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last online Nov 11, 2021 11:32:50 GMT -5
Force Sensitive
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May 30, 2020 13:12:38 GMT -5
Post by Aeternus on May 30, 2020 13:12:38 GMT -5
Damocles
Full Name • Xanthus Graven (birth name)
Nickname • Lord Damocles
Race • Human
Birthplace • Nar Shaddaa
Age • 50
Gender • Male
Sexuality • Heterosexual
Faction • Sith Order, Sith Empire
Concept • Rank 3 Sith Lord - Loyalist Inquisitor and all-round walking nightmare fuel. Filled with disdain for the historical infighting and politicking that has kept the Sith of old fractured and weak, he is dedicated to the cause of Dark Empress Renata, in whom he has placed his faith as the one to elevate the Sith to true, long-awaited glory.
Languages • Basic, Huttese, Sith
Assets •
- Lightsaber: Damocles' lightsaber, finished in a burnished black metal, is as much a symbol of fear as the man himself. The Nextor crystal within used to belong to his treacherous former master, and the vibrant red blade it used to produce took on a darker hue and a volatile, crackling aspect after Damocles bled it a second time and bent it to his own will.
- Custom vibrosword: This massive vibrosword is not a weapon of war in Damocles' hands, but a tool of certain death. While not quite as heavy as its size would suggest, it has enough heft to bite through armour and flesh alike with massive, cleaving swings. Damocles considers the weapon too bulky to easily transport in the line of his usual duties, relying on his lightsaber first and foremost; he reserves the vibrosword for execution of traitors and enemies of the Empire, and for specifically hunting his own most hated prey.
- Armorweave coat and wide-brimmed hat: Typically worn over standard Sith armour, these garments have become an unmistakeable symbol of office for Damocles, and he wears them with pride.
- Caldera-class Imperial Yacht "Huntress": Granted to Damocles as a base of operations upon his elevation to the Convocation of Sith Lords, this Caldera has been heavily modified to serve his purposes. Her hangar has been enlarged to house medium freighter-sized craft; her hyperdrive, sensors, and communications equipment have been modestly upgraded from the baseline specification; and her modular interior sports an array of holding cells and interrogation rooms, along with private quarters for Damocles including a meditation chamber.
- Miscellaneous additional equipment
Appearance
Face Claim • Mark "The Undertaker" Calaway
Height & Weight • 6'10" / 310lbs
Overall Looks • Towering in height and built like a rancor, with ashen grey skin and piercing yellow eyes that signify his deep connection to the Dark Side, Damocles is an imposing physical specimen, and carries himself accordingly. His long black hair hangs in slim, shallow waves, and he sports a full, faintly greying goatee. His body is a slab of powerful, well-trained muscle; it is also a grim tapestry of scars, telling the stories of the tortures he has endured and battles he has fought. He walks with a measured, ponderous gait, seemingly in no hurry to be anywhere, though his long stride carries him apace. By his deeds, strength in the Force, and sheer physicality, he has cultivated an air of menacing authority that practically dares his lessers to defy him; wherever he goes, he rarely fails to be the most fearsome presence in the room.
Personality Profile
To the wider Empire, Damocles is practically a spectre - a spirit of vengeance set loose against the Empire's foes. He has built around himself a mystique of uncompromising devotion to duty and utterly implacable strength that looms larger than he does, for he has long understood the value of mastery over the simple power of fear. This is not, of course, to say that he is anything less than fully capable of justifying his frightful reputation when the need arises; he simply prefers to allow his reputation to speak for him when it can.
He is a scholar as much as a warrior, well-versed in politics, philosophy, military strategy, and the lore and history of the Sith. It is precisely this latter interest that has instilled in him his own driving motivations; history has taught him that the Sith of old were forever their own worst enemies, undone by scheming and competition within as much as by the work of enemies without, if not more so. This constant infighting, he realises, is the sole reason the Sith have thus far failed to truly establish their lasting dominion over the galaxy, of which they are surely capable.
