Korroth Karn

Under Construction This page seems to be Under Construction. Watch out for large groups of Rebel fighters. After construction is complete, please place a note on the article's talk page and remove this message.

Korroth Karn is a young Pau’an learning in the ways of the Dark Side. He is a Krath Guardian in House Acclivis Draco, Clan Scholae Palatinae.

Biography

Foundations

Korroth and his twin brother were born in 2 BBY in the sinkhole of Ika, on Utapau. Following their mother’s family name, they were baptized Korren Noren and Turren Noren. Their mother Mavana Noren was a prominent member of the Council of Administrators, which was the ruling government in Ika. The Council had been instituted six months before the twins’ birth, after his father’s regime had been overthrown. Tuvon Karn, father to the twins and husband of Mavana Noren, had since then dominated Ika in a harsh dictatorship. All bowed to his will, and those who refused were arrested and imprisoned. Unbeknownst to him, the dictator’s wife had joined an undercover group which planned to restore freedom to the sinkhole. In a quick and non-violent coup d’état, Tuvon Karn was deposed and exiled to the surface of the planet.

A bright future

Six months after the creation of the Council, upon the twins’ birth, it was decided that they would be the future rulers of Ika. Up until then, the Council would have directed the sinkhole, and the twins would be prepared for their duty. Since their earliest age, the two children were taught the art of politics and diplomacy, the laws and constitutions of the sinkhole and were even trained in duels with the sword and laser pistol. At home, their loving mother told them tales of justice, honour, hope and freedom, so as to instil these principles into them as their bedrocks. For the same reason, Mavana never told her sons of Ika’s modern history. She did not want them to know of their greedy father and his despotic reign. When the twins asked her about Tuvon, Mavana simply that he ‘went away to the surface’ before they were born. This only made Korren more curious about his mysterious father. When he was little, he daydreamed of his father’s brave exploits and his travels to faraway fantastical lands. Even though there still were people who despised Mavana and her sons because of her exiled husband Tuvon, Korren refused to let go of the frail image he had built of his father.

In their adolescent years, the twins’ abilities matured. Their mother and the rest of the Council of Administrators recognized them to be indeed promising for their future at the head of the Council. Turren Noren was gifted at making inspiring speeches to audiences, and he had a remarkably accurate aim with the laser pistol. Korren Noren’s talent lay in persuading people to his point of view, and his skill with the sword and the riding of the winged dactillions was surpassed by few in the sinkhole. Yet, the most impressive thing was the twin brothers’ bond. They shared every thought and every secret; at times they acted as one person, the one’s weaknesses compensated by the other’s strengths. They said that, when they came of age, they would lead Ika into a golden age together. This pleased the Council greatly, and the people of Ika themselves voiced their anticipation at being guided by the twins.

However, there was another faction in Ika that had watched the twins’ progress since they made their first tottering step. No one but the members knew of the existence of this organization, as they had laid dormant since the fall of Tuvon the dictator, silently analyzing and evaluating the evolving state of affairs. By the age of eighteen, the twins had their unofficial word in some of the Council of Administrators meetings, although they were not its members yet. Pau’ans come of age at twenty, but their opinion was still taken as advice.

Dark clouds

The secret organization noticed this, and one night Korren found a letter under his pillow. It stated simply a place and time, two days hence, and it warned not to bring or tell anybody else, even his brother. At the bottom of the message was stamped the insignia of the old Tuvon regime.

For two days Korren secluded himself to his room. He read the letter over and over again, trying to divine who wrote it and why, and most of all struggling to understand why it said that he had to go without his brother. The night of the encounter came, and Korren Noren was finally overcome by his curiosity. He followed the message’s directions down into dark underground caves at the bottom of the sinkhole. He walked deeper and deeper into the labyrinth of damp passages and bridges going over underground rivers, until he entered a large circular room. Inside, a small group of short stocky Utai and tall Pau'ans were waiting for him, with their faces hidden by hoods. They identified themselves as the Arbiters, a body of sorcerers created by Tuvon Karn in secret during his reign. They had acted as the eyes and ears of the dictator, and their duty had been to seek out those who questioned the will of the regime and make them disappear.

Since the creation of the Council of Administrators, they had kept silent, blaming themselves for the success of Mavana Noren’s treason and the fall of Tuvon’s reign. But now, after having observed the two brothers from the shadows, they had chosen the leader that would help them restore the regime. They had already appointed Korren the rightful heir of Tuvon and his reign, giving back to him his true name, Korroth Karn. The Arbiters then revealed the whole history of his father’s regime; how he had risen to power through murder and brute force, how he had kept Ika under the iron fist of fear and hopelessness, extinguishing any thought of rebellion before it even materialized, and how he had fallen to the seduction of the duplicitous Mavana.

Perceiving the confusion and outright shock on Korren’s face, the Arbiters almost regretted not having waited until he was older. Hoping they had not overestimated this still fledgling Pau’an, they led him back outside the caves, asking him to ponder on what he had just heard. In the next few weeks, Korren did just that. He had no doubt that what the Arbiters had told about his father was true; it all fitted together now: his mother’s silence about Tuvon, the animated discussions that suddenly stopped when he came near, the hateful looks from strangers when he went to the lower-class quarters. Then he searched for the reason why he didn’t now despise his father for his immoral actions. After long meditation he realized that he admired Tuvon even more, not necessarily because his actions had been so vile, but because of his proficiency at obtaining and maintaining power. His despise had now transferred to the Council of Administrators itself. It had been difficult, for he still loved Mavana as his mother, but in the end he acknowledged their weakness and how uselessly frail and fragmented their power was. Korren finally committed himself to follow in his father’s footsteps and walk the path of self-seeking that leads to Power.

