Aleema Keto

"I'm enjoying our contest, but I'm winning too easily. Perhaps I want you to be stronger. Perhaps I'd like to be conquered."

- Aleema Keto, to Ulic Qel-Droma

Aleema Keto was the the daughter of Lady Magda Keto and niece of the elder Lord Keto, as well as the cousin of Satal Keto. She and Satal co-founded the Krath, a secret dark side society, and together succeeded in overthrowing the Tetan Monarchy just prior to the Great Sith War. As co-rulers of the Empress Teta system, Aleema and her cousin instigated the conflict known as the Krath Holy Crusade. As she progressed down the path of the dark side, she became a Sith sorceress, gaining proficiency in the arts of Sith magic. After becoming the lover of Ulic Qel-Droma, Aleema joined forces with Dark Lord of the Sith Exar Kun and held position as his senior ally in the Brotherhood of the Sith. She was later killed by her own actions when she caused the destruction of the Cron Cluster during the Battle of Kemplex IX, having been tricked into the affair by both Kun and Qel-Droma.

Biography
"This is it, Satal! The power of the dark side will soon be ours!"

- Aleema, to her cousin, Satal



The son and daughter&mdash;though not siblings&mdash;of the then-rulers of Empress Teta, Aleema and her cousin Satal were next in line for the throne of the Empress Teta system. Bored and spoiled, she, Satal, and some of their aristocrat friends formed a secret society called the Krath, so named after a fairy-tale magician-god. The cousins learned much from their tutors about the ancient Sith Empire, which instigated the Great Hyperspace War in 5,000 BBY&mdash;so much so that they were compelled to explore the history further on their own.

The Keto kids took a trip to the Galactic Museum on Coruscant in search of more knowledge on the Sith. In the museum, they perused a hall dedicated to Sith history, and managed to steal a book of Sith lore, only to find that they could not understand the ancient text. Dejected, they went back to their hotel, and while scanning the news reports, heard about dark side adepts on Onderon who were terrorizing the populace with their dark powers. Intrigued by this new knowledge, the pair traveled to the war-torn planet aboard the Tetan Royal Space Yacht known as the Krath Enchanter, with hopes of locating any Sith affiliate who might aid them in unlocking the secrets of the book. They arrived on Onderon to find a massive battle taking place between Republic forces and the Naddists, a cult following of the ancient Sith Lord Freedon Nadd. Their yacht was shot down in the midst of a Republic rocket-jumper deployment, and crashed in the Onderonian capital of Iziz, where they just barely escaped the explosion into the streets. After spending some time showing their acquisition around and inquiring about the Sith, they were finally brought before Onderon's monarch: King Ommin.



Curious about the ancient Sith text, Ommin was pleased by these two potential Sith initiates, and so agreed to help them. Satal openly expressed his apprehension, fearing that the old king did not possess the knowledge they sought. All that changed however, when King Ommin worked his dark magic on Satal, rendering him ill and opening Aleema further to the dark side. Ommin then showed them his prized collection of Sith amulets, one in particular that allowed them to read Sith writings. The decrepit King agreed to give Satal the amulet, but under one condition: he must be allowed to take a copy of the spell book for himself. Satal acquiesced, and while a scribe transcribed the text, Ommin showed them the captive Jedi Master Arca Jeth, hung on a wall and suffering heavily under Sith magic. But as Ommin leaned in close to taunt Jeth, a team of Jedi Knights crashed the royal palace to free him. Ommin was caught off-guard as his forces were soundly defeated by Jeth's rescuers. The Jedi quickly triumphed, and just as Ulic Qel-Droma smashed Ommin's durasteel exoskeleton to incapacitate him, the ancient spirit of the Dark Lord Freedon Nadd appeared. With Republic forces and the Jedi Knights now in complete control of the city, Nadd realized Ommin had failed in his task of restoring the glory of the Sith; instead, he convinced Aleema and Satal that they held the key to building a new Sith Empire and that he would guide them. Eventually, the Jedi freed Arca Jeth and Ommin was slain by Qel-Droma.