It is for this reason that Damocles professes his complete fealty to Her Imperial Radiance, Darth Renata. Having watched the young Empress' meteoric rise to power, Damocles has seen first-hand the strength and loyalty that she inspires in all who rally around her. In her, he sees one who may finally unite the Sith, carry them beyond the fatal failings of their disparate predecessors, and propel them to the glory that is theirs to seize together. He has dedicated himself to preserving the strength and integrity of Her Empire by rooting out and destroying those enemies who do not appear in the theaters of war; to that end, he aspires to the lofty station of Lord Inquisitor, so that he might turn the entire strength of the Cult of Truth towards this noble purpose.
Background
Father • Daris Graven, 39 (deceased), professional gambler
Mother • Shaena Graven, 34 (deceased), housewife
Other Important Connections •
Xalast, 44 (deceased), slavemaster
Pristis, 62 (deceased), Sith Knight, former master
Overall History •
A Miserable Fate
The man formerly known as Xanthus Graven was born on Nar Shaddaa, a product of a whirlwind romance between slick professional gambler Daris Graven and his recently wedded wife Shaena. Daris was a shrewd and canny player of a variety of casino games. His wins were modest but frequent, enough to sustain a very comfortable lifestyle - at least by Nar Shaddaa standards - for himself and his new family. Shaena resigned from her job as an administrator in a catering supply chain shortly before the birth of her son in order to become a full-time mother.
For ten years, Xanthus enjoyed a relatively ordinary upbringing, until his father's luck eventually ran out. Daris fell afoul of a vengeful Falleen casino shark named Xalast, and although Daris had never failed to make good on whatever minor debts he accrued with even the shadiest of his peers, Xalast never allowed a perceived slight to go unpunished. In a single night of brutal retribution, Xalast dispatched his henchmen to murder Daris and Shaena. A terrified and furious Xanthus gave in to a voice inside that demanded that he fight back against this home invasion, but he was easily subdued, and the thugs made the decision to take the boy with them.
Xalast, though perturbed to have this last-minute deviation from the plan presented to him, was ultimately pleased to see his orders carried out. He knew how to make the best of a changing situation, and decided that he would make use of the fire in this boy. Young Xanthus was pressed into unforgiving slavery, serving the criminal purposes and cruel whims of his new master. Xalast impressed on the boy that this was the only life he would know now; he would serve in perpetual atonement for his father's mistakes, and his only worth was in whatever value he added to Xalast's burgeoning influence through his work.
Needless to say, Xanthus loathed his captor with every fiber of his being. Frequent and vicious beatings kept him cowed for years; some were punishments for perceived mistakes, others were merely to satisfy Xalast's own sadistic thirst for violence. Any ordinary child would surely have been utterly broken by this miserable existence. What Xanthus did not know at the time, however, was that he was no ordinary child. He was keenly sensitive to the Force, and as a natural means of coping with his unending torment, he was unconsciously steeping himself in the Dark Side, tapping into his simmering hatred to feed a stubborn will to live.
From Slavery Rises a Warrior
Six years later, having grown into a body that was tall and strong in spite of the mistreatment it suffered, his will to live saved him from his plight. Xalast finally made the mistake of trying to strongarm the wrong business partner, an olive-skinned Nautolan who had introduced himself as Pristis. Their first meeting, negotiating an exchange over goods that were never identified in Xanthus' presence, did not go the way Xalast intended, even as he made use of his natural pheromones in an effort to steer the meeting. His plan, therefore, was to coerce the Nautolan's cooperation by sending him the head of a member of the retinue with whom he had come to Nar Shaddaa. This mistake would be the Falleen's last, and he would learn the true meaning of revenge before his end.
Pristis was in fact a Dark Jedi, and he marched alone into Xalast's lair to mete out punishment. Xanthus cowered when the fighting broke out, and watched as the fight turned into a massacre. Pristis was a force of nature; he crushed windpipes and skulls with merely a gesture, conjured blazing sheets of lightning from his fingertips, and carved through Xalast's panicking henchmen with a blade of red. Somewhere up above, an explosion rocked the building; Xalast's personal freighter had just been bombed by Pristis' surviving attendants, cutting off the only other avenue of escape.
