Clarke

The ex-Stormtrooper-turned Bounty Hunter/Mercenary. He escaped from the Empire through dark circumstances, and has been running ever since. Jodo Kast was hired by the Empire to hunt him and those like him down. Clarke only recently found out that he was part of a cloning project and some of his clones had escaped through an “underground railroad” set up by an unknown cloning scientist consortium. However, the tale of how he found out about his clones was quite interesting. His encounter with Jodo Kast, which forced Kast into retirement, revealed to Clarke that there was more to him than just another escaped Storm trooper.

He prides himself now in modifying armor, and he has started by modifying Jodo Kast’s Armor. As part of his victory over the bounty hunter, he was able to take the armor and integrate into his own. He is rather proud of his handy work.

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Life History

Clarke was born Ramsen Charway on the planet Werewolf, an human-normal colony world. Werewolf is covered in lush, green forests. The flora was largely benign, with many edible species. Fauna was mostly small and friendly. Werewolf is a veritable paradise… for six cooler months of the year. During the other six months , the planet’s mean temperature rose the 5 degrees necessary for certain chemicals in the plants, soil, rocks, etc. to evaporate, mix and form a deadly nerve toxin.

For this reason, the colony resides in a large arcology, which can be sealed against the gas during the warmer months. The Arcology, which resembles a huge inner tube buried up to its equator, is home for most of the 250,000 residents of Werewolf There are a few, smaller habitats, but none of any major size.

Clarke’s parents ran a curio shop and restaurant in the arcology starport zone. The shop’s business depended largely upon tourism and passing-by ship’s crews. Business boomed due to the large numbers of tourists during the winter. As time progressed, shifts in the local trade lines moved the shipping elsewhere, and other, newer colony worlds caught the interest of the tourist trade. Werewolf fell into global recession due to this. Clarke’s parents were still able to provide the basics for themselves, but they ran closer and closer to the line while working more and more. Eventually, Clarke was virtually left to raise himself.

At the age of eleven, Clarke joined a group of teenage smugglers. The children were all from families in similar dire straits to his own, all essentially alone. They provided the social group he didn’t have at home. Clarke was much younger and smaller than the others, so after some initial teasing, he settled into the role of “weasel”, a messenger and spy who could slip through the tangled pipes and ducts of the arcology like a ghost

Clarke learned to run the sewers and access tunnels of the arcology like none before; he had discovered the “master pattern”; the set of common, universal elements that all city engineers used in urban infrastructure design. Certain conduits always led to certain places, a certain type of ducting always went to a certain facility, etc. He was the best weasel in the business.

One day, his adopted family showed their stripes. The oldest boys in the group had stolen a batch of high-capacity data crystals from a government storage facility. Things went bad at the meet with the buyers. police pounced just after the cash changed hands. The older masterminds were able to escape, but at the cost of the rest of the gang, with the exception of Clarke. He watched his family being loaded into vans headed for detention centers. Clarke followed the boys from inside a duct: he discovered they knew about the raid beforehand, and had set the other boys, and the buyer up.

The next day, the boys were captured inside their hidden safehouse. No one ever came forward to accept credit (and credits) for the tip.

Shortly afterwards, the planet’s economy began to pick up again.

When Clarke was 12, a saboteur set off a bomb in protest of Governmental policy. He was caught inside the blast effects, and only survived by sheer miracle. He left the hospital with an interesting scar running from forehead to ear, and a near complete resistance to mental manipulation. He has no idea he has this, due to the rarity of such abilities.

One of Clarke’s favorite hobbies was backpacking. During the cooler months he would sometimes stay out for days at a time. One of those times, he was attacked by a wild animal. The animal left him critically injured, and near death. As luck would have it, he was near the dome of a reclusive scientist. The scientist applied first aid, and saved his life. By the time Clarke was well enough to leave, the summer had arrived, bringing it’s airborne death with it. Clarke was forced to stay.

