Typhon Advanced Defence Systems, Ltd. / TYPHON

Typhon Advanced Defence Systems Ltd. was established in 2927 by Raphael Faulkner, the charismatic visionary with an uncanny talent for blowing things up. The company has its roots in the slums of London, Earth, where it provided for the protection of the outcasts of society. During the early years of the company, Faulkner crafted all his designs by hand, and, coming from a wealthy background, was able to put superior quality firearms and protection devices in the market at stunningly affordable prices. It therefore wouldn’t take long before Typhon got a firm foothold in the local economy by employing and training local talented youngsters, and became a household name in the wider London area.

Within years, major investors and entrepreneurs took note of the promising start-up and by utilising powerful channels and connections, the business exploded. Among the interested parties was Jack Harper, the man and driving force behind the infamous paramilitary organization Cerberus. Mr Harper opened many a closed door for the company, and with quickly expanding sales and profit Typhon opened its current production plant and headquarters on a prime location on Terra.

While still officially the CEO of Typhon Ltd., Raphael Faulkner has since deferred the day to day leadership of the company to his long-time directors and friends John Welch and Rick Cullen. Faulkner himself is known to spend much of his time working on new designs and applications, and it is said that he even takes on the odd trade mission every now and then.

Raphael Faulkner

Raphael Faulkner was born in London, U.K. on April 15, 2909, to the wealthy couple Michael and Gabrielle Faulkner. His father was a renowned weapons scientist and entrepreneur, while his mother was the lead engineer in his company. During his early childhood, Raphael lived in a grand, traditional 23rd century estate, with all the luxuries befitting the heir of an upstanding family. He was home schooled by his mother, for whom he had a deep affection. In contrast, his relationship with his father was troublesome at best; during the sparse times the two spent together, the boy displayed a very competitive attitude and the compulsive need to best his father at every turn. From his early years, Raphael displayed a few interesting traits: his exceptional intelligence, a hunger for learning and a love for blowing things up. A curious anecdote tells us that at the age of 6, Raphael outfitted his toy miniature space carrier with a functioning arsenal of tiny turrets, and rigged it to explode after sending it to hide in his father’s wardrobe.

Michael and Gabrielle took advantage of the boy’s quick wit and learning capabilities and taught him to speak several languages (including Chinese, French and Xi’An) fluently during his early years. Also, his curiosity led his mother to show and explain to him many of the projects she was working on during those golden years of Faulkner Corporation, and he was soon able to engage in detailed discussions about their inner workings and design complications—sometimes in foreign tongue, if only to spite his father, who did not possess the natural gift for languages like his wife. As such, his parents put all their efforts and hopes into forging Raphael into the heir apparent of the company.

Things took a turn for the worse when on January 17, 2922 when a supposed gas explosion consumed most of the company’s ongoing research projects, causing several stakeholders in the company to withdraw their investments and leaving the family bankrupt. A few short weeks thereafter, Gabrielle Faulkner went missing. The unfortunate circumstances caused Michael Faulkner to suffer a nervous breakdown and was consequently hospitalised. Raphael, then 12 years old, blaming himself for the explosion, took to the streets and ventured entire days into the unseen depths of the great city of London. There he encountered many individuals who were more than interested in his abilities to weaponise common materials and design even more complex personal armaments, and willing to pay for them. I would not take long before Raphael decided to permanently vacate his parental home, where his father’s depression had caused him to primarily neglect both his son and the household. He took up residence in an abandoned apartment in one of the more notorious slums of the city, where he started building a small production unit and selling his weapons, using both bits and pieces from his own understanding and recollection of his mother’s designs, and parts of his father’s research he had discretely managed to salvage from the ruins of his lab. He quickly earned a name for himself under the pseudonym The Falcon and due to the affordable deadliness of his wares, he quickly grew infamous on the streets. He used his earnings to grow his little start-up, recruiting two promising thugs, John Welch and Rick Cullen—both of whom work as executives in his corporation to this very day—to be his customer representatives.