It was terrifying. It was beautiful.
Finally, when the blaster smoke cleared and silence fell over the warehouses, Pristis called out for the young lad he knew was hiding there to show himself. Xanthus emerged, scarred and trembling, too awestruck to resist. Pristis put up his radiant sword, and explained to the boy that he meant him no harm. He had seen Xanthus for what he truly was on the night of their first meeting; he knew that Xanthus was strong in the Force, and he could feel it practically suffusing the boy, willing him to stand when any lesser man would have fallen long ago. More importantly, he could feel the roiling anger and hate behind Xanthus' eyes. The boy longed to see his cruel master suffer. Pristis offered to grant that wish.
With Xanthus following, he ranged through the warehouse, following a trail of open doors and scattered miscellany where somebody had made precisely no effort to conceal their retreat. They found Xalast on the roof, silhouetted against the fires that consumed his wrecked ship, held at blasterpoint by Pristis' three servants. Their own fury was shown plain on their faces, now that their victory was secure. Pristis towered over his captive, and calmly recited two accusations as if he were a magistrate laying criminal charges at the Falleen's feet. First, he had killed a member of Pristis' retinue without provocation, and thereby invited his revenge. Secondly, he had abused and worn down the young Xanthus, a blameless casualty of Xalast's appetite for power... and thereby invited his revenge.
Pristis turned, gestured to the defeated Xalast, and invited Xanthus to take his revenge. Xanthus stared at the cowering Falleen for a long and silent moment. The past six years of his life flashed before his eyes, and he realised in an instant of divine epiphany that the power Xalast had held over him was no more. He had just watched the man's enterprise crash and burn around him in a single night, at the hands of these four strangers. Xalast had nothing left. At long last, he would reap what he had sown.
Xanthus stood taller then, as if chains that had weighed him down for years fell from his body, and he threw himself at Xalast with a bellow of exploding rage that echoed into the night. With every fist that hammered into Xalast's face, Xanthus' fury rose higher in his chest; with every sickening crack of the Faleen's bones as his slave broke his limbs and ribs, Xanthus wept fresh, burning tears of cathartic bliss. He rained down punches and screamed his throat raw until there was nothing left of Xalast's head but a quivering mass of pulp and a glistening pool of green blood.
Pristis and his men stood in silence, and the Nautolan watched with gleeful satisfaction as this young man allowed the Dark Side of the Force to overtake him completely. He waited until Xanthus' tears ran dry and his screams choked to silence in the back of his throat before he stepped forward. He invited Xanthus to join him, and journey across the stars to seek a better understanding of their gifts in the Force. Emancipated body and soul from his misery, Xanthus smiled for the first time in a long time and accepted.
Journey into the Darkness
Xanthus had a lot to learn about a lot of things. Pristis was a stern but fair teacher, who pushed Xanthus hard but rewarded and encouraged him appropriately, very much a carrot-and-stick method. His own patience was frequently rewarded, for Xanthus was a voracious learner regardless of the subject. He owed this new life to his teacher, and wanted to throw himself headlong into learning everything he needed to know to navigate the galaxy and explore his powers. It certainly also bore noting that he was growing even larger and stronger now that he was able to enjoy proper diet and exercise!
He served dutifully as Pristis' right hand for years. As they travelled across the stars from one enlightening and hazardous adventure to the next, fending off foes and eluding the long arm of the despised Jedi time and again, Xanthus grew into a man of many talents; he had a tactical and scholarly mind that was keen beyond his younger years, he was a physical mountain of a man with incredible strength and a body honed as a weapon, and he took easily to Pristis' instruction in the arts of the lightsaber. Learning of the history and philosophies of all the common forms, Xanthus gravitated towards the twin sisters of Shien and Djem So, a fine match for his ever-sharpening reflexes and great physical strength. Their journey into the Dark Side eventually took them to the distant world of Ossus. The Force called to them there; they could both feel it. What they found was the final destination of their years-long quest for insights into the Force.
