Chelli Lona Aphra

"Thank you, Mr. Lord Vader. Sir? Your majesty? Your illustriousness? Honestly, no idea. I'm a rogue archaeologist, not a protocol droid."

- Aphra, to Darth Vader

Doctor Aphra was a human female who lived during the Galactic Civil War. She was a rogue archaeologist and the foremost raider of lost weapons in the galaxy, and also the pilot of the Ark Angel. Shortly after the Battle of Yavin, Darth Vader turned to her for assistance in acquiring a personal army of battle droids.

Stealing assassin droids
"And now for our devilishly clever plan to steal a robot womb factory off a homicidally broody alien queen. Still think this is a good idea, Lord Vader?" "Yes."

- Aphra and Vader prepare to fight a Geonosian queen

The Human female Aphra grew up in a homestead on the frontier during the Separatist Crisis and Clone Wars. When raiders came to take what she had, her mother told her to run away. Finding a cave with an "awesome" cannon inside it, she came back and killed all of the raiders who had attacked, but was unable to save her mother from being murdered in a ditch. Thereafter, she spent her time as a rogue archaeologist and technician, reactivating technology including droids for military use.

At one stage she was sent to prison, but the sentence did not stick for long. The criminal group known as the Droid Gotra hired Aphra to acquire two droids for them which had been constructed as part of the Galactic Empire's Tarkin Initiative. She managed to find one, the astromech-like BT-1 assassin droid, floating in space near where it had destroyed the Initiative base that had created it. The droid was equipped with strong behavioral inhibitors that she was unable to bypass due to the fact the only droid only spoke an R&D language from the base it had destroyed. She also acquired the deactivated body of the second droid, 0-0-0 and kept both onboard her starship Ark Angel. In order to activate the two droids, Aphra needed the Triple-Zero personality matrix, which would activate 0-0-0 and allow it to communicate with BT-1, as the matrix contained the R&D language.

Shortly after the Battle of Yavin, Aphra traveled to Quarantine World III in Kallidahin Space in order to steal the personality matrix. She was able to bypass the planet's surveillance, using stealth microdroid dust to reveal the laser security systems in the room containing the matrix and slip past them to reach it. After collecting her prize she accidentally triggered the security, forcing her to flee from the systems response, which included automated blaster fire and a droideka. Thinking she had escaped, the Doctor was confronted by the curator Utani Xane and a group of B2 super battle droids, who reclaimed the matrix. One of the battle droids then informed the curator that they had a visitor, and Aphra was brought along by Xane to meet the new arrival who turned out to be the Sith Lord Darth Vader. Xane protested Vader's presence on the world, but the Sith quickly attacked the curator's four battle droids.In the confusion, Aphra tackled Xane as he tried to flee, knocking the matrix from his grasp and off of the landing platform the group was on. She managed to catch the object before it fell, while Vader killed Xane. The Sith then revealed he had come to the planet seeking Aphra, as he needed her help.

Alliance with Darth Vader
Aphra brought Vader on board the Ark Angel and asked how she could help, also wanting to know how Vader had found her, before changing her mind. The Doctor set about trying to break through the personality matrix's code lock, which she estimated would take a few hours, but was astonished when Vader unlocked it immediately using her console. With the matrix ready to use, she installed it into 0-0-0's body, which activated and introduced itself. Aphra overrode the droid's programming by a voice command to recognize her and Vader as masters, stopping it from trying to electrocute them through a handshake. She then ordered the droid to wake up BT-1, which 0-0-0 was able to do, but once activated the assassin droid prepared to attack Vader and Aphra. 0-0-0 was able to talk his fellow droid down, defusing the situation, which allowed Vader to explain to Aphra that he needed her to help him acquire a private army, as the forces of the Galactic Empire were no longer under his control due to his failure to prevent the destruction of the Death Star battlestation. Aphra agreed to cut her ties with the Droid Gotra and serve Vader, informing him that what he needed could be acquired on the planet Geonosis.

