rock and stone
NAME: Cei Kyros
FACTION: Smuggler's Alliance // Outer Rim Coalition
RANK: "Grand" Captain
SPECIES: Duros
AGE: 50
SEX: Male
HEIGHT: 175 cm
WEIGHT: 85 kg
EYES: Crimson
HAIR: None
SKIN: Blue
FORCE SENSITIVE: Borderline
STRENGTHS
- Smuggler Prince: Cei has been in this game a long time. He has helped build trade empires, legitimate and otherwise, and made a lasting mark not just throughout the underworld but on a galactic stage. Now stylizing himself as a "Grand Captain", Kyros employs a veritable armada of smugglers. He has the connections, the resources, and the ambition to haul just about anything.
- Scoundrel's Luck: Or so they say. Cei has lived a very self-charmed life, owing in large part to a modicum of sensitivity that even the Grand Captain himself may not be fully aware of. Not enough of a connection to manipulate in any conscious way, this glimmer of psychic empowerment has nevertheless made a difference between life and death on more than one occasion. Kyros trusts his feelings and instincts, which both rarely lead him astray.
- Martial Arts: A crack shot with a blaster, Kyros has never received any formal close quarters combat training. He is a competent enough street brawler, knows some dirty tricks like everyone in his line, but Cei isn't the type to bust out any Teräs Käsi or overpower a wookiee. Although he has lived a very violent life, he is not a soldier, and lately he has become accustomed to not needing to fight his own battles.
- Unstable: Kyros has always had an eccentric reputation even from a young age, but lately his behavior has become more and more erratic. Extreme paranoia, delusional thinking, speaking to voices that aren't there. Even his closest confidantes cannot say how severe his symptoms are out of fear and uncertainty that it isn't all one big elaborate test of loyalty.
APPEARANCE
For all his efforts to go straight, Kyros still can't help but play the part of the dashing rogue to an almost theatrical degree. Never found anywhere without his wide brimmed hat, Cei wears age beyond his years in his face but not in his expressions, which are just as vibrant and prone to change as in his youth.
BIOGRAPHY
An early joiner and powerful figure within the Galactic Alliance, Grand Captain Cei Kyros was sometimes known as the 'fourth head of the Triumvirate'. Apart from being grammatically troublesome, it wasn't entirely true, but still the de facto leader and civilian representative of the Alliance Merchant Fleet possessed an amount of influence within the hierarchy of Federation leadership that would surprise most people. After the liberation of Coruscant and the relative stability that followed the Alliance had grown in territory and infrastructure, becoming less reliant on independent traders and other freelancers to keep their supply lines intact. The self-styled Grand Captain went to great lengths to ensure that the people did forget the contributions of the Fleet during the war, and due to popular support the merchants enjoyed a profitable relationship with the Defense Force offering freelance contracts on the edge of Alliance territorial expansion, helping to secure and strengthen recently established trade routes and taking on other odd jobs, under Cei's leadership the Merchant Fleet became known as a place to come to find semi-legitimate work without being asked too many questions.
Born of humble beginnings on the impoverished decks of Bburru Station in orbit over Duro, Cei was a relatively well behaved young kid before as a teenager his fascination with gambling got him pulled down into the underworld without much of a say in the matter. Caught attempting to card shark some connected locals, Cei's smooth tongue managed to convince them to allow him to work off the debt instead of getting his bones broken, and soon found himself hopelessly involved in organized crime. Despite his distaste for the darker, seedier side of the life, with no other options the young duros found himself naturally gifted at making credits. Earning enough favor to stick to racketeering, trafficking, and theft, he maintained a dislike for narcotics, the species trade, and other particularly destructive ventures and activities. When he had risen high enough in the organization, he worked to eradicate those aspects of the business, and under his leadership the enterprise expanded through much of the Duro stations and to several other worlds in nearby systems.
When they grew large enough, Cei's organization caught the attention of the Exchange, and when Kyros was reluctant about the deal they offered his partners betrayed him, robbing him of his wealth and arranging to have him killed. Shaken by the experience and also more or less free of his debt for the first time since his youth, Cei vowed to try and go straight, just as soon as he borrowed a freighter indefinitely. Taking jobs for the Merchant Fleet in the early days of the Galactic Alliance, eventually he earned enough to purchase his own Action VI transport which he modified into an Interceptor-class frigate. Working his way into the trust of the Defense Force, he cultivated a reputation as an intermediary between the military and their so called 'civilian contractors'.
When gifted a system by the Galactic Alliance Triumvirate to settle for their contributions to the One Sith campaign, Kyros was chosen to act as their representative. He surprised everyone by selecting an uninhabited, uninhabitable, dead end system which the Defense Fleet had been for years using as a space junkyard. In a shrewd business move, Cei claimed ownership to all salvage rights in system for his fledgling Merchant Fleet via eminent domain.
While the more storied names among their ranks continued to make Alliance headlines for their public service, Grand Captain Kyros through sheer force of will united dozens of smuggler crews and mercenary clans for long enough to serve as his initial work force in pursuit of the duros' mad vision. Over time more were drawn in from across the galaxy through word of mouth to help contribute to the dream of a Caravan, particularly when the station's hyperdrive network was finally completed and it first began to make some headlines of its own.
Now with a small 'fleet' more or less under his command, Cei spent many years reaping the rewards of an Alliance in peacetime before war once more loomed on the horizon. The Grand Captain was not complacent during the First Order's reign of terror across his nation's Outer Rim territories. He supplied many detailed starcharts of the Anoat Sector early in the war, proved instrumental in helping to negotiate some of the finer details of the Vero Passage, and Kyros sponsored smugglers were in large part responsible for keeping supply chains open to worlds like Lothal and Elrood, looming in the shadow of a hyperlane blockade.
By that time he had already seen writing on the wall however, and long before Grand Marshal Raaf set events into motion that would lead to his Alliance's sudden and tumultuous end, the wily old duros diverted Caravan Station's course to make best speed for the Outer Rim. Requiring months to cross even moderate distances, by the time Coruscant was sacked and Lothal placed under siege, Kyros and his Merchant Fleet were passing through the Vero Passage and into Coalition territory.
Since the Fall, his vast merchant empire has largely ceased to exist, although some still choose to band together in an informal sort of Smuggler's Alliance. Elevating himself to owner and chief proprietor of the Caravan, his traveling freeport still roams the Outer Rim depths, although without protection afforded by the relative stability and security of Alliance space, such a prospect has become more dangerous than ever. Pirate raids are common, and Cei now employs squadrons of independent combat pilots to defend his interests.
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