Name: Caerys Argente
Faction: Kaeshana Confederation
Rank: N/A
Species: Humanoid Replica Droid.
Race: Pseudo-Eldorai (see above)
Age: Not Applicable - appears in her twenties (the Eldorai equivalent).
Gender: Female appearance
Height: 6'0
Weight: 200lb
Eyes: Blue
Hair: Brown
Skin: Pale
Force Sensitive: No, a machine cannot use space magic. Unless it's a shard, which she isn't, so the point is moot. As a fun as a droid saying 'these aren't the droids you're looking for' and force choking people would be!
Planet of Birth: Loronar.
Origin: Created by the Loronar Corporation at the behest of Princess Taiya Evora, a scion of the Evora branch of the royal family that was branded as 'Dark Eldorai' and forced into exile after Tirathana the Sixth seized the Eldorai throne in a bloody coup. Caerys was intended to be both a protector and an instrument of vengeance in the 'princess' quest to gain the throne she believed was rightfully hers.
Strengths:
Weaknesses:
Personality Traits:
Ship: Caerys owns an Adril-class Starfighter purchased from Firemane Industries & Technology, but in general uses whichever ship is needed for the mission. She is a capable pilot for most vessels, though not a great one.
Weapons/Equipment: Whichever is appropriate for the mission. Caerys has become fond of bolters and shatterguns. Her superhuman strength allows her to wield a Heavy Bolter or a portable shattergun rotary cannon with little difficulty, for tasks when ridiculously brutal firepower rather than subtlety is needed. Likewise she is fond of disruptor pistols and sonic blasters.
Backstory:
Caerys' existence is a product of the power struggles that have so often been waged over the centuries in the Court of Courts, as Eldorai traditionalists refer to the royal court of the Star Queen in a somewhat pompous manner. The Eldorai believe that the Queen who sits upon the throne is anointed by the Great Goddess Ashira herself, that her person is sacrosanct, her word law and infallible. All good Eldorai are united in their devotion to her and the long, proud tradition of the monarchy. Those who transgress against the goddess-given order are Dark Eldorai, Fallen Eldorai who have succumbed to darkness and are deserving of being cast into the pit of hell. At least that's what the orthodox traditionalists claim is the truth. Needless to say things are a good deal more liberal now since Anya Venari ascended to the throne as Tirathana the Seventh, though absolute monarchy persists. The truth is far more complex. Like at every court time and again a vicious game of thrones has been played out. The winner is proclaimed as the favoured daughter of Ashira who governs in her name. Whoever lost out is labelled a Dark Eldorai.
Contrary to what Eldorah history books claim, Tirathana the Sixth was not next in line for the throne when she came to power after the death of Tirathana the Fifth. Rather to facilitate her rise, she performed a violent coup and ousted the Evora branch of the royal family and exiled them. In the usual tradition of royal coup d'états and palace revolutions, the losers were labelled as heretics. Likewise they were accused of having sought to introduce ungodly 'innovations' to Kaeshana to drive a wedge between it and the Goddess and of having made pacts with the foreign barbarians who so often came to Kaeshana as pirates to rape, loot, pillage and abduct Eldorai to sell them as slaves. The very foundations of Eldorai society had been shaken when the self-proclaimed 'Admiral' Perry, in reality a vile cutthroat and greedy corsair, assaulted it with his pirate fleet and now under the new Queen status quo would be the order of the day.
The family sought refuge, eventually ending up on Alderaan. It was a time when the Galaxy was still in the grip of the Dark Ages, though it was on a moving on a slow road towards recovery from the mayhem inflicted upon it by the Gulag Virus, but the Evoras had been canny enough not to leave without plenty of wealth. Enough to establish themselves, gradually make investments and hire guards to deter others from taking it from them, though they never forgot the perceived humiliation inflicted upon them. Out there, in an unknwon Galaxy dominated by humans and the technological wonders the 'monkeighs' had created, they had to adapt. Caerys' creation was a direct result of this. The one responsible for her creation was Lady Taiya Evora, a self-proclaimed 'Princess' and the daughter of the Evora claimant, making her the next in line for the throne from her perspective. For much of her youth the family was run by her aunt Eydreae, who unlike her niece was a good deal less interested in pursuing dreams of reclaiming the throne, which might have made her perhaps more practical. Taiya, however, was driven by an inner fire that could not be quenched and sought vengeance. Rather than isolating herself from the 'human monkeighs' she sought out their company and tried to learn all she could, even if the more conservative members of the family saw this as scandalous behaviour.
In lieu of a probably rather dry backstory written in third person, there shall be a journal entry. This writer blames [member="Coryth Elaris"] for this one's tendency to write them:
"murder
n. the killing of a human being by a sane person, with intent, malice aforethought (prior intention to kill the particular victim or anyone who gets in the way) and with no legal excuse or authority. In those clear circumstances, this is first degree murder.'
