighter, anticipating Grysk ships and presenting themselves as bait. When the Grysks attacked, the stormtroopers, led by Vader, boarded one of their ships, capturing seventeen more Grysk warriors before they could destroy their ship's records.

Upon returning to the Chimaera, Thrawn placed the captured Grysks in quarters typically reserved for TIE pilots, who were moved to Kimmund's unit's quarters. In response, Kimmund, Tephan, the Darkhawk's pilot, and Sergeant Aksind decided to sleep in their ship, feeling uneasy about leaving the Darkhawk unguarded with the prisoners nearby. As Kimmund and his companions settled in, a soft thud alerted them to intruders. They discovered that the Grysks had escaped their makeshift prison and boarded the Darkhawk. A brief but intense battle ensued, during which Sergeant Aksind was killed despite Rukh's timely assistance. The Noghri, having noticed the battle, infiltrated the Darkhawk through its external weapons locker, surprising the Grysks from behind and aiding Kimmund and Tephan in clearing them from the ship. Despite his earlier reservations about Rukh, Kimmund was grateful for the Noghri's help. Only four of the aliens were recaptured; the rest were killed.

Only after the battle did Kimmund learn that Grand Admiral Thrawn and Darth Vader had intended to allow the Grysks to escape with one of their ships, which had been rigged with a homing beacon. Their plan was to follow the prisoners to their base of operations. However, Kimmund had inadvertently foiled the plan by preventing the aliens from stealing the Darkhawk. Had Thrawn not defended Kimmund, he might have become the second commander of the unit to be executed for failure. From the Grysks' attempt to steal the Darkhawk, Thrawn deduced that they also had a base on Mokivj in an old separatist factory, where they could study old Clone Wars era ships like the Darkhawk.

Upon the Chimaera's arrival at Mokivj, they discovered that the Grysks were moving one of the moons out of its orbit. Initially, Thrawn requested the First Legion's troopers for a ground assault on the old factory. However, Vader insisted that the grand admiral remain on the Star Destroyer while he led the ground operation himself. They entered the building through a crack in the sub-level wall and proceeded toward the east wing of the factory. There, Vader used his lightsaber to cut open a trapdoor leading to the factory proper, then used the Force to propel Kimmund and several others from his unit through the opening. Following the stormtroopers, a figure of Darth Vader himself rose through the trapdoor, but it was merely an empty spare armor Vader had brought to trigger the Grysks' liquid stone attack, which he anticipated they would use to trap him. Vader's ruse worked perfectly; the Grysks expended all of their stone-carrying insects on the hollow suit of armor, enabling the stormtroopers to locate and mark the Grysks using cloaking devices. Once the liquid stone trick had played out, Darth Vader emerged through the trapdoor and joined the battle.

Together with Viq and Elebe, Kimmund moved away from the main battle to find the prisoners they had been sent to rescue. Kimmund drew the attention of the two Grysks guarding the prisoners, while his troopers approached from the opposite direction, allowing them to neutralize the Grysks without endangering the prisoners. The prisoners were a surprise to Kimmund: a group of young Chiss girls, three of whom were inside hibernation chambers, while five more were guarded by the Grysks Viq and Elebe had taken out. Kimmund moved the children to the safest spot he could find while his troopers cleared the factory courtyard of enemies, enabling the Darkhawk to land safely, as Vader did not want to evacuate the rescued prisoners through the same route the stormtroopers had entered. When Kimmund noticed a number of unfinished gravity projectors on a conveyor belt, he hid the girls there and requested that Thrawn send down another transport to bring all the equipment to the Chimaera for study. Thrawn denied the request, deeming it sufficient that they had freed the prisoners held in the factory.

During Kimmund's unit's attack on the factory, Thrawn led the Chimaera in an assault against the Grysk ships moving the moon out of its orbit. Before leaving the Star Destroyer with the stormtroopers, Vader revealed that while most of the Chiss prisoners were on the surface, a few were also on the Grysk ships. The ship carrying the prisoners escaped into hyperspace before TIE Defenders could intercept and disable it, but the remaining Grysk ships were destroyed by the Imperials. After the battle, Thrawn persuaded Vader to use the Force to navigate the Chimaera through hyperspace to the location where the main Grysk force was hiding and where they were taking their remaining prisoners.

