A young Vebra at the onset of the war.
Technical data
Name: Vebra Mirthios
Species: Zabrak (1/8th human)
Age: 36
Gender: Male
Faction: Jedi Strike Team
Rank: Republic Special Forces Captain
Training: Various Jedi Sparring partners, Combat Experience
Concerning you
You are on a mission. How did you dress for it? What else can you say about your looks?
Height: 1.9 Meters
Weight: 270 lbs.
Eyebrow Hair color: Black
Skin Color: Caramel
Standing at 1.9 meters tall I’m physically imposing to most with a muscular build.. While in between missions or deployments I will usually gain nearly a dozen pounds due to my trouble keeping body fat while living off rations. My features are predominantly Zabrak. I have a
Jato on either side of my neck with the smaller ends pointing towards the middle of my throat, both of these are tribal tattoos given to me after completing my rite of passage.I also have an assortment of tattoos
below the neck line. I also have seven small orat on my crown in a V pattern with the tip of the V being on the transition between my forehead and crown. All of these fit into my helmet and are a near white color. my eyes are an intense purple. Due to my Human lineage I do have eyebrow hair, which is strange for a Zabrak, so I simply keep it shaved down to hide my Human ancestry. My nearly pure Zabrak ancestry gives me denser bones, both contributing to my weight but also giving me an edge in a fist fight.
My body has had a heavy toll taken on it from the long war. Both my forearms are more scar tissue than skin at this point due to my fighting style. While the armor technicians give us special forces better gear it didn’t stop me from getting shot several times earlier in my career, while the armor saved my life I possess 3 slightly faded circular burn wounds. My back and part of the left side of my neck was also scorched from a thermal detonator but those burns are fading just like my blaster burns. I have yet to get my Jato fixed in those areas due to personal reasons. Funny side story, one of those blaster bolts actually burned off my left nipple. It’s a little annoying to look at in a mirror.
I don’t really care what clothing I’m wearing while off duty as long as there is a Republic insignia on it, I used to actually dress as a mechanic sometimes just to avoid questions from regular rank and file about my scars however. My armor has been destroyed and replaced more times than I can count, the only thing I keep consistent (and ask my soldiers to do for squad unity purposes) is that I will paint the arms and helmet green or tan, helps blend into the environment after all.
This is what I’m currently using. The unique features of this armor are that I’ve refitted the forearm guards to be a cortosis weave backed by durasteel plate. Usually surprises the apprentices when their sabers get stopped cold on my arm, I prefer to keep them away with my Beskad but it sure beats losing a leg or a head. My primary tool for incapacitations is my left wrist mounted rocket injector. This is 5 loaded rocket boosted syringes full of knockout serum designed to either slow enraged Sith down or to render turned Jedi unconscious. This device is however only effective up to about five meters in most circumstances due to their limited fuel. However, I do keep a few bolts on me that work out to about fifteen meters, but I don’t keep these loaded by default, their a little bulkier and inhibit my wrist movement due to the extra fuel. I dare to think what this compound would do to an ordinary humanoid. The lab boys said something about it stopping most peoples hearts, lucky I got two of them then aye? Jokes aside I keep a single dose of the retroactive agent on my person, just incase. My primary weapon however is a compact rifle designed for short to medium range combat. I’ve also modified it to be able to take my Beskad as a bayonet which almost doubles the length of the weapon.
In order to confront the Sith, you need to be strong. Name one weakness or flaw you have identified but not neutralized.
I’ve seen so many men die under my command during this whole Sith hunting business I… haven’t been able to make new friends in years. What ones I still have left are slowly dwindling from this blasted war. I realize one day this conflict will end and it terrifies me. If I stop to think about how alone I really am in this position of command I might finally crack, who knows what that means. I came close once, during a brief time as a Sith captive on Alderaan. I have no wish to ever come that close to my mental cliff again. As long as I have something to do and to focus on I’ll be alright. I just hope something back home will be able to fill this void for me when we’re done.
Fighting Sith is not easy. How do you plan to use the Force for this?
Well that’s a funny story actually. I actually am weak in the force, much to my parents and a few sergeants surprise. While I can’t do anything fancy like double back flips in the air or close a 100 meters in seconds I can at least keep up with them in some ways. I have a very weak Precognition allowing me to match saber strikes with my Beskad or my gauntlets. I also am able to use a sort of Telekinetic Defense to avoid getting rag dolled like I’ve seen happen when higher level force users get into crowds. While this may be related to my mild force abilities, trying to “suggest” I leave the door unguarded so you can sneak out and fraternize isn’t going to work.
Sure, you can use the Force… but what else can you do?
