Igni Irae
OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION
Intent: Codify a character established in rp.
Image Credit: Here.
Role: Elpsis' boss. Commander of the Forge. Elpsis, Inferno Platoon and the Lions of Gehenna are under her authority.
Permissions: Blanket permission for all subs made by Laira Darkhold's writer here and here.
Links: Inferno Platoon, Communion, Champions of the Flame, Order of Fire, Young Flames, Elpsis, House Kerrigan-Alcori, The Lost Witch's Chrysalis, Bastion Invasion, Dahomey, Lions of Gehenna, Command and Control, Dahomey, Siobhan, General Devotion, Tegaea, Gehenna, The Final Battle, Vigilus, Leonina Varkathras, Tephrike, Limits of Glory, The Resistance, Battle of Kaeshana.
PHYSICAL INFORMATION
Age: Early forties
Force Sensitivity: Non-Force User
Species: Human
Appearance: Lucille Guyenne is a human female in early middle age. She is of above average height and has a slender build. She has an angular face with high cheekbones and brown eyes that have been described as flat and cool. Her jet black hair is cropped short and has some grey streaks here and there. Her uniform is always crisply presented and maintained. Her out of combat attire is scrupulously maintained, too. Guyenne does not slouch, but has an alert and straight posture when seated. However, she prefers to stand because of back problems. She will usually carry a sidearm on her person.
SOCIAL INFORMATION
Name: Colonel Lucille Guyenne.
Loyalties: Firemane Industries, Firemane General Staff.
Wealth: Well-off. She's a senior field officer of Colonel rank and receives remuneration from Firemane in return for her services. The pay is on a sliding scale based on experience, rank, reward and so on. If she makes it to retirement age, life will not be luxurious, but comfortable. She is careful with money and has a frugal life style.
Notable Possessions:
- Collection of Firemane medals for her service: Stellar Cross First Class, Phoenix Cross First Class.
- Hold-Out Bolter
- Renegade Model 557
- Terminus Shiv
- Olympian Armour
- Firedancer Landspeeder
Skills: Lucille Guyenne is a career soldier with decades of experience in combat, military tactics and command. She is skilled in the use of most ranged and melee weapons. While she is no starfighter pilot, she has the training to fly transport craft such as dropships and shuttles. Moreover, she can operate common military vehicles like speeders and APCs. In her free time, she likes to tinker with vehicles. One of her hobbies is refurbishing a classic land speeder she got from the scrap heap. She could have bought a remake of a classic that is already up to date, but she prefers to restore one with her own two hands. This is approach is a good summation of her outlook on life in general. She is a good swimmer.
Personality: On her first day on the Forge, Elpsis had trouble finding the CIC. The space station was quite a busy and complex place, and hard for Elpsis to navigate without knowing the layout since she is reliant on the Force to see. Guyenne chewed her out in front of the crew. She proceeded to make some acerbic remarks about how Elpsis could not expect special favours on account of her family name. Elpsis managed to stand her ground. Guyenne shared a laugh about it with her XO after the Lieutenant had departed.
Strict, stern, and ambitious are good words to describe her. Guyenne is an inherently domineering person with a combative personality. She is the kind of person who will naturally seek to take control over any situation she's in, and is often quite good at doing so. She speaks authoritatively, with the voice of a woman used to giving orders and, more pertinently, and being obeyed because she knows what she's doing. Guyenne is rather emotionally distant. She is emotionally damaged in her own way, but contained.
She is not a popular woman, but does not care about the 'whining cavils of civilians and fools'. As long as she does her job and gets something in return she happily disregards the muttering of people who have no idea of what she is doing. She can be gruff and acerbic in her criticism. This does not mean she will brush aside any idea that does not come from her, but her mannerisms can make her intimidating. She has a sense of humour, but it is dry. Guyenne separates her personal life from her professional one and frowns on fraternising with people in her chain of command. She has a habit of expediting meetings by conducting them without chairs.