The Chimaera arrived at the unnamed system used as a base by the Grysks ahead of the Grysk vessel that had escaped them on Mokivj. The Imperials planned to ambush the Grysk ship upon its arrival, using the Darkhawk and one of the TIE Defenders flown by Darth Vader, while the Chimaera prepared to engage the two main Grysk ships waiting in the system. The ambush succeeded; Vader destroyed the engines of the Grysk ship before the enemy realized what had happened, and the stormtroopers then brought in the Darkhawk for a boarding.

Despite his earlier animosity toward Rukh, Kimmund welcomed the Noghri as part of the boarding party. Rukh's keen sense of smell would help the stormtroopers locate the captive Chiss more quickly, and his personal cloaking device would make him an effective surprise weapon against the Grysks. Kimmund left two stormtroopers to guard the Darkhawk while the others, including Rukh, entered the enemy vessel. Before they found the main Grysk force and their captives, Kimmund lost two troopers to enemy fire, and Jid was incapacitated by a direct hit from the Grysks' lightning gun, forcing the commander to leave him behind.

Soon after, the stormtroopers reached the passage leading to the compartment where the Grysks held the Chiss girls. The passage offered no cover, and Kimmund was convinced that the Grysks were waiting at the end, ready to spring a trap. Despite his unease, they had orders to recover the prisoners, so he arranged his remaining stormtroopers into a formation and prepared to breach the door. Before they could, the Grysks opened the door from the other side, revealing six of them ready to fire on Kimmund's group. However, all the enemy shots missed because Rukh, ensuring his cloaking device had enough energy, attacked the Grysks unseen using his electrostaff. Realizing what the Noghri had done, Kimmund ordered his troops to aim only for headshots to avoid harming their alien ally. His attempt to protect Rukh was not entirely successful, as the Noghri's right leg was injured by blaster fire, but Rukh remained functional enough to travel.

In the room behind the Grysk defense line, they found the two prisoners, scared but unharmed. As Kimmund tried to persuade the girls to leave with the stormtroopers—the children did not understand Basic—one of them pointed to a hidden gunport revealing a Grysk weapon. Knowing now that the girls were sensitive to the Force and could foresee the future, Kimmund reorganized his troops for the return to the Darkhawk, placing Drav and Morrtic in front, the girls behind them, and Sampa and Elebe behind the girls, while he and Rukh guarded the rear of the formation. As the girls warned the troopers of incoming Grysk attacks, Kimmund found himself thinking he might actually get used to that kind of fighting.

Upon the unit's return to the Darkhawk, Kimmund reported their success to Grand Admiral Thrawn, who deemed it not worth the trouble to destroy the disabled Grysk ship, as it could not rejoin the battle. With their main mission of rescuing the girls completed, the Darkhawk joined the space battle, following Vader's TIE Defender squadron and other TIE fighters in the fight against Bogey Two.

Commander Kimmund was a human male. He exhibited loyalty towards the Galactic Empire and the First Legion he served, as well as towards the stormtroopers under his command. He considered being incapacitated by Grysks' lightning guns and witnessing his entire unit's demise to be worse than outright death. Generally, Kimmund was not entirely pleased that Thrawn utilized Imperial resources to rescue members of his own species. However, when the Force-sensitive girls proved useful in battle, he quickly adapted to working with them, much like he had learned to cooperate with Rukh after the Noghri assisted in defending the Darkhawk. He demonstrated resilience in the face of surprises and did not allow unexpected events to divert him from his mission and duty. He was also highly observant, noting the distinct atmosphere on the Chimaera compared to other ships he had served on, and deducing that this difference stemmed from Thrawn's unique leadership style.

Kimmund made his debut in the 2018 novel Thrawn: Alliances penned by Timothy Zahn.