This is unsurprisingly where I specialize. I’m an accomplished Special Operations Trooper, meaning I’ve seen both the trenches and backlines sabotage. While I’m not much of a bomb maker I can at least cook you up something to take down a power plant or a local defense grid. Meaning I've had a great deal of experience making and disarming IED's, this comes with some knowledge of Imperial security systems. It's possible I can run into security systems I've never seen before but if given enough time with it I might be able to splice it or at least determine a weak point in a defense grid. But my main skills however are in my marksmanship and hand-to-hand combat. Training day in and day out with rifles for the better part of two decades means I can take a womp rat out at several hundred yards without breaking much of a sweat. But that’s not what your here for, you wanna know how I can even match Sith in hand to hand. Due to my special occupation as founder of the first Republic Army Sith Kill Team I have had a great deal of training with both Jedi and against Sith in the field. I’ve taught two classes of recruits now (with Jedi help of course) how to outsmart and overpower Sith apprentices.
Getting into upper level Sith however gets rather tricky. The only Sith lord we’ve managed to kill I was only able to keep up with for a short time before we had to start doing squad rotations on him with the assistance of a Jedi. Being a few years removed from that now though me and the other trooper that survived that mission have spent quite a bit of our time training with Jedi in the way of Soresu. While I wouldn’t consider myself proficient in a lightsaber form I would say it’s been the main reason I’m still standing.
Something got you to join this mission. What was it? What events shaped your life?
Born on the Zabrak homeworld of Iridonia into the traditional clan of Mirthios I was always destined to become a warrior. Even at a young age play fighting with my brothers and other kids my age in the clan I always seemed like I enjoyed fighting. I have fond memories of almost being killed multiple times by people or things bigger than me. Even though I began to mellow out at around the age of eight I was then introduced to the martial combat my people so love. It was during this that I showed to be unnaturally good at picking out what someone was going to try and due to me. Dodging counter strikes I shouldn't have been able to see, backing off a fight when I knew I couldn't win. I even managed to push some things without even touching them. my parents took this information correctly, realizing I was force sensitive and it was then that I was taken to the Jedi Academy on Alaris Prime.
While not only did I come there at a rather late age for younglings I still tried my hardest to be good in my studies and learning of the force. For some reason though I constantly struggled with connecting to the force or being able to use my abilities in any meaningful way. My young self having been instilled since birth with the ideals of achieving excellence in all things tried futilely to keep up with my peers. Being the right age, I began to feel left out when my friends were beginning to leave the academy with their new masters. This continued for several more years until I turned 12 and the Jedi finally gave me the option to either join the service corp or go home after I failed my initiate trials. I failed them due to the fact that I had missed the point of them, to reach out with the force and create something worth while with it. I ended up assembling the saber correctly but did so with my own two hands instead of with any use of the force. This failure weighed heavily on me through the rest of my teens and helped to me also fail my third trial of insight. I was unable to identify the darkness within myself. Being 12 I decided home was where such a failure as myself belonged and left, but I was encouraged heavily by the Jedi to continue doing good for the galaxy.
Upon my return I was welcomed back with open arms but I internalized those feelings of failure throughout the rest of my childhood. My primary escape from this feeling was in continuing my training in combat. Also at this time my aunt had a child and I was asked to help watch her and care for her, perhaps to teach me how useful failure was. Between being given responsibility and continuing my combat training I managed to push down my feelings of failure and of not being good enough for awhile. My cousins were almost my own brothers and sisters, seeing as they were only a short walk from our family home. This also meant that I started my rite of passage rather late compared to other members of my family. While my low level force sensitivity and being older helped me with my passage it was still one of the most grueling things I’ve experienced in my life.
When I was a bit older I had a bit of a fling with a Human padawan girl a year older than me named Serina. Turned out she remembered me from our youngling group back at the academy and we had had a bit of a connection, being from families with military traditions. Whenever we talked, everything felt like it was understood, we didn't even have to speak sometimes. We had spent a lot of time in angst around each other as we matured, I guess we just finally happened to cross each other the right time at that market. I found out she was being given some time away from her master to explore Iridonia before they headed out to the Outer Rim. The time seemed.... right. I enjoyed the few days we had together before word of war reached us and her time on the planet was cut short. As we parted ways her allegiance to the Jedi confirmed my decision to join the Republic armed forces, after all, the Jedi had told him to do something positive right?
For my first few years of service, I was shuffled around to several fronts and didn't actually see much action. Most of the battlefields had degenerated into vast no man's lands with little interaction of troops in any meaningful way. However, while awaiting reassignment to another front, Alderaan was attacked. When news arrived of the capture of the royal family I along with most of my garrison was lead by Jedi Satele Shan to assist in slowing down or even stopping the Imperial march on the capital city. While the forward forces had already engaged the army and the Sith leading them I was part of the wave of reinforcements that arrived with the Jedi.
