Dodd Rancit

Dodd Rancit was born in the Outer Rim and attended the illustrious academy at Prefsbelt. During the Clone Wars, he served the Galactic Republic as part of Republic Intelligence. In this role, he was the case officer that was responsible for supplying his old friend, Captain Wilhuff Tarkin, with counterintelligence operatives to combat the CIS Shadowfeeds. Another major assignment was the oversight of subcontractor Knotts and station chief Berch Teller, both of whose roles were the support of partisans and resistance groups that operated on worlds occupied by the the Separatist Alliance, including Antar 4.

After the end of the war and the transition into the Galactic Empire, Rancit's first assignment was the command of Sentinel Base, a remote outpost supporting the construction of the Death Star battle station. Later, he was removed from the Death Star project and transferred back to Coruscant, replaced at Sentinel by now-Moff Wilhuff Tarkin. His many rivals enjoyed interpreting this as a demotion, despite being appointed to head the new Naval Intelligence Agency by Galactic Emperor Sheev Palpatine himself, with the rank of Vice Admiral. During this time, he was often seen in the company of fellow-NIA Vice Admiral Terrinald Screed, and developed hardened rivalries with other members of the Imperial Military, especially Harus Ison. NIA Commander Gallius Rax, who was tasked with the execution of the Emperor's Contingency plan, submitted his reports directly to Wullf Yularen; bypassing Rancit and Screed in the chain of command.

In the years following the end of the war and the formation of the Empire, Rancit became extremely dissatisfied with the course his military career was taking. He felt pushed aside during his time as the commanding officer of Sentinel Base, despite its importance to the Imperial cause. His bitterness only grew when his old comrade Tarkin, now a Moff while he, Rancit, languished as an admiral, was given command of Sentinel and Rancit himself sent back to Intelligence.

Hatching a plot of vengeance against the Empire, and against Emperor Palpatine and Tarkin in particular, Rancit arranged for his old Clone Wars subordinate Berch Teller, as well as his crew of insurgents (the names of which he may have personally provided to Teller from ISB databases), to attack Sentinel Base and later steal Tarkin's personal ship, the Carrion Spike from Murkhana and use it in a variety of anti-Imperial activities. Rancit managed to convince the Emperor to divert substantial Imperial military resources to defending Imperial facilities in the Perlemian Trade Route and Hydian Way. While this won him the Emperor's favor, it enabled the dissidents to plan an attack on an Imperial convoy ferrying supplies to the Death Star. In addition, Rancit secretly planned to betray Teller and his crew and destroy the Carrion Spike at Carida, in the hopes of earning himself a promotion and improving his standing with Palpatine.

However, Teller had figured out that Rancit was not trustworthy and instead had abandoned the Carrion Spike, sending it on autopilot towards the Imperial fleet at Carida, in order to take a cobbled-together warship to attack a supply convoy en route to Sentinel Base from Desolation Station in the hopes of delaying construction of the Death Star, intending to leave Rancit holding the bag. Rancit, unaware of Teller's counter-betrayal, was aboard the Secutor-class Star Destroyer Conquest at Carida, and ordered its commander to fire upon the Carrion Spike as soon as it emerged from hyperspace.

Darth Vader arrived with Lieutenant Crest and a contingent of stormtroopers to arrest Rancit, preventing the Conquest from destroying Tarkin's ship. After proving to Rancit that the Carrion Spike was empty by scanning it for lifeforms in order to prove to the Vice Admiral that his erstwhile allies had double-crossed him before he could double-cross them, Vader ordered Crest to take Rancit and load him into an escape pod, then shoot him into space.

As he was taken away, Rancit defiantly told Vader he wouldn't beg for mercy. Unmoved, Vader simply replied that it wouldn't make a difference if he did. The Vice Admiral's punishment was carried out without delay, with the added humiliation that Rancit was made to issue one final order to the Conquest—to fire on his own escape pod and kill him, which he did.

Rancit's betrayal was the main reason that led to the end of Naval Intelligence as an independent agency, being folded into Imperial Intelligence and headed by Rancit's rival, Colonel Wullf Yularen of the Imperial Security Bureau. His demise ironically benefited many of his other contemporary rivals as well; with Ison promoted into the Ubiqtorate and Nils Tenant elevated to the Joint Chiefs, along with similar promotions for Cassio Tagge and Conan Antonio Motti.

The details of Rancit's treason and death were kept a closely guarded secret from his colleagues in Naval Intelligence on direct orders from Palpatine, so that he could not be martyred. Palpatine did, however, establish the Council of Moffs after Rancit's execution. After Rancit's demise, it was said that he perished in an attack by the Rebel Alliance, though the true circumstances regarding his death—that Vader had killed him for treason—circulated as rumors.

Unlike many of his more-reclusive contemporaries in the Imperial hierarchy, Rancit was very much familiar in the social circles of Coruscant, known to be a lover of art and of the Coruscant Opera. This fact did much to mask his covert operations, both for and against the Empire. He was considered friends with fellow-NIA Vice Admiral Terrinald Screed as well as Moff Wilhuff Tarkin, despite secretly resenting the latter's success. Rancit was inwardly jealous of Tarkin's and others' career advances, a feeling that would eventually fester into concealed hatred.