Arba Trinivii Jesaal, known to most non-Hutts as simply Arba the Hutt, was a Hutt crime lord who ran a weapons and spice empire from Nar Shaddaa during the fading years of the Old Republic, through the Empire, and into the New Republic. A master manipulator and strategist, he rose from a position of relative obscurity in his clan to command a large portion of the Trinivii kajidic. He was both employer and ally to the Sith Lord Tak Sakaros.
Biography[]
Early years[]
Arba was born in 287 BBY, the third son of Frogo Trinivii Jesaal, the fourth in the line of succession to leading the Trinivii kajidic. Due to his position in the order, he was slated from birth for a position of relative inferiority in his clan. Like all Hutts, he spent the first fifty years of life in Frogo's pouch, and he spent the next thirty as a rather small and insignificant Huttlet, clinging close to his father nearly all the time. Though he was often at hand to witness business deals and learn the gangster ways by osmosis, he was ridiculed by his elder siblings for childishness and weakness.
A life-altering event came in 199 BBY, when Arba's brother Globba tried to eat him, and Frogo did not intervene. Though Arba managed to escape by poking his brother in the eye with the blunt end of a blaster rifle, he lost part of his tail and learned a very hard lesson about self-reliance. It would take another fifty-three standard years for the tail to grow back properly.
Gangster in the making[]
Due to his low standing in the kajidic and the contempt with which his elders viewed him, when Arba came of age he was given mostly menial and inconsequential assignments. After being maimed by his brother he had taken time to learn combat, and though his sluggish nature made quick movements difficult, he was capable of strong hand blows and surprisingly fast and lethal strikes with his regrown tail. This led clan elders to assign him as extra muscle to weapons and drug deals while more respected Hutts carried out the actual negotiations.
While the intent was to put Arba in a position of little power, the unintended side effect was to give him again a front row seat to the machinations of Hutt crime. He spent the first nine years of his crime career taking orders from elders and playing the part of the demure inferior. When Globba was assigned an important arms deal with Corporate Sector pirates, Arba waited until mere hours before, then poisoned his brother.
Arba having wrongly measured the dosage, the poison was not sufficient to kill Globba, but this worked out well. Globba appeared only to be sick, and as no replacement was available, Arba was given the job with warnings of dire consequences should he make a mistake. The deal, however, came off without a hitch, and young Arba had finally appeared on his elders' radar.
From then on Arba was slowly but gradually moved up the ranks, acquiring positions and missions of importance, until he was held equal to (and in competition with) his brother Globba. Globba made known to his associates that Arba and his small network of enforcers should meet an unfortunate fate. When preparing to leave to ambush Arba's personal transport, however, the shuttle full of Globba's men fell from its anchorage and crushed Globba himself beneath it, killing him and all the men inside.
Mysterious falls and Arba's rise[]
Following the demise of Globba, Arba acquired his late brother's organization, businesses, agents, and contacts with the blessing of the Trinivii leaders. Thus armed, he was able to easily fill the orders from his superiors. Nar Shaddaa and Nal Hutta were strictly controlled by elder Hutts, as was illegal trade in most of Hutt Space. However, the regions outside were more open to up-and-coming Hutts, and Arba intended to capitalize on them.
Arba's new smuggling associates, who spent a good deal of their time far from Nar Shaddaa, were eager to put him in touch with potential weapons customers. The Hutt gangster's first venture was selling disruptors to pirates operating in the Lahara sector. Unfortunately, as this was far from home and in Republic territory, both the pirates and Arba's smugglers were quickly caught and crushed, resulting in a brief but painful loss to Arba and a reproval from his superiors.
The other distance venture was to be more successful. Tipped off by one of his associates, Arba got into the spice business, selling pyrepenol on Pzob and Gamorr. This latter system provided the unexpected bonus of more minions. Hooked on the feeling of invincibility that accompanied pyrepenol use, a community of Gamorreans joined with Arba without even requesting the normal trial-by-combat required to earn their loyalty. Ordering only that they use it in their spare time, Arba brought the thugs into his fold, paying them in spice instead of money. They quickly become addicts, and the lack of money made them unable to obtain sustenance outside Arba's generosity.
