"Your overlords have come. You do not face one race, but the combined might of the Andromeda. The Hammer of Torgal will crush the lesser species, and the cosmos itself will tremble at the sound of our march."
- Excerpt from Garthek's transmission to humanity shortly after Earth's invasion, 2161 C.E.
Warlord-General Chief Torgal Garthek Nukpanka Barbadek, or simply Garthek, was a Krogan Warlord, General of the entire Andromeda Treaty's military, and military head of the Treaty High Council.
Garthek was an immensely powerful Krogan soldier, one of the most renowned of his kind in history. He was the veteran of a thousand conquests, his most notable being the attempt to claim Earth. Though his military was forced to retreat because of the Reapers, his failure was quickly turned to success when the Treaty harvested Sol and nearly obliterated the solar system.
Garthek was very proud warrior, and he held his family's warrior pedigree in extremely high esteem.
History[]
Born Garthek Nukpanka Barbadek, Garthek was born into a family with a history of the males all being great Warlords of the clan Torgal. He was raised on the rugged and harsh homeplanet of the krogan, Tuchanka. This hostile world shaped Garthek into the iron-willed, rough and tough krogan he was throughout his life. As is krogan custom, he served in the military for a minimum of 5 years. However, after his time was up, he decided to pursue his career in the military, because he knew that, as a member of the Barbadek family, he was bred for war.
Over his life, he forged his reputation in the fires of war on a thousand battlefields. He served in the military for a total of around 200 years. During this time, he led his Torgal krogan against hostile aliens and other krogan in hundreds of bloody campaigns across the Andromeda. He solidified himself as a fearless, ruthless, and brilliant warrior and tactician. He was praised as one of the finest Torgal krogan ever produced. He brought honor to his family and his clan, and earned the title Torgal Warlord-Chief. After his 200 and some odd years of krogan military service, he was formally recruited into the Andromeda Treaty's uppermost echelons.
Autarch Saren had heard of Torgal Garthek's extraordinary accomplishments as a Warlord of Tuchanka and other nearby systems, and sought to bring the fearsome Krogan warrior into his service, as a blunt tool to annihilate those who opposed the Autarch. Saren promoted Garthek to Commander, and began sending Garthek, in charge of a brigade of Treaty storm troopers, on tasks for the Autarch himself. After a crushing victory against Batarian separatists on the planet Hurguslad, Garthek was given the rank of General. He was put in charge of a large portion of the Treaty's military. But, he still sought to prove himself further.
After a rebellion broke out on a Treaty planet, Garthek traveled with his troops to the front lines to extinguish it. His troops landed, and were outnumbered by the insurrectionists 10 to 1. However, they still came out in a monumental victory, one that made the battle, and Garthek, go down in Treaty history. Saren then proudly bestowed Garthek the rank of Warlord-General, the highest military rank available in the Treaty. He was put in charge of the entire Treaty military, and hundreds of billions of soldiers all across the galaxy. Garthek was extremely proud of his achievement, and he soon became a member of the Treaty High Council, which consisted of Autarch Saren, Supreme Admiral Krebb, and himself.
When the need for more energy arose, The High Council agreed to leave the Andromeda and find a new source of star energy. When they found the Milky Way, Garthek was the first to propose a preemptive strike upon all life forms in the galaxy. He knew well; after all his years of experience in war, that newly discovered "under-developed" aliens could not be trusted. Autarch Saren and Admiral Krebb, however, proposed to seek negotiations first, and if the aliens still resisted, then the military would be deployed in full force. When scout ships made planetfall on Earth, they were immediately fired upon by Earthen and Martian ships in combat. They each mistook the ships for hostile aircraft from the opposing faction. They were unaware that these ships came from a completely different galaxy. The Grand Admiral Krebb gave the order to engage, and General Torgal Garthek, proud of his foresight, ordered the deployment of a few Treaty battalions against the humans. Within minutes, the token Treaty expeditionary force was already blasting UNSC and Martian Empire ships out from orbit, with the main Treaty warfleet still on the way. After barely a year, The UNSC was eradicated, and an extremely large percentage of the human race went extinct. After this point, it became a head-on war between the Reapers and the Treaty, with the crushed surviving humans hiding in the shadows of the warring titans. The fighting continued much like this for a whole century.
Finally, towards the end of the "Black Century" the Treaty fleets were exhausted by the nearly infinite number of Reapers. The Treaty was forced to retreat from Earth, and The Reapers claimed the planet. However, it was never the Treaty's goal to take over Earth, so they had no shame in retreat. Instead, they returned to their objective, harvesting the parent star, Sol. They harvested its energy on the spot, and caused the star to collapse and supernova, obliterating the surface of all orbiting planets, except the shielded Reaper planet Earth. The Treaty left the darkened Sol system, and took to other human controlled planets in the galaxy, attempting to claim them, and harvesting their stars. After Atmah and Lenor bridged their universes, and the Equestrians achieved space travel, the Treaty discovered even more sources of star energy in Lenor. Thus, they began mercilessly attacking Equestrian worlds and laying siege to them. Apart from the Reapers, the Equestrians stood as their only resistance for the time being
...
Ultimately, the Treaty capital world of Palaven was sieged by Reapers, UNSC remnants, and Blue Team. Garthek fought outside the Palace of Unity, trying to make a last stand against his Reaper enemies. He slew hordes and hordes of Reaper monstrosities, until he was eventually attacked by the Reaper convert Tai Lung, and the two fought for a short time. Though the veteran warrior Torgal Garthek was mighty and gave the dark servant a deathly thrashing, Tai Lung's augmentations proved too powerful even for the Warlord-General, as the krogan became spiked and infected by Reaper nanites. Garthek was defeated, and had begun the process of mutating into a Reaper abomination.
The Warlord-General, ever proud and honorable, shot himself in the head with his own shotgun before fully mutating. General Torgal Garthek, though defeated and the Andromeda Treaty collapsing around him, still managed to die with honor in the end.
General Torgal Garthek in his Warlord power armor.
Personality[]
Torgal Garthek was an extremely prideful and uncompromising Krogan. However, he respected his superiors like a true honorable soldier. To his enemies, he was a vicious, cruel, and brutal krogan. Garthek hated failure and excuses, and he valued nothing but honor, duty and victory.
Garthek took his military career seriously; he did not perceive his doings as obligation, but as acts of honor and respect, to make his ancestors before him proud.