Beri Tulon

A male Human, Beri Tulon's birth occurred within a family boasting a long and distinguished military heritage spanning millennia. According to family history, his ancestors served alongside Empress Teta during the era of the Great Hyperspace War. Eager to uphold this legacy, he promptly enrolled in the Academy at the earliest opportunity. Raised on the foundation of traditional military ethics, Tulon distinguished himself as a conscientious and honorable officer. He prioritized fostering camaraderie and earning the respect of the soldiers under his command. While this approach drew criticism from his peers and superiors, his exceptional performance as a commander validated his methods.

However, his actions only intensified the resentment of one of his superiors. This spiteful officer devised a scheme to kill Tulon by assigning his unit to what was ostensibly a routine reconnaissance mission on Khomm. To Tulon's dismay, a contingent of mercenaries ambushed them, resulting in the massacre of nearly his entire complement of soldiers. Tulon successfully traced the cowardly act back to his superior and ensured that he faced the full consequences of Imperial law.

However, this event disillusioned Tulon with command. No longer desiring to bear responsibility for the lives and deaths of his men, he requested a transfer to become a training instructor. He quickly became one of the most highly regarded training instructors in the Galactic Empire.

Eventually, Tulon became involved in Grand General Malcor Brashin's Battlefield Holographic Control Interface (BHCI) program. In 0 ABY, Tulon, by this point a captain, observed the Battle of Kalaan in order to identify individuals suitable for training on the BHCI. He identified Brenn Tantor, a stormtrooper corporal who had assumed command of his unit after his superior's death and performed exceptionally. Approaching the young man amidst the ruins of a devastated Kalaan city, Tulon granted him a battlefield promotion to the rank of lieutenant and instructed him to report to the Star Destroyer Inquisitor for training.

While in orbit above Tatooine, Tulon acquainted Tantor with the Battlefield Holographic Control Interface, a command center enabling officers to remotely direct troops from the safety of orbit, providing the most accurate representation of the battlefield. Tulon supervised Tantor as the newly appointed officer guided Zeta Squadron through a series of exercises. However, their training was interrupted by an announcement that an escape pod from the Rebel Alliance corvette Tantive IV, containing plans for the first Death Star battle station, had landed near Zeta Squadron's location. Tulon observed as Tantor quickly located the pod.

Subsequently, the young officer tracked down the Jawa sandcrawler that had collected the droids carrying the plans and led a raid on Obi-Wan Kenobi's hut—where the droids had previously visited—all under Tulon's guidance.

Tantor, Tulon, and Brashin were then dispatched to Ruul, based on the possibility that the starship Millennium Falcon, carrying the droids and the Death Star plans, may have diverted there instead of its suspected destination, Alderaan, which was on a similar trajectory. Upon arrival, they discovered that while the Millennium Falcon had not arrived there, the primary computer facility on the planet had been seized by Rebel Alliance forces. Tulon watched with pride as Tantor, now also a captain, destroyed the Rebel presence on Ruul.

This marked the final mission where Tulon supervised Tantor. Tulon, who had long regarded himself as a man of principle, had lost the confidence of Grand General Brashin. Brashin believed that Tulon's conscience, and his subsequent instilling of traditional military values in Tantor, was dangerous and inappropriate for an Imperial officer. Tulon was relieved of his duties as Tantor's training officer and reassigned.

For half of the following three years, Tulon was stationed at the Trasse Proving Grounds, an Imperial facility responsible for manufacturing All Terrain Armored Transports. There, the walkers underwent testing using Rebel prisoners and armored units. This assignment only deepened Tulon's dissatisfaction with his government. He had been raised by his family to be a man of honor, and as such, he found it impossible to reconcile his values with those of an Empire that promoted brutality and injustice. Tulon resolved that he could no longer serve the Galactic Empire.

In 3 ABY, Tulon, now holding the rank of colonel, was assigned to command a detachment involved in the assault on a Rebel base on Abridon. Intending to defect during this mission, Tulon discovered that his commander would be his former student, Brenn Tantor, now a high-ranking Imperial general. Shortly after the mission commenced, Tulon's personal AT-AT, the Annihilator 1, opened fire on the rest of his detachment and headed directly for the Rebel base. Tantor, believing that his mentor was either dead or being held hostage by renegade elements, pursued the walker and brought it down. He was stunned to find that Tulon was in fact the one attempting to defect. Tulon tried to explain to Tantor that the Empire was corrupt and evil, but Tantor, feeling betrayed, and with Brashin observing, was unable or unwilling to assist Tulon.

Tulon was sentenced to imprisonment at Tarkin Detention Facility on Ruul. However, he never reached his destination. Unbeknownst to him, Tantor himself, tormented by his own Imperial demons, had refused an order to massacre civilians shortly after Tulon's capture. Tantor orchestrated his own defection with Rebel General Tyr Taskeen. Tantor's first assignment following his defection was the rescue of Tulon.

Tantor led a team of troopers on a daring commando mission, destroying the Imperial convoy transporting Tulon across Ruul's surface and extracting Tulon in a Hover Transport. Tulon learned that Tantor intended to capture an AT-AT walker to prove his loyalty and reliability to Taskeen and needed Tulon's expertise with the Trasse Proving Grounds. Tulon realized that they would require a security code to access Trasse undetected and convinced Tantor to raid the Imperial computer facility at Sounder Flats in order to obtain the codes. Tulon successfully retrieved the codes, despite an Imperial counterattack.

In preparation for the Trasse operation, Tulon trained a unit of elite soldiers, known as the Infiltrators, to hijack Imperial walkers. They were successfully deployed on Trasse and captured an AT-AT, but matters were complicated when the Inquisitor appeared in the system, with Grand General Brashin aboard. Tantor's forces crushed Imperial ground opposition in order to rush Tulon to a planetary ion cannon, from which he disabled the Star Destroyer. While accessing the ion cannon's computer banks, Tulon also discovered some interesting data, suggesting that the second Death Star was nearly operational.

Later, during the Liberation of Coruscant, Tulon was present when Taskeen briefed Tantor for the invasion of Coruscant, the Empire's throne-world. Tulon reported Rogue Squadron's successful sabotage of the shields.

Beri Tulon's upbringing in a military family instilled in him a strong sense of traditional martial values. These values would have served him well had the Republic endured, but the establishment of Palpatine's Empire ushered in a new order.

A staunch traditionalist with a deeply ingrained moral compass, Tulon was ill-suited for the New Order. Nevertheless, Tulon was not unlike countless other Republican-minded officers. However, his placement under Grand General Brashin, a fervent proponent of the new ideology, brought this conflict to the forefront.

Tulon's reassignment had little impact on his career, as evidenced by his promotions, but his new responsibilities seemed to have a more profound effect on his conscience. The brutality he witnessed and was forced to participate in did not desensitize him but instead drove him further away from the Empire. While he valued loyalty, he placed a higher value on his other principles and ultimately sided with the Alliance.

The character of Beri Tulon was created for Star Wars: Force Commander, where Peter Firth provided his voice.