Not one to pass up an opportunity, the scientist used Clarke in various cybernetics experiments. The man tried several different procedures on Clarke, all without his consent. Clarke’s retinas were burnt out accidentally during one procedure, so the scientist was forced to accelerate his schedule and implant replacements. The artificial retinas were masterfully crafted, being cell-based nanotechnology. The new retinas took normal visual input, and quadrupled the resolution, using digital image processing. The enhancements made a large difference (+1d Perception) in Clarke’s vision. The retinas were still experimental, however. Occasionally (10% – 30%) the algorithms “guess wrong”, presenting an inaccurate picture image, especially when viewing things at long ranges.

When the toxic months passed, the doctor tried one last experimental device on Clarke. The doctor had been researching memory manipulation by means of electro-magnetically activated biochemical tracers. He completely wiped all memory of the previous six months from Clarke’s mind, leaving only a vague mistrust of doctors as a unavoidable residue.

When Clarke was 15, his family became colonists on a new frontier world. Two years later, half the colony was destroyed when the Imperial escort vessel was destroyed by Rebel action. One of the ship’s reactor cores de-orbited onto the colony. The colony was thrown into chaos, and was on the verge of collapse for a long time afterwards.

Clark left the struggling colony at the age of 18, to join the Imperial Army. His frontier experience landed him in Recon Scouts. Within a few years, he was leading an squads into hostile territory, acting as the eyes of the army.

On one of these recon missions he was sent to a barren planet. There he encountered the last survivor of a lost race of aliens. Before dying, the alien gave him a gift. The gift was a more efficient respiratory system, letting him survive on half the normal concentration of oxygen, and be without air for up to 10 minutes without discomfort.

When he was 22, he was honored with an appointment into the Imperial Stormtroopers. Here, he was given training and equipment he could’ve only dreamed of in the Army. He served with distinction for almost two years, until the battle of Kal-na’-Fen. His team was out on recon patrol when the local resistance launched a counter-offensive with newly-arrived Rebel reinforcements. The Imperial forces were outnumbered, but not critically so. The Imperial ground command retreated immediately. Thousands of troops were abandoned because one general felt uncomfortable without an oppressive firepower advantage. All the Imperial forces remaining in the planet were hunted down and killed. Except for Clarke. Clarke had watched his men killed one by one over six months. He developed a keen hatred for the Empire over their betraying him. He swore to himself that the Empire would pay dearly for each man lost on Kal-na’-Fen. Imperial forces eventually returned in force to retake the planet. Clarke had made his decision by then. He buried his remaining stores, including three complete sets of Stormtrooper armor, and sneaked onto a Rebel evacuation transport.

He systematically destroyed all records of his former existence, replacing it with the fictional “Clarke”. It’s possible that even he doesn’t remember some details of his past. He returned to Kal-na’-Fen when the hostilities were over, recovered his equipment, and after a short remembrance for fallen comrades, left Ramsen Charway and his past on that war-torn planet forever.

For the last two years, Clarke has been working as a sometimes free-lancer, sometimes mercenary, sometimes bounty hunter, sometimes bodyguard, etc. One thing his experience has left him with is a deep mistrust of any form of large organization or authority. Clarke now is an emotionally subdued character. He doesn’t trust, or make friends easily, and considers betrayal a death warrant. Likewise, he will not turn on a friend or teammate, and never leaves one behind, not even as a corpse.

His methods are of a very practical nature. He acknowledges the benefits of technology, but realizes that too much reliance on technology leaves one hanging from a thin line over an abyss. Also, too much specialization paints one into a corner. His motto is along the lines of “Whatever Works…”

Equipment notes:

Clarke has kept the majority of his Stormtrooper gear, especially the armor. The suit now has a red neoprene-like outer layer with a scale-like texture. To aid him in his business, he has several tools and surprises built into the armor. The helmet is sculpted to ha-,,e an almost reptilian appearance. His armor is the reason for his pseudonym, the “Red Lizard”.