Sakoda Dathu
Character
"If I can think it, I can build it"
- Name: Sakoda Dathu
- Alias: -
- Nicknames: "Hot Shot", "Stormchaser", "Koko", "Greatest tech savant in space" (self titled)
- Faction: Clan Dathu
- Homeworld: Eres III
- Species: Human
- Relatives: Mother, Father, 2 Brothers (Older)
- Languages Known: Basic (Galactic), Bith, Mando'a (Fluent), Dug, Huttese, Twi'leki (Moderate Fluency)
- Age: 20s
- Gender: Female
- Height: 5'6"
- Weight: 52kg
- Eye Colour: Green
- Hair Colour: Purple (Dyed), Black (Natural)
- Skin Colour: Light Olive
- Body Type: Fit, Lean
- Marks/Scars: Light Abrasions across face and hands
Untrained - Novice - Adept - Proficient - Expert - Master
Techniques:
Art of Movement - Novice
- Force Sensitive: Yes (Untrained, Unaware of Connection)
- Affiliation: The Mandalorian Empire
- Rank: Verd (Warrior)
- Occupation: Tinkerer, Nomad, Explorer
- Trainees: N/A
- [+] Indomitable Spirit: While lacking in the physical prowess of her mandalorian brethren, Sakoda does share the same warrior spirit despite her stature. More likely to quip than fall into a pang of despair when the going gets tough, she has the tenacity of a wookie when backed into a corner.
- [+] Technological Savant: As per the specialty of Clan Dathu, Sakoda puts mechanics to shame with her aptitude for technology, carrying out repairs in record time and squeezing the most performance out of her creations and lifespan of existing tech.
- [+] Weapons Connoisseur: While Clan Dathu puts an emphasis on small arms, Sakoda prides herself on knowing the ins and outs of any weapon she lays her eyes or hands on, while her forte is using small arms like blasters she is accustomed to the use and specifications of most conventional and advanced weaponry and the means to repair or optimize them even if she doesn't use them herself. It is this trait in particular that makes her a fussy buyer in the market place.
- [+/-] Gear Head: With her affinity for technology comes her lackluster social skills, talk ships or engineering with her and she could go on for hours, talk politics or social nuances and she will either opt to fade into the void or clam up with little to contribute. She tends to associate more easily with droids than she does living, breathing beings.
- [+/-] Untrained (Force) Potential: Oblivious to her affinity to the Force, it guides her hand in a subtle manner, aiding her as her mechanical creations whirl to life or click soundly into place, the soft "hum" of technology built to perfection. However this same affinity extends to living beings as well and thus comes with its list of headaches (particularly at busy bazaars) for unwittingly tapping into the world around her and everyone in it. She chalks this up as a psychological quirk rather than anything extraordinary.
- [+/-] Barbed Tongued: Having "fallen short" of the optimal height for a mandalorian warrior, Sakoda had grown up as the runt of a squad and since she could not outgrow her detractors she instead had to humble them with devastating remarks that had brought at least one fellow mandalorian to tears. An optimal trait for a scoundrel to have a quick quip to return fire with, this same trait does not make for conducive relations in more esteemed company and seldom goes over well with prestigious company.
- [-] Fit, but Frail: Sakoda's dedication to mastering the many fields of technology has come at the cost of her physical prowess, while she can dash and sprint with the best of them she is no stand-and-fight warrior, a minor bruise for one will leave a longer lasting impression upon her exterior.
- [-] Heavy Handed: The concept of "reasonable and proportionate force" is a foreign one to the savant, while not acting out of malicious intentions she will often up the ante in retaliation. She would return a slap with a punch, a small laceration with a blaster bolt and anything beyond that will likely involve a thermal detonator as recompense.
- [-] Begrudging: On the other-hand, while she tends to offer her hand in friendship or at least maintain cordial ties as her first option, once someone has lost her favour they've likely lost it forever. There are other instances where she may hold an unprovoked grudge towards a faction for slights against her people, such as those experienced when Eres III was put to the proverbial (and somewhat literal) torch.
Birth & Upbringing...
On the ravaged world of Eres III, the headstrong and adventurous wife named Imriel Dathu along with the curious and mechanically inclined husband named Varkis Dathu ushered in their third and final child that they named Sakoda Dathu. Like her brothers, Jarrus and Greyor Dathu before her, she was in for a loving but tough upbringing, her parents like many of their neighbours being contented if not defiant in their decision to continue living on the planet that perhaps should have been abandoned generations ago. Foolish mandalorian pride...
