Galen Marek

Galen Marek was a Human male taken as a secret apprentice by Darth Vader from his father, a Jedi named Kento Marek, on Kashyyyk during the Great Jedi Purge. For years, the Dark Lord trained him, under the codename Starkiller, in dark side arts and to eliminate his enemies, including Jedi who survived Order 66. Marek was told that he would ultimately assist in overthrowing Vader's own Master, Darth Sidious, Emperor of the Galactic Empire. In reality, Vader and Palpatine only planned to use him to root out those who rebelled against the Empire. In 3 BBY, fifteen years after the commencement of Marek's training, he had begun his missions to hunt down the last remaining Jedi.

After killing Shaak Ti on Felucia, he returned to the Executor, his Master's flagship, on which Darth Sidious appeared and ordered Vader to kill the apprentice. In apparent submission, Vader telekinetically hurled him through the viewing windows, into open space. Vader secretly recovered his body and had him "resurrected" six months later on the science vessel Empirical, during which time he was known as Subject Zeta. The Dark Lord convinced Starkiller that he had saved him from death against his Master's orders, and gave him a new assignment: to rally an alliance of rebels who would eventually destroy the Empire.

After locating key figures, Marek and the rebels met on Corellia where they formed the Corellian Treaty, an accord that created the Alliance to Restore the Republic. However, Vader, along with Imperial forces, raided the meeting, captured the rebels, and revealed to Marek that he had only been used to rally the Empire's enemies. Marek tracked the Dark Lord and the Alliance leaders to the Death Star, a massive superweapon, on which he dueled both Vader and Sidious. Marek bought time allowing the rebels to escape. His apparent sacrifice inspired them, and the new Alliance would ultimately prove to be the undoing of the Sith.

Somehow, Marek survived his encounter on the Death Star.

Early life
Galen Marek was the son of Kento and Mallie, both Jedi and survivors of Order 66 who had traveled the galaxy in search of safe haven until they met the fiercely loyal Wookiees of Kashyyyk. While Galen was watched over by the Wookiees, whether his birth occurred on Kashyyyk or before his parents arrived there is not clear. His mother was killed while defending Kashyyyk from Trandoshan slavers, leaving her husband to raise Galen alone. As a consequence of her death, the Empire became aware of Kento's existence.

Not long after the onset of the Great Jedi Purge, during an Imperial attack on Kashyyyk, Darth Vader landed on the planet in a shuttle on his own mission to hunt a rogue Jedi. He found Kento Marek, his Jedi objective, who met him with fierce resistance, though Vader proved stronger. As Vader was about to deal the finishing blow to Kento inside his hut, his lightsaber was pulled from his hand. He turned in defense, only to discover a young boy holding the blade, who Vader sensed had an incredible affinity for the Force.

After the Dark Lord killed the boy's father, the Stormtrooper commander leading the assault arrived. Mistakenly thinking that the child intended to attack Vader with his own weapon, he directed his men to kill him. Vader quickly summoned his saber from the child's grasp and deflected their blasts, killing them so there would be no witnesses of the boy's existence. He then brought the young Galen with him off Kashyyyk and trained him to become his apprentice in secret.

Training under Vader
Now in Vader's custody, Marek was taught the ways of the Force by the Dark Lord personally. The boy was first controlled by fear, not guided every step of the way by his new Master. Instead, he was made to find his own way, Vader offering scant advice and instruction only when he found himself lost. During their many sparring sessions, which involved lightsabers and Force powers, no encouragement was offered by Vader. Moreover, Marek's Master would never debate or enter into deep discussion with the boy. During the brutal training regimen, Galen was pushed to his limits; the physical tests he was subjected to bordered on torture, and many times, he felt on the brink of death.

Growing up in the secluded underbelly areas of the Star Destroyer Executor during its construction, the apprentice himself and his abode kept secret, Marek was given access to records of the Galactic Republic and Jedi Order by the Dark Lord. He devoted himself to the study of these records, convinced that understanding an enemy might mean the difference between life and death. He sometimes despaired of attaining Force mastery. His only inspiration was the thought of assisting his Master in overthrowing the latter's own Master, Darth Sidious, the Emperor of the Galactic Empire, as Vader had promised. As the boy grew older, Vader promised him greater power, and was taught to embrace his hate. Singed repeatedly by his master's lightsaber blade, he bore scars from his multiple mock duels. Throughout his training, Galen did not know his true name, but was referred to only by the codename Vader had given him: "Starkiller".

