DarkStar Astrodynamics was founded by Sylk Darkstar to provide services primarily to those of her ilk; her fellow Starborn. A terrifying discovery a few years later forced her to make a rash decision: to make DarkStar's systems available to all, in order to better protect the galaxy from what might come next.

Sylk was born on Gagarin to parents who quickly abandoned her to the streets. To this day she has not discovered their names, or why they left her at the young age of three. She was taken in by her fellow street rats, and somehow survived her younger years with barely any adult intervention. That did not last long, however, as her lifelong urge to find more, and push for something better, became a strong part of her personality only a decade later.

At thirteen, Sylk snuck aboard a Hopetech ship owned by a rather filthy merchant. She nearly made it to New Homestead, his desired destination, before her presence was discovered and he chose to change course. A few hours later, she found herself shoved out of his ship's landing bay, without a suit, on the surface of Cydonia. She ran toward several nearby technicians as quickly as she could, but she'd never practiced exerting herself while holding her breath.

When she awoke, she found herself in an underground city, surrounded by shocked doctors and a very concerned nurse. That nurse, a woman named Alise, took Sylk in for a short time and was the closest thing she ever had to a real mother. Unfortunately, fate wasn't quite done with her. Less than a year after taking her in, Alise was the victim of theft gone wrong. A burgler attempting to steal from the Trade Authority turned the wrong way and found himself barreling toward the mines beneath the city. In his frantic attempt to discern a better route, and avoid UC Security personnel close upon his heels, he ran into a group of people who were chatting along the railing of the upper platform. Alise and one of her friends were knocked over the railing and fell to their death on the rocks below.

Sylk, who was only fourteen at the time, and in the middle of study with a tutor, thankfully did not witness the event. However, the horror of its occurance hit her at her core. Coupled with the fact that UC Security had failed to capture the thief, she felt a loss she couldn't quite comprehend. While struggling to mourn the loss of her would-be mother, she was approached by a man who spoke of hope, and promise. He was recruiting for an organization full of trackers and mercenaries; people he promised were more than capable of hunting the villain down, and bringing him to justice. Moreover, he promised her a new home; a bed, food, water, training and education.

With no other options available, it did not take her very long to agree to his terms.

So it was that Sylk became a member of the Ecliptic, a mercenary organization that took jobs for the highest bidder. Captain Kane Dogan had recruited her, as he'd been recruited himself; off the streets of a city, destitute, and with little left in life except for the looming threat of death. Over the next few years, he trained her mercilessly and took her, along with his crew, on countless missions for untold clients.

The colony war was in full swing, and her unit was busier than they'd ever been. Most of the jobs they received were fairly noble, depending on the side of the war you supported. However, she found herself more and more being pulled into jobs she detested, for men she despised, and grew to hate her crew... and her captain. Thankfully, they were far too busy to notice her distaste for them, and much to concerned with staying alive, and staying employed, to discover the credits she was skimming from their profit.

A few months before the war ended, she disappeared into the streets of Akila during a supply stop. She never learned whether they noticed, or looked to find her. They departed on schedule, and she set about putting her plan into motion.

Sylk purchased a Hopetech Watchdog from the ship technician in port. It was a little worse for wear, but had been upgraded and tweaked by its previous owner. With few credits left to her name, she stocked the ship with supplies as best she could and immediately set to task; putting an end to the Ecliptic in the settled systems, and thwarting their attempts to undermine the Freestar Collective. She didn't care who was paying them to do such jobs. She had no capacity for determining who'd hired them. All she knew as that if they continued on their path, the FC was going to be destroyed, and countless civilians would die as a result.

While she was no fan of the FC, the United Colonies had never done her any favors either. She couldn't go back in time and stop her adoptive mother from dying, but by the gods, she was going to put an end to the current treachery.

Well versed in Ecliptic tactics, it was a relatively easy feat for her to track their movements, lay in wait and attack when they were least prepared to defend. Ship after ship fell at her hand, sending a ripple of fear through the mercenary fleet. They didn't know who was killing them. She never spoke. She never revealed herself. She simply destroyed. The only way they could identify her, or her ship, was the black and purple star painted on the cockpit by the ship's former owner.

From those days of Ecliptic terror, the name "Dark Star" was born, and quickly became her callsign.