Guyenne prides herself on her self-discipline and has high professional standards. She is rather judgemental of those who fail to live up to them. Her harshness has made her the scourge of young junior officers though. To her credit, she is not a hypocrite about it. Force help whoever attracts her ire for not pulling their weight or being guilty of inappropriate conduct on-duty. She is not afraid to get into a scrap, but her role is one of command rather than leading the charge.
Military service runs in the family for her. As a result, she grew up in the close-knit culture of military bases and grew used to moving from one place to another at an early age. Her uncle Xavier Guyenne served as commanding general of Omega Pyre during the early days of the Protectorate. This made him Siobhan Kerrigan's superior for a while. One of her key traits is ambition. Guyenne believes she is meant for great things and wants to rise to the top. However, the military, like any organisation, has its share of cliques and she has run afoul of some of them. Among other things, she is on poor terms with the so-called Dahomian Clique. She feels that it supports its members and secures promotion for them on account of their shared ethnic origins rather than merit. She is also not too fond of Force-Users.
She considers her present posting a bit beneath her. The Forge is a station on the 'frontier'. This means she will receive little support if something bad happens and have to get by with scarce resources. At the same time there is a high chance of her being overshadowed by someone who has a more glamorous post and friends high-up even if she scores a success. Advancement is not just a matter of merit, but also patronage. This means office politics. She has stepped on her share of toes in high command.
While Guyenne is not particularly keen on her present post, she is determined to run her command with model efficiency. This ties in with her perfectionist streak. She feels no reverence or special respect for Force-Users and is scornful of the idea that they are higher beings. From her perspective, they were born lucky and given the power to cheat. It is a bad idea for an apprentice with chosen one syndrome to cross her path. They may run away crying after she has given them a good dressing-down. She does not hate Force-Users, but quickly gets impatient when they use 'mystical hocus pocus' instead of 'proper Basic' to explain things.
Ironically, Guyenne is spiritual, but not in a way that puts Force-Users on a pedestal. She has a relatively simple belief system based on the idea of the heart being weighed against the feather of truth. The heart records all the good and bad deeds in a person's life, which forms the basis for judgement in the afterlife. Thus when a person dies the heart is weighed against the feather of truth. It is not done by gods, but just a sort of universal karma. She is not the type for marriage or close romantic relationships, though not friendless. She has a regular patronage with a female Twi'lek escort. The relationship is transactional, but mutually respectful. The courtesan is quite educated, which means they can have an actual conversation. The Colonel is close friends with a human male engineer on the Arx.
Guyenne dislikes Elpsis. She is upfront about her disapproval of what she rightly sees as the young officer's chronic hero syndrome. In her view, Elpsis has been a beneficiary of nepotism, notwithstanding the latter's protestations that she just wants to do her duty like any other soldier. In all fairness, Elpsis seems to have a way to get assigned to all manners of special missions. Doubtless her combat skills play a role, but also the fact that she happens to be a Kerrigan.
However, it's not Guyenne's job to be Elpsis' friend or mother over her, but to provide leadership, make sure she does her job and use her skills to fulfil her command's objectives. If the Colonel has to sacrifice her - or any other member of her command, for that matter - she will do so, but it is not a decision she will make lightly. She gives no quarter to an enemy once she has offered it and been refused. For her part, Elpsis has come to grudgingly respect her because her commander does not lie to her. She considers this a refreshing change from the hypocrisy of her parents.
COMBAT INFORMATION
Weapon of Choice: Various types of guns. Also proficient with vibroknife, blade and explosives. She is a senior field officer, and thus has minions to do a lot of the fighting for her, but is no slouch in combat herself.