What they found was the Sith Order.
Pristis and Xanthus made their petitions to be allowed into this esoteric number. Each was subjected to his own grueling trials, testing their skills, their powers in the Force, and their dedication to their professed desire to explore the mysteries of the Dark Side. They were both found equal to the challenge, and welcomed into the fold as Sith Knights. The duties laid before them were different, so from here, their time as independent master and apprentice was at an end. Xanthus expressed his final thanks to Pristis for lighting the way to his new life all those years ago, and accepted his new call of duty along with a title bestowed upon him from on high.
Xanthus Graven was no more. Rising in his place was Damocles.
From Strength to Strength
In this new fraternity, Damocles flourished like never before. There were wellsprings of knowledge and lore here that he had never dreamed of, and a growing number of fellow disciples with whom to test and broaden his skills. He quickly established himself as an exemplar among his peers; physically dominant, adept with a lightsaber, more cunning than his brutish looks suggested, and growing more and more powerful in the Force. Many would learn to resent and envy his prowess, but his superiors looked upon him with promise, seeing him for what he was; a prodigy who had walked hand in hand with the Dark Side for nearly his entire life.
As he grew in strength and esteem, Damocles watched from a distance as a younger peer did just the same; he knew her only as Renata. If his growth had been swift, hers was positively explosive. She was truly deserving to be regarded as a prodigy, and he studied her trajectory with admiration. There was an undeniable magnetism about her that found ways to inspire confidence and trust in even the most obstinate of their fellows. Damocles knew that she would be one to keep tabs on, even as his own duties carried him away from Ossus and Korriban to other worlds where the Sith Order was growing its power.
Damocles eventually found his niche. Seeing and embracing value in the structure and laws of the Order, he took up the task of enforcing them. He realised and espoused the importance of their cooperation; together, they were far greater than the sum of their parts, and ever greater heights of power and knowledge could be theirs if they stood as one. Much to his chagrin, however, he found as the years went by that few shared this vision. Far too many seemed to view the Order only as a means to their own ends; this was not a collective, he saw, but a gaggle of disparate individuals, whose ambitions were far too often at odds with one another.
In hopes of finding inspiration, Damocles turned to the annals of Sith history. He hoped to learn from examples of unity among the Sith of old that might inform his efforts to bring his compatriots together. His dismay deepened all the more when he found that the Sith of old were in fact no different. They held up and strengthened their institutions only as long as those institutions served their own interests. They all saw the hierarchy of a Sith collective as a pyramid - and the greatest among them competed with each other to be the one sitting at the top.
Damocles was consumed with a disgust which he was only too keen to turn upon his fellows. All around him, he found that he saw squabbling fools where he had once seen worthy peers. They were all walking carelessly into the same mistakes that had laid their forebears low, blinkered as they were by their own egos and desires for greater power and prestige. This was no Order, only a rabble of doomed souls. He was ready to entertain the notion of turning his back on them and striking out to find his own way; but when Renata returned to his notice, it was in a manner so spectacular that grizzled old Damocles found himself enthralled.
She had become Darth Renata when he wasn't looking, and in a single auspicious turn of events, asserted herself at the top of the hierarchy as Dark Empress Renata. Damocles might have turned up his nose at what he would have seen as nothing more than another egotistical fool staking her claim on what power she could claw together for herself, if he had not seen Renata's ascendancy with his own eyes. He had always known her to be one to watch, known her to be more than capable of inspiring the kind of loyalty that true leadership was built on; now, as she claimed for herself the responsibility of building and elevating the Sith Order in accordance with her own vision, he saw her in a whole new light. She could well be the one to finally bring the unattainable within reach, and forge a truly united Sith.
