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Calrissian, Lando

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Lando Calrissian is a dark-skinned, human male from an undisclosed world. Born during the later years of the Old Republic, Lando grew into a gambler and con-artiste, smoking cigars and learning how to play sabacc and win regularly. Never one to stay in any single place too long, Lando made more friends than enemies in his early years roaming the galaxy. Ever the gambler, Lando considered himself the Commander of Staves, a sabacc card that often showed up in the fortunes told about him with the sabacc deck. When a perfect hand of sabacc won him ownership of the Millennium Falcon, Lando's life took a strange turn. He ran into Han Solo on Nar Shaddaa, rescuing the young man from Boba Fett. Lando was never much of a pilot, and allowed Han to teach him the basics. However, following the Battle of Nar Shaddaa, Lando's first flight went off-course, bringing him to the Oseon System. A few games of sabacc later, Lando had won the strange droid Vuffi Raa, and was launched into a series of adventures. As was par for the course, Lando made a few more enemies during this time, the greatest of which was the Tund Sorcerer Rokur Gepta. Gepta pursued Lando across the galaxy after Lando loosed the Mindharp of the Sharu from its hiding place; Gepta wanted the artifact for himself. After getting stuck in one of the Oseon's Flamewinds, Gepta nearly killed Lando in an elaborate plot. By this time, Lando was beginning to feel his own mortality, and when he and Vuffi Raa encountered the Oswaft, he sympathized for them enough to try and run the Imperial blockade of their home and bring them food. Gepta again nearly killed Lando at the ThonBoka, but Lando was able to overcome the Sorcerer and eliminate him. After this, Lando began honing his business skills, and he used the Millennium Falcon to start a small transport operation. It was during this time that a young smuggler named Han Solo beat him at sabacc. Lando had offered up Han's pick of the starships in Lando's personal fleet, hoping that Han would pick one of the shiny new ships over the battered Falcon. Han's nose for starships led him to choose the old freighter, and Lando was left to his newer, less friendly ships. Using his nose for business, Lando learned of the tibanna gas mines near Bespin, and set out to see them for himself. He ended up winning Cloud City in a sabacc match, and his growing business acumen allowed him to turn the mining outpost into a profitable operation. However, when Boba Fett later traced the Millennium Falconback to Cloud City, Lando's string of hard-luck business ventures began. Darth Vader commandeers Cloud City in order to capture Luke Skywalker and Lando was forced to evacuate the outpost. After seeing Han Solo frozen in carbonite and Cloud City overrun by stormtroopers, Lando signed up with the Alliance, and became one of the Alliance's best generals, leading a number of missions to success, including the bombing run on the second Death Star orbitting over the forest moon of Endor. Following the destruction of that Death Star and the fall of the Empire, Lando returned to Cloud City, but was unable to make the operation profitable. Using a set of plans and ideas he borrowed from Cloud City's founder, Ecclessis Figg, Lando started The Nomad City mining operation on Nkllon. In another stroke of bad luck, Grand Admiral Thrawn first stole most of his mole miners, then disabled the mobile city in a strafing run. Lando was forced to abandon the mining operation before Nkllon's intense primary star fried it to ashes. After assisting the New Republic in the defeat of Thrawn, Lando tried his best to win the heart of Mara Jade. He succeeded only in gaining her as a business partner, as the two joined their collective resources to try and re-establish the spice mines of Kessel as a legal operation. This failed, as the galaxy no longer felt the need to indulge in artificial pleasures. Down on his luck, Lando set up camp on the planet Coruscant, and began working on Dometown, an underground city that was not too affluent but could cater to the upper-middle class. He only needed financial support, and devised a plan where he would marry a rich woman who could support his monetary needs while turning a profit with him. Lando courted several woman, but found himself drawn to Tendra Risant. He was temporarily thwarted in this endeavor by the secession of the Corellian Sector from the New Republic, as his prospective bride was a native of Sacorria. However, after the resolution of the Corellian Crisis, Lando and Tendra began to discover that their relationship transcended the galactic politics. Eventually, they were married, and they used their combined business acumen - and a good deal of luck - to amass a small fortune in a variety of business endeavors. Shortly before the Yuuzhan Vong invaded the galaxy, they formed Tendrando Arms. They planned to provide the YVH 1 combat droids to the New Republic in order to help combat the Yuuzhan Vong, but Lando was reactivated to his rank of General when the alien invaders attacked Coruscant itself. As the war ground on, Lando and Tendra spent an increasingly larger portion of their time with the Smugglers' Alliance, working on the fringes to assist the New Republic's war efforts. Their relationship with the likes of Booster Terrik and Talon Karrde came to fruition just after the Battle of Ebaq, in time to assist the Galactic Alliance in its mission to retake Coruscant from the alien invaders. When the Yuuzhan Vong finally surrendered to the Galactic Alliance at Coruscant some five years after their invasion began, Lando and Tendra decided to pursue more legitimate goals. The galaxy needed to be rebuilt, and there were too many honest ways to make a living.