Combat Function: Lucille Guyenne is a capable tactical commander with a keen understanding of battlefield tactics, organisation and logistics. As an officer of Colonel rank, she is qualified to command formations up to regiment size. She has been through her share of scraps and is not afraid to get her hands dirty. But her role is one of leadership, not being the first to storm the trench or lead a boarding action. So most of the time she will be too busy managing the battlefield and issuing orders to her field officers in order to prevent the enemy from getting the upper hand.
However, she can defend herself if she is say ambushes in her command post. If it comes to that, her weapon will usually be a powerful sidearm or a blade, though she can utilise most Firemane weapons. Moreover, she is good at operating standard military vehicles like landspeeders, speeder bikes and infantry fighting vehicles. She is a decent pilot, but no dogfighter. Guyenne is a combat pragmatist because fighting fair does not keep you alive and she is not afraid of casualties.
Strengths:
- Experienced combatant.
- Capable tactical commander.
- Old war injuries. She has been through her share of scraps and these have taken a toll. She is still sharp, but they can impede her in combat.
- Guyenne has not been blessed with preternatural powers. She must rely on her wits, training and tech to prevail, as she cannot use space magic or a laser sword.
Lucille Guyenne's life has been shaped by strife, service and ambition. She was born towards the end of the Four Hundred Year Darkness. Much of her life has been defined by the subsequent struggle for supremacy between the great powers of the galaxy. Lucille grew up in what passed for middle class in the Dark Age. Her family was not rich or part of the social elite, but they were not impoverished either. However, both remembered darker times. As a result, they were pragmatic folk who valued thrift and had worked hard to get where they were. They wanted to provide for their child and ensure she had a better life than they had had.
Both of her parents had to work to make ends meet, so Lucille was raised to be self-reliant and take care of herself from an early age. Nonetheless, she was friendly and outgoing. Her family lived on Fondor, a world of shipbuilding and industry. Like many inhabitants, her parents were employed on Fondor's shipyards. There they worked as engineers. Unsurprisingly, the Dark Age had caused starship technology to stagnate significantly. After all, interstellar trade had collapsed and many worlds had entered into isolation - either as a measure to stop the spread of the Gulag Virus or simply because organised government had collapsed. So her parents were among those working on some of the first new starship models.
Sometimes Lucille got to visit them. One of her early memories is being allowed to enter the cockpit of a new starship, with her father showing her the various instruments and explaining how they worked. One of her early companions was an old astromech droid her mother had rescued from the scrapyard. Her future seemed set for her. However, then tragedy struck. While at work, her parents were killed when an accident caused an explosion. All of a sudden, young Lucille found herself orphaned. She was inconsolable. However, fortunately for her she did not vanish in the foster system. Her maternal uncle Xavier Guyenne stepped in to look after her. While not rich, he belonged to the fortunate part of the family. They had managed to retain some influence and resources. Xavier had chosen a military career early in his life and accumulated a lot of experience leading colonial militias and planetary self-defence forces.
Xavier was respected by his subordinates, but a stoic, severe man. His personality was not cruel, but not congenial. Monastically dedicated to his craft, the old general was not the coddling type. Although he could have afforded a more expensive life style, he chose to live simply and careful with money. As a result, her schooling was based around the fundamentals and nothing fancy. Her frugality came from his simple upbringing. Each day followed a structured timetable. There was room for off-beat things, paternal affection and free time, but Xavier had little tolerance for idleness or frivolity. One might say he was more used to raising cadets than children of his own. She hung on to the astromech droid her parents had gifted her. It was the type of droid that had developed a rather willful personality of its own after having gone without a memory for an extended duration.
Her guardian did not like it because it was rude and naughty, but let her have it because it was useful. Perhaps because it made her feel close to her lost parents, she liked to tinker with old speders and their engines in her free time. However, she was nervous about space travel. Young Lucille enjoyed playing with toy soldiers and dressing up in a uniform her uncle got for her. She often hung around the barracks, and the soldiers became fond of calling her 'the Little Corporal'.
