Roganda Ismaren

Homeworld: Alderaan
Species: Human
Gender: Female
Height: Unknown
Weapon: Hold-out blaster
Vehicle: Unknown
Affiliation/Rank: Jedi, The Empire
Master: Unknown
Apprentice: Unknown

Before the Clone Wars…

Roganda Ismaren was a young student at the Jedi Temple.

During the Clone Wars…

No known Clone Wars exploits.

After the Clone Wars…

During the Jedi Purge, Roganda and her brother Lagan, along with other Jedi spouses and children including Nichos Marr and Hoddas Umgil, were taken to Belsavis to hide with Jedi Master Plett, a Ho’Din. Their hiding place was called Plett’s Well, and it was in caverns beneath Plett’s house. Roganda and Lagan were captured, taken from their parents, and brought before the merciless Imperial Inquisitor Ameesa Darys, who skewered Lagan and forced Roganda to watch.

Roganda vowed to become powerful enough to avoid a similar fate. She realized she could use her charm and exquisite beauty to manipulate men. Wielding her seductive faculties as tools, she worked her way up the hierarchy of Coruscant’s male elite until she reached the exclusive Imperial Court and became one of Emperor Palpatine’s mistresses. Her Force sensitivity quickly distinguished her among Palpatine’s harem. Eventually she became pregnant, but the father was actually Sarcev Quest, a dashing playboy of the Imperial Court who had for years secretly spied on Palpatine’s political enemies as one of the Emperor’s Hands. Before that, he was a failed Jedi student whom Palpatine had “rescued” from the monotony of the Agricultural Corps. Through great resolve and persuasion, Roganda earned a position as another Emperor’s Hand. As a Hand, she used her personal magnetism and mastery of carnal intrigue to extract secrets from Palpatine’s enemies. During this time, she was simultaneously grooming her Force-strong son Irek to one day inherit the Emperor’s throne. When he was 5 years old, Irek was implanted with a subelectronic converter, a computer chip that allowed him to control machinery with his mind. At 7, he began formal training in the ways of the dark side by an Imperial named Nasdra Magrody.

Irek was 8 when Palpatine died at Endor, and was unready to assume power. Roganda and Irek went into hiding on Belsavis, preparing for the day when Irek would be ready to take over. A year after Endor, another impostor, the three-eyed mutant Trioculus, was crowned Emperor as Palpatine’s son, but was deposed soon after. Roganda forged an alliance with the ruling Houses of the politically aloof Senex and Juvex Sectors; her bargaining chip was Irek’s ability to summon the Eye of Palpatine--an Imperial battlemoon that had been programmed to destroy Plett’s home 30 years before, but was disabled by the Jedi Padawans Callista Ming and Geith. It had been lost in space ever since.

Eight years after Endor, Leia Organa Solo and the crew of the Millennium Falcon came to Belsavis to investigate rumors of grown-up “children of the Jedi”. Leia eventually found Plett’s Well, the hiding place of the Jedi families. Leia and R2-D2 were trapped there by Roganda and Irek. Leia knew that her best chance of survival was to surrender—she was too important as a hostage for them to kill her. She gradually learned of the Ismarens’ plot to summon and commandeer the Eye of Palpatine. The Eye arrived at Belsavis, but Irek discovered he was unable to control it after all. His weakness was that he could only control objects if he had memorized their basic schematics. If the schematics were changed, he couldn't manipulate an object. The Eye was about to destroy Plett’s Well as programmed, but was destroyed by Nichos Marr, now an adult trainee at Luke Skywalker’s praxeum.

Leaving Leia behind, Roganda and Irek escaped. They fled to the Senex Sector, then to the Atravis Sector, Admiral Harrsk’s base of power. Roganda somehow obtained some Sith scrolls explaining the obscure Sith discipline of mechu-deru—mechanical manipulation using the Force. The cyborg chip in Irek’s brain allowed him to master mechu-deru at an accelerated rate.

Roganda and Irek later reached Coruscant. There, in a research lab in the Bluenek Section of the city, Roganda began an experiment, artificially stimulating bone and muscle growth long past the point of maturity, deepening his connection to the dark side, and implanting lightsabers at his wrists, knees, and shoulders and linking them to his electronic implant. She located a fellow Dark Jedi to help her train Irek. She hoped to turn Irek into a huge Force-wielding monster that would defeat the New Republic once and for all. Unfortunately, Irek became self-aware of his new state and broke free before the alterations were complete, leaving his mind virtually blank, but with a deep connection to the dark side. Enraged, Irek destroyed much of the lab and killed Roganda before fleeing into the underworld of Coruscant.

He used mental projections to control the weak-minded beings who survived the Yuuzhan Vong’s invasion of Coruscant, and became known as Lord Nyax, after a mythical Corellian ghost. He discovered the former location of the Jedi Temple, and drew power from the nexus of concentrated Force energy beneath it. When a Jedi/New Republic Intelligence infiltration team including Luke Skywalker, Tahiri Veila, and Face Loran discovered Nyax, they were forced into battle. The Jedi were unable to defeat him with their lightsabers, but disabled him using Force-levitated boulders. Nyax fell into a pit below the Temple. As he lay dying, he gathered the dark side and began flinging tons of rubble into the sky, which then crashed back down. His physical body was destroyed, but he left a dark side imprint in the surroundings.

Sources: Children of the Jedi, Enemy Lines II: Rebel Stand, The Essential Chronology, The Essential Guide to Characters (1st edition), Star Wars Gamer #5

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