The Alpha serves as the head of the High Council, as well as the leader of the entire society of the Eternals.  Information gathering, multiversal diplomacy, cultural knowledge, languages, logic, military operations, technological aptitude, and scientific study...these are just a handful of the vast number of things the Alpha must know and be able to do.  If the purpose of the Eternals is to facilitate the constructive growth and smooth working of the Multiverse, then the Alpha is the personification of that purpose.  The Alpha is aided in his work by the Beta, Gamma, Delta, and Sigma: four positions that specialize in logistics and information, arts, sciences, and the Memory Pools respectively. Together, these five positions and their Epsilons make up the High Council, the leading Eternals which preside over their society and make up the High Court.

	The Alpha also has the great responsibility of communing with the Multiverse, shifting into a higher state of consciousness to 'talk' with the Creator, maker of all things and founder of the Eternals' society.

Dhanus

	The current Alpha of the Eternals is Dhanus, and he is the driving force behind the creation of the elite fighting force that he has dubbed “the Vanguard.”  An intelligent, insightful, and inspiring leader, Dhanus has full confidence in himself and his Eternals, and is deeply respected for his integrity and tremendous courage – courage that persists even in the face of the full power of the Void.

Appearance

	A turian from the Mass Effect universe, Dhanus is a humanoid of an evolved avian species from the planet Palaven, in the Milky Way.  He strongly resembles Councillor Velarn from the original game, with a dark and smoky caparace, though his colonial face tattoo differs slightly – a stark white, it forms a broad V-shaped burst that slicks back over his fringe.  His pert mandibles and sharp violet eyes lend him an air of refined insight among his people, though to most other humanoid races it contributes to the sharp and austere air expected of the leader of the Eternals.  Like all his species, he is sleek and slender of frame, and his talons are more than capable of rending flesh.  He is exactly two meters tall and wears a gold-on-white uniform becoming of his rank as Alpha.

	Dhanus carries an M-6 Carnifex Handcannon on him at all times, a powerful pistol possessing mass effect field technology and modified with a palladium “titan pulse” to increase damage.  While the pistol was notorious in its home universe for a slow rate of fire and poor effectiveness against shields, Dhanus' superhuman hand-to-eye coordination more than compensate.  (Teeknote: Clint would totally give the Dirty Harry speech with this thing.)  The pistol and its modifications are also his ongoing private experiment in what could prove to be a revolutionary new design for Eternal firearms...

Personality

	The years he has spent among the Eternals have both hardened and expanded Dhanus' character.  He remains the consummate turian soldier - stern, determined, inexorable, with a sense of duty none in the echelon can outstrip, and his battle philosophy remains not simply to defeat an enemy but to stop them from ever becoming a threat again - but the caste system is currently witnessing a new, more flexible period under his leadership.  He is considered among the most honorable of all Eternals; his administration is open to talent rather than being the preserve of familial heritage (one positive reflection of his culture's imperial character).  His somewhat religious perception of the Eternals as "the ultimate spirit" causes him to value all castes equally, the irreplaceable parts of a single grand whole.  However, that does not prevent him from asserting superiority; he firmly believes his leadership should be "informed but unchallenged" during this crisis, which remains a source of tension in his interactions with other members of the High Council.

	It is important to note that while Dhanus does not consider himself an emperor, the trajectory taken by the Eternals' civilization since his ascension is one of the reasons many within the Continuous consider it an empire in all but name.  Division of labor has become an absolute priority.  Local systems in the Continuous independent of central control carry on purely local administration. A central body independent of the periphery discharges most of Eternal administration.  In the face of all these changes to Eternal governance, Dhanus' political opponents, especially the vituperous Rysera Feniss, have seen the blueprints for an empire.

	Fortunately, the blueprints for an empire have not become the blueprints for tyranny because of Dhanus' strong moral character.  He is a forthright and determined Alpha - where many expected him to be humbled by filling the void left by Anko's departure, Dhanus has proven to be a remarkably dependable leader even under extreme pressure (perhaps something lent to him by his experience as Epsilon of Transportation).  His bravery and resilience won him widespread acclaim during the First Void War, and his policies have kept a strong and wide balance of Eternal freedoms.

