Barkeeper Brelan
A wanderer of sorts, Brelan is one of the few Kel’Regar men who have chosen to mix freely with the greater galactic society, having found his calling at last behing the bar.
Brelan grinned, almost maniacally, at the two sentients that had just plopped down at the bar, and made requests of him. One, short and purple, had asked for something to knock him flat on his back, and he hadn't thought it even possible for the other to even get drunk. None had ever asked him for alcohol befor. "... Aah! I see, small one. You would challenge me indeed, then! ... Naaa, the Kel'Ora as well? Haaa-laaa, the Gods have smiled on me this day." A flurry of activity, hands flying and, yes, he did just kick that bottle, marked in the alien script of his home into the air off the shelf and into his own hands. Flip and flash and... was that something screeching beneath the bar? Or was that a part of the music? Either way, it was hard to tell, as twin highballs landed on the bar, thick and syrupy, bubbles slowly working their way up from the bottom of the glass through the brilliant green color of the concoction. "Seven creds, each, because I like you. You two, yes, you have the look of the hungry traveler about you."
Appearance
Tall and thick, to those who know how to look, Brelan has sampled many of his own wares over the years, his body having the appearance of toneless muscle everywhere. His broad, cheerful face is pale, though not ghostly, and colored often with the emotion that fills his expressions, while his sharp ears poke out from beneath his impeccably groomed blonde hair.
When Brelan speaks, it sounds sing-song to the human ear, rising and falling in strongly emotional crescendos, and he often spices his sentences with interjections, drawn from a half a dozen separate tongues from his homeworld.
Perhaps oddly, he has forsaken the normal garb of his kinsmen, and when he is at work behind the bar, he can normally be seen in a tremendously frilly white shirt and black tuxedo pants, his waist wrapped with a silken sash, whose color changes with the day.
History/Background
As a young man on an established colony world, Brelan found himself restless, unsatisfied with his early work as a food supply engineer. Drifting often around the small city that he was helping to grow, he found himself in the bar at the foot of the space elevator again and again, watching the human immigrant mix drinks, even as he himself got drunk. It did not take long for it to dawn on him that what he was watching was an art form, though it did take somewhat longer for him to decide that it would be his new calling.
Starting with a hypernet course, he soon traveled to another of the myriad frontier worlds, where, he reasoned he would have plenty of relatively willing victims for his initial experiments. While they appreciated his alcohol, and indeed, he started to learn the subtleties of the alien palate, he was run off-world in short order, largely due to his hamhanded ways in the bar, and his initial clumsiness at handling the social aspects of his new chosen profession.
Making a few more hops, and finally reaching another frontier world, he spent some days in introspection, consdering his failures, and here, on his new home, he did his best to keep the locals happier. It is probably for the best that the local crime boss has taken quite the liking to his exotic liquors. In turn, the Kel'Regar learned to sniff out, quite literally, which direction spacers looking for work should be sent - to the official boards, or to the boss, becoming one small portion of the grease required to keep the station going, above and below decks. And it gives him so much chance to ply his real art, that of making more and more insane drinks.
Special Equipment
Brelan generally has access to a truly remarkable range of liquors, but otherwise has no special equipment.
"Work? Saaa, let me think a moment, spacer. Halon Jane is trying to get her swoop track up and running, and the pirates have been harassing the shipping lanes. Haa-laa, the guard, they are always looking for scouts out there, scouts and salvagers to clean up the hulks of the war-fields."
Roleplaying Notes
Brelan is attracted to the exotic and the alien, at least from his point of view. Ancient earth liquors are an especially favored hobby, and the Kel'Regar can always be counted on to be operating several semi-legal stills.
Brelan will dispense his friendly ear to all those who wish to talk at him, but any advice that he dispenses will be bizzare and often entirely inappropriate, though often naive - he finds the way that humans and their descendant races interact with each other to be entirely incomprehensible, and will often fall back on his experiences in the commune that he grew up in, an all-together less frenzied pace of life than humanity's way.
He is, however, able to sort those he meets into a handful of bins in his mind, primarily based on how much they trip the 'predator' reflexes of his body. The worst, he will send towards the local crime bosses, if they're looking for work, but his reccomendation carries little weight. These men will often be used in an expendable fashion.
Hooks
First and foremost, Brelan knows what everyone else thinks is going on. He is the axle about which the local rumor mill turns to make its grist, and there is no rumor he does not hear over and over again. He may be used to find the sources of one particular rumor, or even paid to seed one, as his morals are very flaky, even by Kel'Regar standards.
Second, his advice has likely landed another in very, very hot water. If it is someone he needs to survive, he may well be seeking freelancers to put the situation right... especially if it's the sort of situation no sane freelancer would stick his nose into. He may well have sent an important person straight into the arms of the local crime lords, or even one of their guests into the hands of the local militia!
Thirdly, because of his obsession with Old Terran booze, he may be interested in having humans steal a bottle of something or another.. or better yet, the recipe for long forgotten brands of alcohol. Chasing down the legend of Pabst Blue Ribbon in the 3rd millenium may prove extremely troubling indeed.
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? Responses (7)
Excellent NPC Siren - I would to see a shortstory or longer in this universe of yours!
As a note, using ' in freetext simply does not work. I'd suggest the inaccurate but safe Kel-regar as an alternative, or come up with a more encompassing one for your universe.
The space-elf that can get a space-dorf drunk. ;p
A colorful character indeed, and a magnificent example of what a Ke'Regar can be.
A nice NPC, if I had more votes I would've voted for at least 4.5
Fun and unique, he should work out well my next sci-fi campaign. Perhaps adding in a few plot hooks to the sub would help it really stand out?
Touche.
Lovely update, some useful plot hooks to get the ideas flowing, and an updated vote to reflect this.