Eventually, Vader dispatched Starkiller on assassination missions against adversaries of both Vader and the Empire. Among the young man's targets were spies, thieves, and even high-ranking traitors to Imperial rule. To aid him in his task, Vader had provided Starkiller with two tools: a holodroid named PROXY, and a starship, the Rogue Shadow. The Dark Lord handpicked enlisted Imperials to pilot the Rogue Shadow, though he usually executed each of them within only a handful of missions. PROXY was a prototype holodroid who served as a companion and long time friend of Starkiller and traveled with him on the Rogue Shadow. Despite their friendship, PROXY was programmed by Vader with a prime directive to kill his master, further adding to his training. PROXY was equipped with advanced hologram technology that, when coupled with its built-in servos, would allow him to change appearance and adopt a wide range of disguises and abilities. He could also present messages: he would turn holographically into the sender, and the sender would relay the message. In addition, when Starkiller wanted information on an individual, PROXY would become that person and access databases to confirm his or her identity.

Rahm Kota
At night, Starkiller meditated attempting to peer into the future, but never successfully. Consequently, any break from his daily routine would surprise him, which happened after a particular dueling session with his Master, while Starkiller was made to kneel before the Dark Lord. While the youth knelt, a lightsaber loomed above his head, and he awaited death. However, upon hearing Vader's following words, he realized he was being informally knighted by his Master. For the first time, Vader acknowledged him as his apprentice, which Starkiller had always considered himself to be.

After commanding him to rise, Vader provided his secret apprentice with his new target: Jedi General Rahm Kota, who was attacking key Imperial facilities, the TIE Fighter Construction Facility over Nar Shaddaa in particular. Aside from being his first Jedi target, another element to Starkiller's new mission diverged from previous ones: to evade notice of the Emperor, he was to leave no witnesses, meaning that all whom he encountered aboard, insurgent and Imperial alike, were to be killed. Having spent his life in loyal service to his Master eliminating enemies of the Empire, the prospect of destroying Imperial troops filled the apprentice with uncertainty at first, but he accepted this aspect of the new mission as another test in pursuit of his Sith destiny.

As he entered the hangar that held the Rogue Shadow, he was attacked by PROXY, who had taken on the appearance and lightsaber style of Jedi General and former Jedi Council member Obi-Wan Kenobi. The pair dueled for some time, creating a substantial mess of the nearby equipment, until Starkiller stabbed PROXY through the chest plate. Starkiller, having fought that particular training program long ago, was impressed with the droid being able to surprise him by repeating it after so long. Nevertheless, PROXY expressed disappointment that he had not finally killed his master, wherewith Starkiller replied with his confidence in the constancy of PROXY's primary programming. Despite the gaping hole through his chest, the droid was still able to walk and function, albeit with more difficulty than before.

As they approached the ship, Starkiller encountered his new pilot: Juno Eclipse, former captain of Vader's Black Squadron and now the eighth pilot of the Rogue Shadow. Eclipse informed him that she had upgraded the Rogue Shadow's sensor array, so that he could spy on any suspect ships within an entire system. Upon her further questioning of his affiliation and status, Starkiller tersely told her that she need only know their destination.

Inside the starship's cockpit, PROXY detailed the target Jedi Master to Starkiller, who learned that Rahm Kota had been a respected General during the Clone Wars who had relied on his own militia rather than the Clone Army; therefore, there had been no clones to receive Order 66 when it was issued. Only recently had Kota come out of seclusion and started attacking key Imperial facilities with the same militia he had used years before.

Upon reaching the TIE Fighter Construction Facility, Starkiller instructed Eclipse to land in an open hangar. Eclipse was wary, as it was defended, but he responded that he would handle the defenses. Activating the ship's weapons system, he took aim and destroyed the cannon emplacements with two shots. As the Rogue Shadow safely landed in the hangar, Juno informed him that she would slice into the mainframe and guide him through the infrastructure. Starkiller then leapt out of the Rogue Shadow onto the hanger deck. There was no one to be seen, only droids and debris.