Given the rapid rise of the upstart young Hutt, irritation and jealousy from the higher ranks was inevitable. Arba's first major challenger after his brother was his uncle, Snorbu, second in line to head the Trinivii kajidic. He insisted that Arba give him an obscene cut of his profits (to the tune of sixty percent), and when his nephew resisted, Snorbu sent back two of his Gamorrean guards, minus their hands. After this display of cruelty, Arba relented, paying tribute to his uncle obediently. His organization began to suffer, but for three months Arba remained dutiful and subservient to his "patron".
On the three-month anniversary of the mutilation of the Gamorreans, Arba arranged to meet his uncle in the Corellian Quarter to transfer even more of his funds. When Snorbu began to cross a catwalk to his nephew, however, the bridge (which Arba had ordered weakened) collapsed, dropping both bridge and Hutt on the monofilament net Arba had rigged beneath. Even better, the pieces fell on and killed another Hutt leader (who had been invited to that very spot by Arba). The incensed Hutt's relatives killed off Snorbu's offspring and destroyed most of his organization, and Arba's role was forgotten in the chaos—as was any obligation to pay tribute.
Tightening the grip[]
The Arba crime ring had grown large enough that unilateral management was becoming inefficient, and so in 67 BBY Arba decided to appoint a majordomo. He selected one of his earliest smuggling ring leaders, a man named Gormon Brogar, for the position. Brogar took to managing the fairly straightforward weapons enterprises, while Arba turned his attention to the infinitely more touchy matter of spice.
Though pyrepenol spice had been great business for Arba, the mining facilities were located across the galaxy, and periodically shipments would be intercepted by the Republic or pirates. The real money was in glitterstim, but this market was tightly controlled by Jabba the Hutt. Even his gift for making enemies disappear would not embolden Arba to challenge the more powerful Hutt lord, and so he instead traveled to Tatooine to strike a deal. In return for forty percent of his profits, Arba was allowed access to some of Jabba's suppliers and the right to distribute closer to the Mid Rim, where Jabba had little interest. Arba was sent back to Nar Shaddaa with the promise of vast wealth, though Jabba made the snide comment that he was not often inclined to walk under shuttles or on weak catwalks.
With the burden of Snorbu removed and a new source of great wealth, Arba at last turned his eye closer to home. Nar Shaddaa's spice and weapons markets were already well-covered, but other vices were somewhat more open. Arba quickly bought up a group of casinos around the Smuggler's Moon and began to run betting rings on offworld events, such as podracing on Tatooine and Malastare.
Incursions into the market so close to the Hutt homeworld were not appreciated by all. During his rise to power, Arba had accumulated a number of enemies, and many came to the decision that their lives would be easier without Arba in them. Just before the matter came to a head, however, Arba was handed an instrument with which to cement his hold on his enterprise and crush his enemies once and for all.
Arba, Astariax, and Tak[]
Inclined as he was to occasionally place a bet himself on offworld sporting events, for a laugh Arba bet a hundred credits on the underdog in a horribly one-sided fight on Borgo Prime. The match pitted a humanoid against a Krayt dragon, but remarkably, the humanoid won. Having been given 1:6,357 odds on his fighter, Arba collected over half a million credits, and when the amnesiac Tak Sakaros showed up at his palace looking for work, Arba greeted him like an old friend.
Though only recently escaped from slavery, Sakaros had earned himself a reputation for being a ruthless and effective killer. Though he could not remember using them, the young man was efficient with a gun and handy with explosives. Sensing the hostility that had been building around his rise and realizing that he needed every capable fighter within reach, Arba extracted a promise for continuous work from Sakaros and gave him an apartment, a Z-95 Headhunter, enough weapons to start an arsenal, and a steady paycheck.
The timing was lucky, for mere weeks after Sakaros's arrival the other Hutts struck. The unknowing Sith pulled his employer away from his speeder seconds before a timed explosive destroyed it, and two days later shot and killed two assassins who had been sent for Arba. Buckling down for a pitched fight, Arba at first tried to send others to do his work while keeping Sakaros close to himself, but after a few disastrous hits was persuaded to let Tak do what he did best. Within a week, one of the attacking Hutts had been hoisted up on a construction crane, hooked through his mouth and out the top of his head; the second had had a major shipment of spice hijacked and its escort completely destroyed; and the businesses under the protection of a third were inspired to assassinate him with a thermal detonator.
