Mark Stannum

Mark Anthony Stannum, also known as Echo 312, is the former leader and lone survivor of the CSA organization Echo Legion, prominent member of Alpha with long-time best friend Lucius Varner, and is considered an establishing member of the United Races of the Galaxy as the second Supreme Admiral of Human Military Operations and the second Human Representative to the URG. His notable accomplishments include becoming the first known member of humanity to successfully traverse universes, achieve the ability to use Raishin, as well as having a role in the early and late SHADE Conflicts, a primary role in the Alterverse's Tutorea Conquests, and a primary role in the CSA-URG War and leading participant in the War on Chaos.

Early Life
On March 12, 2356, Mark Anthony was born to parents Victoria and Matthew Stannum on the CSA world Olympia in its capital, Verne City. While his birth was nothing particularly special, Mark experienced an extremely fortunate childhood. His mother Victoria held a position at the University of Verne as Professor of Fusion Engineering, while his father Matthew worked as a CSA Military Psychologist. Between their two careers, the Stannum family was at the top of Verne's already fairly wealthy middle class.

As Mark grew up, he had no siblings yet grew quite close to his cousin Ryan Stannum, who was only two years older. The two frequently spent time together and went to school together, ultimately considering each other brothers more than cousins. As Mark grew, he developed a keen sense of humor and charismatic nature, easily being able to lead his peers to succeed, as well as maintaining impressive grades throughout school.

Along with Ryan, Mark became very close to Satie Nevim during his school career. A young love interest to Mark, he confided in Satie often and always wanted to take the next step to ask her out, but never could despite his charisma. On June 16, 2373, Mark planned to ask out Satie. Upon his arrival at her home, however, an Insurgent bomb exploded, trapping the two of them under an extensive amount of rubble. Satie Nevim died before the two were rescued, and Mark subsequently spent three weeks recovering from his injuries, though his mind was thoroughly tramautized.

Enlistment in CSA Military and Echo Legion
After Satie was killed by the Insurgency, Mark swore vengeance. Abandoning any future plans for education, he followed Ryan's footsteps and applied for the CSA Military. At age 17, he met the director of Echo Legion, Colonel William Tsu. While his older cousin chose to enter the Snow Bird super-soldier program, Mark instead joined the Echo Legion under Tsu. Only being 17, however, Mark first attended the CSA University of Battlefield Enrichment, a military education center in the Antaro system, roughly 126 light years from Olympia.

Once he had accumulated one full year of educaion in military strategy, as well as completing higher mathematics and physics courses, Mark Stannum entered training for the Echo Legion on board the CSA frigate Animus where he was given the callsign Echo 312. During his first few years in the Echo Legion, Mark participated in raids against the Insurgency, but on Christmas Day in 2375, the commander of the Legion, Echo 209, revealed himself to be corrupted by the Insurgency and attempted to force the crew of the Animus to surrender themselves and the Legion's top-secret technology to Insurgent forces. Despite being captured and outgunned on the Insurgent-held planet Ladle, Mark was able to convince the crew to stand up and take back the ship. They were successful, with the help of twenty Snow Birds that were immediately deployed (Ryan Stannum learned of their capture during his own undercover work and reported it) to secure the Legion's sensitive information. Mark was subsequently able to kill not only Echo 209, but several Insurgent leaders as well, including one Insurgent who had a minor role in the Olympian Bombings. After leaving the surface of Ladle, Stannum also made the controversial decision to unleash an Echo Legion superweapon that devastated the surface of Ladle--an action that was later covered up and explained as an Entente attack.

On New Years Day, 2376, Echo 312 was promoted to Commander of the Echo Legion. From here, he was now in the position to choose whichever missions and foes he wished to fight, so long as they were able to test their technology. For about another month, they continued to target Insurgency members, and then spent the next two years attempting to keep the CSA's borders safe from pirate raiders. Betweem 2378 and 2381, Commander Stannum chose to pursue the Entente, receiving honors for being one of the most successful Special Task Groups. In early July 2381, the Echo Legion received orders from CSA High Command about extremely important cargo that they were being trusted to transport from the Antaro system to Earth.