To give her what he considered a wholesome education, he sent her to a cadet school. This institution was a boarding school supposed to prepare young people for a future military career. The school gave its its pupils academic and military training. Lucille was a good pupil, albeit a closed-off one. She good grades in rifle practice and showed an interest in military history. She was one of the few girls at the institution, but noted to be fiercely competitive. She soon developed a rivalry with a boy from a noble family who believed his gender and blue blood placed him above her. His rich family assured that he would be able to go to a proper military academy and acquire a commission, regardless of how he performed. Lucille was reprimanded when his bullying caused her to be particularly brutal during a sparring match.
The cadet school had rather strict rules when it came to the consumption of liquor. Nonetheless, as graduation drew close, some older students were suddenly able to acquire some, even though they were not being subtle about it. Feeling suspicious, Lucille chose to forego participating in drunken debauchery. This was a smart choice because it turned out the head of the school had had a hand in procuring the inequities to trap them. She had the satisfaction of knowing that her rival had been unable to resist temptation. She did, however, take an interest in speeder racing. Her uncle was not too happy about that.
When she graduated, Xavier assigned her to a platoon of a self-defence force under his command. However, he made it clear that she would answer to her commanding officer, not to him. He scolded her harshly when she went above her platoon leader to talk to him when there was a disagreement. In fact, he slashed her salary for the rest of the month and made sure she got menial duties to teach her a lesson. The lesson stuck. She fought in some early skirmishes against pirates and other low-level threats. When her squad was stationed on the rim, escorting a convoy, they came across Bando Gora. The dark cultists had been spreading their tendrils across the rim, taking advantage of the lack of an overarching authority. Lucille's superior was killed by an eldritch spear and she and her squad had to hold out against numerous attacks from the fanatics.
The convoy could not leave, so Lucille took the initiative and had them form their speeder trucks into a 'wagon fort'. This was an archaic tactic, but the formation proved surprisingly effective against the death charging Reavers and cultists. However, the defenders eventually started running out of ammunition. The Bando Gora made one last charge and the soldiers fired with all they had left. Then a masked Bando Gora sorceress entered the fray. Drawing power from the dying, she channelled dark energies into an enchanted staff and summoned a flaming blast that blew a hole into the improvised fortification and entered it. Lucille fired at her with a blaster rifle, but most of her shots were deflected or simply frozen in mid-air.
The sorceress tore her blaster from her hands and started to telekinetically break bones, but then was distracted when an ally fired a scattergun, injuring her. Lucille tackled the sorceress to keep her from using her staff, repeatedly stabbing her with a vibroknife. As the sorceress started to beat on her, she yelled at her comrades to shoot her. Lucille was injured by one of the projectiles, but the sorceress was gunned down. But the cultists were upon them. Finally, a relief force had arrived, forcing the Bando Gora to flee.
Lucille had to be put into hospital due to her injuries, but received a commendation. During her recovery period, her uncle made her an aide. At first Lucille resented this, as it kept her from the action. She felt stiffled. She eventually realised that he was grooming her. The time gave her some insight into logistics and the administrative side of things. The period of every planet standing for itself was coming to an end. New powers were rising and seeking to exact their will upon the galaxy. These included the Galactic Republic, the Sith Empire and the Omega Protectorate. It was the last one that the Guyennes gravitated to. It had started out as a mercenary corporation, but evolved into a Republican Dictatorship once its territory became too big for a company to administer.
However, it remained a militaristic, authoritarian entity with some democratic fig leafs. Having made a name for himself on the fringe, her uncle was offered a job as commanding general in Omega Pyre. Lucille helped out on the administrative side, preparing briefings and dossiers. She mad the acquaintance of the notorious Siobhan Kerrigan, a rising star in the Pyre. Her uncle was the young Colonel's boss, but Siobhan also had a relationship with Exarch Tegaea Alcori, who was above both of them. Lucille disliked this, seeing it as nepotism.