Rise of the Inquisitor
As the Sith Order finally stepped onto the galactic stage, Damocles took his place in the Cult of Truth. Assembled as one of the four "pillars" of the Order, the Cult of Truth concerned itself with overseeing the governmental echelons of the Sith Empire at large, and with protecting the Order and the Empire both from internal dangers. It was a perfect match for Damocles' desires, and he discharged his duties with faith, fervor, and unwavering determination. Where he walked, squabbling aristocrats fell in line, thieving industrialists set their affairs firmly in order, and the many interlocking machines of the Empire as a nation ran more smoothly. Though he never set foot directly on one of the Empire's battlefields as it struck into the heart of the galaxy, his work at home was no less important.
It was only after the conclusion of the war, in the midst of the unprecedented Archeri Crisis, that Damocles was given his first taste of true treachery against his Empress, and it would come from a most unexpected quarter. It was brought to his attention that an archaeological expedition on the world of Rhen Var, active for the past two months, had suddenly fallen silent. Few resources could be dedicated to investigating, as the Empire as a whole was turning its attention toward a concerted response to the Archeri threat, so it was decided that this mission would serve as a test for Damocles alone. He would make for Rhen Var immediately, and get to the bottom of the cause of this expedition's complete communications breakdown. He took with him a squad of Imperial troopers.
What got his hackles up immediately when he arrived at his destination was that he found the base camp empty. It looked to have been unused for days, and the snows were encroaching, threatening to swallow it all up. The camp was built around and sheltering the yawning mouth of a cave in this towering cliff of ice. Damocles scavenged a torch from the camp, ordered the troopers to hold this position, and ranged inside, following the marker lights into gloom and silence. As he descended into the caverns, he found that he was being guided by a presence in the Force of which he had not been aware until he crossed the threshold. It felt as if the Dark Side was reaching out to beckon souls who entered the cave, but the further he walked, the more tense the grizzled Knight of Truth became. The total absence of the archaeologists was one thing, but this sensation in the Force felt wrong.
At last, deep in the darkness, he came upon a light; shifting, mutable, shades of pale purple in colour. He discarded the torch, brought his lightsaber to hand, and approached warily. He turned a corner into a vast cavern, with unnaturally smooth walls and a ceiling so high it vanished into the darkness. The rocky ice underfoot sloped upwards a distance ahead, to a sort of dais in the center of the massive chamber. The purplish light was emanating from a spherical object that floated above the dais. It looked almost like a giant globe of mercury, moving and pivoting unnaturally around a dozen axes at once. As he drew closer, Damocles realised that he could glimpse faces in its surface; they were gone as soon as they appeared, masks of twisted agony that seemed to reach out to him fleetingly as if crying out for aid.
Standing before the sphere was a familiar old Nautolan.
Pristis turned, distracted from his work by the unexpected intrusion. Smiling, he welcomed Damocles - finally, a worthy witness for his ascension! Damocles stared in confusion, demanded to know what was happening. Pristis gestured to the sphere and declared it his greatest discovery, his path to the power he had sought for so long. He called it a conduit of the Dark Side, a living artifact that could bestow unimaginable power upon one strong enough in the Force to master it. It had whispered to him when he first found it, demanding that the price for its secrets be paid, and he paid without hesitation.
It dawned on Damocles at that moment that the faces he had seen were of the archaeologists. Incensed, he laid at Pristis' feet the realisation that he had been in charge of this expedition, and the accusation that he had sacrificed his colleagues to the object. Pristis offered no defence. He only declared that by the power of this artifact, he would finally realise the ambition that had come to him when he first arrived on Ossus; to rule over the rising Sith, and make it the means by which he would claim all that he desired.
Damocles wore his disgust plain on his face. For all his self-professed wisdom, Pristis had learned nothing from history. He too was blinded by ego, unable to see that he was only perpetuating the greatest failing of the Sith. Damocles realised then that he had surpassed his old master. Perhaps it was only right that it fell to him to put a stop to this threat to his Empress.
He ignited his lightsaber, ascended the dais, and battle was joined.
At first, he couldn't even get close before Pristis repelled him with mighty waves of telekinetic energy, try as he might. Gouts of Force Lightning were met in kind and overpowered, forcing the grizzled Knight of Truth onto the back foot. He reached into the Force for answers, and found that he could feel a current of power flowing from the shifting sphere into Pristis' body. He spoke true; he had activated the artifact, and it was strengthening him. How long could he have been lingering here, feeding upon this connection?