Using the Ark Angel, the four traveled to the sterilized world of Geonosis, where the Droid Gotra had previously informed Aphra that a surviving Geonosian Queen was still using a functioning droid factory. Aphra had meant to capture the factory for the Gotra, but offered to help Vader claim it instead. The Doctor sent 0-0-0 and BT-1 ahead to move through the tunnels leading to the factory and began questioning Vader as they followed a little behind the droids. After the assassin droids destroyed a number of B1 battle droids that attacked them, Aphra examined the droids and found they were slightly altered from the standard model, more closely resembling Geonosians, and concluded that the surviving queen probably viewed them as children. The group of four then discovered the queen, who had a gigantic robotic womb which could create the altered battle droids. Vader attacked the queen and cut her biological body from the cybernetic womb, and ordered the assassin droids to destroy the battle droids which the queen had ordered to attack him. Aphra then attempted to activate a location beacon and send it to the factory's roof, but discovered the beacon's thruster had malfunctioned. Leaping down from the platform she was standing on, the Doctor reached Vader, who used the Force to move the beacon to the ceiling. With the beacon secured, the Ark Angel fired on its location upon Aphra's orders, destroying the factory's ceiling. Vader used the force to create a bubble, protecting himself and Aphra from the blast. The two were then lifted from the cavern by Vader's own J-type 327 Nubian, which had dropped down cables to collect the factory womb. The assassin droids used jets to fly up after their masters, while the B1 battle droids unsuccessfully attempted to stop them on the queen's orders.

Once Vader, Aphra and the droids were safely off Geonosis and back on board the Ark Angel, the archaeologist managed to activate the droid factory and used it to produce a BX-series droid commando for Vader. 0-0-0 was then left in charge of the womb to produce an army for Vader while applying his own advancement methods which involved droid self improvement. Knowing she had fulfilled her purpose, Aphra asked what Vader planned to do, assuming he would kill her and requesting that the Sith make it quick. She was surprised when Vader elected to keep her around, believing that he would have further use for her.

Assisting Vader's investigations
0-0-0 then informed the pair that the Wookiee bounty hunter Black Krrsantan was contacting them as he had completed a job Vader had earlier hired him for: capturing a scientist commissioned by the Galactic Emperor Darth Sidious. The Wookiee delivered the captive to the Ark Angel, where Aphra and Vader greeted him before leaving 0-0-0 to torture the man. The droid killed the captive but was able to discover that his name was Doctor Cylo-IV, and that he operated a base where he was creating potential replacements for Vader on the Emperor's orders.

When Vader launched his attack on the base with two platoons of droid commandos, Aphra acted as logistical support from the Nubian, informing Vader of the presence of two occupied quarters : the barracks and the dojo. Vader led the assault on the barracks but the platoon sent to the dojo was destroyed. When Aphra relayed this information to the Dark Lord, he made his way there where he found the replacements Cylo-IV had been creating for the Emperor.

Losing contact with Vader after his arrival in the dojo, Aphra later left the Nubian to assist the Dark Lord but Vader, who had discovered his Master's plans for him and Cylo's cyborgs, was in a foul mood and silenced her. Later, Aphra informed Vader of Boba Fett's message about the pilot who destroyed the Death Star.

Possessing new information on the Rebel pilot, Vader traveled to Tatooine, the boy's home planet where Fett had cornered but failed to capture him, to follow his tracks. Aphra, 0-0-0 and BT-1 accompanied him and they investigated the moisture farm where he had been raised. Aphra realized that the Empire had been the one to have the boy's family killed and that revenge was most likely the motive that drove him. They then visited the home of Obi-Wan Kenobi, who had been the boy's mentor and which was where Fett had confronted the boy. Aphra let Vader conduct his investigation as she guessed that he would be using the Force to try and find a trace of him. When Vader was done, Aphra set off a molecular purge bomb to wipe any forensic evidence of their presence.