A majority of Sakoda's infantile years were spent in the reclusive comforts (and relative safety) of her families bunker/abode. The skies of Eres III long since scarred by the reckless actions of the mandalorian occupiers and republic responding forces making travel along the surface unsuitable for toddlers let alone infants where moving carefully and quickly was essential. That's not to say she wasn't taken to the surface at all, the sunlight was an important ingredient to a healthy immune system after all but never was she allowed beyond the threshold of the property in anything less than the confines of a secure (and insulated) vehicle for traveling.
Subsequently, this resulted in Sakoda forming a stronger bond with her father as he would often dwell within the estate to tinker with and create technological innovations and devices to improve the quality of living for his family, one of his goals ultimately being to create something that could restore Eres III to its former glory. The mother, during this time, would hunt and procure the more immediate provisions to ensure the families future, only slightly agitated that her husband focused more on the long term (and sometimes seemingly unrealistic) ambitions rather than the more immediate concerns though this was also why she loved him so it never became a grave point of contention.
When Sakoda was eventually old enough to venture outside under her own power (albeit with supervision, usually her brothers) she ironically spent most of her free time exploring the rural areas of Eres III that had once been military complexes and "points of interest" for the then-military, she and her brothers would go on the search for working tech and occasionally hunt large rat-like beasts that tended to call such locales their nesting places. Plenty of times the trio would
One such incident saw them travel much further than ever before, the nearest installations having been picked clean of any worth salvage. Their far reaching trek was not in vain, using topographical information they'd sliced from computers in other complexes they had tracked down a facility that had remained undisturbed since (as far as they could tell) the republic offensive. Their exploration of the facility was thwart with danger, internal security measures were still active and operational (typically taking the form of sentry turrets, droids and ray shields to name a few) but the risks were nothing compared to the rewards and eventually the Dathu teens proved to be the superior force, loading their land vehicle with all kinds of fresh, undamaged and unsoiled tech... this proved to be the critical mistake they would make and later suffer for.
The trek towards home was relatively uneventful, other mandalorians had little to no reason to venture out this far into the wilderness and the more dangerous wildlife was much the same and as the weather turned for the worse it became obvious why. There was no shelter to be had out where they were, even the dumbest of creatures had enough sense not to stray too far from their hovels to avoid being "caught out in the rain" and while the rain of Eres III was not in itself hazardous, the vehicle the trio were piloting home was not designed for the weight it was now burdened with and it was inevitable that at some point in its journey, especially with the path home turning to mush, that it would become bogged.
While Sakoda would have been the logical choice to put in the driver's seat while the brothers pushed from the rear she was not yet tall enough and so she was tasked with helping Jarrus instead as the rainfall intensified. Their combined strength was insufficient and so time was spent unloading the overburdened vehicle of some of its precious cargo, stashing it in whatever crude alcove that might protect it from the elements but was otherwise too small for the mandalorians themselves or their vehicle. Rainfall turned into a storm and the trio became more fretful of the conditions worsening.
Just as it seemed as though they had removed a sufficient amount to get their vehicle unstuck, lightning was beginning to strike and with their vehicle the only vestige of attraction for the lethal elemental fury the trio was especially looking forward to hitting the road once more. Greyor gave the engine another rev, pedal to the metal and at last their salvation lurched forwards out of the bog it had fallen into, while Jarrus had been quick on the uptake and rushed to the vehicle and the relative safety of the cabin Sakoda was not so fortunate, having given it her all to push she ended up face planting into the mud once the vehicle surged forwards. Quick realization set in that their youngest sibling had yet to join them in the cabin and just as Jarrus (who had yet to secure himself in the vehicle) practically leapt out of the vehicle a bolt of lightning sundered down towards the ground seemingly right where Sakoda had been standing after standing up from the muck.
At first there was a sharp pain, a blinding light, the feeling of weightlessness yet inability to move so much as a finger, the world was upside down and then the descent to the ground arrived with a rough landing and the wind being forced from her lungs and deaf to everything except the ringing in her ears. Greatly concerned for her well being yet doubly concerned about the consequences of moving her so soon after having been seemingly struck by lightening Jarrus conceded that whatever further damage he may unintentionally cause by moving her was marginal compared to simply leaving her as is, he pounded on the side of the vehicle for Greyor to get out and help him move her, Greyor of course doing so most expeditiously.
