Ayanos Bactra was a Quermian male Sith Lord who ruled a region in the Grumani sector during the Republic Dark Age. While most of his Sith neighbors waged war against each other, Bactra avoided battles and established himself as an arms dealer, using corporations as a means by which he could expand his influence.
In 1032 BBY, Bactra made a deal with the Sith Lord Daiman, whereby he would supply Daiman with an arxeum—a type of mobile university dedicated to the study of war sciences—in return for Daiman allowing him access to the world Vellas Pavo, which was competing with Bactra in the production of the superconductor Gadolinium. Bactra subsequently traveled to the planet Gazzari with a small fleet and handed over an arxeum to Daiman's forces, and he observed from afar a battle that took place on the world between Daiman and the armies of his brother Odion. However, during the fighting, the brothers' grandmother Vilia Calimondra sent a message to Daiman and Odion, ordering them to turn on Bactra. The two siblings sent their forces to attack the Quermian's holdings, and within a few days, Bactra's empire had fallen.
Ayanos Bactra served as the ruler of the Bactranate, a Sith state that was located in the Grumani sector, and established a capital on the planet Jutrand, on the Duros Space Run hyperlane. In 1040 BBY, the Sith Lord Chagras, the heir to the holdings of the powerful Sith Lord Vilia Calimondra, died. As a result, a conflict broke out between Calimondra's grandchildren, who competed against each other for the right to become Calimondra's new heir. Viewing the contention as an opportunity, Bactra began selling arms to all sides. Later in the war, Bactra the world Sarrassia, and in order to protect the planet's deposits of the metal Sarrassian iron, he ended a conflict on the world between followers of the Grumani and Spumani religions.
The Bactranate
By 1032 BBY, Bactra was considered to be aged, and had entered a deal with the Sith Lord Daiman, a grandson of Calimondra, to grant agents of Industrial Heuristics—one of the Quermian's companies—permission to carry out recruitment operations within Daiman's territories. Around that time, the Jedi Master Vannar Treece compiled a report on the state of affairs in the Grumani sector, and, in it, he detailed all of the information that the Galactic Republic possessed on the subject of Bactra and the Bactranate.
Following the destruction of a Daimanite testing center on the planet Darkknell, Bactra contacted Daiman on a priority communications channel. Daiman explained to the Quermian the details of the attack, and Bactra claimed to have no prior knowledge of the strike, or any recognition of Narsk Ka'hane, a Bothan spy who was partially responsible for the loss of the research facility. In order to resolve the temporary weakness in the Daimanite defenses created by the loss of the testing center, Daiman requested that Bactra supply him with an arxeum, a mobile university devoted to the development of war sciences. Bactra agreed to the proposition, promising to hand over an arxeum to Daiman on the world Gazzari, in return for Bactranite forces being granted passage across Daimanite space to the world Vellas Pavo, for six weeks. Vellas Pavo was the site of mines extracting the superconductor Gadolinium, which were competing with Bactra's own superconductor interests, and Daiman's Woostri aide, Uleeta, believed that Bactra planned to destroy the Vellas Pavo facilities.
Bactra traveled to Gazzari with a small flotilla and relinquished an arxeum to Daiman's forces. Shortly afterward, a fleet led by Daiman's brother, Odion, arrived in the system, intent on attacking Daiman's forces and their newly acquired arxeum. After sighting Bactra's fleet, Odion contacted the Quermian, and Bactra informed him that the deal with Daiman had taken place and that the Bactranites were no longer concerned with the fate of the arxeum. Bactra and his fleet then remained in the Gazzari system, observing the battle between the Daimanites and the Odionites from afar. However, Vilia Calimondra had decided that her family no longer needed Bactra, and, during the battle, Narsk Ka'hane sent a message from Calimondra to Daiman and Odion, that ordered them to turn on the Quermian Sith Lord. The two siblings subsequently sent their forces to attack Bactra's fleet, destroying half of the Quermian's forces in the Gazzari system.
The remnants of Bactra's fleet jumped into hyperspace and fled to Jutrand. However, the Daimanite and Odionite forces pursued them, and, within a few days, Bactra's empire had fallen to Daiman, Odion, and the Sith Lioko and Malakite. Vilia divided Bactra's corporate assets up among her grandchildren, and her granddaughter Arkadia Calimondra claimed to have received information that Bactra had gone into hiding in a Quermian retirement colony.
Ayanos Bactra was a strategist and one of the cleverer Sith Lords who operated in the Grumani sector. While most of his Sith contemporaries enslaved populations and dissolved corporations, Bactra instead viewed his subjects as assets, and he ensured that the Bactranate served as a safe haven for companies that had fled from contested worlds. He went out of his way to avoid fighting battles against rival Sith states, instead using companies as a means by which he could expand his influence in regions that he could not gain control of by military means.
He openly and equally sold arms to all of the various Sith factions in the Grumani sector, because he realized that supplying weaponry secretly would earn him the enmity of the other Sith, since they would expect an arms dealer to supply all sides. Vilia Calimondra considered Bactra to be a friend of her family, but her grandchild Odion publicly displayed a dislike for the Quermian. Bactra also believed that members of the Bothan species had a tendency to meddle in matters that were above them.
Ayanos Bactra was first mentioned in The Knight Errant Gazetteer, an article that was written by Daniel Wallace, Jason Fry, and John Jackson Miller and published on StarWars.com in November 2010, serving as a tie-in to the comic series Star Wars: Knight Errant. The character was later featured in the Knight Errant novel, which was written by Miller and released in January 2011.
- The Essential Reader's Companion