Still feeling overly leashed by Arba, Tak returned to the palace one day with a Nagai assassin named Astariax Drago. What association the two men had was unknown, and neither would disclose it to Arba, but Drago was a gunfighter and bladesman nearly on par with Sakaros. The two could act as a team, or leave one as bodyguard and the other as field agent, and between the two of them they decimated Arba's enemies.
Family troubles[]
After a few years, Sakaros began to seek occasional bounty hunting and assassination contracts offworld, usually leaving Drago with Arba but sometimes taking him with. Though his competitors had been cowed, Arba now faced the disapproval of his own kajidic leaders. They sensed weakness with the great enforcer Sakaros absent, and Arba's businesses began to experience unexpected raids, bombings, and fires.
The solution, it seemed to the Hutt, lay not with another covert assassination, but more open actions. Most of the attacks had been instigated by Lorrga, the elder brother of Snorbu, Hujo, and Arba's father Frogo, and leader of the Trinivii. Lorrga was a shrewd and ruthless businessman who kept most of the glory and profits for himself, keeping siblings, offspring, and subordinates in line with intimidation and bullying. He was feared, but despised, and Arba realized he needed but to remove the fear.
After Drago artfully fired a sniper shot at Lorrga, missing him but killing his Captain of the Guard (which had been Arba's original aim), it became apparent that perhaps Lorrga was not quite so well-protected as others thought. Through cajoling and flattery, Arba was able to convince his father and uncle Hujo to lead a war against Lorrga. The Trinivii power struggle consumed a large part of Nar Shaddaa, and business suffered greatly, but Arba was convinced of his rightness and would hear nothing against the move.
Others were not so convinced. Arba was nearly assassinated by a thermal detonator smuggled in with a protocol droid; only a timely gun shot from Tak Sakaros which detonated it prematurely spared him. It was obvious that the plan would otherwise have succeeded, and the mastermind had simply not counted on Sakaros and his uncanny danger sense being present at the time. Only one man could have gotten so alarmingly close to Arba: his own majordomo, Gorman Brogar. Thorough digging by Drago and his associates revealed that Brogar had been on Lorrga's payroll since before the war.
At the same time, Hujo and Frogo began to demand that Arba do his part in the war, and the younger Hutt saw a chance to stymie such requests and eliminate the traitor in one blow. He sent Brogar to oversee a major glitterstim deal, then dispatched Sakaros to hire a band of pirates to ambush him. The ambush went perfectly, as did the subsequent ambush and slaughter of the pirates, who both did not need to be paid and gave Arba the appearance of having wreaked due revenge for his "fallen friend". Even better, the death of his majordomo and the apparent failure of a major deal (which was actually faked by no less than Jabba the Hutt, who supported his vassal against the Lorrga) made Arba appear weak and of no help in the war.
In the end, both Lorrga and Hujo were killed, and Frogo absorbed much of their organizations. Subtly, Arba began to win over many field leaders in his father's business, but publicly he gave deference and hailed Frogo as the new and worthy kajidic leader. This arrangement carried Arba into 31 BBY.
Wartime and the rise of the Empire[]
Years before, Tak Sakaros had defeated a Jedi Knight in combat with a lightsaber, to the amazement of all concerned, and Arba had paid him a bonus to simply stand in his court, wearing the defeated Knight's lightsaber on his belt. However, after Sakaros disappeared on a month-long sabbatical, he returned with far more impressive news: he was, as it turned out, a Sith Lord. Though he retired to his private apartment complex to rebuild his fledgling powers, the Sith would occasionally act as bodyguard for Arba on important deals, armed now with his own lightsaber.
The far more constant deprivation of his greatest warrior did not overly concern Arba, as a market had sprung up which distracted all organized crime figures who ran weaponry. The Separatist Crisis boded ill for the Republic, and those worlds which considered secession feared for their safety. While the main players in what would come to be the Confederacy of Independent Systems were already well-armed, either through private fleets or the Geonosian weaponers, several smaller systems were eager to augment their defenses, especially as time wore on and rumors of the creation of a Republic Army began to circulate. The uneasy times also brought heightened stress in the everyday lives of citizens, and spice sales rose accordingly.