Lucille went to the Protectorate staff college to get a proper commission, but didn't find it to her liking. So she transferred into being a line officer and rose up the ranks. Rather than serve in Omega Pyre, she joined the Protectorate marines. It fit her attitude of being first into combat. In that capacity she participated in various operations on the galactic fringe. The young officer acquired a reputation for efficiency, though her cold attitude made other soldiers wary. But to her failure was not an option.
Lucille took part in an operation against Eriaduan insurgents. Shortly after its foundation, the Protectorate had sent an emissary to Eriadu to negotiate that nation's inclusion into its sphere. However, Regulus Tarkin, Eriadu's dictator, had the ambassador murdered. In response, the Protectorate launched an invasion. As the invasion was considered legally dicey, it was claimed that Tarkin was secretly in league with the Bando Gora. In any event, his fascist regime was toppled. However, Tarkinite insurgents continued to fight against the new government. The insurgents carried out several bombings, targeting courthouses, 'collaborationist' politicians and judges and alien neighbourhoods.
Lucille's marines were dispatched to take out a heavily defended underground insurgent camp. Having received support from rogue elements in the new Eriaduan defence force, the insurgents were well-equipped and entrenched. The underground tunnels were rigged with traps. Bombing the base from orbit was not practical. Lucille led a strike force of marines to crack the base. She succeeded, and the insurgents were wiped out. A key insurgent leader could be captured for interrogation.
However, her unit was decimated by the assault. It is beyond doubt that she used them as disposable assets. It cemented her reputation, but caused a storm of controversy. Opinions varied on whether it had been a necessary sacrifice or if she was just being a glory-seeker. Lucille herself was severely injured during the fight. In the aftermath of the incident, the Protectorate conducted an inquiry. The driving force behind it was General Devotion.
However, Lucille had an unexpected ally. Colonel Kerrigan called her actions 'unfortunate, but necessary' and spoke out in her favour. The inquiry dragged on for a while, but she was essentially acquitted of wrongdoing. However, she gained a reputation for callousness and, whether true or not, obsession with winning no matter the cost to further her own ambitions. Privately, Lucille was rather troubled by what had transpired. But she did not let it show outwardly. Lucille served bravely during the Battle of Gehenna, which marked the end of the Bando Gora War. She was wounded during the battle, but refused to quit the field and doggedly led her unit to knock out Bando Gora defences. The severity of her injuries eventually compelled her to seek aid when she collapsed. Gehenna was a victory for the Protectorate, but this came at a staggering cost. The battle had been a bloodbath.
Her uncle retired after the battle's conclusion. After Tegaea was almost assassinated by a Sith assassin, she had to resign as Lady Protector. Siobhan followed shortly thereafter. Lucille was at a crossroads. Her uncle had decided to settle down, and enjoy his retirement. But the changes represented a chance for her to make a name for herself. She left the Protectorate with the rank of Captain and with the Stellar Cross pinned to her uniform. She accepted an offer of employment from Firemane.
Lucille served Firemane loyally, seeing action foes against various foes such as Bando Gora, Eldorai insurgents, the One Sith and the First Order. She served with distinction during the Battle of Kaeshana and against Qadiri insurgents. She commanded a battalion as a Major after its commander was incapicated. During that battle she managed to deliver a heavy, yet bloody defeat on a Sith remnant. She earned the reputation of being a bit of a sanguine commander. Not a butcher, but someone not afraid of heavy casualties.
She also gained a reputation for being severe in dismissing or punishing officers who acted cowardly, displayed hesitation or whose conduct was unbecoming. She deliberately avoided the idea that a commander should be a parental figure to their soldiers. She would make sure they had the ability to achieve their objectives; she would set up her command post very close to the front and she would make sure they were fed and sheltered. However, she would expect discipline and adherence to protocol and ruthlessly punish those who failed to do so. She removed a company commander who openly refused an order to conduct a frontal assault on a bunker, though she was flexible enough to agree to allow one of his subordinates to carry out a flanking manoeuvre. She also cashiered a group of rich officers for billeting themselves in a warm house far from danger, while the wounded were being kept in poor conditions.
