Ïadel Urio

Ïadel Urio (pronounced /ˈiːədɛl ˈʌriːoʊ/) is the current head of the Urio Syndicate on Kadis, and as such is one of the planet's most powerful crimelords. Urio is both physically imposing and highly charismatic, and is ruthless enough to take whatever steps she feels are necessary to preserve her organization's power. The Urio Syndicate deals in many different activities, but its particular specialty is illegal duplication; to better run her organization, Urio has taught herself a lot about the duplication process, and is as knowledgeable about it as are most professional engineers, fully capable of repairing a duplicator herself if needs be—though she usually leaves such minutiae to her employees.

Officially, Urio only has three duplicates, though she could easily afford many more. Because she has through her organization access to practically unlimited under-the-table duplication, however, it's likely she has many times that number off the books, scattered throughout the galaxy; her official duplicates are maintained only to facilitate translocation. At least one of her duplicates is generally on Kadis at any given time, usually in her organization's headquarters.

Although Urio has never been married, she generally has at any given moment a number of reprogrammed island duplicates of people she finds physically attractive on hand to serve her and gratify her every whim, including sexual. Some of these duplicates are of celebrities; others are of otherwise ordinary people Urio met—or glimpsed in passing—and found desireable. Urio is bisexual, so her stable of slave duplicates, which she sometimes calls her "harem", consists of both men and women. Its makeup is constantly changing; as she tires of one harem member, she'll either dispose of him or her in a creative way or palm him or her off on an underling, and later find another to fill the vacated spot.

Ïadel Urio has seven children, all genetically the offspring of some of her favorite harem members of the past (though none of the children's fathers remains in her harem currently). While three of her children, Naven, Ianthemie, and Crodon, have followed the "family business" of helping to run the Syndicate, Urio's other four children have chosen diverse paths, one, Madel Firl, having even joined the Palladium to fight against the corruption that his mother represents (and having changed his surname to distance himself from his criminal parent).

Outside of the money and power her leadership of the Syndicate brings her, Ïadel Urio's main passion is music. At her headquarters, she has music playing at all hours of the day and night, with computer systems set up to adaptively change the music selection depending on the circumstances and the events of the moment. Urio enjoys stirring orchestral pieces, and especially of complex canons and fugues—her favorite antediasporan composer is Johann Sebastian Bach, and among more recent composers she is especially fond of the music of Srithyan Prokip, Lui Kai-Jeng, and Koroko Mbalatente. Urio herself plays the kmulu, a rare wind instrument invented by the seevark; though already the most skilled kmulist on Kadis, and one of the most skilled in the Dupliverse, Urio continues to hone her talent, taking lessons from the seevark master Tmattci-Koeng.

Ïadel Urio is a large, full-figured woman whose size owes as much to muscle as to fat, though she certainly contains an ample portion of each. She usually wears her brown hair straight and pageboy-short, though she often likes to weave into it fibers of gold and other shiny and attractive materials. Urio's squinting eyes and upturned nose have given more than one person she encountered the impression of greed and stupidity—an impression altogether inaccurate, at least in the latter respect; Urio is possessed of a keen intelligence, and always has several back-up plans in reserve.