A new assignment
With their business on Tatooine concluded, Vader told Aphra that he was returning to his duties for the Empire and that he would contact her for her next assignment, which he told her would be 'a matter of some delicacy.' After the Empire broke the criminal organization known as the Son-tuul Pride and captured all the credits they had hoarded, Aphra summoned bounty hunters Black Krrsantan, Bossk, IG-90 and Beebox in a cantina on Son-tuul where she told them that she had inside information which would allow them to capture the hoarded credits and get away.

With the aid of the bounty hunters, Aphra intercepted the light cruiser carrying the credits above Anthan Prime. She detonated an asteroid orbiting the planet, creating a debris field that the cruiser was unable to maneuver around. Using the cover of the asteroid collision, Aphra fired an ion torpedo at the vessel, crippling its electrical systems. With the cruiser dead in space, Aphra, Bossk, IG-90, and Beebox crossed the vacuum to board the vessel. Once on board, the team gained access to the ship's vault, where they were confronted by three Viper probe droids. Aphra disabled the droids using an electro magnetic pulse grenade and the bounty hunters made quick work of their husks. Aphra then planted a homing beacon on the vault and led her team back out of the cruiser. With the team safely back aboard the Ark Angel, Black Krrsantan, in his own ship, towed an asteroid into a collision course with the hull of the cruiser, ripping the ship apart and releasing the credits into space. BT-1, who had positioned himself on the outer hull of the ship, then generated a magnetic field, capturing some of the credits. Aphra, who had promised the bounty hunters a bigger score, attempted to placate them by fronting the expense of the operation. Later, on Anthan 13, where she and Krrsantan had secretly collected the rest of the credits, Aphra was approached by Vader, the mastermind of the entire scheme, who gave her a new assignment.

Obtaining knowledge from The Ante, who she located in a floating city hovering above Anthan Prime, of the location of Commodex Tahn, a mortician from Naboo, she went off to find him along with Beetee and Triple-Zero.

Finding Tahn on Naboo, Aphra had BT-1 disarm him of a DC-15 blaster rifle. Just before interrogating the former mortician, she instructed Beetee to clean out Tahn's safe to make their break-in appear to be a robbery rather than a secret mission from Lord Vader. Under torture by Triple Zero, she obtained the confession that Tahn had doctored the corpse of Padmé Amidala to make her appear to have died while still pregnant, and also confirmed the existence of one child, a son. Once she had obtained all the information she believed he would give, she told Triple Zero to "finish up", which the droid did by murdering the mortician with a significant electric shock, not wanting to be seen as a sadist by trying to find information that she was unsure he would or would not have. Afterwards, she brought her droid companions back to her ship, returning to Vader with the news of a possible heir to the Naboo throne. Finding her way back to Vader, she admitted that his sources were correct, and said that from what she had gained from Tahn, Amidala seemed to be someone very special, and that the mortician loved her. Realizing an awkward situation of silence from the Dark Lord, she asked for her next mission, which was to find Vader's son before another imperial agent who had been sent out.

Returning to Anthan Prime and going straight to the Ante's base at the Spire, she decided to go to her business with the Ante herself, letting Beetee and Triple-Zero roam the base. In front of a fireplace with him, she told of her necessity to find Luke Skywalker, who he noted was sought after by many people, and that the demand for him had upped the price for his location to what Aphra called an "exciting" number, and that he had not actually given the location to anyone yet on account of how high the price was. To his surprise, she gave a duffel bag full of Imperial credits, noting he could "keep the change." Despite his apparent offer for business otherwise in his underworld organization after realizing that this was the Son-tuul Pride's fortune, she asked again for the location, which he gave: Vrogas Vas.