Via comlink, Eclipse guided him level by level and voiced her concern over High Command being displeased if the rebels took control of the facility, which Starkiller was apathetic towards. Obedient to his mission's mandate, he left none alive in his path. As the battle progressed, the security level of the facility was raised with an order issued to kill unauthorized personnel. At least two TIE Fighters were shot down by enemy fire, crashing into the walkways. Starkiller took a lift to the next floor, where the militia and Imperial forces were in a firefight on the bridge, leading across the station. A shot down TIE crashed into a walkway and destroyed a portion of it; however, Starkiller easily jumped the gap continuing his mission. All hangars eventually fell to rebel forces, and the assembly lines began to crumble.

As he began breaching the assembly line, Kota's men trapped him within an energy shield. He deactivated it by pulling the machinery out of the wall outside the barrier using the Force, and moved on, confronting an AT-CT walker in the wing assembly, which he compacted into a cube using his power. Unfortunately for him, Kota and his militia had set explosive charges throughout the facility, causing major structural damage.

He eventually reached the command center where Kota was waiting for him. Kota was both surprised and disappointed, as he had expected that Darth Vader himself had come after him. Starkiller made the first move, unleashing a bolt of Force lightning at him, which the Jedi easily deflected. Their duel raged across the command center, while constant explosions were being set off. The general realized he had underestimated the apprentice, but was confident he could still defeat him —- even if that meant bringing the entire factory down on their heads. Through the Force, he tore it in two, sending the factory towards Nar Shaddaa's atmosphere.

Eventually, a fragment of debris struck the Jedi's knees from behind, sending him down to the ground. Starkiller pinned him down with his lightsaber. While their lightsabers were locked, Kota said cryptically that he could see the young man's future, and that he would not always be Vader's servant. With surprise of his own, he said that he saw only himself. Using the moment as an opportunity, the apprentice forced Kota's own lightsaber down onto his eyes. While the Jedi General screamed in agony, Starkiller saw, instead of Kota, a man with dark hair and strong features, not unlike that of his own, and thought that he heard a man shouting to run. The apprentice finished off Kota by using the Force to push him through a glass floor, sending him to free fall through Nar Shaddaa's atmosphere. Though Starkiller did not believe he had killed him, he did believe that he was no longer a threat, and retreated from the facility retrieving the fallen Jedi's lightsaber.

Starkiller returned to the Executor and presented Kota's lightsaber to Darth Vader as evidence for his victory. Vader informed him of his next Jedi target: the reclusive droid maker, Kazdan Paratus, on Raxus Prime. The Dark Lord claimed that he did not expect the apprentice to survive.

Kazdan Paratus
During the travel to Raxus Prime on the Rogue Shadow, Starkiller was distracted and frequently asked PROXY to repeat what he had missed while deep in thought. Eventually, he left the cockpit for the meditation chamber to gather his energies, where he stared into his red lightsaber blade to regain his focus and treated his injuries with bacta patches.

As the Rogue Shadow entered Raxus Prime's atmosphere, Starkiller and his companions gazed upon a massive recreation of the Jedi Temple on Coruscant, presumably the location of Paratus. Because there were few clearings, the apprentice had to approach the "temple" on foot. He instructed Eclipse to circle past the structure and wait for his signal.

Upon landing on the planet's surface, Starkiller encountered scavenger droids and technobeasts created by the Jedi, in addition to Rodian scavengers. Scavenger droids were nothing to worry about, but Rodians were; via comlink, Eclipse informed Starkiller that they were a clan led by Drexl Roosh, a criminal with thirty-eight counts of fraud. Though the apprentice attempted to avoid them, due to an influx of droids, alarms were set off, resulting in every Rodian being on alert.

Fighting his way through these hordes and activating the hyperdrive engine on a crashed corvette to clear his way, Starkiller soon reached the parody of the Jedi Temple, where he encountered droid golems made by the Jedi from junk and battle droid parts. After defeating them, a massive junk golem smashed through a nearby wall wielding two vibro-axes. When the opportunity presented itself, Starkiller pushed through the Force, blowing its body off its leg and hurling it through a wall. Following the droid to make sure it was destroyed, he found himself in a junk High Council Chamber, with the mannequins of the Masters of the Council during the final days of the Clone Wars in their seats.