A new path

After long days of meditation in his room, he waited for the next message from the Arbiters, and presented himself to them once again, his resolution set. This time they had received him in a colossal natural cavern that appeared to be their centre of operations. A much larger number of Arbiters had gathered compared to the last meeting, and they all had their hoods down. They told Korren that they already knew of his decision, and they announced that all of the Arbiters would from now on assist him in claiming his father’s vacant throne. However, for now they advised him to wait. He should carefully gain the Council’s trust so that, when the time came, they would be taken by surprise.

Korren exited the caves with a new purpose. He set about making friends and allies in the Council, while the Arbiters worked covertly on gaining supporters in Ika’s population. By the time Korren turned nineteen they had made good progress. Some of the Administrators in the Council were now so devoted to Korren that the Arbiters thought about enrolling them to their cause when the time came. No one in the Council, or in the rest of the sinkhole, would ever suspect Korren to be planning such things. No one, except his brother. Only he had noticed how Korren had changed over the past year. Their bond was still as strong as before, but Turren knew that he was guarding a secret; a thing that neither had ever done to each other. Korren had become more solitary, and he seemed to be on the alert all the time, especially the time she sneaked away to the lower levels.

A taste of Power

The day before the twins’ twentieth birthday, which would have been their coming of age, Turren decided that he would follow his brother on one of his furtive visits to the lower levels. He stalked Korren down into the caves, silent and careful to remain out of his sight. As they descended into the deeper parts of the caves, Turren puzzled over what his brother could ever be doing in such a dreary place. Turning a corner, he suddenly noticed that he had lost Korren. He began running through the stone corridors, without even taking notice of which forking he took, until the tunnel ended abruptly over a great chasm. Turren stopped himself just in time, and saw that he was standing on a ledge high up near the ceiling of a massive lit-up cave. Voices came from below him; he looked down and spotted an aggregation of Pau’ans and Utai wearing dark cloaks. They were talking loudly enough for Turren to hear what they were saying. It didn’t take him long to figure out who they were. Their discussion outlined their future plans for the Council of Administrators. Turren heard them talk about an uprising, and the disbandment of the Council. Many of them were of the opinion that the Administrators should be killed so as not to have trouble in the future. Then a young voice spoke up, expressing his agreement as long as Mavana Noren was kept alive. Turren narrowed his eyes, it couldn’t be true. He was too far away to be sure, he had to be wrong. But it was unquestionable; Korren was the one who had just spoken.

The group had now moved on to debate the method of assassination for each Administrator, then it disbanded and each conspirer exited the cavern through a different passage. Turren collapsed to his knees, too horrified to move or think. After a while Korren appeared unseen behind him. At first he seemed to be perplexed; he was torn between acting to protect the Arbiters now that they had been discovered and the love for his brother. Just as Turren became aware of him, Korren devised a way to appease both sides. He explained fully to Turren the Arbiters’ plans. Turren’s expression was blank; so Korren tried to convince his brother to leave the feebleness of the Council of Administrators. Together, they could establish a dominion more powerful than their father would ever have hoped for.

Turren refused to listen to him; he begged Korren to see through the lies and acknowledge the wrongness of what he was doing. Korren’s face gradually distorted with rage, inside him the beast of wrath had been released and now it controlled him completely. With a fire burning behind the deep black eyes, he grasped his brother’s neck in his hands and throttled him to death. As Turren’s body crumpled to the ground, Korren felt a river of molten lava surge through him, threatening to pull him under the surface, where he could see pure evil flowing. He drank in the power from this river, that he would later come to know as the Dark Side, craving for more and more, until everything turned black and he passed out.

The chains are broken

When he awoke, Korren felt like somebody had ripped a piece of his heart out and his soul was now bleeding freely out of the hole. No it was I who wrenched it off, he told himself, and that hurt even more. But then he grasped why he had ripped that part of his heart out. It had been like a malignant cancer, weakening the rest of his body. The part of him that had belonged to his brother had been a useless burden on the walk to power.

Korren opened his eyes and recognized the Ika prisons. In the cells next to his were all of the Arbiters’ doyens. Briefly, they explained to him what had happened since he lost consciousness. From what they had heard, one of the Council’s own shamans had detected the surge in Dark Side energy produced by Korren. The shaman sent the civil guard before the Arbiters could hide themselves and the two brothers. They were all captured and taken before the Council of Administrators, while the unconscious Korren was brought to the prisons and Turren’s body carried to Mavana. Without even a trial, the Council voted unanimously for the exile of Korren and the execution of the Arbiter elders. The sentences would be performed tomorrow at sunrise.

Korren’s last hope lay with Mavana. He was let out of jail and the warders escorted him to his mother. Korren was aware that she already knew of his fratricide, but he had to try out every possibility; exile to Utapau’s lifeless surface meant inevitable death. Korren knelt at her mother’s feet and begged to be shown mercy, but the hatred exuding from her was almost palpable. She threw her surviving son out, bidding him to never come in her sight again and rejecting Korren as her son.

This broke Korren’s last connection to his old life, that in which he had ideals, pride, kindness and love. A new life of darkness had begun; he had made his first true step on the path of power, the path that had first been forged by his father. He was now Korroth Karn.

On the morning of his twentieth birthday, while the gallows were being set up for the Arbiter doyens, Korroth was flown out of the shaded safety of the sinkhole of Ika and conducted under the harsh sun to the barren and windswept surface of Utapau. The Council of Administrators, convened in a semicircle in front of him, drew out an ancient ceremonial sword used it to draw a line in the parched ground. With their robes jerked behind them by the wind, they marched him to the edge of the line and then pushed him beyond him. They proclaimed solemnly that he was now banished from Ika, he was never to come back under pain of death. They turned, mounted their dactillions, and left him solitary on the plains. Korroth was exiled.

Path of Power

TBA