Warlord Zsinj is a supporting antagonist in the Star Wars Legends continuity. He is the main antagonist of the "Wraith Squadron" trilogy of Star Wars: X-Wing novels and of Star Wars: The Courtship of Princess Leia.
Biography[]
Zsinj was a senior Imperial officer with the title of Warlord. After the death of Emperor Palpatine, he gained control of a large section of the galaxy, big enough to rival both the remains of the mainstream Empire and the fledgling New Republic. Following the defeat of Ysanne Isard, he was considered the New Republic's biggest threat, especially as he had destroyed a bacta convoy in the midst of a pandemic.
Ruthless, Zsinji relied heavily on deception to get others to underestimate him, and to ensure that the New Republic would not be able to assemble an accurate psychological profile on him. Zsinji also had a reputation for being short tempered and failure-intolerant who was known to execute subordinates for failures.
The task of bringing him down was assigned to Wedge Antilles' new command, Wraith Squadron, as part of a larger taskforce led by Han Solo. After the defeat and death of Apwar Trigit, one of his senior admirals, at the Battle of Ession, Zsinj took a personal interest in taking down Wraith Squadron. He unknowingly met the squadron when they posed as a group of pirates called the Hawkbats in order to infiltrate his organization. Zsinj, who commanded his forces from the Star Dreadnought Iron Fist, made plans to steal a second craft of the same type, Razor's Kiss, being constructed for the Empire at Kuat. He initially succeeded but the ship was attacked and destroyed by New Republic forces soon after.
Zsinj was now being hunted both by Han Solo's forces and by an Imperial taskforce led by Admiral Rogriss, who began co-operating with each other. Zsinj had brainwashed several non-human members of New Republic forces as sleeper agents and disrupted operations by triggering them and having them attack their cohorts. A number of strikes forced Zsinj to withdraw his forces to the Selaggis system. He had retrieved Gara Petrothel, an old agent of Trigit's, unaware she had now switched her loyalties to the New Republic and was functioning as a triple agent. Thanks to a warning from her and also Zsinj attempting to contact the Hawkbats for help, the New Republic learned of his location and ambushed him. Zsinj's forces were decimated and the Iron Fist was apparently destroyed. However, Zsinj had actually escaped, using wreckage from the Razor's Kiss to fake his ship's destruction.
Zsinj retreated to Dathomir, which he was blockading in an attempt to control the Force-sensitive Nightsisters. When he learned Han Solo was on the planet, he set his satellites to freeze the planet to try and force the Nightsisters to turn Solo over to him. His plans were disrupted by the arrival of Luke Skywalker and Prince Isolder, followed by a fleet from Hapes which engaged Zsinj's forces. Han let the Millennium Falcon be caught by one of Iron Fist's tractor beams, then broke free once inside the ship's shields and began firing on the ship at pointblank range. Zsinj was killed when the Falcon's fire destroyed the ship's bridges.
Trivia[]
- Zsinj was introduced in Star Wars: The Courtship of Princess Leia, which climaxed with his death. He was then retroactively used as an antagonist in the Star Wars: X-Wing novels, giving the back story to his enmity with Han Solo.