While continuously and gradually investing in both his education and his company, thoughts of his family’s downfall and his mother’s disappearance kept haunting him through those years. One of the biggest investors in his father’s company had been the illusive Jack Harper, and Raphael’s investigations showed that many of the other stakeholders had direct or indirect ties with Mr Harper or his paramilitary organization Cerberus. Therefore, Raphael focused his efforts on infiltrating Cerberus and searching for clues that indicated that Harper knew any more information regarding the tragic events. Under a false name, Rodney Fletcher, he got to work in the weapons divisions and quickly manoeuvred himself into positions with more responsibility and access to classified files. However, every time he reached a possible trail of clues, he was met with a block or a dead end.

Living this daring double life, he managed to break his own company out in the open and onto the intergalactic market, with records suggesting that he signed his first UEE-approved contract in 2927. With a flair for the dramatic, he renamed it to Typhon, the terrifying ‘father of all monsters’ from ancient Greek mythology. Keeping to his strong selling points, Typhon Advanced Defence Systems, Ltd. quickly grew out to be a renowned manufacturer of both personal and spacecraft-side weaponry. In the same fashion as the company’s name, from the early days the products were named after characters from ancient mythology. The one exception to this rule, however, was the Falcon, Typhon’s exclusive top-of-the-line sidearm, only granted to the most important of public, corporate and underground figures, pristinely refined and perfected since the early days of the company, and nowadays said to be still handmade by Raphael Faulkner himself.

During that time, several noteworthy events happened in quick succession. Michael Faulkner, his father, committed suicide on August 7, 2928. Shortly afterwards, Raphael changed his residence from the dwindling planet Earth to the newer and more promising Terra, and he transformed his late father’s estate and grounds into the main small arms manufacturing facility for the Sol system.

Due to his involvement with Cerberus, he left most of his public relations to his charismatic sidekicks and chief executives, Cullen and Welch, keeping his own name out of the records, acting as a shadow director to the company. However, due to the high profile and excellent reputation of Typhon, he eventually received word that Jack Harper himself—whom Raphael had never even seen in person before, and likewise many others with him—requested a personal meeting with the elusive Raphael Faulkner. Not willing to pass up on the opportunity to confront the man himself after all these years, but neither willing to waste his efforts within Cerberus, he accepted the invitation, and at the same time frantically pushed forth in his search for information, no longer exerting his utmost caution he had displayed during the years before.

He eventually found a promising clue on the whereabouts of Gabrielle Faulkner, and was shocked to find his mother working in a secret Cerberus research facility all those years. After having been reunited with her, Gabrielle explained how she had been recruited by Cerberus shortly before incident in 2922, and had used the explosion as a cover to disappear and prepare for a deep cover operation to prevent a surprise raid on Earth by the advancing Vanduul. After successfully completing the mission, her cover broke and she had to go into extended hiding. Jack Harper had promised her that he would keep taking care of the young Raphael in her absence.

Through his mother, Raphael found out that Michael Faulkner had been a top executive within Cerberus, an honour handed down for generations of Faulkners since the founding of Cerberus in 2611. Michael had withdrawn from the organization to be with his wife and new-born son when new Vanduul attacks flared up in 2910. Some within the ranks of Cerberus had branded him a coward and persona non grata—effectively banning the Faulkner name from its rightful place—and after his empty seat had been filled, the organization began its steady march to the notoriety it bears today, riding the wave of pro-human sentiment that followed the raids of human colonies. After the incident at the Faulkner estates, Harper had decided to cut loose the dwindling Michael Faulkner.

Unable to reach out to her son, years later she recognized parts of her own designs in the weapons manufactured by Typhon and realised who the young driving force behind the company was, understanding that Jack Harper had kept his promise. An authorised search in the UEE business archives confirmed her suspicions. Gabrielle had always kept a close relation to the Illusive Man, Harper, and when she cautiously inquired after her son, he revealed that many of Raphael’s early day clients had been hired or commanded by Harper or his subordinates, and that Typhon’s CFO, John Welch, had been brought in contact with Faulkner by Harper himself, but that Raphael’s burning ambition had skyrocketed his company beyond Cerberus’ reach.

Not long after that, Raphael met with Jack Harper and in no uncertain terms claimed his rightful place among the Cerberus elite. Harper gladly welcomed Raphael into their ranks, and was quite surprised to learn that he and Mr Fletcher were, in fact, the same person.
Ever since, Raphael Faulkner has been dividing his time and attention between maintaining his successful manufacturing and trading company and working with Cerberus, supposedly even participating in expeditions and operations.