Tamara Ryvora

Tamara Ryvora, nicknamed "Tam", was a human female mechanic from Kuat who served as a member of Team Fireball on the Colossus, a refueling station in the Outer Rim Territories. She aspired to be a star racer, and saw repairing the derelict starship Fireball as a second chance at her goal, after having lost her first ship.

Origins
Tamara Ryvora was the daughter of a racer. Her father's career inspired her to become a racer herself, and she left her home planet of Kuat to pursue that dream. After falling on hard times while working her way up the circuit, Tam came to the Colossus station on Castilon sometime before 34 ABY. She became good friends with another racer, Hype Fazon. However, the friendship ended after Fazon earned a place in the Ace Squadron, reserved for the station's most elite pilots, and moved to Doza Tower. Ryvora's racing career was derailed when, in need of credits to repair her racer, she borrowed on the ship's value prior to a race, but lost the race and, consequently, her ship.

Enduring Kaz
By 34 ABY, Ryvora was a member of Team Fireball, a racing team and group of mechanics led by Jarek Yeager, along with Neeku Vozo and R1-J5 "Bucket". Yeager had promised her the Fireball, an old racing ship, if she could fix it up. The arrival of Kazuda Xiono to the Colossus changed things at the team. Xiono, who was secretly a spy for the Resistance, joined Team Fireball as his cover, and almost immediately got off on the wrong foot with Ryvora when Yeager loaned him the Fireball to fly in a race that Vozo had signed him up for. Upon seeing the ship, Xiono was not impressed, and Ryvora took his criticisms as an insult of her work. She was not pleased with the used parts Xiono acquired to repair the ship as he could not afford new ones. After Xiono crashed the Fireball due to pushing it too hard, the repair of the ship had to start all over again.

Ryvora found Xiono's poor mechanical skills, and dubious excuses as to why, suspicious. She was further unimpressed by Xiono's apparent lack of work ethic during jobs. During one such job, for a Neimoidian named Hallion Nark, Ryvora went down to the Office of Acquisitions to drag Xiono back to the repair shop, as he had taken a long time getting a part and their client was in a hurry. Not long afterwards, there was a pirate attack, and Ryvora spent it in a shelter with Yeager and Vozo. When they returned to the hangar, they found Xiono working on the Fireball, which he claimed to have been doing for the entire attack. Ryvora was skeptical, but remained unaware that Xiono had covertly assisted the Aces in driving off the attack.

Although Ryvora continued to be frustrated by Xiono, she slowly warmed up to him. After Bucket informed her that hyperfuel had been stolen from Yeager's office, she was alarmed, telling Xiono when he asked her that more than a few drops of the stuff turned ships into flying bombs. This led Xiono to rush off to save the thief, Jace Rucklin, from the consequences of his actions.

Visiting Doza Tower
During a series of power outages to the Colossus caused by a fuel shortage, Ryvora was put back in contact with her former friend Fazon when the members of Team Fireball spent some time at Aunt Z's Tavern. Fazon had come down there because he refused to fly supply missions involving the First Order. He saw Ryvora while he was talking to Xiono, but didn't approach her. Ryvora told Xiono that being an Ace wasn't all glamour and excitement. After Xiono hurriedly left the tavern to try and spy on the First Order shipment, Ryvora and Vozo caught up with him, and she and Xiono speculated on what the First Order wanted.

The two then had to rush after Vozo after he misinterpreted a statement from Xiono and decided to innocently ask the visitors the reasons for their arrival. Fortunately, Vozo was unharmed. Ryvora overheard Xiono telling the droid BB-8 about his desire to get into Doza Tower, and when he asked her about her friendship with Fazon, told him the details. As she began listing off the things she disliked about Fazon, Xiono tried and failed to silently warn her that Fazon had seen them as he was walking by in the hallway and was approaching from behind her. Fazon, who was somewhat regretful about how things had gone, invited Ryvora and Xiono up to Doza Tower, an invitation Xiono was happy to accept for all of them.

In the Aces Lounge, Ryvora got into an argument with Fazon about the derelict Fireball, as Fazon thought that she would never become a top-ranked racer with an old ship in that state of disrepair, while Ryvora was confident her mechanical skills were up to the challenge. Xiono took advantage of the argument to slip away to spy on the First Order, which caused Ryvora to wonder where he was when she decided to leave.

Later, she was in Aunt Z's with Vozo when he spotted Xiono on the side of Doza Tower, which astonished Ryvora, who was baffled as to how he came to be there. She and Vozo watched nervously as Xiono navigated the side of the tower while avoiding shots from some stormtroopers before making it safely inside. When Ryvora and Vozo met back up with Xiono at the repair shop, he claimed the troopers had been chasing him because he'd accidentally entered an unauthorized area. Ryvora was pleased when Xiono claimed he'd seen that Doza Tower wasn't what it was cracked up to be, and ordered him back to work as the station's power came back on.