The Dathu brothers carefully (or as carefully as they could) loaded their sister into the vehicle and then clambered in themselves before shooting off like bandits to escape the eye of the storm, they were able to return home with a few additional harrowing experiences of bolts of lightning smashing into the ground in frighteningly close proximity to the vehicle, the rain coming thick and heavy against the windscreen obscuring much of the path ahead but by the grace of the ancestors (and perhaps... the Force?) they were all able to reach the safety of the estate and rush Sakoda to the sick bay for immediate medical attention.
She hadn't been aware of it at the time, but the fleeting moments prior to the lightening bolt that had almost sundered her had been her first unwitting experience in utilizing the force, a precious few seconds of time to leap away with the power of the force saved her from a direct hit though not enough to come out unscathed. Fortunately, the family had the benefit of a Bacta tank (any family on Eres III without such available was generally regarded as doomed, such was life on the turbulent planet) and Sakoda was slid into it almost immediately, her recovery took a little time but after the nausea wore off after having come out of the tank some days later she was back to her spirited self though she did make a mental note to be more alert to perilous weather patterns in the future the next time she went adventuring.
Further into her years, she learned well by now that if you want entertainment on Eres III that it was usually rife with danger, racing through the fields on a swoop bike during a storm, hunting in abandoned complexes for ever increasingly hardy and dangerous game, getting into shootouts with off-world pirates that had heard rumours of republic facilities laden with "loot" (though this last instance was less about entertainment and more staking ones claim to quality tech, sometimes even cleaning out the pirates ships when they'd been beaten into surrendering). Such climates as well as acts of foolish bravery instilled upon Sakoda a warped sense of danger as she grew up, matters that others would consider too risky seemed par the course for her and her siblings as they matured into recognized warriors of Clan Dathu.
While her older brothers focused more towards their physical prowess to compliment their CQC skills, Sakoda went the opposite direction by using her knack for technology to harry her adversaries in a firefight and minimize her direct exposure. A mandalorian from another clan may chastise and speak ill of her tactic but for the same reason one does not run into the path of a lightening bolt she reasoned that rushing to engage an opponent head-on was folly.
Leaving the Nest...
As the years went on it became abundantly obvious that the daughter of the family was not going to conform to conventional upbringings unlike her two older brothers. While they [the two brothers] had joined the greater Mandalorian Empire to aid against the nations enemies and subversive allies, Sakoda desired the leeway to spread her wings and explore the galaxy, lusting for adventure and the opportunity to chart her own path (much to the chagrin of her family and what would likely be a dim view by most other mandalorians by and large).
With the parents content to remain on Eres III or at the very least stay out of any future conflicts around the galaxy and the sons having joined the larger mandalorian community (and thus, neither needing their own individual vessel as they would be riding cargo to trained pilots anyway) it seemed this Dathu family had little need to horde the family ship for themselves. As such, the Dathu Stormbreaker was bequeathed to the youngest daughter, feeling that the best way to perhaps get her on-side with "the program" was to support rather than browbeat her. With the cosmos as her playground she felt a swell of joy when she charted a course for the stars at the helm of the ship her parents had utilized in their own adventures.
Her first adventure took her right to the heart of Mandalore, the home world of her people to which served as the source of many great (and not so great) tales of conflict, resolve and perseverance. She was taken aback at first on how much easier life seemed to be on the planet but quickly came to the realization that it merely masked its inherent danger in other ways, she'd opted to spread her wings in a time of great conflict and she'd learn before long that things less obvious than bolts of lightning would present a danger to her, having narrowly missed the thwarted invasion of Mandalore by the Sith Empire by a weeks time.
For reasons she couldn't fathom in her own head, this garnered her chagrin, she felt an ancestral fury at the news of Mandalore having been attacked in her lifetime and set about garnering experience abroad in the ways of fighting on the modern frontier so that she may one day rally alongside her mandalorian brethren when the time comes to return the favour against the insidious sith that tried (and failed) to assail them...
((THIS WILL BE EXPANDED UPON AND FLESHED OUT AS TIME ALLOWS))
Stamp Collection:
CREDITS
Stamps - Kaalia Pavanos
Also Stamps - Niaami Solas
