Introduction: Victor Stone
The name's Victor Stone, a scavenger mechanic living in the outer rim planet Nal Hutta. I find whatever work I could around the space dock, repairing starships and vehicles for meagre pay. It wasn't good work, but it kept food on the table and a roof over my head.
My skill has always been second to none, I could work miracles with whatever I worked with, turning beat up and useless devices back into working order. Despite my skill, I never progressed further than a mechanic for hire, fixing minor breaks or faulty wiring when one of the captains of a starship happened to be in a rush or couldn't find a decent mechanic. Decent, Ha! I could work circles round the best of them.
I would work my self to the bone in not just repairs, but also scavenging through the scrap piles that build up over time. If I could find something of value or pieces that I could combine together then I had something I could sell, it didn't happen often but with perseverance and vigilance I can build a decent enough rig that could give me a week's worth of pay.
As great as it is to work with scrap and metals every day, I hope to leave this pirate's wonderland for somewhere that I could truly excel. To be able to work on top-of-the-line ships and with new experimental tech would be my ideal job, to become a chief engineer on one of the famed Alderaan science vessels would be a dream come true.
Wishing for a better life was a pipe dream, with no guarantees behind every decision it means everything you do you had to make sure you could live with the consequences and leaving Nal Hutta without a goal or adequate research could be the end of me. This planet may be a pirate's paradise, it's the only place my skills are guaranteed to earn me credits.
I can't say that I didn't have the options available to me, I heard of the Republic and the Empire's academies, both of which would give me the opportunity to become the engineer on board a starship that I wished to be. However, after being on the outside of both sides of the eternal war, I can't place my loyalties with either of them, and if I can't trust them then I refuse to work with them. It feels idiotic to turn them down when they could give me a better life, but I have to stick to my principles otherwise I would be the same as the pirates galivanting around Nal Hutta.
My refusal to leave soon became my ruin, forever altering my life from that point onwards. I was called upon to work on a Hutt Cartels' ship that had a faltering engine, it was easy work and decent pay, so I didn't refuse. Traveling up into orbit was the first time I had been in space since I first arrived on the swamp planet, the feeling of being in the vast emptiness was indescribable.
The ship was an old-style freighter that was used for its robustness and reliability, large and bulky but sleek enough to pass as stylish. Fixing the engine wasn't much of a challenge, it was more user error than old age or accident with the equipment. When I work on ships like these, I always make sure not to look around or go near the cargo bay, I don't want to know what they were carry and I was sure they wouldn't take to me meandering around at my leisure.
During my work I found a strange device lodged into the engine compartment, sitting there connected to nothing as if someone had thrown it in there. I knew these pirates don't like anyone taking anything from them, even if it was a useless piece of scrap that had been tossed to the floor, though the temptation to know what it was overrode my rational sense.
When I was finishing up the final touches on my work, I heard something that resembled closely to a scream. I should have ignored it, I should have done anything other than investigate the source of the sound. Finding a girl being harshly beaten, I rushed to her aid without counting the number of pirates laughing around her. To say the beating I took was bad was an understatement, they burned and scarred me beyond recognition.
Dumped back onto the planet without pay or my tools, I barely survived by crawling through the swamp to the old doctor in town. He did the best that he could do but there was nothing that could have been done to save my arm, parts of my face and my arm was gone. The pain had me blacking in and out for days, I was lucky enough to stay conscious to work with the doctor and build a basic robotic arm.
The arm worked sufficiently for my purpose of repairing my lost eye and charred face, with the doctor's input it went as well as I could though it caused me to worry as I knew he would be expecting a fee for his services. Luckily for me, he knew of my situation and told me to teach him how to make the robotic arm in exchange for his fee, he had patients that needed them and couldn't go to any of the other medical professionals for one reason or another.
Returning back to the shack that I called home, still in agony, I found it in ruins as someone had raided it for anything they could get their hands on. My credits and spare parts that I had worked hard to clean up were taken, my bed and cupboard laid in pieces after it had been torn to pieces. Sitting down in the ruins of my home, I felt defeated and dejected, hope fading as I realised that I couldn't work or had enough credits to get me a viable arm.
Just as I was about to fall asleep, my hand glanced my pocket, and I remembered the strange device I had pilfered from the pirates. Holding it in my hand, I managed to get a good look at it after I had shoved it into my pocket. It had all the hallmarks of a data storage, except it was vastly more advance than anything I had ever seen anywhere on Nal Hutta.