While the fighting in the dense forest was brutal it eventually became the Republic's first victory in the war. My battalion was disbanded due to heavy losses and what remained of our battalion was scattered across the galaxy. I did run into a few of those boys later in my life but they even are dwindling in number. I had the honor however of being shuffled into a new battalion being formed to hunt Sith. But nothing was ever so easy. As we left Alderaan in our shattered and temporarily consolidated forces our transport convoy was attacked by Mandolorians. For reasons I never understood, the crazy Jawa's boarded us. Their troop transports drilled through our hulls and they poured forth into the interior of our ship while most of us were still putting on our boots. As soon as I left the armory I was saved by a corporal who shoved me out of the way of a thermal detonator.
Wishing to honor my comrades sacrifice I leveled my rifle at the Mandolorians and began firing. As we pushed them out back towards their boarding craft several Mando's began pulling out various melee weapons including vibroblades and beskads, which he could only guess had been in their families for awhile. As they charged into us their superior armor granted them the ability to take enough of our fire to close the distance with us. Narrowly dodging the swing of a beskad I tackled the assailant at the waist and knocked off his helmet. As he went for his pistol I grabbed his helmet and smashed his head with it. As the dazed soldier tried to regain his bearings I kept hitting him. Bringing the helmet down on the soldier's head until all that was left was a sticky warm paste. That was my first kill that wasn't me staring down an enemy meters away and watching them drop. This was real for me.
After being given R&R befitting my multiple combat engagements I was also able to keep a trophy. A Beskad from the man I had beaten to death with my bare hands. I kept a hold of that blade for a long time, training with it in my spare time while also hiding it from my superiors for quite some time, lest I reveal that I took a trophy. My unit specifically bounced around from planet to planet fighting on new fronts against the seemingly never ending hoard of well trained Imperial troopers. Our squad happened to be one of the few to come up against Sith and not require overwhelming force to take them out. We were able to surround this Sith pureblood apprentice in a warehouse and with a series of explosives, we managed to force him into a compromised position. I took it upon myself to be the sacrificial nerf and engaged him with my beskad while my squad mates fire down on us. While I was in close I detonated a repulser grenade which while burning my hand had the consequence of knocking us both down. My squad, as they were ordered, fired down on the now stunned Sith.
High Command recognized us all with promotions and began using my squad as a hit and run kill team. We were deployed behind enemy lines more than a few times. My team and I picked up numerous skills and several replacements along the way. While we had the occasional officer assassination order most of our work became Sith killing. After nearly a decade of this at the beginning of a newly redoubled offensive effort by the Imperials my squad and I managed to bag our first Sith lord kill with the help of a Jedi knight and half an artillery battalion. We had him pinned with heavy weapons emplacements for three days while we crawled through a network of trenches, fighting tooth and nail with a contingent of regular army no less then a hundred meters behind us. We were the tip of the spear.
We fought multiple Sith apprentices and even a Sith Juggernaut on our way into the complex. It turned out however the Jedi had decided to send their own knight to infiltrate the compound, without telling us. We weren't unwelcoming of the support but we were suspicious as to why the council had not told us to begin with. Half the squad was either maimed or killed during the encounter but in the end we prevailed. Republic command saw fit to expand the few squads they had acquired like ours into more. While the ultimate goal was to create a whole company of troopers able to directly combat Sith on the battlefield it proved difficult to train people to do our job. At this point the Republic reached out to the Jedi to specifically help them train men to combat these lower leveled Sith, as well as those of us from the original units.
While the Jedi agreed to loan a knight or two and few dozen padawans most of the trainers for my company were forced to be deployed to the front. While the project was not abandoned training has slowed to barely be able to replace the occasional death of a member of these squads. I actually ran into Serina during this time at the staging ground on Ord Mantell before being deployed to Serenno. She had lost an arm and gotten a robotic replacement since I last saw her. This didn't diminish our feelings for each other however, we've actually made plans to get together after the war. Just have to hope she makes it through.
Though after the loss at Serenno my squad and I were barely able to escape the planet before it came under Imperial occupation. Now we’re waiting on new orders, what we’ve heard come through the pipe is talk of a combined offensive with the Jedi to take out some Darth or a few lords. This is all less than chatter though, we can barely stand the inactivity though. Almost makes me wish they’d send us out to Balmorra.
What are you like, and what keeps you motivated?