When the war finally ended, the Ecliptic retreated to the outer edges of the known galaxy. Rich beyond their dreams, and intent on avoiding their own demise at UC, FC or Dark Star's hands, they isolated themselves at an undisclosed location, and became little more than a rumor in short order.

Sylk turned her skills toward the one things the Ecliptic had taught her that she agreed with: bounty hunting. She picked up jobs on Cydonia, Jemisson, Akila, Gagarin... anywhere she could find work without being noticed. She used the few contacts she'd made as a member of the fleet, and communicated almost exclusively through encrypted slates under the name Dark Star.

Unfortunately, her future wasn't nearly as bright as she'd hoped. An attack squad of nearly twenty Ecliptic found her as she passed through Jaffa. She barely escaped, her grav drive failing from the damage it sustained just as she arrived in orbit above Jemisson; the one place she knew they wouldn't follow with intent to attack.

After nearly a week stranded in orbit, she pilfered enough parts from enough non-essential systems to repair her ship for landing, then proceeded to nearly crash into landing pad 2 in New Atlantis.

Sylk walked away from her all-but-destroyed ship far more worse for wear than she let on. She sighed and shrugged off the port authorities when they confiscated her ship. She received little more than a pittance from the salvage, after they deducted what she owed for repairing the landing zone. She found herself, yet again, stranded in a space port with little to her name.

The Well was as much as home during that time as any she'd ever had, even if she had no bed to call her own. She stole what she needed, sold what she could, and used what was left to save up for a new ship. That plan was thwarted, however, when a street gang stole her savings, putting her back at ground zero.

Destitute and at her wits end, she answered the call for an unlikely job... to become a miner for Argos Extractors. It wasn't the kind of job she'd ever considered, and to that end, was likely the last place her enemies within the Ecliptic would come looking for her. Little did she know, that too would end in tragedy...

She learned a lot during her time with Constellation. Sarah was an inspiration to her in more ways than she cared to admit. Losing her to The Hunter was a pain worse than anything she'd ever felt. She'd... never been that close to anyone. While her attachment to Andreja grew in the weeks that followed, nothing in the galaxy felt real to her any longer.

When the opportunity presented itself to get revenge on The Hunter, leave that reality and try again somewhere new, how could she resist? It was an easy choice, if one insisted it be called a choice. To Sylk, it was a matter of course, and as simple and automatic a task as breathing. The Unity beckoned, and she didn't hesitate to heed its call.

She explored countless realities, lived countless lives. At first, she was an explorer, siding with the Emissaries and putting a stop to The Hunter's reign of terror. Slowly, she became The Hunter. The soundness of his reasoning began to ring true. Nothing mattered. No one mattered. Only the power mattered. Only... what she had become.

Then it happened. She entered a new universe, ripe to take over and bend reality to her will. Yet, as she strolled into Constellation, her eyes full of distaste, she shoved open the doors and was confronted with... herself. Another version of her stood there, staring back at her bewildered. A version of her who had grown up with her parents, and never experienced loss. A version of her who had become a miner simply to annoy her parents, and not out of absolute necessity.

Sylk traveled for a time with her young, protege self. She taught her everything she knew about space flight and combat, ground combat, sieging an enemy outpost, bending opponents to her will, rebuilding ships, and so, so much more. And yet, she learned more from her young self than she was able to teach. Reality wasn't pointless. People mattered. Life... mattered.

"What have I become?"

Distraught at her chosen path, Sylk vowed to change. She continued her travels, but chose to aid humanity along her way, rather than destroy and bend them to her whims and desires. She guided the lost to their destination, and helped bridge the gaps between those who would sooner be at war.

In those final travels, she was inspired to take a stand; to build something permanent that could span all realities, and create a foundation upon which those of her kind could stand, strong and proud, in defiance of The Hunter, and those who took his approach.

DarkStar Astrodynamics was born of that simple, attainable desire. While traversing the multiverse to spread her creation to one reality after another, she encountered her final foe. A foe she'd never seen coming. A foe far worse than a single Starborn. The inspiration behind her desire to spread upgraded technology to mortals and starborn alike. A force that was looming just beyond sight, building itself to strike...

...they call themselves Terminal Dawn.