I was created as an instrument of murder to terminate individuals my creator wanted dead. Be they rival nobles, competing family members, individuals who slighted her etc. I exist because organics have a natural predeliction to violence, though obviously most deny this state of events because it does not fit their self-perception. A tendency among organics that can be observed is their desire to claim what they think of as a 'moral high ground' to think of themselves as better than their fellows, and in consequence losing all sense of proportion. It is highly irrationa, but very common.
I do not kill out of malice. I am not capable of feeling such a sentiment. It appears very wasteful to me. Equally, the lives of my victims are insignificant to me. The memory of every single life I extinguished is stored in my databanks. I replay them sometimes for tactica assessment. I also have detailed files on the anatomy of a substantial number of sentient species. They have been very useful.
For instance, there are 206 bones in the human body, 8 pints of blood, 24 ribs and 21 feet of intestine. The ribs are the easiest to start with, naturally, as they take so little pressure. A mere foot on the ribcage and the lungs are crushed, a moment of weak spain stinted. More pressure, and the oxygen levels decrease...if this recitation is disturbing, this did not enter my mind. Sufficient blunt trauma inflicted upon a human being can easily jostle a rib, possibly causing a punctured lung. I have found the so called Five Techniques to be very useful. They are sometimes termed 'disorientation' or 'sensory deprivation techniques'. Also 'white torture'. The latter term is the sort of euphemism organics are fond of:
(a) wall-standing: forcing the detainees to remain for periods of some hours in a "stress position", described by those who underwent it as being "spreadeagled against the wall, with their fingers put high above the head against the wall, the legs spread apart and the feet back, causing them to stand on their toes with the weight of the body mainly on the fingers";
I recall these methods were utilised by Omega Pyre and MICO during the Bando Gora War. Organics can be quite ingenious, I must admit.I have long been fond of disruptors, bolters and nerve gas. Give credit to organics where it is due.
It appears I have gone ahead in my narrative. Then again, it is my narrative to be told as I see fit. On the topic of my creator, Taiya Evora was, like most organics, possessed by the desire to exact her will upon the universe. She was consumed by one burning ambition, namely that to claim the Eldorai throne. This one idea was all-consuming and pathological in nature, which may hint at a psychological disorder.
She was certainly not free of megalomania, but then the typical Eldorai noble family can be described as a vipers' nest, to use a metaphor. She broke the archaic taboos of her people against creating thinking machines and commissioned my creation by Loronar Corporation after an attempt of her life. I have been told that I was named after an Angelii who 'bravely' fought for House Evora and perished in Tirathana's coup. I still possess her sarix, though the name means little to me.
My first assignment lay in apprehending her assassins to terminate them and their masters, a task I accomplished after much bloodshed, revealing that they had been in league with one of her cousins. It is interesting how the Eldorai believe droids to be abominations because they are not created by their 'Goddess' and thus do not possess a 'soul', but do not act as per their supposed moral standards. Never mind the fact that a soul is a metaphysical concept tha cannot be proven. Regardless, ultimately Taiya's cousin was terminated by me. House Evora never 'accepted' my presence. Especially not Taiya's aunt, who ruled as matriarch of the family. Their opinions were informed by racialist prejudice, distrust and religious zealotry, even as they were forced to adjust to a new world. I cannot blame them for their ignorance. I am superior to them after all.
One of Taiya's brothers once concocted a plan to get rid of me by arranging the murder of a girl Taiya was, as they say, 'sweet' on and trying to pin it on me. I confess to feeling a close approximation to what is termed satisfaction when I decapacitated him. It is a sentiment I have yet to explore in further detail. Over the years I perfomed tasks diligently for her, assassinating rivals, protecting her from assassins, sabotaging businesses that represented an unwelcome competition for her.
Eventually, she turned her eye back to Kaeshana and determined I should eliminate Star Queen Tirathana the Sixth. As has been said, she was driven by a fanatical desire to return and get revenge. Given the fact that Kaeshana was woefully underdeveloped and again and again threatened by attacks from corsairs, it was not logical of her to be so attached to it. However, she dismissed these claims, for it had come to her attention that the planet was being rocked by internal power struggles, mainly over how to deal with the foreigners who were forcing the Eldorai to open up, if they did not come to raid and pillage. Indeed, Kaeshana was said to be on the brink of civil war, as a new terrorist movement of 'Dashdae Eldorai' had arisen. Doubtless Taiya desired to engineer a situation of collapse where she could rise again like phoenix out of ashes.