Trouble for the Republic
Aleema and Satal then fled Onderon with a collection of ancient Sith artifacts and texts, and used them to become proficient in Sith sorcery. Now the way was clear for the Krath to immediately begin plotting their rise to power. Armed with her new Sith knowledge, Aleema was instrumental in bringing down their parents, the legal rulers of Empress Teta. During a visit to her uncle's carbonite processing facility, Aleema, along with Satal, caused an uproar when their escort Korus revealed that his tongue had been replaced with an adegan eel. Reeling with anger, Lord Keto demanded that she and Satal be arrested. The Keto cousins had other plans, however, and Aleema again used her newfound talents to turn the guardsmen's weapons into illusory snakes that drove them into despair. With the guards out of the way, she even went so far as to have her uncle Lord Keto lowered into a vat of molten carbonite, leaving her and Satal as the unchallenged rulers of Empress Teta. Tutor Korus would not survive the upstaging either; Aleema used the Force and burned him alive for simply spilling a drink on her. The Krath had successfully staged their political coup, Aleema and Satal took up residence in the Iron Citadel, the building where Lord Keto formally held court, making it their formal base of operations. They immediately began a plan to unify the worlds of the Tetan system under their heel. However, the citizens of the Empress Teta, specifically Koros Major, rebelled against their new Krath rulers.

In an effort to restore order in the Tetan system, a joint Jedi and Galactic Republic battalion was sent to deal with the usurpers. Aleema and Satal were more than prepared for the Republic, and took up command from a space station orbiting Koros. As the Republic forces emerged from hyperspace, the Krath met them head-on. Aleema used her sorcery to create illusions of space grazers, legendary creatures that roamed the galaxy and preyed upon interstellar spacecraft. The space grazer illusions were lifelike enough to fool Captain Vanicus and the Republic fleet during the Battle of Koros Major, almost forcing the panicking commanders into retreat. However, the Jedi Nomi Sunrider saw through the deception, and used her battle meditation to confound Aleema, thus allowing the Republic forces to ignore the apparitions. Drawing upon the sum of her powers, Aleema created a mass illusion to conceal a screen of Chaos fighter suicide bombers launched by Satal. The Chaos fighters harassed the Republic fleet, and Jedi Knight Ulic Qel-Droma was injured when one of the Krath vessels plunged into the command ship he was on. Although Sunrider was able to distract and defeat Aleema, the Republic detachment was forced to withdraw in the face of such a blatant attack, leaving the Krath in complete control of the system.

Seducing a Jedi


Some time later, Aleema and Satal used Krath war droids disguised as servitors to attack the Conclave on Deneba, where the Jedi had gathered to discuss the growing Krath threat. During the assault, Master Arca Jeth was slain, and his student Ulic Qel-Droma swore revenge on the Krath. Consumed by grief over the death of Master Arca, Qel-Droma soon after attempted to infiltrate the Krath in hopes of destroying them from within. He arrived on Empress Teta and made his way to Cinnagar, the capital city. Aleema sensed Ulic's great strength in the Force, and was wary of him, but devisd a plan for turning him to the dark side. During a skirmish in Koros Major, she let Qel-Droma "save" her from a fake assassination attempt, and managed to take him as her lover to win his trust. However, her cousin Satal grew jealous and suspicious, and had Qel-Droma interrogated and tortured in the dungeons of the Iron Citadel. Despite his denying that he was a Jedi spy, Satal injected Qel-Droma with a Sith poison&mdash;a poison that played off the individual's rage and amplified it. By doing this, Satal was confident that Ulic's anger would activate his poison, and ensure the Jedi's fall to the dark side.

