Arturius au Vardan is a Gold of the Martian house Vardan, a member of the Board of Quality Control, and former best friend of Fitchner au Barca.
Appearance[]
Personality[]
Involvement[]
Sons of Ares[]
Arturius and Fitchner were in the same class during The Institute, where Arturius was Primus of House Jupiter for their year. During their time at the Institute, he and Fitchner developed a close friendship, and both graduated as Peerless Scarred.[1]
Sometime after their graduation, Arturius invited Fitchner to dinner with his family, and was noticeably drunk when Fitchner arrived. Upon discovering that his mother had assigned Fitchner's seat at the end of the table instead of by his own, Arturius made a fuss and forced another Gold to give up his seat for Fitchner.[1]
After dinner, Arturius and Fitchner discussed their plans for the future. When Fitchner expressed a desire to continue serving at Arturius's side, he promised to speak with his mother, Irenia au Vardan, about getting Fitchner a job as part of House Vardan. Irenia disapproved of their relationship, and threatened to disown Arturius if he did not sever his ties with Fitchner.[1]
Sometime after Fitchner left for Triton, Arturius went on to become a Prefect for the Board of Quality Control.[2]
When Fitchner returned to Mars, Arturius ran into him at the opera during a mission to assassinate Theron au Aktler for Quicksilver. While catching up, Arturius informed Fitchner of his new position. Later that night, he walked into the restroom to find Theron challenging Fitchner to a duel. Blaming the incident on his friend being drunk, Arturius urged Fitchner to apologize so he wouldn't get killed, only to be told that unlike him, Fitchner doesn't flinch from a little scrap.[2]
At some point before August 720 PCE, Arturius married an unnamed Gold woman.[3]
In November 720 PCE, Arturius oversaw the interrogation of Zarubal, the carver who helped Fitchner and Bryn conceive their child Sevro, after the man was arrested for work done on an Obsidian gladiator and ratted the couple out for a reduced sentence.[4][5]
Arturius met with Fitchner to offer him a job as part of the Board, and uses his authority as Prefect for the Board to have Bryn and Sevro arrested and disposed of in a misguided attempt to help his old friend. In response, Fitchner attacked Arturius before leaving to gather resources for a rescue mission. Meanwhile, Arturius returned to Whitehold to oversee Bryn's interrogation.[5]
Arturius used the threat of Sevro's impending dissection to coerce Bryn into confirming her relationship with Fitchner. When the alarms go off due to the Sons of Ares' infiltration of the facility, Bryn steals Arturius's razor and threatens him with it. He hands over his key pass and warns that the Society will hunt her and her son before she knocks him out.[6]
When Arturius regains consciousness, he announces Bryn's escape over the intercom and orders the base's security forces to intercept her, having a lurcher squad deployed alongside the regular security.
Arturius arrived in the base's hangar after Bryn managed to throw Sevro to Fitchner, and jumped down to confront Fitchner himself. Arturius cut off Fitchner's hand and offered him a choice between sparing his wife or his child. When Fitchner chose Sevro, Arturius allowed them and their associates to leave Whitehold unharmed. After overseeing Bryn's execution, Arturius kept Fitchner's relationship and Sevro's parentage a secret.
Six or seven months later, Arturius and his wife had a son named Drusus.
In September 721, Arturius and his wife hosted a party for their son in the House Vardan estate, less than four months after his birth. Fitchner and the Sons of Ares infiltrated the party in a failed attempt at revenge for Bryn's death. When Fitchner attempted to kill Drusus in his crib, Ryanna fired her gun in the air, alerting Arturius and his security to their presence. Arturius and the Grays of House Vardan confronted the intruders, with Arturius collecting his son while his security dealt with Fitchner.
After Fennix was captured during the Sons' escape, Arturius checked in as his security team interrogated him and deduced that Fitchner was the one behind the attempted assassination of his child. Following this, Arturius began tracking Fitchner's movements, hoping to catch his old friend away from his support and destroy him.[7]
He eventually found Fitchner at a secret shipyard in the Asteroid belt. While Arturius and Fitchner dueled in the shipyyards, his forces set charges to destroy the ships that Quicksilver was building to colonize other star systems. Arturius eventually left Fitchner for dead and evacuated aboard his personal ship, but Fitchner followed in gravBoots and massacred the ship's crew. As the two Golds dueled above the exploding shipyards, Ryanna shot out one of his gravBoots, sending him falling to his death in the inferno.
References[]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Sons of Ares, Volume 1; Issue #2
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Sons of Ares, Volume 1; Issue #4
- ↑ Drusus was born 6-7 months after Bryn's death, so Arturius and his wife had to have gotten married 3 or more months before that
- ↑ Golden Son, chapter 46
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Sons of Ares, Volume 1; Issue #5
- ↑ Sons of Ares, Volume 1; Issue #6
- ↑ Sons of Ares, Volume 2: Wrath