	In his private life – when he takes off “the Alpha face” - Dhanus is considerably more approachable.  His appearance and administration have many Eternals, especially humans, expecting a hard, even fearsome person; in reality, Dhanus is an easy, if quiet, laugh.  It is a rare occasion where he doesn't get a joke, and even then can be gently and humorously self-deprecating about himself.  Saddled with the enormous weight of all creation's survival around his neck, Dhanus will take all the respite he can get – he never knows when next he'll have the chance.  

	For many years he was a very lonely Eternal, but there are three beings he can honestly say he considers friends.  One is Ardhamal, the Beta, who was his fellow student, rival, and, despite their numerous differences in policy and personality, good friend.  The second is Headmaster Hanira, with whom he served and became close friends with during the First Void War; he credits her with having saved his life many times during the conflict.  The romantic tension between the two is very possibly the Eternals' worst-kept secret.

	The third is the Creator herself.  Dhanus' responsibilities as the Alpha have had him communing with the Goddess of the Multiverse on a semi-regular basis, and the long centuries he has spent doing so have given him a bone-deep love for her.  Though no mortal – or immortal – can say with conviction that they know the heart of a god, Dhanus is the only entity among the Eternals, outside of Vante or perhaps Anko, who knows the Creator as more than her depiction.  And if it can be said that there is a source to his strength, Dhanus would attribute it directly to the Goddess.

	Interestingly, Dhanus has (famously) never liked Vante.  Most Eternals who witness a conversation between the two would describe every one of them as “icy.”  Why this is the case is uncertain.  The two cooperate efficiently – when they must – but seem to regard each other as a necessary component of the echelon and...little more than that.

Skills

	Even as a mortal, Dhanus was an exceptional soldier, and took to the required military service of his people with enthusiastic dedication.  After an especially decorated career, he was finally assigned command of turian naval operations at only 31 years of age (though the urgency of quelling the Krogan Rebellions was likely a factor), and proved himself an exemplary tactician, as well as starpilot and soldier.  His service as admiral – and the whole lifespans he has lived as an in-field Eternal since – supplied him with a nearly peerless command of military strategy and starship engineering.

	Already an expert in firearms and electronics, Dhanus is also a biotic, one of the few ever discovered among his species; he can generate and manipulate mass effect fields and dark energy, to an almost superhuman (superturian?) degree.  He received hand-to-hand training at the Eternals' Military Academy, but when confronted in melee range usually relies on amplifying his own strength and speed with biotic powers in a "conventional brawling" style.  No laundry list of martial arts disciplines here: Dhanus is perfectly capable of hammering through finer techniques with overwhelming speed and brute force.  A fighter like Ardhamal or Evi would use their abilities for deadly precision and unpredictable innovation; Dhanus, by contrast, is a crackling powerhouse who takes the field like a thunderbolt.  One would have to look to his marksmanship and long-range biotics for examples of real finesse.

	When he was made an Eternal by the Creator, the process built on this talent and awakened his true potential, an occurrence known as the Lost Essence Phenomenon – his command of biotics now began to absorb the dark energy that biotics manipulate into his body, to the point where it is now irrevocably tied to his molecular makeup.  His body houses a magnitude of dark energy previously thought impossible even by the Eternals' best scientists and mages, and all of it is at his beck and call.  He can use the energy to levitate not only objects but himself and other beings, transmit slams and shockwaves across great distances, and create powerful barriers.  He can even hyperactivate the dark energy in his body to give himself superhuman surges of strength, speed, and stamina.  (TeekNote: Ardhamal totally has a monopoly on the dirty jokes about this.)

	But as powerful a biotic as he is, Dhanus' most common application of his innate supply of dark energy was also what made him the ideal Epsilon of Transportation: in layman's terms, Dhanus is a living, breathing hyperdrive.

	With sufficient technology, Dhanus can enable ships that do not otherwise possess FTL ability to travel at such speeds, sheerly under his own biotic talent and innate supply of dark energy.  At his absolute peak, Dhanus is capable of transporting entire fleets - though the more ships he must supply the capability to, the fewer light years he can allow them to traverse, and the greater the risk to his physical (and mental) health.  This ability, unsurprisingly, made him an invaluable fleet technician and Epsilon of Transportation during the First Void War.

