10 ABY (Novel)

10 ABY is a dystopian novel by English author Thenorthernman. It is set in the eponymous year and focuses on a repressive, totalitarian regime. The story follows the life of one seemingly insignificant man, Wakari Tiber, a civil servant assigned the task of perpetuating the regime's propaganda by falsifying records and political literature. Tiber grows disillusioned with his meagre existence and so begins a rebellion against the system that leads to his arrest and torture.

Setting
10 ABY is set in the Galactic Empire, one of three Galactic super-states. The story occurs on Coruscant, itself a province of the Galactic Empire. Posters of Emperor Sidious, as he is now openly known as, bearing the caption LORD SIDIOUS IS WATCHING YOU, dominate the city landscapes, while two-way holovision (the holoscreen) dominates the "private" and public spaces of the populace. The Empire's people are in three classes — the Inner Council, the Outer Council, and the Serfs. The government controls the people via the Ministry of Propaganda, the workplace of protagonist Wakari Tiber, an Outer Council member. As in the Nazi and Stalinist regimes of reality, propaganda is pervasive; Tiber's job is rewriting historical documents to match the contemporary party line, the orthodoxy of which changes daily. It therefore includes destroying evidence, amending newspaper articles, deleting any references to the existence of people whom the government has claimed never existed.

The story begins during the early Coruscanti Spring of 10 ABY: "It was a bright cold day in the spring, and the time was one in the afternoon". The date is questionable, because it is what Wakari Tiber perceives. Historical facts and documents have been rewritten and revised so many times that even the correct year is uncertain. In the story's course, he concludes it as irrelevant, because the Empire can arbitrarily alter it; the year 10 ABY and its world are transmutable.

The novel does not render the Galaxy's full history to 10 ABY. It is assumed that the point of divergence from established canon is in the year 4 ABY. Wakari's recollections, and what he reads in The Truth About the Empire by Rufaan Tigellinus, reveal that after the, reveal that Coruscant fell to civil war, becoming part of the Imperial superstate. Simultaneously, the Yuuzhan Vong annexed many of the planets that had been under the control of the Rebels, forming an extension to their own empire. The third super-state, the Zann Empire, comprises the planets of the Zann Consortium. The three powers fight over the areas of the Galaxy that are left, forming and breaking alliances as convenient, and never ending the constant state of war.

Main Characters

 * Wakari Tiber - The novel's protagonist. A phelgmatic Everyman.
 * Kari - Wakari's Zeltron lover. A covert 'rebel from the waist down' who openly praises the Emperor and his doctrines, while secretly living in contradiction of them.
 * - The dictator of the Galactic Empire.
 * - A Sith Lord who deceives Wakari and Kari into believing that he is a member of the resistance, convinces them to join it, and later uses this against them to torture them. He convinces them that they must not only obey, but love the Emperor. Vader can be viewed as the novel's main antagonist.
 * - A former Grand Moff and now opponent of the Emperor. However, Tigellinus is most likely dead by 10 ABY and may only be being used for propaganda purposes.

Minor Characters

 * - An old Grand Moff killed and erased from the historical record.
 * Abbert - Wakari's colleague, a poet who was imprisoned for writing the word "Jedi" in one of his poems.
 * Weebul - A Rodian, who is ostensibly the owner of a junk shop in the Serf District; actually a member of the dreaded Emperor's Eyes.
 * Vysa - Wakari's ex-wife, a strong supporter of the Emperor.
 * - Vader's servant.
 * Xendi - Wakari's naive Eriaduan neighbour and colleague, described as an ideal Imperial subordinate because of his idiocy and suggestible nature. He is last seen in the Ministry of Loyalty after his children turn him in for thought crime, at which point he felt proud of their children for doing so and looks forward to being corrected.
 * Syme - Wakari's intelligent colleague. Is later vaporized (made so as to seem that he never existed), presumably because despite his strong orthodoxy and support of the party, he thinks too clearly and knows too much.