Without my equipment, I could not examine the device, yet that has never stopped me before. A light bloomed inside me, a glimmer of hope sparked within me. Forcing myself to my feet, I got to work piecing my life back together.
It took a considerable effort to find the parts needed to upgrade my arm and my eye, but it paid off as with my advancements my efficiency and skill rose greatly. My new eye could examine and scan through bulk heads to see the faults quickly, having to tear panels off one by one takes time and weakens the structural integrity of the ship, and my arm contains a whole new set of tools that I can deploy on command.
Yet, with my amazing upgrades, comes a downside I didn't expect. Cyborgs aren't exactly favoured among the pirate infested Nal Hutta, they view us as robots rather than people. Tools to be used and thrown away. It dampened my spirits slightly, though I preserved as I had a goal, a dream to fulfil.
I wanted to leave this swamp hell and forge my own path among the stars, all I needed was to crack the encryption on the data storage. The device would be a wealth of information, and that info could be the answer to all my prays.
Except, it wasn't. The data storage had to have been in there for decades, back when the old freighter was created or possibly older, as it was corrupted beyond anything that could be repaired. Only fragments of the data survived, enough to piece them together into some semblance of use. The data storage was part of seven devices that held the records of a planet in Wild Space, some place beyond the outer rim that couldn't be travelled to without an exact star chart mapping.
From what little I had to work with, it seemed that an old age civilisation was nearing the brink of destruction and sent out rockets carrying these devices, what they wanted people to do with them wasn't exactly clear. The only saving grace for my dream lied with the device's redundant back up, saving the star chart needed to find the planet from being corroded over time, though not all of it.
I had a piece of a map leading to a planet beyond the scope of charted space, it was a start to an adventure that could lead me somewhere better than Nal Hutta. Now, I only needed to find a way off this planet without being scene by my regular customers, they would definitely be upset about my departure.
Working hard and gathering together a small portion of credits, I snuck aboard a smuggler's ship and hid as one of the grunts doing manual labour on board. It was a tough trip, a few close calls when the captain decided to wander the corridors, though I managed to made it to Nar Shaddaa. From there it was simply, my work garnered enough credits and reputation to book myself a trip to Tatooine.
After decrypting the device, I struggled to figure out any locations for the other six, they didn't have anything identifiable or distinguishing that could aid me in my search. Though, my luck on Nar Shaddaa proved profitable as one of my clients happened to notice the drive in my pocket and started another of his tediously long monologues about his travels, I had tried to block him out as I worked and then he mentioned that he spotted an object similar to the one I had. Tuning in instantly, I listened intently to the story in hopes that he would tell me where he had seen it.
His story took ages as he went on and on about his excellent diplomacy skills in dissuading a bandit leader from disembowelling him, he finally mentioned seeing the data device on Tatooine in the hands of a local merchant who used it to prop up their table. With this lead, I travelled to the sandy planet and scoured for the merchant in question, running across my fair share of pirates and bandits. My trusty assault cannon coming in handy dealing with rowdy individuals who foolishly decided to attack me, I may be an engineer, but I will defend myself no matter what.
After relentlessly searching, I found the merchant in a small town, hidden in a small building that I accidentally stumbled into. Bartering with her turned out to be harder than I thought, once she knew that I wanted that piece from her she refused to go lower than every credit I had on me. Though I left with the drive, I didn't have anything to pay for transport off the planet.
I knew that I could offer my services in return for a free trip to the nearest space dock, from there I could work part time until I had enough credits to continue my travels. When I arrived at this town, I noticed several ships lined up just on the outskirts of the town, there I could find a ship off world. That said, I had to be careful as if they found out my talents as a mechanic then I could end up in a tough situation, forced to fight my way out lest they tried to keep me as their token mechanic. It has happened a few times before, and I hope I can avoid it.
Trudging towards the shipyard, wondering if what I find at the end of my search would be worth the effort, or if I am deluding myself into following this course as there was little else in my life to fight for.
Author's Note: These introduction chapters are in the first person as an experiment, from here onwards I am switching to third person.
I know that the characters are going to be OOC and their backstories don't exactly match to their origins but I am adding my own flair to the story, and how I imagine them to be in the star wars universe. (This is the SWTOR universe, about 3000 years before the start of the star wars movies)
I didn't state it in Richard or Victor's intros because I thought it would be self-explanatory that they were human, I only stated it for Kori was because she was the only human in a Twi'lek village. Also, they are all over 18+
Garfield and Raven = 18
Kori = 19
Victor = 20
Richard = 21