After a failed attempt by Nomi Sunrider and her Jedi cohorts to rescue Qel-Droma, Satal again questioned Qel-Droma's loyalty and attempted to have him assassinated. The vengeful former Jedi repelled the attack and then confronted Satal, striking him down in anger. Ulic also rebuked Nomi and the Jedi and despite their pleas, refused to leave Koros Major with them. Aleema knew her seduction was successful, and that Ulic was falling further and further to the dark side. She revealed to Ulic that she was aware of his infiltration scheme all along, and saw it as a challenge for the both of them. Now convinced that Ulic could not turn away from the dark path even if he wanted to, she took Qel-Droma as her official partner, and they became the new co-rulers of the Krath. Six months later, Ulic confronted Mandalore the Indomitable in a duel to the death. Qel-Droma was triumphant, and instead of cutting the Mandalore down, Qel-Droma made the warlord and his forces swear fealty to him. During the Great Sith War, the Krath, along with the Dark Lord Exar Kun and their Mandalorian allies, waged war on the Republic. During an assault on Coruscant, Aleema betrayed the now-Sith Lord Qel-Droma and allowed him to be captured by the Jedi. But Qel-Droma would never be tried and sentenced; he was rescued by his Sith Master Exar Kun, just as he was facing the Inquisition for his crimes against the Republic. Although Aleema feigned affection for Ulic once he returned, Mandalore the Indomitable made Qel-Droma aware of Aleema's treachery, and although outwardly unaffected, Ulic began plotting his revenge.

Fatal Betrayal


Near the end of the Sith War, Qel-Droma sent Aleema and the traitor Jedi Crado to attack the important relay station at Kemplex IX in the Auril Sector. The idea was to lure the combined Galactic Republic and Jedi fleet out into the Cron Cluster, where the fleet would walk into a trap and be destroyed. Her dark side power was greatly augmented by the use of certain Sith weapons, one of which was a set of Sith crystals used to power the Corsair, the ancient starship used generations ago by Naga Sadow. Sadow flew the Corsair when he eluded the Republic by passing between the binary star known as the Dena rii Nova, and used his Sith magic to agitate solar flares as Republic ships passed through, thereby destroying his persuers. After Kun taught her how to harness the Corsair's power, Aleema intended on using Sadow's crystals to rip the core from a nearby star and hurl it at the fleet. Although she succeeded in destroying most of the starships, she failed to fully control the power she wielded, as Qel-Droma had deliberately calculated; she, the betrayer, was now the betrayed. The liberated solar core ignited the hearts of the surrounding suns, and created an intense, multi-star supernova, which engulfed three Auril Sector star systems and later the planet Ossus. Caught in the blaze, Aleema and Crado were killed along with their Jedi pursuers Dace Diath, Shoaneb Culu, and Qrrrl Toq, just as the Qel-Droma and Kun had planned.

Legacy
Aleema and Satal's legacy would be realized many thousands of years later in the form of Satal's descendant, Sebban Keto. Sebban, a Tetan businessman who like his ancestors, practiced dark side magic and used it to reestablish the Krath traditions on Empress Teta.

Personality and traits
Aleema Keto was a rather privileged youth, having grown up as royalty amidst the aristocracy of Empress Teta. To this end she was bored with the normal goings-on of high society, and sought to amuse herself by dabbling in the lore of Sith magic. She showed quite a thirst for forbidden knowledge, and so traveled with her cousin to Onderon solely for the purpose of discovering the mysteries of the Sith. She was naive to the fact that the dark side had a corrosive nature, and would surely twist and corrupt her.



As a Sith sorceress, Aleema had a penchant for treating individuals as worthless inferiors, often devising cruel punishments for subordinates who tried her patience. Her short temper was obvious, and she was not above using her powers to horrify and terrorize those of her choosing.

Aleema was sneaky, cunning, and conniving, not above using deception and manipulation to further her goals. She used her womanly wiles to seduce Ulic Qel-Droma, who was already on a path to the dark side, and then further manipulated him into ultimately murdering her cousin. The way was now clear for Aleema to govern the Krath exclusively, and with Qel-Droma by her side she became even more brash and arrogant, fully believing in the strength of her powers. Her dishonesty was further realized when she betrayed Qel-Droma to the Jedi, but when he returned, she resumed her romantic deceptions. Her naivety was again obvious, as she was unaware that Mandalore the Ultimate had warned Qel-Droma of her treachery. It would prove her undoing, since Qel-Droma's own deception ultimately ended in Aleema's demise.