Unfortunately, it was at that moment that a sizable Imperial raiding force was attacking the Spire, looking for the stolen funds that Aphra had taken for herself and used to purchase Luke Skywalker's location. As she tried to escape, the Ante gave up to Darth Vader, at the head of the invading force, that it was she who had used the funds. Though she nearly made her way to the Ark Angel unharmed, Vader stopped her path forward not long after she had escaped the firefight between the criminals of the spire and the stormtroopers. Though she tried to reason her way around him to get to her ship, he punished her by holding her in a Force choke, only letting go once she told him that she knew where Luke Skywalker was. When demanded to tell where, she agreed to do so, but at a later time. Using the Ark Angel to secure her exit by leaving it in wait as a trap, she quickly boarded, but not before Vader told her that she would "answer for this." Using clouds around the planet, she managed to evade a carefully lain Imperial blockade in its orbit.

After Vader cleverly diverted the attention of his personal forces to the destruction of the Plasma Devils, Aphra escaped to another planet, where she and her droids met with Vader once more after he tracked her down in his personal transport. Upon the confirmation of Vrogas Vas as the location of Luke Skywalker, she asked if he required her company, which the Sith Lord denied, leaving without her to confirm her information.

Assault on Vrogas Vas
Monitoring Vader's comms from an unknown location in space on board the Ark Angel, Doctor Aphra instructed him on the planet and insisted that Luke Skywalker would be there. Unfortunately, it was a rebel stronghold, and, to her distress, she lost communication with him shortly after he left hyperspace, and she soon after had word from intercepted rebel comms that Vader's personal transport had been shot down over Vrogas Vas. Unsure of whether he was alive or dead, she agreed with 0-0-0's suggestion that they follow him and kill any and all rebels they could in order to save the Sith Lord.

Landing on the planet after learning that she was up against the forces of Han Solo (who she did not recognize at all), she came across Luke Skywalker, seeing him from a distance on a pair of macrobinoculars. Aware that he took on Boba Fett by himself and won, she decided that using anything less than heavy weaponry would be effectively suicidal, and so she decided to instead spray paint Triple-Zero gold, disguising him as C-3PO. When he came over to Skywalker and his astromech droid R2-D2 and shocked the former into unconsciousness with his hand, Aphra came over to them from behind Triple-Zero.

Whilst Beetee chased R2-D2 away, Aphra and 0-0-0 started to walk away with the kidnapped Skywalker. Denying the latter's request to drain Skywalker's blood from his flesh, she started toward the Ark Angel in order to get ahead of a ship she had heard. In the process, she was stopped by Han Solo with a rifle when he shouted for her and 0-0-0 to drop Skywalker, or he would drop them. Identifying him, she scolded the "infamous smuggler" for demanding she drop Luke Skywalker first, instead of shooting before making the demand. She also announced her own identity, which seemed to worry him. However, their impasse and her threat to have Luke Skywalker killed by 0-0-0's shocking palms was cut short by the intervention of Chewbacca, who tore off one of 0-0-0's arms and caused him to drop the captive, who was coming to consciousness. Meanwhile, Solo and Aphra engaged in a firefight that ended with them each hitting a nest of Wasp-worms above their opponent and causing them to be covered in them. The two, blinded, ran at one another in a panic, the crash causing Aphra to be knocked unconscious and setting her homicidal droids free of their master's commands for the time being. Soon after, she awoke and told her droids, Triple Zero lacking his arms, to go and capture Skywalker, noting the arrival of support in the form of the Wookie Krrsantan.

Appearances

 * Star Wars: Darth Vader 2: Vader, Part II
 * Star Wars: Darth Vader 3: Vader, Part III
 * Star Wars: Darth Vader 4: Vader, Part IV
 * Star Wars: Darth Vader 5: Vader, Part V
 * Star Wars: Darth Vader 6: Vader, Part VI
 * Star Wars: Darth Vader Book II: Shadows and Secrets
 * Star Wars: Vader Down, Part I
 * Star Wars: Darth Vader 13: Vader Down, Part II
 * Star Wars 13: Vader Down, Part III
 * Star Wars: Darth Vader 15