Hanc Thorben Hanc Thorben was a Human male officer who served in the Rebel Alliance holding the rank of Captain . Stationed at Haven Base on the planet Arbra , he also served as a pilot for the flight group known as Rogue Squadron . He flew a T - 65 X - wing starfighter and served under the command of Luke Skywalker . Biography . Captain Thorben supervised the refit of four black market Imperial TIE Fighters that would be used to infiltrate an Imperial armada led by Admiral Mils Giel . As part of the mission codenamed Operation Earplug , the Alliance planned to destroy the strange entity called the Teezl , which the armada was transporting . The Teezl acted as a natural hyperspace communications amplifier , which would have given the Empire instantaneous communications throughout the galaxy . The Alliance tech specialists under Thorben ' s supervision added shields , a hyperdrive , a navicomputer , enhanced laser cannons , and an ejector seat to the four TIEs , dubbed Flying Bantha Squadron . In Thorben ' s report on the refit , he accepted the possibility that the pilots sent on this mission — himself included — may not survive . A raid against an Imperial outpost at the planet Spindrift served as a field test for the new TIEs . Thorben and other pilots , including Luke Skywalker and Shira Brie , decimated the outpost ’ s weapons systems forcing the meager Imperial garrison to surrender . Thorben was then able to retrieve the command codes that would allow the pilots into Giels ' armada . Immediately after that mission , Thorben was part of an excursion that followed Shira Brie to the planet Shalyvane . Shira told the other members of her squad that Shalyvane was her home world and that a tribe of alien nomads known as the Em ' liy had been conducting raids on the village of Chinshassa . The pilots disembarked from their fighters and engaged the Em ’ liy at the Circle of Kavaan . With the help of the astromech droid , R2 - D2 , the pilots of Rogue Squadron succeeded in driving the opposing forces away . Finally ready to initiate the mission to destroy the Teezl , pilots Skywalker , Thorben , Brie , and Alph flew the stolen TIEs into the heart of Giel ' s armada and opened fire on the assembled ships , confusing the pilots and starship gunners . Thorben ' s fighter was severely damaged in the chaos and he barely limped away into hyperspace . As he escaped , Skywalker made the final successful run to destroy the ship carrying the Teezl . Once Thorben returned to base , he reviewed the images from his flight recorder and made the shocking discovery that Skywalker had accidentally fired on Brie ' s fighter and killed her . Thorben reported it to Princess Leia , and later somberly played the recording for Skywalker , who was devastated . Skywalker was later exonerated when it was discovered Brie was an Imperial spy , and he had sensed her evil intentions through the Force . Some time later , Thorben discovered a dangerous secret about the abandoned Rebel base on Golrath . Lieutenant Gemmer Sojan had taken a stone from Golrath as a souvenir , and was complaining of losing sleep because of flashes of light it gave off . Thorben brought the stone to an Alliance scientist for analysis . He learned that the planet ' s stones somehow recorded nearby images . The Empire now controlled Golrath and the Rebels worried that they could learn Alliance secrets if they found out about the stones ' strange properties . Skywalker and Thorben led a squadron of fighters to the planet and distracted Imperial fighters while the base was infiltrated and destroyed . Personality and traits . Captain Thorben was a balding , middle - aged male Human . He wore the standard - issue X - wing flight suit and carried a BlasTech E - 11 blaster rifle . Behind the scenes . The character of Captain Thorben was created by David Michelinie and Walt Simonson . Thorben was one of only a few recurring Rebels besides the film characters that appeared in the Marvel Comics series . Thorben ' s first name , " Hanc " , was established in the " " roleplaying game article from Wizards . com , more than twenty years after his last appearance in the Marvel series . Shira Brie ' s entry in " The New Essential Guide to Characters " explicitly confirms that Thorben was a member of Rogue Squadron .