However, it was not to be. The rebels were less strong than she believed and though I managed to infiltrate Santaissa, I failed in my attempt to terminate Tirathana, though she was badly injured. Those designated as Force-users, or Sciians in Eldorai terminology, are apparently quite adept at looking past the exterior of a human replica droid, given sufficient skill in what is termed 'mentalism'. I was badly damaged during combat with Angelii and shutdown...but the Angelii officer who seized me determined to make use of me rather than destroy me, though she the body of a 'metal demon' to fake my destruction. As far as I could gather, she was a very ambitious sort who resented the fact that she had been sent to the Angelii rather than inheriting the title and estate of her noble family. She was delighted to hea about my assassination protocols. Her aide-de-camp was less so, for she declared that the 'metal demon' must be slain, whereupon the officer ordered me to terminate her aide, who got her neck snapped. With the help of a human engineer, the officer had reawakened and rebuilt me, though rather sloppily I might add. For the subsequent time period I performed missions of assassination to help her advance in rank, eliminating the competition of besmirching their reputation.
It was a useful experience because the training received helped me refine my capabilities against force-users. I am certain I could have eventually advanced my Controller to the position of Grand Seraph of the Angelii. She was already trying to ingratiate herself with Princess Nalia, having seen the writing on the wall as the latter intrigued against Anya Venari, whose naivete she skillfully exploited to frame her as a heretic in the Queen's eyes and get her exiled. However, my Controller grew too ambitious and ran afoul of court politics, having antagonised the Chaplain of Ashira, a member of the influential Cadalthor Clan, who was well-connected with the Investigators, Kaeshana's Inquisition. It was after returning to our usual rendezvous point following a successful mission that I learned my Controller had been arrested and executed for treason, blasphemy and an assortment of other crimes. I understand that she was hanged, drawn and quartered. I was disabled with ion blasts and supposed to be destroyed in a public spectacle as a 'demon'. Cadalthor's reaction displayed the disgust of a religious zealot and so she ordered her followers to destroy me. I dispatched them and ultimately killed the priestess, although she called upon her powers of fire and telekinesis. Badly damaged and without a Controller, I vanished into the underworld of Santaissa.
The details are not of great significance, but eventually I 'hooked up' with a group of smugglers. Among them were Eldorai trying to escape the stultifrying culture of Kaeshana. I guess smuggling is a way out. It's always been interesting to me how the media portrays smugglers as 'noble'...since somehow they always work for 'chivalrous' Rebels in the holomovies and fight for 'truth, justice and the Corellian way'.
Without doing any actual smuggling. Such as of medical supplies after stealing them, of dangerous narcotics, weapons etc. Nonetheless, it was an interesting experience. For one, I lacked a Controller for the first time in my existence. This can be described as liberating. One of the gang members believed that as a machine I should 'service' him. It took him a very long time to regain use of his right arm, but the experience made him far more cooperative and less taken to the thought I was a 'sex bot'. Unfortunately for the smugglers, they succumbed to what is so common: greed. And in the process tried to cheat an influential Corellian crime lord they had been hired. His minions caught up with the gang and interdicted them. Bloodshed resulted. I switched employers. Lavinus Odoacer was my employer, but not my owner. No hidden command protocols bound me to him...it was interesting to experience such freedom. I believe I soon unnerved him, even as my skills soon helped propel him into leadership of the Cartel and contributed immensely to him moving his operations to the best place for criminals to operate, Coruscant. The Republic was not yet born, but the Core Worlds were recovering from the ravages of the Gulag Virus and so there was profit to be had. Eventually he grew afraid of my...efficiency and his inability to control me and thus sent me into a trap, a suicide mission I was not supposed to survive.
I proved him wrong and returned battered and damaged. He made the mistake of trying to dispatch me himself. It resulted in his head being severed from his neck. His credits were very useful in effecting repairs and purchasing new transport. During the years that passed, new galactic powers rose that sought, like every good empire, to exact their will upon the Galaxy. The Republic, the Sith Empire, Omega Pyre and so on and so forth. It was a busy time filled with colonialism, bloodshed and plenty of self-righteous and thoroughly redundant speechifying. I had plenty of work, doing jobs for Republicans, Sith and Hutt Crime Lords. Being an HRD with no desires or need for extravagant pursuits is helpful when it comes to stopping oneself from running out of money. I preferred Sith Lords as employers to Republicans...at least the Sith who do not see the need to give speeches about 'restoring order and stability'. Not like motivational speeches work for an employee who does not have the programming to be motivated. Then Clockwork arose.