But her past and her burning ambition caused her problems. General Devotion had joined Firemane and become one of their leading administrator generals. Both officers disliked each other from the start. Devotion saw Lucille as a callous gloryhound, while the latter believed the Dahomian just wanted to play favourites with the 'Dahomian Clique'. This was an influential network of Dahomian officers in Firemane's military who mutually supported each other and whose members soon managed to attain influential positions. Lucille came to resent their influence in high command. She was rather blunt about this, which did not work to her advantage. For their part, the Dahomians disliked her, too. The shadows of the Eriaduan incident played a role. The unit she had led had been mainly composed of Dahomian recruits, and so some in the clique felt she used them as cannon fodder for her own ambition. Militaries are bureaucracies, and promotion has a lot to do with office politics and connections in addition to merit.
Originally, Guyenne was supposed to take command of the marine contingent for the Scarlet Destiny's maiden voyage. ultimately Colonel Leonina Varkathras was chosen instead. Politics played a role in this decision. She took it as a slight, but served loyally during the war with the League of Krolis. Unlike some Firemane officers, Guyenne did not care much for the 'developmental mission' the megacorp allegedly had on Tygara. She did not look down on the elves, but she was not enamoured with them either. In short, she treated them like everyone else.
Following the Tephrike campaign, Guyenne was put in charge of the Forge. There she gained a reputation for being a strict disciplinarian. It was not just a patrol station, but also a boot camp for the Order of Fire's apprentices. However, she was not impressed or intimidated by space mages. Her professional relationship with her subordinate Elpsis was not an easy one. Guyenne openly disliked the 'Fire Princess'. She did gain a grudging respect for her, though it irked her that the young woman could use her family name to always get on special assignments. However, Guyenne was not above using that to her advantage to get the boss' notice.
During her time early days on the Forge, she directed a joint operation between Firemane and a rebel group called the Resistance. A world on the far rim had been taken over by what at first appeared to be a small cell from a remnant of the First Order. Guyenne doubted the intelligence, but judged that Elpsis and her team would be good bait to draw out the enemy and determine his strength. Elpsis' squad and a few Resistance operatives went undercover by posing as mercenaries in order to determine the strength and goals of this remnant. Firemane had had an informant on the planet, but he had been murdered by unknown assailants. The team learned that there was a Ren by the name of Vigilus on the planet. The group was able to bluff the First Order remnant into hiring them, as the occupiers were fighting an insurgency spearheaded by deserted Stormtroopers.
As part of the ruse, Elpsis and her crew supported the First Order warlord's troops in a battle with the insurgents in the main town, while secretly undermining them. This required killing some rebels though, as they had to maintain cover, while at the same time using their abilities to sabotage the warord's troops to keep them from decimating rebels. Eventually the team was able to link up with the rebels and come up with a plan of attack. There was bad blood, but the two groups managed to join forces and take out an important First Order factory. Guyenne and her Resistance counterpart deployed troops to aid in the operation. However, the factory had been the main reason for the imperialists to hold on to the place. The Ren deemed that the local warlord had failed to contain the insurgency and decided to make an example by bombing the city from orbit. Reinforcements had to turn away, as they could not match the firepower he had at his disposal. The team was barely able to escape.
Guyenne did not give her a subordinate a pep talk after the failed operation, but defended her in an official report. If they let a tyrant who used barbaric tactics intimidate them because they were afraid of casualties, they would lose and tyrants like this would reign unopposed. Later Guyenne reluctantly authorised the deployment of Elpsis and her squad during the Second Battle of Bastion. Her minion received a medal for her actions there. Guyenne found them brazen, but recognised she could capitalise on them. She remains with Firemane to this day, still in command of the Forge.
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