	While not as overtly impressive as the preceding, Dhanus also possesses a secondary ability heightened by the LEP that certainly augmented it – metacoordination.  He has the fastest reaction time of any Eternal and is known to multitask dozens of duties all at once, with a clear and calm head.  This was an obvious point in his favor when discussion for Anko's replacement began; few other Eternals possess the ability to so efficiently micromanage as much information and activity as Dhanus can.

	And of course, his last and sheerly nonphysical ability: inspiration.  Dhanus has a virtually unbreakable resolve, and a trust in the Eternals that is second to none.  He is as effective a wartime leader as a peacetime leader.

	So as to not mince words further: if the Void sends him a gift of DIS PEAR, he'll accept it and then send it a thank-you card taped to a hydrogen bomb with the timer ticking just past 0:02.

	(TeekNote: Dhanus' combat appearances during the RP should and will be kept to a minimum.  He is a very powerful Eternal, but also a very busy Eternal – probably the busiest, in fact, and his value as a leader and strategist far outstrip his value as a battlefield heavyweight.)

Historical Data

	Dhanus was formerly named Dhanus Mehrkuri, a turian from the MEF (Mass Effect) realities who lived during the time of the Krogan Rebellions – he would have been born on Palaven around 775 A.D. by Earth's timeline.  He was, in fact, Admiral Mehrkuri, the turian chief of naval operations during the Krogan Rebellions, and a distinguished soldier.  His biotic talent was discovered early in his life, when he began boot camp at fifteen years of age.  His superiors, however, valued him more as a soldier in the field, and chose not to assign him to a Cabal (a turian team of biotics, commonly used for special operations) and kept his talent an unspoken and undisplayed secret, even from Dhanus' parents – something that put all parties' stations in turian society at great risk.

	Their decision saw Dhanus develop into an excellent soldier and natural leader, at the absolute top of his class.  The urgency of the Krogan Rebellions moved his superiors at the academy to push his training directly to the field of battle.  By then a young and bold turian all too aware of his own exceptional skill and intelligence, Dhanus welcomed the opportunity.  He, too, had felt firsthand the ferocity of the krogan assaults, having lost an entire half of his family when the krogans decimated one of Palaven's sister worlds.  Assigned the rank of second lieutenant aboard a capital ship in the turian starfleet, he saw action in the turian campaign within a month of graduation from the academy.

	And for a time, Dhanus enjoyed combat.  Every cannon fired, every comrade made, every enemy killed, every new promotion and medal in his way – it provided him with a sense of destiny and limitless potential.  Many of his friends actually found him harder to relate to during shore leave, during which he would grow tense and impatient, only becoming the Dhanus they had befriended when he returned to duty.  And at the pace he climbed the command rungs of the starfleet, Dhanus had little time for other pleasures.  Fighting the krogan became the great passion of his life.

	Yet for all his service, and his rigorous training at the academy, Dhanus possessed little in the way of personal combat with the krogan by the time he became a lieutenant commander.  That would change soon after – and so would he.

	During an intense but favorable pursuit of a krogan vessel, the cruiser on which Dhanus served was led into an ambush within an uncharted territory that would later be called the Gagarin system.  In the vicious battle that ensued, the captain of the turian vessel was fatally wounded by an explosive hull breach, and Dhanus led a team to the fightercraft in an effort to buy time for the ship to get to safety and call for reinforcements.  The exhausting dogfight with the krogan forces did just that, but scattered both sides, and 

	Precisely what happened during that pursuit is unclear, and Dhanus' dossier among the Eternals has made only clandestine detail of it: that his craft and an enemy's were entangled upon descent to the largest moon of a distant ice giant, that a fight ensued once both pilots had landed, and that Dhanus was ultimately victorious and eventually returned to the starfleet, his fighter severely damaged but functional.  However, records in his home universe indicate that the distress beacon on Dhanus' craft had been running for over 170 hours upon his retrieval – well beyond the support of his craft's emergency supplies.  Combined with the brutally cold temperature he had been exposed to and the dire injuries listed in his medical exam post-retrieval, the scenario is considerably less survivable than it appears in Eternal City databanks.

	Even more telling, though, was the dramatic personality change that his superiors noticed upon his rejoining the starfleet.  Dhanus was still a driven and committed soldier, but now it seemed like he was finally a being of flesh and blood under the uniform.  He wrote old friends frequently and looked forward to shore leave with them, where he no longer resembled the reserved and humorless turian who was just counting the hours until active duty.  Undercutting these changes was a barely detectable sadness or pensiveness in his demeanor.  Some of his friends overheard him talking softly (apparently to himself) in his quarters, which he assured them was only a prayer he'd “picked up somewhere.”  Most considered it an effect of his near-death experience, that he was learning to enjoy life, having come so close to losing it.