As the apprentice observed them, the armor plating on the massive droid he had last destroyed opened, and from it came his insane Aleena Jedi target. Convinced that the Jedi Masters he had built were real, he told them he would defend them from the "Sith trash". Paratus made the first move. Every blow the latter tried to make was blocked, but Paratus was vulnerable to Force lightning, which left him writhing in pain. When it seemed as if the fight was already over, the junk droid representing Plo Koon rose from his chair and attacked the apprentice with a vibroblade. He was quickly blown to pieces, Mace Windu and Coleman Kcaj were dismembered, Kit Fisto was melted, Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi were thrown out a window, Ki-Adi-Mundi, Saesee Tiin, Agen Kolar, and Shaak Ti were blasted with lightning, Stass Allie was beheaded, and Yoda was used as a missile to strike Paratus.

Still convinced that they were real, Paratus mourned for their "deaths". While he wept, Starkiller caught him in a Force grip and smashed him into the window frames and roof. Though he was too weak to fight, the apprentice continued to batter him, fearing a repeat of the vision that had happened while dueling Kota. Finally, he let him drop to the ground, where he was pinned by an avalanche of junk. Paratus's last words were sorrow for failing the Masters.

The hunt for Shaak Ti
Starkiller once again contacted Vader with news of his victory, and believed that he was ready to face the Emperor. However, Vader countered that the boy had only defeated "an old man" and "an outcast", and informed him of his next target: Shaak Ti, one of the last of the Jedi Council on Felucia.

Upon reaching Felucia, Starkiller noticed Captain Eclipse's uneasiness. After questioning her about it, he learned that the planet reminded her of Callos. Like Felucia, Callos had been a world overgrown and teeming with life, until it had been razed during the Bombing of Callos, in which Eclipse had led the Imperial forces. Starkiller assured her that she had done the right thing by following orders.

Meanwhile, the Rogue Shadow had been spotted by Shaak Ti, who mobilized her army of Felucians and sent her apprentice, Maris Brood, to hide at the Rancor Graveyard. As the Felucians were Force-sensitive, and their bone swords were resistant to lightsabers, they proved to be tougher opponents for Starkiller than the stormtroopers, militia, and droids he had previously faced, though their skill and ability still did not exceed his. In addition, they appeared to be more organized and powerful than Imperial records indicated. The entire planet was alive through the Force. Once balanced between light and dark, Shaak Ti's influence through the Force had suppressed the dark, herself a shining beacon Starkiller easily tracked in the Force. Killing Ti would undo her efforts on Felucia.

After fighting his way through Felucians and rancors, Starkiller finally encountered the Jedi Master at the Ancient Abyss; a place of sacrifice for the Felucians, and in reality the only known Mega Sarlacc pit. As he approached her, Shaak Ti appeared to be in deep meditation. Thinking it to only be a facade, Starkiller ripped a mushroom out of the sarlacc's skin and threw it towards her head, which she deflected telekinetically, barely moving. He then attempted to influence the sarlacc's mind so that it would attack the Jedi, but his attempts proved futile as she assisted it in its resistance. Activating her lightsaber, she leapt toward him, striking downward. The apprentice backflipped and blocked the opening blow, while the force of it surprised him. With that, the duel had begun.

Their duel moved onto the moving tentacles of the sarlacc. Eventually, Starkiller moved to the ground, and evaded an attack from Shaak Ti sending her flying back into the sarlacc's tendrils. Once there, Starkiller used Force lightning to attack both the creature and Shaak Ti together. Shaak Ti fell to the ground, mortally wounded.

In pain, she uttered a fateful prophecy that Starkiller would eventually learn that the Sith always betrayed one another, before allowing herself to fall into the sarlacc's maw with pity in her eyes knowing she could not win. As she began her plummet, Starkiller, halfheartedly tried to catch her, but failed and was knocked backwards by an explosion of Force energy. The remaining Felucians appeared to lose interest in Starkiller and returned to the jungle. Starkiller's actions would have far-reaching consequences as, with the death of Shaak Ti, Felucia recoiled into darkness. PROXY would later remark that he was unsure whether, by reaching for the Jedi as she fell into the pit, he wanted to finish her himself, or because he sensed truth in her words.

Appearances

 * Star Wars: The Force Unleashed video game
 * Star Wars: The Force Unleashed novel 
 * Star Wars: The Force Unleashed comic
 * Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II
 * The Ultimate Battle

Non-canon appearances

 * Star Wars: Visions of the Blade
 * Soulcalibur IV
 * Star Wars: The Force Unleashed: Ultimate Sith Edition
 * Super Smash Bros. Unleashed