Carlos Castillo
"You can only win the game when you understand that it is a game. Let a man play chess, and tell him that every pawn is his friend. Let him think both bishops holy. Let him remember happy days in the shadows of his castles. Let him love his queen. Watch him lose them all."
|| THE BASICS ||- Name: Carlos Castillo
- Alias: The Crow
- Titles: The Prince
- Species: Human-Umbaran
- Homeworld: Umbara
- Faction: The Lords of the Fringe, The Panathan Empire
- Rank: N/A
- Force Sensitive: Yes
- Alignment: Lawful Evil
- Gender: Male
- Age: Twenty Three
- Height: Six Feet, even
- Weight: One hundred and eighty three pounds
- Complexion: Pale
- Eye Color: Light Blue
- Hair Color: Dark
- Distinguishing Marks: None
- Voice Sample: To Be Added
- Appearance Description: Fairly tall and wiry, Carlos is practically a lean, mean, speaking machine. Although he may definitely appear worthy of such a gentlemanly and charming outlook, the devious and predatory smile that foretell his intentions beg to differ. He walks with purposeful, arrogant strides and gazes upon the galaxy as his. With sky blue eyes, he knows that the sky is not the limit; nothing is.
- Marital Status: Single
- Sexual Conduct: Heterosexual
- Languages: Galactic Basic (Fluent), Umbarese (Fluent)
- Occupation: Political lobbyist/deviant
- Residence: Classified
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|| STRENGTHS ||- [+] Morals? What morals?: Who needs 'em?! Exactly; nobody. Carlos will kill you, your mother, your girlfriend, even your dog and not feel bad about it. Post traumatic stress? That'll most likely never happen to him. If he had a conscience, he probably invaded it and instilled a puppet government.
- [+] Sword is mightier than the Pen: Carlos, in his earlier years, took it upon himself to acquire some rather different ways of defending himself. Not blasters, but rather swords. Not those dreary, heavy ones either, but the lightweight ones. He ain't no master at it but he can sure jab holes in you better than the next Padawan.
- [+] Pen is mightier than the Sword: Sticks and stones may break your bones but these words on this diplomatic charters will cause your planet to starve for decades. Carlos isn't a fool, he's far from it. Understanding that a few words can spark a war, even win one, are more powerful a weapon than any glowstick or space magic. That Umbaran heritage helps a lot.
|| WEAKNESSES ||
- [-] Heir Growth Problems: Heir, not hair, you dimwit. Either he needs a son or a clone, doesn't matter, he just needs one of the two and he'll practically do anything to get one; or both. Nothing lasts forever and both hair and heirs are the first ones to agree to that statement.
- [-] Power Hungry: Having a high metabolism isn't the only reason this young wolf is craving more power than Palpatine ever did. It's all he's ever dreamt of, he'd probably even believe you if you told him that he was conceived by power and conquest itself! Subtly (and smartly) entice him with some avenues of approach to fulfilling this desire and he may just go for it.
|| BIOGRAPHY ||
"Yeah, so, this Holopedia article was a lot different than when I edited it to correct standards. My name is Carlos Castillo, the one and only heir to House Castillo of Umbara. Those filthy little mongrels that call themselves politicians on that planet will call me a ‘traitor’ and a ‘thief’ and I’ll just tell them to improve their vocabulary. Perhaps killer would’ve been a better word in place of thief, I dunno, I did steal life that day.
“But let’s not start in the middle, shall we? I was a measly little thing in the beginning, truth be told, even I thought I was weak. But apparently luck was on my side and I am forever indebted to something that isn’t real, kinda like those Jedi-types over on Coruscant. I did, however, learn a thing or two from them about swordplay, though. One chance visit as a preteen granted me some insight into something the brown-robed fellow called ‘Makashi’. I didn’t really know what it was at the time but he said I had an innate ability for it.
“My parents weren’t exactly the most loving of creatures, especially my father. I don’t even know how I can remember that since I was about six or seven when he died, apparently from an accidental cause. Yeah, right. Accidents on Umbara. That’s like saying you can drive to a pub drunk and then back home sober, I think. But fear not, mother was there to save the day and spared me no pity in the actual truth. Assassination. I was quite surprised, actually, especially considering our middle-class status in society. It was actually a little...pleasing. Mom was the one who taught me politics after that, and other importants things that helped me tell people what to do without even outright saying that. It was pretty easy, actually.
“So then I started doing my own assassinations. Not personally, of course, but through the other families. Pitting each one against the other in vicious, subtle power plays that demanded the attention from the top-tier houses. Got a few quick and clean kills here and there, but never enough to actually gain more than enough prestige to satisfy my desires. With that in mind, I went for the head of the snake, cause a little panic, y’know?
“Yeah, that didn’t exactly work out the way I had planned it. Got caught, so I framed mom. Mom was the first to get killed and then some other family members until they traced it directly to me. You know how the saying goes: If you can’t beat ‘em, run away. I did exactly that but with a plan in mind so that it seemed a little less like cowardice and more like a strategic withdrawal. I didn’t very much like the Republic and my “murder” crimes would no doubt get my rear-end in prison, so I went to the next best place: anywhere else.
"My goal is still far from accomplished, though. Very few have what it takes to be King. The title is hereditary in theory, but war and rebellion plagues the weak King's realm more than the actual plague could ever hope to. It takes more than the blood in one’s veins to be a King. It takes more than a sword to gather men and make them follow. It takes more than a promise of prosperity to unite a realm. One has to be willing to do whatever it takes; and ofttimes it takes slaughtering half the village to make the rest fall in line. Sometimes it takes even more than that.
"What many seem to forget is that the common folk enjoy being ruled. The uneducated farmers bow and smile before the polished noble they call King. They scrape a meager living off the highlands and pay everything they can spare in taxes just for the ‘right’ to be called the King’s subjects. It’s an insane concept, one that the occasional rebel stabs at with his pitchfork, but one that will last a thousand years. Monarchy, in whatever form, will outlive the revolutions simply because some people are always willing to throw their lives away for a cause or a ruler; sometimes both.
"I am that cause. I am that ruler. I understand the board and I understand the pieces. I know that every man has a point where he’ll dig his heels into the ground just to oppose whatever’s pushing him. I know that the cornered man will fight with the strength of many. I know that all it takes to deceive a nation is a masquerade. I know the stakes and I’m ready to gamble with my own and a million others’ lives if I have to. In that sense; there’s something in me that’ll break before it bends.
"The galaxy will burn for my quest. Children will lose their parents for my cause. Women will cry till they drown because of my actions. I’ll slaughter half the galaxy if it means I’ll rule the remnants. I’ll sacrifice every pawn, rook, bishop and knight if it means the survival of my empire. I’ll burn the fields and infect the wells before I retreat. I’ll conquer the lands at my borders simply because they say I can’t have them."
|| KILLS & BOUNTIES ||
- Kills: None
- Bounties Collected: None
Quotes and themes from
The Broken Empire series by
Mark Lawrence