When war finally erupted in 22 BBY, Tak departed the Smuggler’s Moon to fight for the Confederacy and Arba cornered the weapons market near Hutt Space. He had begun to get the sense that his only remaining elder brother, Gubba, might need to be eliminated, but miraculously enough Gubba was killed without his intervention. On an attempted deal with Republic loyalists on a Separatist world, Gubba and the loyalists were bombed out of existence by General Grievous himself, in the system to root out deserters.
The end of the war and the rise of the Empire boded ill for the weapons trade, and the Hutt clans knew it. Several kajidics tried to supply weapons to rebels against the new Empire, but Arba chose to avoid this course. This proved wise, as the smugglers who ran the guns (and several kajidic leaders) were massacred whenever caught.
While weapons trade decreased, spice use continued to rise, especially on formerly loyal Republic worlds disillusioned with the change in government. Arba was able to push his reach closer to the Core than he had ever been, which brought interaction with Black Sun. Rather than risk an underworld war under the nose of the watchful Empire, however, Arba and the Black Sun Vigos reached an arrangement of mutual exclusivity in their own spheres of influence.
After the fall[]
Many things changed in 4 ABY. The fall of Palpatine, the chaos which consumed the Empire, and the lack of any legitimate government on hand to immediately replace it led to a free-for-all of criminal infiltration. Further, the death of Jabba the Hutt opened the glitterstim market to anyone with the power to seize it. Arba's men began to divert a sizable portion of the spice mined on Kessel to his warehouses, and he quickly became one of the richest Hutts on Nar Shaddaa.
Sensing that the time was ripe for a final coup, in 7 ABY Arba engineered the demise of his aging father Frogo, the only remaining kajidic leader who outranked him. He used much of his new spice wealth to recruit mercenaries, dispatched his own guard, and even employed the services of his old friend Tak and Tak’s son Khrado in an all-out assault on Frogo's fortress in the depth of night. Well-funded, well-armed, and supported by traitors inside, Arba's coup was likely to succeed from the start; with the Sith Lords it was a foregone conclusion.
Many of Frogo's men were killed, and more capitulated. Frogo's entire smuggling and security fleet was confiscated, and the Hutt lord himself was captured. Arba ordered his father fed to a Krayt dragon tail-first, finally revenging the centuries-old indignity of Frogo's nonintervention in his son's near-death. Firmly established as head of the Trinivii kajidic, Arba offered the hand of reconciliation to Frogo's supporters, with the understanding that the other held a vibroaxe. Unsurprisingly, the kajidic members eagerly accepted their new boss.
The New Republic[]
Arba made no attempt to return to his wartime weapons franchises during the campaigns of Grand Admiral Thrawn, Admiral Daala, and the reborn Palpatine; he felt both sides were well-equipped enough, and the involvement of criminals could only be bad for business.
Having secured his position, Arba had to shift his focus from upward mobility to maintenance. He had to deal with several incarnations of his old self, young Hutts hoping to supplant him and rule the kajidic themselves. Fortunately, Tak Sakaros was often willing to lend his sons to Arba's court to develop their instincts for danger, and conspiracies in the immediate area were almost always rooted out.
After 21 ABY, Arba had either Tak or his only surviving son, Tariun, at his court almost constantly. He had by this point expanded his business into Hutt Space itself; the power vacuum after Jabba's death had at first resulted in local competition, while Arba looked for markets afar. However, that decision now lent him the financial power to crush rivals closer to home, and by 25 ABY he was the gambling lord of all Nar Shaddaa.
The Vong[]
When the extra-galactic Yuuzhan Vong invaded the galaxy, Arba was among many kajidic leaders who agreed to allow the Vong free passage through the Y'Toub System in exchange for nonaggression. He did so, unusually, against the advice of Tak Sakaros. Predictably, and especially when the Hutts tried to sell information on the Vong to the Republic, the Vong retaliated. Sakaros seriously considered leaving Arba to his well-earned fate, but relented at the last moment and launched a daring raid to save his old friend.
Having been rescued along with a small part of his court, Arba was deposited on Borgo Prime by the Sith and told in no uncertain terms to stay put and keep his head down. Indebted to Tak for saving his life, the Hutt gangster swallowed his pride and agreed, even redirecting a substantial portion of his funds to the upkeep and replacement of Tak's fleet.
Arba remained on Borgo Prime through the Yuuzhan Vong War. During the course of the war, and especially visiting Shanko's Hive, he discovered a new goldmine: information. Though weapons demand had skyrocketed during the Vong invasion, the spice trade had bottomed out, and a new source of revenue was needed.
