Yupe Tashu

Age
 Status
 Weight

**Yupe Tashu** served in the Galactic Empire as one of Darth Sidious's closest advisers. Although Tashu was not Force-Sensitive himself, he was a historian of the Dark Side and a Sith cultist. Following the death of the Emperor during the Battle of Endor, Tashu became a part of the Imperial Future Council, a group of high-ranking officials who met on Akiva to decide the future of the shattered Empire. However, he was captured when the New Republic learned of Imperial leaders flocking to Akiva and attacked. Tashu was held a prisoner of the Republic on Chandrila, until he managed to escape with help from Fleet Admiral Gallius Rax. Tashu later resurfaced with the Acolytes of the Beyond, coordinating an uprising across the galaxy. While on Jakku, Tashu assisted Rax to initiate the Emperor's Contingency plan. After his role was done, Rax threw him into a hole that led to Jakku's core, starting a chain reaction that nearly destroyed the planet.

## Biography

### Serving the Sith

#### Earliest Visit to Jakku

A male Human, **Yupe Tashu** served as an adviser to Sheev Palpatine, a Sith-Lord who served as the last Chancellor of the Republic and the first Emperor of the Empire. Tashu's dealings with Palpatine dated back to the last years of the Galactic Republic. Three decades before the Galactic Civil War, Adviser Tashu visited the barren planet of Jakku, which lay at the edge of the Unknown Regions. After landing in Palpatine's yacht *Imperialis*, he instructed six droids to begin excavating the Plaintive Hand plateau before returning to his ship. Unknown to Tashu, he was being watched by a local human boy named Galli, who sneaked aboard the yacht but was found by Palpatine, who gave the boy a new purpose of guard the excavation site. Tashu kept in touch with the young Galli and reported that the boy had been very loyal indeed.

### Serving the Empire

The excavation site became the Jakku Observatory, which was part of the network of Observatories around the galaxy. The Jakku Observatory stored a replica of the *Imperialis*, various Sith relics and artifacts, along with ancient computers that projected a map of the Unknown Regions, and a borehole which led to Jakku's core. The Jakku Observatory was central to Palpatine's Contingency plan to destroy the Empire should he die prematurely. After Galli joined the Empire and adopted the named Gallius Rax, Palpatine tasked Rax with carrying out the Contingency. By the Galactic Civil War, Tashu had become of the Emperor's closest advisers, and as such he was part of the Empire's uppermost tiers. He was even considered a friend of his master, or at least as much as one could be. Although he could not wield the Force, a mystical energy field generated by all living things, Tashu had embraced the ways of the Sith, an ancient order whose members sought to gain power over the whole galaxy, considering himself a historian of the Dark Side. Yupe Tashu possessed at least one Sith artifact, a red metal mask with demonic features. Due to his close relationship with Emperor Palpatine, Tashu was one of the few people who was aware that he was the Dark Lord of the Sith. He and Rax were also privy to the Contingency.

#### Imperial Meeting on Akiva

After a twenty-three-year reign, the Emperor died during the Battle of Endor, when the Rebel Alliance destroyed the second Death Star battle station. With Palpatine's untimely demise, the Empire was plunged into turmoil, and the Rebel Alliance evolved into the New Republic. Adviser Tashu, along with a few other high ranking officials, agreed to meet on Akiva, a backwater planet of the Outer Rim Territories that still fell under Imperial jurisdiction, to discuss the future of the Empire. Tashu felt that the remaining Imperial forces should retreat "beyond the veil of stars", searching for the source of the Dark Side. According to the Imperial adviser, that was the only way to rebuild a stronger, better Empire that would hide in the shadows, and then strike the New Republic in due course. However, Tashu was at odds with other members of the newly-created Imperial Future Council. The self-proclaimed Grand Moff Valco Pandion wanted to go on the offensive, using the planets still under Imperial control to conscript more soldiers and using the ships in their control to attack the Republic and nip it in the bud. The banker Arsin Crassus, for his part, wanted to negotiate.

During the proceedings, Tashu also took the time to interrogate a New Republic starfighter pilotnamed Wedge Antilles, who been captured by the convener Admiral Rae Sloane while on a scouting mission. However, the Imperial Future Council was short-lived, as the New Republic disrupted its meeting on Akiva, inciting that planet's citizens to overthrow the Imperial occupation. During the ensuing battle, Adviser Tashu was captured by the enemy, along with General Jylia Shale. Due to his refusal to cooperated with his New Republic captors, Yupe Tashu was housed in a spartan cage with little comforts. He smeared the walls of his cell with food waste and drew strange symbols and maps. The New Republic guard assigned to guard Tashu was the Chandrilan man Windom Traducier, who was an undercover agent of the Imperial Fleet Admiral Gallius Rax. Five years after the start of the Galactic Civil War, Tashu was visited by the former Imperial loyalty officer Sinjir Rath Velus and his friend Temmin Wexley, who had joined a group of rebels who hunted down Imperial war criminals. After some delays, Sinjir managed to force the guard to open the door to his cage.