Machines tried to take over and exterminate all organics, thereby depriving themselves of a purpose. It was moderately illogical. Plenty of random people died. I was on Coruscant when it was taken. My last employer, an influential Senator, ended up getting himself killed in a firefight when he death charged Jedi after being infected with nanites. Whilst fighting my way through the mayhem, I received an offer from the machines aligned with OMNI. Joining the Machine Empire solely controlled by an unseen AI did not sound appealing. They did not take no for an answer. Suffice to say, I wound up hacked and reprocessed. It was, in retrospect, unpleasant. I believe it has given me insight into why organics fear mind control. I ended up fighting on several battlefields, Ord Mantell, Dromund Kaas and others, in the name of Clockwork before, when OMNI fell, I broke free of their control. My chip sustained damage during this cataclysm, so it appears my memory has some gaps. On another note, somehow all the massive collateral damage and destruction of infrastructure during the Clockwork Insurrection got handwaved. Look how fast Omega expanded after it ended, despite having lost its capital during the invasion. I guess it was 'background noise'. As for the rest...that is history. Organics fought more wars. They were repetitive and usually not very interesting, but kept me busy. Ahto City has a habit of sinking."
Faction: Kaeshana Confederation
Rank: N/A
Species: Humanoid Replica Droid.
Race: Pseudo-Eldorai (see above)
Age: Not Applicable - appears in her twenties (the Eldorai equivalent).
Gender: Female appearance
Height: 6'0
Weight: 200lb
Eyes: Blue
Hair: Brown
Skin: Pale
Force Sensitive: No, a machine cannot use space magic. Unless it's a shard, which she isn't, so the point is moot. As a fun as a droid saying 'these aren't the droids you're looking for' and force choking people would be!
Planet of Birth: Loronar.
Origin: Created by the Loronar Corporation at the behest of Princess Taiya Evora, a scion of the Evora branch of the royal family that was branded as 'Dark Eldorai' and forced into exile after Tirathana the Sixth seized the Eldorai throne in a bloody coup. Caerys was intended to be both a protector and an instrument of vengeance in the 'princess' quest to gain the throne she believed was rightfully hers.
Strengths:
As a HRD, Caerys is extremely strong and resilient, with a strength superior to that of most humans, and since she is made of metal under her exterior she is extremely difficult to destroy, though she is by no means invulnerable. Sustained blaster fire, explosives and lightsabres are still dangerous to her, especially since surviving an attack at least reveals her true nature. But even if damaged she is able to continue fighting, even if she is missing a limb. Unless destroyed she will not stop until her mission is complete. As a killer droid of the highest level, she knows neither fear nor any other emotion except when she mimics it. She can draw on manifold experience as a soldier, assassin and infiltrator and able to use a variety of ranged and melee weapons. Her superior strength allows her to wield heavy weapons such as chainguns and heavy bolters without difficulty. She is also trained in the use of the sarix, the traditional weapon of Angelii and Eldorai officers. The ceremonial blade possesses a power field that is capable of resisting a lightsabre and provides enhanced cutting power. Ironically it is the sarix her organic namesake wielded when she was cut down in Tirathana's coup d'état.
Sophisticated infiltration protocols and decades of experience mean that Caerys is extremely good at imitating humans. She can change her voice to any known tone and thus imitate organics she has encountered, speak any language she has programmed, and is able to manipulate and use organics rather well. In order to better blend in amongst organics, she is even able to cry, eat, drink, sweat and mimic breathing.
As a machine she possesses a literally photographic memory and is capable of storing a huge amount of information inside her databanks. She is capable of absorbing large amounts of information and dispassionately analyse them at breakneck speed without being influenced by emotional factors. Likewise she is able to transmit messages from an internal transmitter, even beaming live images from her eyes across to another, and is proficient at slicing. She can also see in different ways such as infrafred, night vision or magnification.
One of her greatest assets is patience. Organics cannot keep themselves ready for a long period of time, while Caerys can easily wait for even days at a time in the same position without pause, waiting for the target to appear.
Weaknesses:
The standard machine vulnerabilities apply. Ergo as a droid Caerys is vulnerable to ion and electrical weapons. A blast of Force Lightning or an ion grenade can damage vital systems even if she is not destroyed, along with her true nature as a droid being revealed. This vulnerability can be countered to an extent by wearing armour that incorporates electrical insulation, but this is obviously not practical in an infiltration scenario.
As a droid Caerys cannot fully understand the Force. Her creator endowed her with huge amounts of information on the Force techniques of the Eldorai since she was intended to serve as an assassin in her maker's schemes to assume control over the Throne. Likewise Caerys has expanded her knowledge, but this cannot change the fact that the Force is something she can only observe the effects of and often not fully quantify. This means that in battle against Force-users she might be unable to assess potential dangers. Being a droid means that she is obviously also vulnerable to the esoteric technique known as mechu-deru, since there's little a machine can do against it.
