Eiko Lanzer lived as a drifer, information broker, and smuggler in his travels throughout the Outer Rim Territories and Core Worlds. He rarely uses his surname, a link to the parents who left him in the care of his godfather at a young age. He is the current Quaestor for House Revan. Determined, loyal, and ultimately respectful, he considers himself an implement of his house – a part of Revan’s unique unity of purpose and direction.
Character History
The Young
The planet Kabaira
His father and mother, both small-time traders, left Eiko with his godfather on the continent of Belshain, Kabaira to keep their son safe from the risks of small-craft space travel and the struggle of legal trading. Without official documents to give an exact age, Eiko’s age remains a fluid number. His own study has pinned his birth between 11 ABY and 13 ABY. For most of his childhood, Eiko and his godfather lived comfortably if modestly in a reasonable section of town. His godfather, Kasander Iskay, was a plant worker at the nearby Delgas Medical and had built up multiple relationships within the community that allowed him to quietly assist Alliance efforts on the planet.
Eiko began to work for a message-running business, carrying physical copies or scrabbled datapads between clients who needed their information to be sent discretely without leaving a digital trail. After the Pellaeon-Gavrisom Treaty ended hostilities between the Alliance and Empire, the resulting downturn in military contracts for Delgas Medical and the other local companies, especially Hydrospeare Corporation, triggered a sharp recession in the planet’s economy. Five years into the recession, the whole planet wrestled against itself for any hope of security. As workers’ unions formed into gangs, the cities became havens of back alley violence. City patrols were introduced to protect citizens. Eiko fought for the first time to protect another messenger from a gang member who was going to intercept their packages. Eiko was grazed in the thigh by a blaster bolt, retaliating by breaking several of his opponent’s ribs and then fracturing the nose, killing his assailant.
The incident prompted Eiko to flee the planet in 25 ABY. Not long after he left the planet, Kasander Iskay died of natural causes in his home. Eiko received the news a year into his travels, on the sixth anniversary of the treaty.
The Nomad
Eiko’s history as a messenger grew into a fascination with information. He started building a reputation as a low-level informant and information broker attached to a larger unit. His budding interest in information trafficking was bolstered with a yet-unrecognized sense of luck that let him draw information from officials, political dissidents, and social leaders. As he grew more adept at the trade, he began drifting along the Corellian Trade Spine and around the Outer Rim, slowly generating contacts and building up capital as he moved. To better support himself, he accepted the risk of weapons trafficking. During his longest stay, he began settling down with a small group of Lutrillian shippers and entrepreneurs on Ione.
The Student
Nal-Huttese Calligraphy of "Eiko" 
Aran Tonor As his merchandise stagnated with a lack of buyers on Ione, Eiko moved into a rented flat in the Lower City hoping that his association with the Lutrillian entrepreneurs would produce results. One of the primary backers for the group was forced to withdraw, causing the whole idea to fold in on itself as legal inquiries threatened the others with charges of underground gambling and embezzlement. To fill the void, Eiko returned to the information trade, collecting information for any client willing to pay upfront. His success allowed him to meet his living expenses, but never reached the point where he was able to continue his travels.
He began studying Dulon under a Gray Jedi by the name of Aran Tonor. Tonor helped Eiko through the martial art and began teaching Eiko the basic elements of sword fighting. Tonor helped foster in Eiko an appreciation for aesthetic art: storytelling, poetry, and history. Eiko formed one of the central features of Tonor’s studio, considered by his friends and colleagues to be one of Tonor’s most disciplined students and a natural inheritor of the studio. Along with Jaina Dabrini, he assisted in teaching students as Tonor saw fit.
Tonor finally opened up to Eiko about his perception of the latter’s latent force ability, ending all lessons of swordfighting. Eiko’s resentment followed, building up a distance between himself and his teacher. After a buyer surfaced for the weapon he’d been storing over his time on Ione, Eiko visited his master’s apartment once more. He stole a number of records pertaining to the Jedi as well as Tonor’s steel katana that Eiko had practiced with regularly. He was chased by Tonor from the room, losing the terminal three fingers of his left hand to Tonor’s lightsaber blade. Despite the injury, Eiko managed to escape with the information and the sword.
