Penn Zarang Penn Zarang was a red - hair ed human male individual who was accepted as a cadet for the Galactic Empire . History . Early life . Penn Zarang lived with his mother and father , who ran a depot on Syngia Station in the Sertar sector . Zarang ' s parents were uninterested in politics and simply wished to make a living . A group of Zygerrian slavers docked at the station to make repairs to their hyperdrive and decided they couldn ' t leave witnesses . Zarang hid in a maintenance conduit , but his parents were both taken . His mother died during the trip to Zygerria , his father slaughtered simply for being too old . Zarang decided that not being involved in politics had offered his parents no protection . He decided to enter into the Empire ' s service in order to bring stability even to remote sectors such as the one he had grown up in . Imperial service . Accepted as a cadet at the Arkanis Academy of the planet Arkanis , Zarang was a candidate to become an officer in the Imperial Military . Zarang , however , did not do well in his studies and was quickly identified as one of the academy ' s worst - performing students . Though not right at the bottom , he was regularly placed on academic warning . During his time at the academy , he developed a friendship with Zare Leonis . Leonis liked the young cadet , as he had been one of the few cadets at the academy who had been nice to him , notwithstanding the fact that he had already heard that Zarang was generally regarded as a " loser . " The two sat together during meals and Zarang introduced Leonis to Scaparus Port , a small port - town that offered Leonis he chance to use a comm booth to contact his family and girlfriend on Lothal . While traveling to Scaparus on their diplopod mounts , Zarang related his past to Leonis . Zarang recounted how his experience of seeing his parents being killed and enslaved by Zygerrian Slaver ' s had motivated him to serve the Empire . He believed that a strong Empire with a large military would be able to protect people like his parents from the depredations of pirates and slavers . Though Leonis was sympathetic , he personally wondered whether Zarang would obey orders to kill protestors , evict farmers , and take children from their parents . Unfortunately , Zarang ' s poor academic performance made a target for the Commandant ' s Cadets , a secretive group of some of the top - performing students at the academy , culled by its overseer , Commandant Brendol Hux . Leonis , meanwhile , had been identified as a candidate to join the ranks of the group . When the time came for Leonis to perform a task in order to be initiated into the group , he was told that his task was to kill Zarang . Leonis was horrified at the idea , but played as if he would complete the task in order to not arouse suspicion . He reported what he had been asked to do to Lieutenant Chiron , an Imperial officer that had been reassigned from the academy on Lothal . Chiron devised a plan to save Zarang ' s life . With Zarang ' s help a side of nerf was buried on the academy ' s grounds as a stand - in for Zarang ' s body . Though this deception meant the end of Zarang ' s time at the Arkanis Academy , Chiron promised to raise his case personally with Governor Tarkin if necessary and get him transferred offworld to another Imperial Academy . Personality and traits . Penn Zarang was a friendly human boy who was an Imperial cadet at the Arkanis Academy . Zarang had red hair and many freckles on his face . He was friendly and approachable towards Zare Leonis , a new transfer student from the Lothal Imperial Academy and secret rebel sympathizer . Zarang joined the Imperial Academy in order to help make the galaxy a better place . Zarang was traumatized by the experience of seeing his father killed by Zarracine slavers and his mother enslaved . As a result of that experience , he came to believe that a strong Empire and strong military would protect the Galaxy from pirates and slavers . While he was not an exemplary student at the Arkanis Academy , Zarang still believed that he was not the worst performing student and was shocked and horrified when Leonis informed him about the Commandant ' s Cadet ' s plot to kill him . Despite this brush with death , Zarang still wanted to serve the Empire as an officer and relcuantly accepted Leonis ' and Chiron ' s offer to help him . Behind the scenes . Penn Zarang first appeared as a secondary character in Jason Fry ' s junior novel " " , which was published on October 25 , 2015 . His lines are told from the point of view of Zare Leonis , one of the novel ' s two main protagonists .