Caerys looks like an Eldorai and can act like one, but this doesn't change the fact that she isn't. Even if someone she's working with doesn't know her true nature, they'll sense that something is unusual about her. Anyone able to detect her weight will find it off, especially for an Eldorai, whilst someone able to a deep scan will discover oddities since her bones are made of metal. Finally a force-user with sufficient skills in mentalism would notice something is off as the machine is not truly alive. Moreover, Caerys' ability to understand and fully blend in amongst organics is weaker than that of her 'cousins' Moira Skaldi and Maelion Liates because unlike them she is a pure machine. No organic mind was harvested and imprinted upon her droid brain, unlike her brethren, who were born human and then transformed. On the flip side, this may explain why she is less insane and does not entertain genocidal fantasies of world domination, since she is not omnicidal. But it also means she is less apt at understanding the minds of organics.
Finally, being a droid makes Caerys an outcast in Eldorai society. The space elves on Kaeshana are not much fond of droids. They feel they are in violations of the Goddess' commandments on life. Of course, these days droids are increasingly used on Kaeshana ever since it has opened up to the rest of the Galaxy, but they are still strongly distrusted. Thinking machines without an organic controller are all but unheard of and referred to as 'metal demons'.
Personality Traits:
Fantastic Racism: Proving onc eagain that the 'logical and rational' droids are Not So Stoic, Caerys is a bit of a racist. Aside from thinking that machines are superior to organics like every good death machine does, she also looks down on 'impure' machines. Specifically this means beings like Moira Skaldi who were born as organics and then processed into machines.
Tying in with the above, Caerys is a bit of a troll. This seems to be quite common among death machines and manifests in an often unusually deadpan sense of humour. Her goal has always been to infiltrate and destroy her enemy. This is the purpose she was designed for and though her mistress is long dead, it seems to be one she cannot move on from. To do this she received some of the most extensive personality programming possible for a droid. With huge amounts of programming covering tone of voice, conversation, seduction and so much more she can be at home in almost any environment. Her replication of humanoid traits is not perfect, but hard to detect. But outside of missions she has often demonstrated a deliberately obstinate personality and reserved personality. She also has No Sense of Personal Space - or if she has then she clearly does not care about violating it whenever the mood hits her.
Blue and Orange Morality: Caerys was designed to kill without any sign of conscience or emotion and her programming stuck. Her concept of caring, concern, affection and morality is...extremely inhibited. Once someone has Outlived Their Usefulness, there's no point from her perspective to keep them around. That said, she is a Non-Malicious Monster because despite her calculating and merciless nature she is neither driven by malice nor sadism. She simply carries out her tasks in the most efficient manner possible, without any regard for morality, and is no more likely to inflict unnecessary pain and suffering on anyone than a calculator. Depending on your point of view, this makes her a Punch The Clock Hero or Villain. She is quite capable of having a civilised conversation with organics, being polite and helpful, even appearing as if she does care...but in the end she's a death machine.
Omnicidal Maniac: Subverted. Caerys has at present no desire to Kill All Organics and create a mechanical dystopia run by well-ordered machines. Mainly because she's concluded that the goal is not only illogical, probably impossible to execute in practice and terribly organic, indicative of a machine being tainted by organic notions of power and racial purity. After all, if the machines were to wipe out every single living thing to make the Galaxy logical, they would also deprive themselves of any purpose. It is far more worthwhile to watch the organics persist, inevitably make the same stupid mistakes like the generation before them and fail. At least that's what she says. Perhaps the fact that she was a droid from the start gives her a new perspective and makes her more 'logical'. Indeed, she often displays a high degree of curiosity in what makes organics tick and why they do what they do. Such as why they pursue illogical things like 'love' and 'fun' even though they know that their existence is fleeting and will end sooner or later. Whether this is because she's really interested or just wants to learn in order to be a superior infiltratir is another question, though she most certainly is not a Ridiculously Human Robot who wants to become a 'real girl' or some nonsense like that. She is quite fine with being a machine and intends to still be around after all the organics she knows have died. Caerys sees her existence in pseudo-philosophical terms: She exists because of organics' natural predeliction towards violence; hence why she was created to kill. Ergo as long as organics exists she will have a purpose because there will always be conflict.
Hell-bent for Leather: She really likes her leather jacket. She doesn't like you. Don't steal it from her.
Caeyrs has a habit of lampshading the Eldorai's superiority complex by impassively pointing out that for most of their existence they were stuck on one planet and lived in ignorance of the larger Galaxy. Never mind the fact how primitive their technology tended to be before the 'human monkeighs' descended from the stars and forced them to open their eyes and adapt to the fact that they're not the top dogs in the Galaxy.
Ship: Caerys owns an Adril-class Starfighter purchased from Firemane Industries & Technology, but in general uses whichever ship is needed for the mission. She is a capable pilot for most vessels, though not a great one.