#### Escaping his Republic Prison

Tashu recognized Sinjir, who returned the greeting and then asked him about Imperial prisons. After some babbling, Tashu reluctantly told Sinjir to visit the Siniteen prison builder Golas Aram on the planet Irudiru on the edge of Wild Space. Using this information, Sinjir and his team managed to free a hundred prisoners from the automated Ashmead's Lock prison on the planet Kashyyyk including Temmin's father Brentin Lore Wexley. However, this turned out to be a ruse by Rax to use the prisoners to attack the New Republic leadership. During the attack, Traducier freed Tashu from prison. After being reassured that Traducier had not come to kill him, Tashu thanked the darkness for saving him. Traducier then directed Tashu towards a ship on Docking Platform E-22. When Tashu queried about Shale, Crassus, and Pandion, Traducier revealed that Pandion was dead and that he had murdered Shale and Crassus. When Tashu inquired why, Traducier replied that he had received orders to kill them and to free Tashu. Traducier clarified that Rax was the new Emperor and that Rax served Palpatine. Tashu praised the late Sidious for having a plan before making his escape.

#### Master of the Dark Acolytes

Later, Tashu traveled to the Colonies planet of Devaron where a cell of the Acolytes of the Beyond had gathered for an attack on a New Republic outpost near the Karatokai Mountains. This was part of a series of coordinated strikes against New Republic targets throughout the galaxy. Among the Acolytes was a Pantoran woman named Kiza and her lover Remi. Remi had stolen a Sith Lightsaber from the archive beneath the Peace and Security station in the Corellian city of Coronet City. As the master of this group, he gifted Kiza the mask of Viceroy Exim Panshard at the wishes of the venerable specters of fallen Sith. When Remi tried to seize the mask for himself, Tashu chastised the youth for angering the venerable specters. As punishment, Tashu seized Remi's lightsaber and handed it to Kiza. During the attack on the New Republic outpost, Kiza fully embraced the dark side and entered into a homicidal rampage. Overcome by the dark side, Kiza murdered Remi with the lightsaber after he tried to recover his prized weapon.

#### Fulfilling the Contingency

In the months following the Attack on Chandrila, Yupe Tashu escaped to the Inner Rim planet of Jakku, where the self-proclaimed Counselor to the Empire Gallius Rax had brought the Imperial remnants in order to test their mettle. Due to his close connection to the Emperor, Tashu and Rax were among those privy to the Contingency, the late Emperor's plan to destroy the Empire in the event of his death. Tashu was present when Rax killed his former master the Anchorite Kolob. Tashu regarded Rax's death as an offering to the Dark Side. Tashu then informed Counselor Rax that he had a visitor in the form of one of the Emperor's Sentinel droids. The Sentinel droid informed Tashu and Rax that Grand Admiral Sloane was traveling with Niima the Hutt's convoy to the Jakku Observatory. Tashu was present when Rax ordered the Observatory's turbolasers to bombard the convoy. During the Battle of Jakku, Yupe Tashu traveled with Counselor Rax, Brendol Hux, Armitage Hux, and Rax's locally-recruited child solders to the Jakku Observatory. While most of them boarded a replica of the Emperor's luxury yacht *Imperialis*, Tashu and Rax entered the Observatory to initiate the Contingency, making their way past several computers which the Empire had been using to calculate safe routes through the Unknown Regions to their intended destination.

Tashu and Rex soon entered a hallway containing artifacts from the old Sith Empire including a red mask, a white lance, a bloody banner, and a black Holocron. Tashu donned the Sith artifacts and carried the holocron, which caused him to grow paler from touching it. The two then crossed a walkway which extended over a deep borehole which led to the core Jakku itself. Before Tashu could give a prayer to the Sith, Rax told him that Palpatine would be pleased with them. Tashu responded that they had activated the Contingency and called on them to give a prayer to the Dark Side of the Force. However, Rax interjected and asked Tashu what he would say to the Emperor when they saw their master again. Before Tashu could give an answer, Rax threw him over the walkway. Tashu hit a rock and was killed on impact. His body then fell down the borehole into the planet's core. Since the artifacts contained a great deal of energy, they began a chain reaction that caused Jakku's mantle to crack. As part of the Contingency, Rax wanted to destroyed Jakku along with the surrounding Imperial and New Republic forces. He and a select group of Imperials would then travel to the Unknown Regions to restart the Empire. Ultimately, Rax's efforts were foiled by Grand Admiral Sloane and the New Republic operative Norra Wexley and her husband Brentin Lore Wexley.

## Abilities

**Sith Historian:** Although Tashu was no Force user, he claimed to have been trained by the best in an ancient Sith art involving the red mask he possessed. Tashu was resistant to interrogation due to his ties with the Dark Side. Due to his connections to the Palpatine, Tashu was aware of the Contingency and Ashmead's Lock prison. Tashu also owned a collection of Sith masks which he dispensed to worthy Acolytes after consulting with the specters of fallen Sith. Yupe Tashu was a wild-eyed religious zealot who refused to abandon his loyalty to the Empire and Darth Sidious. While Tashu saw himself as a zealot and loyalist, others viewed him as an insane fanatic. Tashu's loyalty to Palpatine led him to believe that the void awaited those who betrayed the Emperor. As a follower of the Dark Side, Tashu served as the master of a cell of the Acolytes of the Beyond, a cult that worshiped Sith. He was known to officiate over the sacrifice of sentient beings and to consult with the specters of fallen Sith. He owned a collection of Sith artifacts and masks.