New business[]
Having as he did access to the Imperial Remnant, which was near Borgo Prime, Arba elected to remain on the asteroid even after Nar Shaddaa was resettled. Though the place had many unpleasant memories, Tak Sakaros would occasionally visit his old friend there to trade information or resources.
His organization hollowed out by the devastation of both the Y’Toub system’s planets and the Hutt kajidics’ trade networks, Arba left fighting for the scraps and struggling to rebuild to younger Hutts, intending to return home when the dust had settled and the hard work already been done. His network of spies kept him well-informed, and he happily sold information to the Galactic Alliance Intelligence Service, Imperial Intelligence, dissident governments, and other criminals, though he was more selective with the last group and sometimes fed disinformation when he knew it would serve his ultimate ends.
Tak kept only a very subtle relationship with Arba while serving in the Galactic Alliance Senate, but when he became first a designer and then a director for Kuat Drive Yards, he occasionally fed Arba information so the Hutt could make calculated investments. Arba returned the favor by providing corporate espionage on KDY’s competitors.
Demise[]
By the late 70s ABY, having spent decades on Borgo Prime, Arba had amassed what he felt was sufficient wealth to begin his transition back to Nar Shaddaa. He invested in local enterprises on the Smuggler’s Moon and increased investment in gun-running opportunities. He encountered some resistance from other kajidics, but was not deterred.
In 87 ABY, Arba was startled to receive a badly wounded Tak in his court. The Sith’s right arm had been amputated at the right elbow and he seemed disoriented and stunned. Tak refused to name the person who had injured him, but Arba still connected him with Arkanian surgeons, who fashioned the Sith a cybernetic arm.
Tak came and went aimlessly from Borgo Prime, but Arba tried to arrange his participation in the move back to Nar Shaddaa and the fight he expected to result. Tak reluctantly agreed and remained onworld, but inexplicably refused to carry or wear his usual lightsaber. A perplexed Arba went ahead despite Tak’s obvious unease. However, in 89 ABY, one of the kajidics planted a bomb in Arba’s chambers. Cut off from the Force, Tak did not sense the danger to warn Arba, and the Hutt was killed when the bomb went off.
Personality and traits[]
Arba was of average size for a Hutt, though in youth his arms and tail were a bit more muscular than was the norm. Even after becoming lord of the Trinivii kajidic, he refused to succumb to the habit of many Hutts and become totally sedentary. He exercised (to an extent) on a fairly regular basis, and could be very dangerous from close range. His eyes were a sickly yellow, and were described as "crafty" by many observers.
Arba was a naturally suspicious being, trustful of almost no one and always alert for treachery or danger. He managed to avoid alone several assassination attempts purely on instinct. He had a habit of surrounding himself with intelligent, dangerous, loyal people, and had a great ability to engender loyalty in his core of followers.
Those very few who were taken into the Hutt's confidence knew him to have a good sense of humor and be extremely witty and intelligent. However, he had very little respect for life and no love at all for his own family. The only beings he truly had any affection for were Tak Sakaros and Astariax Drago; even the Sakaros family was simply an extension of Tak to him.
Court[]
Arba liked to keep his palace dark, though lit with ultraviolet light. It disoriented visitors, giving Arba the conversational upper hand, as he could see in the ultraviolet spectrum. Even better, his Sith allies were also perfectly at home in the dark, using the Force to aid their perceptions.
Though he kept many nubile females around, especially Twi'leks, Zeltrons, and the occasional Human, Arba did not have slaves. This was at the insistence of Tak Sakaros, who had been enslaved himself and deplored the practice, and refused to work for a slaver. Needing the Sith's abilities, Arba agreed. However, much of his staff was paid only a pittance, or with something other than money (usually spice, which had the added benefit of making them addicts).
Arba had two majordomos. The first, Gorman Brogar, served him from 67 BBY to his death in 42 BBY. Tak Sakaros refused an appointment as a second majordomo. Arba made due without for a while, but faced with burgeoning demands of his business, finally appointed Errgrulff in 35 BBY. The Wookiee would serve him until 26 ABY, when he was killed in the Vong invasion of Nar Shaddaa. Forced to rebuild much of his business, Arba declined to appoint a third majordomo thereafter.