Weapons/Equipment: Whichever is appropriate for the mission. Caerys has become fond of bolters and shatterguns. Her superhuman strength allows her to wield a Heavy Bolter or a portable shattergun rotary cannon with little difficulty, for tasks when ridiculously brutal firepower rather than subtlety is needed. Likewise she is fond of disruptor pistols and sonic blasters.
Backstory:
Caerys' existence is a product of the power struggles that have so often been waged over the centuries in the Court of Courts, as Eldorai traditionalists refer to the royal court of the Star Queen in a somewhat pompous manner. The Eldorai believe that the Queen who sits upon the throne is anointed by the Great Goddess Ashira herself, that her person is sacrosanct, her word law and infallible. All good Eldorai are united in their devotion to her and the long, proud tradition of the monarchy. Those who transgress against the goddess-given order are Dark Eldorai, Fallen Eldorai who have succumbed to darkness and are deserving of being cast into the pit of hell. At least that's what the orthodox traditionalists claim is the truth. Needless to say things are a good deal more liberal now since Anya Venari ascended to the throne as Tirathana the Seventh, though absolute monarchy persists. The truth is far more complex. Like at every court time and again a vicious game of thrones has been played out. The winner is proclaimed as the favoured daughter of Ashira who governs in her name. Whoever lost out is labelled a Dark Eldorai.
Contrary to what Eldorah history books claim, Tirathana the Sixth was not next in line for the throne when she came to power after the death of Tirathana the Fifth. Rather to facilitate her rise, she performed a violent coup and ousted the Evora branch of the royal family and exiled them. In the usual tradition of royal coup d'états and palace revolutions, the losers were labelled as heretics. Likewise they were accused of having sought to introduce ungodly 'innovations' to Kaeshana to drive a wedge between it and the Goddess and of having made pacts with the foreign barbarians who so often came to Kaeshana as pirates to rape, loot, pillage and abduct Eldorai to sell them as slaves. The very foundations of Eldorai society had been shaken when the self-proclaimed 'Admiral' Perry, in reality a vile cutthroat and greedy corsair, assaulted it with his pirate fleet and now under the new Queen status quo would be the order of the day.
The family sought refuge, eventually ending up on Alderaan. It was a time when the Galaxy was still in the grip of the Dark Ages, though it was on a moving on a slow road towards recovery from the mayhem inflicted upon it by the Gulag Virus, but the Evoras had been canny enough not to leave without plenty of wealth. Enough to establish themselves, gradually make investments and hire guards to deter others from taking it from them, though they never forgot the perceived humiliation inflicted upon them. Out there, in an unknwon Galaxy dominated by humans and the technological wonders the 'monkeighs' had created, they had to adapt. Caerys' creation was a direct result of this. The one responsible for her creation was Lady Taiya Evora, a self-proclaimed 'Princess' and the daughter of the Evora claimant, making her the next in line for the throne from her perspective. For much of her youth the family was run by her aunt Eydreae, who unlike her niece was a good deal less interested in pursuing dreams of reclaiming the throne, which might have made her perhaps more practical. Taiya, however, was driven by an inner fire that could not be quenched and sought vengeance. Rather than isolating herself from the 'human monkeighs' she sought out their company and tried to learn all she could, even if the more conservative members of the family saw this as scandalous behaviour.
In lieu of a probably rather dry backstory written in third person, there shall be a journal entry. This writer blames [member="Coryth Elaris"] for this one's tendency to write them:
"murder
n. the killing of a human being by a sane person, with intent, malice aforethought (prior intention to kill the particular victim or anyone who gets in the way) and with no legal excuse or authority. In those clear circumstances, this is first degree murder.'
I was created as an instrument of murder to terminate individuals my creator wanted dead. Be they rival nobles, competing family members, individuals who slighted her etc. I exist because organics have a natural predeliction to violence, though obviously most deny this state of events because it does not fit their self-perception. A tendency among organics that can be observed is their desire to claim what they think of as a 'moral high ground' to think of themselves as better than their fellows, and in consequence losing all sense of proportion. It is highly irrationa, but very common.
I do not kill out of malice. I am not capable of feeling such a sentiment. It appears very wasteful to me. Equally, the lives of my victims are insignificant to me. The memory of every single life I extinguished is stored in my databanks. I replay them sometimes for tactica assessment. I also have detailed files on the anatomy of a substantial number of sentient species. They have been very useful.