Direct combat was out of the question, Damocles now knew, for he would surely be outmatched. So he did the only other thing that made sense; he turned his lightning upon the sphere. He braced his booted feet in the ice, and leaned into the Force and his lightsaber to shield himself from Pristis' furious rebukes. His hate and disdain for the Nautolan, who he saw now as nothing more than an embodiment of all that was wrong with the Sith, welled up inside him, and he made them into fuel to stoke the seething power of his lightning. He cast his mind back to the moment Pristis freed him from his past; he had never forgotten the purity of his rage that night. He tapped deep into it, allowed that feeling to rise and envelop him like armour, and he pressed his assault. He loomed ever larger, more of a phantom in Pristis' sight than a man now, and the weathered Nautolan faltered at the last.
Damocles seized his chance. With a final furious outpouring of Force Lightning, the sphere exploded. The shockwave blasted Pristis off the dais, knocking him unconscious. Damocles recoiled as gusts of unnatural wind and the wailing of disembodied voices raged through the cavern; then realised that they seemed to be leaving him alone. Indeed, the air immediately around him was much calmer. He heard the voices quieten, pained screams giving way to what sounded like sighs of relief. Then all was silent and still once more.
The day was his. Collecting himself, Damocles hailed his troopers on his commlink, ordering them to descend into the cave as far as the marker lights and meet him on the way out. He dragged Pristis with him, and had the Nautolan placed in stun cuffs when he rejoined the troopers. Together, they hauled their prize back to their ship, where Damocles made his first report to his superiors on Dromund Kaas. He would bring the traitor Pristis there to face justice.
Along the way, having taken possession of Pristis' lightsaber, Damocles made very sure to disassemble it so that it could not be used against him. When he set eyes on Pristis' red Nextor crystal, an even better idea struck him. He would both secure his victory this day, and complete his transcendence of his old master. He would bleed this crystal a second time, taking it away from Pristis and making it his own.
When he descended into his quarters on the ship, he did not emerge until they had made planetfall on Dromund Kaas. The ritual was absolutely grueling, far more so than he remembered experiencing when he first bled his own Adegan crystal. This crystal, already bled once, was even more resistant to his mental overtures, and demanded a true battle of wills. Damocles dug deep, feeding upon his fresh, fully realised contempt for what Pristis had become. He declared to the crystal that it would serve him now in a far greater purpose than the pursuits of one arrogant old man whose time had come. Eventually, the crystal gave in, and turned a still darker shade of red in Damocles' grasp. Satisfied, he fitted the crystal to his lightsaber.
On Dromund Kaas, he laid his charge of treason upon Pristis, and as the traitor's captor, was given the task of carrying out his punishment. He was only too pleased to do so. He stood before the bound Pristis, ignited his lightsaber, and as it crackled alight with its new lease of life, Pristis realised in horror what Damocles had done. Damocles told him only that he would reap what he had sown, and struck him down without another word. The last bonds to his past died with this foolish old Nautolan. If there were any further doubts as to the loyalties of the towering Knight known as Damocles, they could now be put to rest.
In the weeks following the tense conclusion of the Archeri Crisis, Damocles presented himself again on Dromund Kaas to receive a reward for his unerring loyalty that some considered long overdue; he was elevated at last to the Convocation of Sith Lords. In the presence of the Darths, he reaffirmed his fealty to the Dark Empress. He accepted the title of Inquisitor, along with a new set of armour sporting the distinctive insignia of the Jade Pillar.
He stands now as Lord Damocles, exemplar of the Cult of Truth and bane of the Sith Empire's foes. As tools befitting his grim station, he has come into possession of a heavily modified Caldera-class yacht, christened Huntress, and commissioned for himself a distinctive vibrosword. These would be the symbols of the office of the Inquisitor as he works to excise the dangers growing within the Empire and the Sith Order both.
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