My sense of duty to the Republic and my fellow soldiers are mostly what keeps me going. Getting back at the Sith for all the pain and suffering they’ve caused me though, that’s just icing on the cake for me. But it’s also possible I keep going out of fear for what an Empire dominated galaxy might look like. Nothing but brutal politics and poor architecture, who would want such a thing? I try to keep things jovial when we’re in the thick of it but sometimes even I will cut into a serious cool calm just to keep everyone from doing anything stupid. While I don’t particularly like strategic planning I like to go into every situation with at least some sort of contingency plan. When I’m in the thralls of hand-to-hand however I will use whatever emotion gives me strength as it’s no longer about me keeping the men calm in that moment. This is about me crushing the skull of my enemy so that he may not do the same to me. Outside of combat I like to keep things light, the battlefield and life are serious enough as is, no need to add.
How do you fight with lightsabers?
Assuming your talking about my Beskad, defensively. There is not a chance I would be able to keep up with the faster lightsaber forms on their terms. Best bet for me is to sit back and wait for my allies to do something or for the enemy to tire themselves out.
How do you relate to the other characters?
Fa-Val-Kuul, she commanded one of my battalions back in the early days. I would count her has a friend and would answer any call she put out for aid.
Jayda Mirthios, my niece and what may well be a second little sister. While I haven’t been back to the home world in years word had gotten to me that her brother had been killed and she had been made MIA presumed dead. I don’t believe it though, she’s a tough girl. I regretted not being able to make it back for her Res’Selenoren.
Serina, while it's a long and complicated story it's likely that after the war she and I will find a nice quiet place to settle down. Since we're both greatly aware that either of us might not live to the end of this conflict we've given each other a permission of sorts. We care deeply about each other but if another lover may enter the other's life it's probably for the best. Considering we're both deployed routinely to the front lines.
Out of Character
How powerful is (s)he in the Force?
As I’ve said, he’s very weak in the force. That being said what little ability Vebra has put considerable effort into his Telekenetic Resistance and somewhat into Precognition. With the exception of the Darth and one of the stronger in the force lords it is unlikely that a Sith will be able to toss him around like a regular trooper, meaning you have to actually fight him if he wants to fight. The Precognition is purely to aid in his defense and it’s likely that say a Makashi user would be able to act faster than Vebra could utilize this ability. He is lightly trained in Mind Cleanse, primarily for benefit of avoiding succumbing to dark side influence upon contact with a lord.
Has your character encountered members of the other factions before?
Yes, Jayda. This is Vebra’s niece, meaning he would very much like her to survive any encounter he meets her in. Should he encounter her it is very likely that Vebra will be able to convince her to surrender if other Jedi are around, so this should likely be kept in mind.
Your character can’t know his/her every weakness or flaw. Which ones were missing above?
Vebra is a brawler for all intents and purposes, meaning that he will be up close and using heavy strikes if he is on the offensive. However, his offense is very weak compared to his defense but not unbreakable. Illusions and general mind tricks are much more likely to work on Vebra than any Jedi that is on the Jedi team. Even if he is able to tell that he is being toyed with he does not have the tools to free himself from the influence of such force abilities. As I’ve previously discussed fast attacking opponents or multiple opponents will make Vebra’s “street” Soresu fall apart and will likely put him in a dire situation fast.
The Dark Side. How well does your character resist it?
Vebra’s weakness in the force is one of his greatest assets in this case. While dark side temptations still exist for non-force sensitive it’s much more difficult to become a corrupted shell of an individual due to it’s influence. Having dealt with Sith enough to have “felt” the dark side Vebra has had a Jedi master teach him how to fortify himself against it. While this isn’t perfect it will at least keep him fighting in the presence of a massive source of the dark side like a darth.
What is your character’s personality like? What motivates him/her?
Vebra is a generally easy going guy outside of combat and sometimes even while in it. His goal while on deployment is to save as many of his men as possible and complete their objective, everything else is secondary. Vebra has a very strong sense of duty and loyalty to the Republic, especially after having his loyalty tested many times by Republic High Command, both on purpose and as a bi-product of some of their orders. His main motivations are the preservation of the Republic and defense of his soldiers.
Do you have any limits as to what is “ok” to happen to your character?
Short of actually killing him, no. Even if you lop off a leg he’ll get a cybernetic replacement and keep fighting. Breaking him mentally is also a possibility but I would be interested in seeing someone try.
Do the ends justify the means?
With the exception of torture, yes. Vebra is willing to put aside every ethic of the Republic military to complete his missions, however rarely has he needed to. He has no issue with executing unarmed prisoners if they bring a danger to the mission.
Captivity. Do you want him/her to potentially be captured?
I would if it wouldn’t mean his immediate execution since he is a non-jedi making his capture likely to result in an execution. Barring that I wouldn’t mind Vebra being captured.
What do you think your character is doing in a few IC months?
Vebra is a tool of war. He will do what he is tasked to do, if killing Darth Nyiss is still his mission then that is what he will be doing.
