Like most hive rats living out of The Works beneath Coruscant, Morto quickly joined a small time stack gang at the tender age of 12. Such gangs were the only real prospect for kids like Morto. They protected each other, provided paying work (albeit often illegal) and gave some semblance of structure. Loyalty that was everything.

Morto's great passion was for speeders of all types and was himself a prodigy pilot. He'd mastered the simulations at Gurneys by age eight and could be frequently found speeding around in all manner of stolen swoops by age twelve. It was this same talent that brought Morto to the attention of the Sector-22 gang. They had decided to give him a chance to prove himself to the gang as part of an initiation.

There was a particular up-hab gentleman, Javid Trult, who liked to slum it down in Gretta's Hole most Friday nights. He'd pull up in a custom fitted, hazmat yellow CK-6 swoop bike, park it out front under the watchful eyes of some hired local muscle, and drink himself stupid whilst blowing loads of credits at the Sabaac tables. Morto had no qualms about robbing the rich, it was the kind of thing he did all the time.

Morto had snuck in during the early hours, past the stimmed-out bouncers, and pulled Javid's attention away from the painted ladies long enough to whisper into his ear that someone was trying to steal his swoop. Javid had been so drunk and startled that he hadn't noticed Morto swipe the keycard from his fancy, synth-quilted jacket. Morto went around the back, waited in an alley for the commotion to die down, waited for Javid to take his muscle back into the bar in search of him, and hopped onto the swoop. Laughing, Morto had gunned the twin turbos, engaged the heated seating and launched just as Javid came back out of the bar cursing him for the duplicitous little shit that he was. The ride 440kph joyride that followed gave Morto a real taste for the finer things in life and started a lifelong desire to own and fly his own, legally obtained, swoop. Maybe even his own starship. Although that had seemed impossible at the time.

What Morto could not have forseen, as he delivered the CK-6 to the 22's chop shop, was that Javid Trult had been a high ranking member of the Crimson Dawn and one did not fuck with the Dawn and live. Morto never found out how the 22's had been traced back to the theft, but a few nights later dozens of Crimson Dawn enforcers descended on the 22's warehouse and murdered them all. Only Morto and his recently acquired gang pal Neez had been able to escape. Neez reckoned the only people who the Dawn didn't freely fuck with were the Hutts so their plan was now to find the local Hutt, Ziro, and beg for protection in exchange for their services.

Ziro had, surprisingly, been receptive. He had heard of the young pilot from Sector 22 who had so shamed that worm Javik and was keen to have such a promising talent at his disposal for drug runs and other elicit jobs. So it was that for several years Javik and Neek did just that as members of Ziro's syndicate, The Black Sun. Having received their neck brands, they made a name for themselves amongst the syndicates fighting for control of Coruscant's underworld, and soon became Ziro the Hutt's favourite runners. By 19 both had their own custom Joben T-85's and could outrun the local law enforcement with practiced ease. Morto would run afoul of his ego, however, as after getting particularly drunk at a dive bar in Sector 43, he had his middle finger ripped off by a Crimson Dawn Gamorrean called Grundi. It had been fun to beat him at Correllian Spike, but in retrospect Morto knew he was lucky to still have his arm attached. Having escaped with his life, just, Morto had a bionic replacement fitted that he would only flip off to Gamorreans, particularly Grundi if they ever had the misfortune of crossing paths during a job.

All of the fun and danger would catch up to Morto, however, when he was around 23 standard. Ziro had asked him to deliver some unknown cargo to Sriluur. Naturally Morto and Neek jumped at the chance to go off-planet and Ziro had said this was a particularly important job as it was a peace offering to end the turf wars between the Black Sun and Crimson Dawn. Black Sun would provide transport and safe passage to the Hutt controlled world and the Crimson Dawn would provide a lucrative cargo. The job had been simple enough and the Crimson Dawn was providing security, headed by Morto's old friend Grundi. Whilst not thrilled to work with Gammorean, Ziro's orders had been clear. Make. It. Work.

This had been the plan until Neek had gotten curious about the cargo and discovered cryo pods disguised as shipping crates. These pods contained young children and teenagers that Black Sun was smuggling to go and work as slaves in the Hutt's copper mines. Apparently there was a shortage of manpower on the Hutt controlled planet. Neek told Morto and Morto wasn't entirely surprised. This WAS Black Sun after all. Neek, however, had picked this particular venture to grow a conscience. His younger brother had been sold into slavery and it clearly stuck in his exhaust. Despite Morto's warnings to let it go, his best friend and partner tried to activate a distress beacon to alert the local authorities and save the "cargo." Which he did. When they were caught in an interdiction field and Grundi found out why, Grundi split Neek in half with his axe and would have done the same to Morto, but for the timely intervention of the Imperial stormtroopers who promptly boarded and massacred everyone. Except for Morto, who had quickly dashed to the cargo hold in the confusion and placed himself in a spare cryo container. The Imperials had come to the rescue and even removed his Black Sun tattoo for him, leaving a lovely scar on his neck. From there he was pressed into service as a stormtrooper, which he promptly deserted at that first opportunity. Morto carefully crept about the outer rim, finding mercenary work where possible until stumbling upon an angry Bothan and rather rude protocol droid all under that command of an unusually green Duros. They needed a pilot and Morto needed credits - it was a perfect match.