	Regardless, Dhanus returned to the field with a promotion to commander waiting for him.  His continued resourcefulness and resilience eventually outstripped all competition in the fleet, and he was a natural choice when discussions for a new chief of naval operations opened before the final campaigns of the Krogan Rebellions.  Following his performance in the Battle of Canrum, he would go down in not only turian but galactic history as one of the finest admirals in the fleet.

	That also marked the end of his role in history.  Immediately after the krogan surrender, Dhanus Mehrkuri declared his immediate retirement, to the shock of all his kin and teammates.  He was gone overnight, using all his personal funds to purchase a single ship the evening of his resignation.  He departed the fleet with no further contact, and vanished into unknown space.

	(TeekNote: For perspective's sake, while Charlemagne was being crowned Holy Roman Emperor, Dhanus was retiring from winning an interstellar war.  Not bad, Chuck, but I think we know who's going on the cover of People's 800 A.D. issue.)

	Unbeknownst to the rest of the galaxy, Dhanus traveled to Pressha, a quiet and lonely ice giant in the (then unnamed) Gagarin system, the site of whatever experience had transformed him.  He landed his ship gently on one of its moons, and then shut it down.  It would not be discovered by his species until three thousand years later.  Of him, no trace was ever found.

	In reality, his life as an admiral had ended because his life as an Eternal had begun.  At some point during the incident in Gagarin, Dhanus was personally contacted by the Creator – the exact nature of the experience, again, remains opaque, but he was made aware of the Eternals' existence and mission during the event.  

	Dhanus was not the first nonhuman to become an Eternal, but was one of those few who had no idea what a human was prior to joining them.  The prospect of an immortal life in a civilization composed of aliens was difficult to acclimate to at first, but two friendships he formed at the Academy helped him greatly – the human Ardhamal and the elf Hanira, classmates who shared the same “Eternal age” as he did.  Even after graduation and duty parted them, the friendship between the three continued to strengthen.  Of all the Eternals he has known, Ardhamal and Hanira are the ones he trusts and loves most.

	His talents and skills in engineering and naval operations made Dhanus exceptionally useful to the Eternals' scientific and military departments.  He was eventually assigned to an aide-de-camp position under Anko, the Prime Eternal.  Dhanus became the first Epsilon of Transportation, tasked to oversee the efficient and proper use of Eternal transportation resources (e.g., ships and teleportation devices).  He was part of the team that designed NIMBUS, the system currently used to control interstellar access to the Eternal City through the Living Sky barrier.  Even before the First Void War, he was already part of an ongoing discussion to create an auxiliary headquarters for the Eternals – a project which he would later spearhead to create the Khora.

	The outbreak of the First Void War found Dhanus just under nine hundred cycles old.  Nine hundred cycles of training, research, field duty, space travel, missions and adventures spanning more worlds than he ever thought existed – and still the crisis outstripped anything he could imagine.  He had grown accustomed to thinking of the Void as a threat that could be beaten through a campaign of total war, much as his people had employed against the krogans.  He was unprepared for this far more demoralizing and unthinking menace...especially during the first battles of the war, when it took form before him.  His personal encounters and grueling battles with “the Whisperer”, a demonic Voidbeing with immense illusionary and psychic abilities, are the defining and most public struggle of Dhanus' life as an Eternal.

	As the war raged on, Anko appointed Dhanus the admiral of the Eternals' starfleet, which came as a shock to him - and to Phenissa, an Eternal whose skills and experience were considered the best for the position; this, not unpredictably, became a source of tension between the two.  Anko's reasoning was based not merely on skill or experience, however, but on cooperation with fellow Eternals.  In this quality, Dhanus had proven himself to have no better.  His strategies and coordinative skills formed a strong complement to Anko's power and inspiring presence; their mutual dependability allowed both of them to wage war at full capacity.  This was readily apparent during the fateful Battle of Sarbras, the final battle of the First Void War; forced to take the field personally, Dhanus joined with the other Eternal leaders and held the line against the Void's forces (led by the Whisperer itself) long enough for Anko to isolate and kill the Emperor, ending the war.