The broken compensator
Ryvora acquired a rare and expensive acceleration compensator to install on the Fireball, and enlisted Vozo's help in doing so. As she considered Xiono's mechanical skills sub-par, she didn't initially intend to ask him for help, but one stage of installation required the tightening of three bolts simultaneously, requiring a third person to assist. Xiono misinterpreted her instructions and pulled his wrench the wrong way, breaking it. Ryvora was so furious she drove an apologetic Xiono out of the repair shop by throwing tools at him, while he promised to get her a new compensator. When Xiono, accompanied by Vozo and BB-8, came back to the repair shop empty-handed, she yelled at him again, and then gave him the broken compensator so he could match the specs of the new one he'd promised to get her.

Xiono eventually got the compensator repaired by one of the Chelidae who worked in the Colossus' engineering department while he was helping two children escape from the First Order. Ryvora was pleasantly surprised by the repaired part, and when told that one of Xiono's friends had fixed it, said she was surprised he had friends, and jokingly asked him if he had any other secrets he was keeping from her. This prompted Xiono to awkwardly lie that he was the "most straightforward guy" on the platform, before excusing himself.

Befriending Synara San
Later on, Ryvora, along with the rest of Team Fireball, was hired in a secret job to repair the targeting computer for the Colossus' defence turbolasers. When the computer's CoMar Tri-Tracker chip broke, she and Xiono were sent by Yeager to quietly acquire another one. After the Office of Acquisitions turned up empty, Xiono took Ryvora to the loading docks where the salvagers worked, introducing her to an acquaintance, Synara San, the sole survivor of a pirate attack that he and Yeager had registered some time prior. Unbeknownst to anyone on the platform, San was actually a pirate herself, a member of Kragan Gorr's pirate gang, and was now acting as a spy on the platform. Ryvora took a liking to San because of her technical skills, and was appreciative when San found a Tri-Tracker chip. However, this led San to suspect that the targeting computer was offline, and to contact Gorr about the Colossus' vulnerability.

Later, after San surprised Ryvora and Xiono in the repair shop while they were working on the targeting computer, Ryvora and Xiono attempted to hide it from her sight, which proved unsuccessful. In part to get San out of the shop, Ryvora offered to buy her lunch as thanks for the free connector couplings she had brought them. In the Colossus marketplace, Ryvora confided in San about her past, but accidentally took a much longer break than she should have, given the time-sensitive nature of the computer repair. Only when the entire Ace Squadron departed the platform on an escort mission did Ryvora realize she had to get back to work, as Xiono had been sent to look for her.

Upon returning to the repair shop, Yeager was unimpressed with Ryvora, noting that he expected Xiono to take such lengthy breaks, instead of her. Work on the computer resumed, but San had signalled her fellow pirates, who began their attack. After Ryvora had finished working, as Xiono and Yeager were preparing to load the computer onto a hoverlift, she saw explosions at the loading docks and grew concerned for San, running off to see if she was okay. Xiono sent BB-8 to help her.

On her way to the docks, Ryvora encountered a pirate in the halls and took him out by ramming the pirate with a cart loaded with crates, which other Colossus residents looted. When she and BB-8 reached the loading docks, Ryvora saw San amongst crates and charged into the melee. Ryvora knocked down two pirates, but was picked up from behind by a large Trandoshan. Asking BB-8 for help, Ryvora elbowed the pirate in the face, leading him to stumble backwards and slip on the droid, falling over. When Ryvora reached San, she was shocked that anyone would come looking for her to help, and Ryvora commented that that was what friendship was all about. When the two were approached by another pirate, San punched him out before he could reveal her true allegiance, which impressed Ryvora. After the attack was over, San thanked Ryvora for her help, telling her to "be well".

Personality and traits
Ryvora was a human female with black hair, brown eyes and dark skin. She had a generally prickly and tough personality, not taking what she saw as criticism of her work or the Fireball well. However, after Kazuda Xiono came to the Colossus, she slowly became more empathetic and caring, shown when she risked her life to save Synara San during a pirate raid, during which the Colossus was virtually defenseless and all she had to rely on were her fists, wit, and BB-8.

Having never lived under the tyranny of the Galactic Empire, Ryvora failed to recognize their successor, the First Order, as a threat. Following their supposed rescue of Torra Doza, Ryvora quickly developed sympathy for the First Order and wholeheartedly believed they were earnest in their desire to protect the Colossus. Despite that sympathy faltering upon learning of the massacre on Tehar, Ryvora still supported the First Order's increasingly draconian measures.

Skills and abilities
Being a mechanic, Ryvora possessed extensive knowledge of engineering, so much so that despite Kaz being born into an opulent world with many opportunities, she doubted that he had any training as an engineer, and being able to put the decrepit racer Fireball back together. Her skill as an engineer also contributed to her great strength. She was easily strong enough to lift an acceleration compensator, which Kaz was forced to drag, and take down or knock out three pirates in hand-to-hand combat.

Behind the scenes
Tam Ryvora is a character created for Star Wars Resistance, an animated television series. She is voiced by Suzie McGrath. According to McGrath, her performance as Tam was drawn from real people in her life, and she had specific individuals in mind who, like Tam, were just ordinary people. Tam was originally designed to be a background character, but the design team liked her enough that they made her a major character.