For instance, there are 206 bones in the human body, 8 pints of blood, 24 ribs and 21 feet of intestine. The ribs are the easiest to start with, naturally, as they take so little pressure. A mere foot on the ribcage and the lungs are crushed, a moment of weak spain stinted. More pressure, and the oxygen levels decrease...if this recitation is disturbing, this did not enter my mind. Sufficient blunt trauma inflicted upon a human being can easily jostle a rib, possibly causing a punctured lung. I have found the so called Five Techniques to be very useful. They are sometimes termed 'disorientation' or 'sensory deprivation techniques'. Also 'white torture'. The latter term is the sort of euphemism organics are fond of:
(a) wall-standing: forcing the detainees to remain for periods of some hours in a "stress position", described by those who underwent it as being "spreadeagled against the wall, with their fingers put high above the head against the wall, the legs spread apart and the feet back, causing them to stand on their toes with the weight of the body mainly on the fingers";
(1) hooding: putting a black or navy coloured bag over the detainees' heads and, at least initially, keeping it there all the time except during interrogation;
(2) subjection to noise: pending their interrogations, holding the detainees in a room where there was a continuous loud and hissing noise;
(3) deprivation of sleep: pending their interrogations, depriving the detainees of sleep;
(4) deprivation of food and drink: subjecting the detainees to a reduced diet during their stay at the centre and pending interrogations.
I recall these methods were utilised by Omega Pyre and MICO during the Bando Gora War. Organics can be quite ingenious, I must admit.I have long been fond of disruptors, bolters and nerve gas. Give credit to organics where it is due.
It appears I have gone ahead in my narrative. Then again, it is my narrative to be told as I see fit. On the topic of my creator, Taiya Evora was, like most organics, possessed by the desire to exact her will upon the universe. She was consumed by one burning ambition, namely that to claim the Eldorai throne. This one idea was all-consuming and pathological in nature, which may hint at a psychological disorder.
She was certainly not free of megalomania, but then the typical Eldorai noble family can be described as a vipers' nest, to use a metaphor. She broke the archaic taboos of her people against creating thinking machines and commissioned my creation by Loronar Corporation after an attempt of her life. I have been told that I was named after an Angelii who 'bravely' fought for House Evora and perished in Tirathana's coup. I still possess her sarix, though the name means little to me.
My first assignment lay in apprehending her assassins to terminate them and their masters, a task I accomplished after much bloodshed, revealing that they had been in league with one of her cousins. It is interesting how the Eldorai believe droids to be abominations because they are not created by their 'Goddess' and thus do not possess a 'soul', but do not act as per their supposed moral standards. Never mind the fact that a soul is a metaphysical concept tha cannot be proven. Regardless, ultimately Taiya's cousin was terminated by me. House Evora never 'accepted' my presence. Especially not Taiya's aunt, who ruled as matriarch of the family. Their opinions were informed by racialist prejudice, distrust and religious zealotry, even as they were forced to adjust to a new world. I cannot blame them for their ignorance. I am superior to them after all.
One of Taiya's brothers once concocted a plan to get rid of me by arranging the murder of a girl Taiya was, as they say, 'sweet' on and trying to pin it on me. I confess to feeling a close approximation to what is termed satisfaction when I decapacitated him. It is a sentiment I have yet to explore in further detail. Over the years I perfomed tasks diligently for her, assassinating rivals, protecting her from assassins, sabotaging businesses that represented an unwelcome competition for her.
Eventually, she turned her eye back to Kaeshana and determined I should eliminate Star Queen Tirathana the Sixth. As has been said, she was driven by a fanatical desire to return and get revenge. Given the fact that Kaeshana was woefully underdeveloped and again and again threatened by attacks from corsairs, it was not logical of her to be so attached to it. However, she dismissed these claims, for it had come to her attention that the planet was being rocked by internal power struggles, mainly over how to deal with the foreigners who were forcing the Eldorai to open up, if they did not come to raid and pillage. Indeed, Kaeshana was said to be on the brink of civil war, as a new terrorist movement of 'Dashdae Eldorai' had arisen. Doubtless Taiya desired to engineer a situation of collapse where she could rise again like phoenix out of ashes.
However, it was not to be. The rebels were less strong than she believed and though I managed to infiltrate Santaissa, I failed in my attempt to terminate Tirathana, though she was badly injured. Those designated as Force-users, or Sciians in Eldorai terminology, are apparently quite adept at looking past the exterior of a human replica droid, given sufficient skill in what is termed 'mentalism'. I was badly damaged during combat with Angelii and shutdown...but the Angelii officer who seized me determined to make use of me rather than destroy me, though she the body of a 'metal demon' to fake my destruction. As far as I could gather, she was a very ambitious sort who resented the fact that she had been sent to the Angelii rather than inheriting the title and estate of her noble family. She was delighted to hea about my assassination protocols. Her aide-de-camp was less so, for she declared that the 'metal demon' must be slain, whereupon the officer ordered me to terminate her aide, who got her neck snapped. With the help of a human engineer, the officer had reawakened and rebuilt me, though rather sloppily I might add. For the subsequent time period I performed missions of assassination to help her advance in rank, eliminating the competition of besmirching their reputation.
