Grumlians
Short, tail having sapients, the Grumlians are one of the oldest space fairing cultures. They are credited for inventing artifical gravity and near light speed travel. The creation of their Astroid Republics is a marvel of modern space engineering.
They are also known for having a strict collectist cast system. Living aboard an Astroid Republic means contributing to it. Part of the ship. Part of the crew. As such, every breath is measured and every drop of water is counted. The Grumlian Astrpid Republics are so famed for their control and regulations that even crime is regulated.
Vice is wasteful, but needed. The Syndicates, the ruling bodies of the Republics, realize that and charged the lowly passengers into forming "Families," to regulate vice.
These Families became massive criminal organizations that span star systems. They control the gambling, narcotics and other "wasteful" activities to ensure they dont eat too much into the delicate balance of the Astroid Republics
Dell Caliger was one of these "Family Members." An earner working in "Ship Salvage and Recovery," he had a reputation for being a cunning and brutal thief and enforcer. His days in the Caligor Family allowed him to indulge in vices and breath easier than his passenger peers.
Yet that changed after one bad job. One rat ruined the whole operation, and Coalition Major Crimes left him floating in the void, dying.
He was picked up by slavers who patched him up and sold him off to an Arena on New Byzantium. His talent at machinery didnt go unnoticed, neither did his talent with "words."
To both condem him and get his worth, they threw him to the beast to be its pit crew. Fixing the weapons and armor of a Bellator who had long lost their mind.
Dell never had the best bedside manner and when the Beast tried to do its best to scare him he would clap back with an insulting jab. Yet the Beast didnt kill him, they felt, for the first time in sometime, as if they were being treated like a person, rather than a weapon.
Overtime the relationship went from forced cooperation and into something akin to friendship. Finally, when a slave revolt broke out the Beast and Dell managed to escape the crumbling city and out to the wastes.
Hiding up on a dormat volcano the Beast washed itself in the crater lake at its peak. The Beast slept for a while, Dell thinking they died until she woke up. She couldn't remember much beyond her name, Domitia.
From then on, the two have been blood brothers. A bond forged through shared suffering, the two travel the stars, battle space pirates and horrors from Hungry Stars.