Powers and abilities


Even before becoming a Sith witch, Aleema showed a considerable connection to the Force. She endured the strong dark side energies emanating from Onderon, while her cousin Satal was stricken with malaise upon feeling the same power. Aleema also had a propensity for Precognition, demonstrated on numerous occasions in which she displayed a vague awareness of how immediate events would unfold. She was able to calm Satal's fear of impending doom while abord the Krath Enchanter by assuring him that they were going to survive what seemed like an inevitable crash. When they finally touched down, Aleema instinctively knew that they were in the right place. Her Force sense was also strong (more so than Satal's), since she was able to sense the strong dark side aura emanating from Onderon, and the strong dark side presences of both Qel-Droma and Exar Kun.

Her real talents, however, lie in the ancient arts of Sith magic. After receiving instruction from both Freedon Nadd and King Ommin, Aleema developed a unique connection with the dark side that she developed into quite the reckoning force. When performing her magical incantations, an aqua glow of dark side energy shone over her right eye. Her greatest ability was in creating illusions, something she mastered to a high degree. Aleema used Sith magic to conjure apparitions of creatures that seemed alive, but in reality were not. During the First Battle of Empress Teta, she created mass illusions of space grazers and giant starships, and also used her illusory talents to conceal her cousin's Chaos fighters' assault on the Galactic Republic fleet. The Jedi Knight Nomi Sunrider was on more than one occasion able to pinpoint Aleema as the source of the deception, and assault her mind directly, an attack she was not prepared for and could not withstand.



To amuse herself, Aleema would often torture her lackeys with her magic, turning technology into vile organic perversions or serving guests with platters of severed heads. When swords were raised against her, she brushed off the attack and then turned her adversaries' weapons against them, transforming their swords into snakes. She was also able to project concentrated blasts of pure dark side energy, even without the use of a Sith amulet.

From Kun she learned to harness the dark side through Naga Sadow's technology on the Corsair with her sorcery, and used it to destroy the nine stars of the Cron Cluster. Her overconfidence in this newfound abilitiy was her undoing, just as Qel-Droma foresaw; the ensuing supernovae consumed her as well since she was not able to fully control the dark power of Sadow's vessel.

Behind the scenes
The character of Aleema Keto was first conceived and written by Tom Veitch and drawn by Tony Akins for the Tales of the Jedi comic series, first appearing in the issue The Freedon Nadd Uprising: Initiates of the Sith, published in 1994. However, she was first mentioned in the Dark Empire endnotes, a series of short essays that provided back stories for several Star Wars topics, including Ulic Qel-Droma and the Krath. The endnotes' mention of the Krath laid the foundation for Keto's involvement in the upcoming Tales of the Jedi story arcs. For the Tales of the Jedi audio drama, Keto was voiced by Garet Scott, and again by Jocelyn Blue for the Dark Lords of the Sith audio drama. Even though her involvement was minimal, Veitch's creation of Aleema Keto for the Freedon Nadd Uprising allowed for the character to be further explored in the Dark Lords of the Sith and The Sith War stories, respectively.

Appearances

 * Tales of the Jedi: The Freedon Nadd Uprising 2: Initiates of the Sith
 * Tales of the Jedi (audio)
 * Tales of the Jedi: Dark Lords of the Sith Special Ashcan Edition
 * Tales of the Jedi: Dark Lords of the Sith 1: Masters and Students of the Force
 * Tales of the Jedi: Dark Lords of the Sith 2: The Quest for the Sith
 * Tales of the Jedi: Dark Lords of the Sith 4: Death of a Dark Jedi
 * Tales of the Jedi: Dark Lords of the Sith 5: Sith Secrets
 * Tales of the Jedi: Dark Lords of the Sith 6: Jedi Assault
 * Tales of the Jedi: The Sith War 1: Edge of the Whirlwind
 * Tales of the Jedi: The Sith War 2: The Battle of Coruscant
 * Tales of the Jedi: Dark Lords of the Sith (audio)
 * Tales of the Jedi: The Sith War 4: Jedi Holocaust
 * Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords

Notes and references
Aleema Keto Aleema Keto