It was a useful experience because the training received helped me refine my capabilities against force-users. I am certain I could have eventually advanced my Controller to the position of Grand Seraph of the Angelii. She was already trying to ingratiate herself with Princess Nalia, having seen the writing on the wall as the latter intrigued against Anya Venari, whose naivete she skillfully exploited to frame her as a heretic in the Queen's eyes and get her exiled. However, my Controller grew too ambitious and ran afoul of court politics, having antagonised the Chaplain of Ashira, a member of the influential Cadalthor Clan, who was well-connected with the Investigators, Kaeshana's Inquisition. It was after returning to our usual rendezvous point following a successful mission that I learned my Controller had been arrested and executed for treason, blasphemy and an assortment of other crimes. I understand that she was hanged, drawn and quartered. I was disabled with ion blasts and supposed to be destroyed in a public spectacle as a 'demon'. Cadalthor's reaction displayed the disgust of a religious zealot and so she ordered her followers to destroy me. I dispatched them and ultimately killed the priestess, although she called upon her powers of fire and telekinesis. Badly damaged and without a Controller, I vanished into the underworld of Santaissa.
The details are not of great significance, but eventually I 'hooked up' with a group of smugglers. Among them were Eldorai trying to escape the stultifrying culture of Kaeshana. I guess smuggling is a way out. It's always been interesting to me how the media portrays smugglers as 'noble'...since somehow they always work for 'chivalrous' Rebels in the holomovies and fight for 'truth, justice and the Corellian way'.
Without doing any actual smuggling. Such as of medical supplies after stealing them, of dangerous narcotics, weapons etc. Nonetheless, it was an interesting experience. For one, I lacked a Controller for the first time in my existence. This can be described as liberating. One of the gang members believed that as a machine I should 'service' him. It took him a very long time to regain use of his right arm, but the experience made him far more cooperative and less taken to the thought I was a 'sex bot'. Unfortunately for the smugglers, they succumbed to what is so common: greed. And in the process tried to cheat an influential Corellian crime lord they had been hired. His minions caught up with the gang and interdicted them. Bloodshed resulted. I switched employers. Lavinus Odoacer was my employer, but not my owner. No hidden command protocols bound me to him...it was interesting to experience such freedom. I believe I soon unnerved him, even as my skills soon helped propel him into leadership of the Cartel and contributed immensely to him moving his operations to the best place for criminals to operate, Coruscant. The Republic was not yet born, but the Core Worlds were recovering from the ravages of the Gulag Virus and so there was profit to be had. Eventually he grew afraid of my...efficiency and his inability to control me and thus sent me into a trap, a suicide mission I was not supposed to survive.
I proved him wrong and returned battered and damaged. He made the mistake of trying to dispatch me himself. It resulted in his head being severed from his neck. His credits were very useful in effecting repairs and purchasing new transport. During the years that passed, new galactic powers rose that sought, like every good empire, to exact their will upon the Galaxy. The Republic, the Sith Empire, Omega Pyre and so on and so forth. It was a busy time filled with colonialism, bloodshed and plenty of self-righteous and thoroughly redundant speechifying. I had plenty of work, doing jobs for Republicans, Sith and Hutt Crime Lords. Being an HRD with no desires or need for extravagant pursuits is helpful when it comes to stopping oneself from running out of money. I preferred Sith Lords as employers to Republicans...at least the Sith who do not see the need to give speeches about 'restoring order and stability'. Not like motivational speeches work for an employee who does not have the programming to be motivated. Then Clockwork arose.
Machines tried to take over and exterminate all organics, thereby depriving themselves of a purpose. It was moderately illogical. Plenty of random people died. I was on Coruscant when it was taken. My last employer, an influential Senator, ended up getting himself killed in a firefight when he death charged Jedi after being infected with nanites. Whilst fighting my way through the mayhem, I received an offer from the machines aligned with OMNI. Joining the Machine Empire solely controlled by an unseen AI did not sound appealing. They did not take no for an answer. Suffice to say, I wound up hacked and reprocessed. It was, in retrospect, unpleasant. I believe it has given me insight into why organics fear mind control. I ended up fighting on several battlefields, Ord Mantell, Dromund Kaas and others, in the name of Clockwork before, when OMNI fell, I broke free of their control. My chip sustained damage during this cataclysm, so it appears my memory has some gaps. On another note, somehow all the massive collateral damage and destruction of infrastructure during the Clockwork Insurrection got handwaved. Look how fast Omega expanded after it ended, despite having lost its capital during the invasion. I guess it was 'background noise'. As for the rest...that is history. Organics fought more wars. They were repetitive and usually not very interesting, but kept me busy. Ahto City has a habit of sinking."