	The battle had consequences felt down to present day, the worst of which was Anko's abdication as the Eternals' leader following the war.  The power she had unleashed on Sarbras during her battle with the Emperor was a leading contributor to the quarantine imposed on the system and terrified many Eternals, herself most of all, and she chose self-exile rather than test the limits of such power again.  Prior to her abdication, however, Anko designated a successor to her position.  

	Dhanus, who lay battered and unconscious in a medical facility at the time of her announcement, awakened to find himself the Alpha of the Eternals.

	His appointment was, and still is, not a unanimously welcomed decision.  Although Dhanus is well-liked and respected for his integrity, he has often chosen people over principles when forced to make that choice, and his views on the nature of the Void and the Eternals' place in the Continuous have their political and ideological opponents (and none has been more ardent than Phenissa, now an Omicron Prime; Dhanus has been quoted saying a conversation with her leaves him nostalgic for Sarbras).  The implementation of the caste system and the staggering cost of the Khora have also led to a certain degree of dissent.

	Thus far, however, Dhanus has proven to be a stalwart and motivating leader.  Though he lacks the wholehearted support and iconic force of Anko, her shadow no longer wholly eclipses him.  His courage, ingenuity, and strength of character lend him a certain paternalism in dealings with other Eternals, and he has kept himself open to good ideas even when they are not his own.  And despite his age, his experiences, and the internal scars both carry, his idealism remains as strong as ever, and is welcomed in a civilization that sees so much routine in its daily life.

	The onset of the Second Void War is a significant threat, one that promises to be darker and bloodier than even its predecessor.  But the last war beat even the thought of surrender out of Dhanus' mind, and he has kept the Eternals fighting strong.  Now that the threat of the Necromancer has revealed itself, he is wholly committed to ending the war – and in doing so, giving the Eternals the heroes they have needed since his ascent.

●	Alpha Epsilons

	** Alpha Epsilon of Justice: Ni'lah Andalan

	A recent promotion, Ni'lah is a female Andrian and formerly a Kappa Prime, whose life was shattered when a rogue Eternal fled to her homeworld; her family died in the resulting conflagration.  Given a chance to rebuild her life by the Eternals, and vowing to prevent others from experiencing the sad fate she did, she joined their ranks and swiftly climbed the Kappa caste.  She was romantically involved with the previous Epsilon of Justice, Niyar Scorsen, until his disappearance three cycles before the outbreak of the Second Void War.

	Dhanus personally selected Ni'lah for the position following Niyar's disappearance, citing her many resolutions and contributions to law enforcement – especially within Eternal City itself – in a relatively short period of time, and outside himself, Ni'lah was the Eternal who worked closest with her predecessor.  Although they personally have not long worked together, Dhanus is grateful for the intelligence and impartiality she brings to her new office.  His only concern with her is the understandable but vehement resentment of Vagrants; though he trusts her to act professionally, he is also aware that the onset of the Second Void War may be its first and most dire test.

	** Alpha Epsilon of Records: (OFD)

	** Alpha Epsilon of Recruitment: (OFD)

	** Alpha Epsilon of Investigations: Asenath Sheska

	An Akharian female, who famously caught the former Epsilon of Investigations when he came to her world seeking to abandon his post.  The feat alone was enough to warrant her entry into the echelon, taking the reins of the office she had inadvertently just vacated.  Asenath is a born detective, blunt and hard-boiled, and prior to her life as an Eternal was an extremely talented interrogator (“torturer” is not exaggerating it).  She also possesses the ability to scrye on objects and even people, courtesy of a spell cast upon her that takes the form of tattoos across her crimson skin, all in the shape of eyes.

	Dhanus considered the Vagrancy of the previous Epsilon of Investigations to be an unforgivably careless failure on his part, and he still ascribes blame to the surreptitious approach he took with Asenath's predecessor.  While doing his best not to overcompensate, Dhanus has tried to be more forthright with Asenath as a precaution; he makes certain she lacks for nothing in the way of tools and tips.  He confers with her in person (as opposed to long-distance communication) at least once a decicycle.  All of this Asenath likely considers needless, and Dhanus has a certain self-deprecating awareness of it, but for him, she's another reminder to engage personally with his Epsilons.