The Tracker
After having lived on Ione for the better part of 27 ABY and early 28 ABY, Eiko collected his belongings and left the planet without warning, leaving his close friends behind him as he started a trek along the Trade Spine towards the Core Worlds. While he was recovering funds on Harrin, Eiko was witness to a murder at the hands of Tratorus, a rogue Jedi. Eiko avoided any conversations on the matter, trying hard to maintain his own reputable exterior as he continued feeding weapons into underground markets. His interest in the Force merged with a grim fascination as Eiko began tracing Tratorus through his travels. His steady persistence and growing network of contacts allowed him to follow the rogue Jedi from port to port throughout the Core Worlds over the course of the year.
With considerable luck and effort, Eiko moved cautiously along the trail until he’d come to the doorstep of the Dark Brotherhood.
The Soldier
Preparation and Summons
File:EikoChar11286.JPGEiko Lanzer Shortly after he completed his preliminary tests, Eiko set himself to studying. His studies of the Brotherhood’s history and factions showed promise. As a result of several conversations with others about the political climate of the Brotherhood, Eiko was brought out of his original assignment to House Ektrosis into Independent House Revan.
Rite of Supremacy: Spoils of War
Eiko’s transfer came during the middle of House Revan’s efforts to claim Salas V from the killiks and the other clans. Several pairs of scouts were sent out during the ground fighting to control the killiks’ expansion and intelligence gathering and shut down the opposition. Following Tratorus into the field, the pair worked to establish a safe zone that allowed the House leadership to continue with its plans. After the conflict was over, Eiko was promoted from Novice to Acolyte..
The Apprentice
Progression
As events began to even out, Eiko began to take up the fighting style of Kartranin in an effort to ease away from his reliance on his blaster. A quick student of the form, he progressed rapidly as lessons he’d learned from Tonor were readily applied to the new style. His wartime contributions to the House were recognized with the Anteian Cross. Through his study, Eiko actively tried to force out his history and adapt to life in the Brotherhood. Still, memories of his time on Ione leaked out into his poetry.
- "Wisps of my fingers / Can’t reach, feeling the distance. / Please. Rush back just once."
- ―Eiko Lanzer, 32 ABY
His attention shifted to gaining ranks, pressing to separate himself from Tratorus by gaining the rank of Protector. He sought out apprenticeship in Revan and was accepted by Callus Bo'Amar, the Voice of the House. When he’d achieved his rank, he chose a blue armory blade, noting that it had a likeness to “Master’s blade” and was “an attempt to distance myself from the stigma of a Sith crystal.”
With his later promotion to Guardian, Eiko began to integrate himself deeply into the House, training more and more frequently with Bo’Amar in the Obelisk Palladium or via hologram while he was away. Eiko pressed his master repetitively to study higher-level material such as Soresu, meeting with Bo’Amar’s quiet refusal in light of Eiko’s struggle with the final sequences of Banlath.
Adjustment
During a competitive round against then-Knight Luciferus Leviathan, Eiko flew into a rage and committed what he would later consider “outright murder.” Luciferus’s injuries healed with time, but Eiko wouldn’t quickly forget his own lack of control. Through a number of practices with other members of the House, Eiko tried to develop a sense of the “Way of Revan.” He spent an unusual amount of time alone in study, adjusting to the expectations placed on him. He spent more time trying to smooth his technique in Banlath, walking away with numerous bruises from Callus’s lessons as his master tried to enforce in Eiko a sense of urgency in his techniques.
With Callus’s urging and his own will driving him, he pursued a position of Aedile within Revan. He committed himself to absorbing as much as possible from Raken, his immediate superior, but spent a good portion of his time moving through the Core Worlds in a hunt for his former master, Aran Tonor. In a fight that erupted and ended quickly in Eiko’s rented rooms on Ralltiir, Eiko wounded his former master. The physical stress and lingering wounds eventually killed the older Grey Jedi – a fact sensed by Eiko during his meditation on the journey back into the Antei System. By removing Tonor from his thoughts and proving that he’d surpassed his former teacher, Eiko believed that he could finally commit all his efforts to his House and his studies. In reflection of his personal journey, he changed orders from Krath to Obelisk and added more to his commentaries on the Way of Revan.
Once settled back into the position of leadership under Raken, he designed and built a mask for himself with the intent of disguising himself in any future journeys away from his base of operations at Antei.
The Young Leader - In Progress
- "I'm not questioning your powers of observation. I'm merely remarking upon the paradox of asking a masked man who he is."
- ―V, V for Vendetta
His appointment to Quaestor over Revan was heavily impacted by Raken's sudden departure from the public affairs of the House. He was selected as Raken's successor by Muz Ashen. Ashia Kagan Keibatsu was appointed as his Aedile and was tasked by the Grand Master to assist in the House's affairs and also to investigate the conspiracies of Raken and Sarin against the Iron Throne - conspiracies laced into the fabric of the House.
Eiko inherited a House that was both powerful and fragmented as its members pursued goals separately and silently. To the detriment of the House, Eiko continued his own struggle to pursue his identity. He spent time on Kyataru with Mitsuhide Akechi, a retainer to the Keibatsu family, studying Mitsuhide's collection of holocrons and gaining confidence in his own beliefs. In this time, he pulled further away from the set doctrines of any particular group. When he finally returned completely to his responsibilities, Eiko found himself set on a central tenet he had crafted early in his travels: enduring strength through adaptable unity.
Returning to regular contact with the House, he began to draw together its members as best he could...
Personality and Traits
Eiko has been described as “irrepressible”: not in the sense of high-energy, but in his consistent will to persevere despite the odds. He tends to be very task-oriented and methodical in his pursuit of successes. Over his time in Revan, he has been slowly undoing the years of his nomadic life that had left him reclusive and secretive, even with close friends. His philosophies of unity instead of hierarchal conflict are products of his time in Revan; “Enduring strength comes from adaptable unity. We must rise up together if we are to endure.”
In reaction to the stress, Eiko uses aesthetic pursuits such as calligraphy and poetry to maintain his focus. He uses haiku as a method of compressing ideas into easily remembered selections, a practice that he developed late in his study of Dulon.
Eiko is fiercely loyal to those who support him. His unusual appointment to Quaestor before he’d reached the rank of Knight forced him to rely on his Aedile, Ashia Kagan Keibatsu, instead of his master and his former superior. He often underestimates his own strength, giving himself false limits that keep him from realizing potential. Firm and respectful of others, he exercises caution around others, especially among his rivals and superiors. Like his predecessor, he is often quiet – when he speaks, he leverages the weight of the unified House instead of his own personal influence to gain ground for what he has considered his only lasting family.
Possessions
- Weapons:
- Clothing: In addition to his Brotherhood robes, Eiko retains a small wardrobe of heavy canvas jackets, loose-fitting four-pocket cargo uniform pants, travelling neck wraps, and gloves. He wears a full-length black robe in all official proceedings and keeps a brown version of the same robe for his travels. He prefers a well-worn set of leather-sole shoes that dampen the sound of his footsteps. For some missions, he brings a pair of leather gloves to conceal his prosthetic fingers and his identity.
- Personal Items:
- His personal datapad and any in-progress sketchbooks
- A wall-hanging with his name in calligraphic Nal-Huttese, a gift from Jaina Dabrini
- A mixed collection of tools to maintain his pistol, katana, and mask
- A bandolier fitted with capsules containing various poisons, antidotes, and supplies.
- A hand-built mask featuring visual and infrared lenses, a moisture collection system, air filters, and a fitted seal
- Other: His dream is acquiring and customizing a Star Courier for personal use - a number of scribbled lists outline possible modifications and load-outs that would convert the Courier from a transport into a light smuggling and landing craft.
DJB Facts
Positions Held
Trivia
- Eiko's name derives from the word "Echo," meaning a reflected sound; in military alphabets, it corresponded to the letter Esk (Aurabesh), 'E' (Alternate Basic), or Epsilon (Secondary Alternate).