Borbala Ferank

Borbala Ferank is the former matriarch of the prominent Ferank family on Khar'shan. Theoretically "retired" from the criminal life, Borbala is one of the hundreds of batarians who signed up for the Andromeda Initiative's pitch to settle the eponymous galaxy. Ostensibly listed as a "former security officer" in the ship manifest, Borbala serves in the Sleepwalker Team-9 maintenance crew aboard the ark Keelah Si'yah, periodically reviving during the 600-year voyage to help monitor the cryopods and other systems aboard the vessel.

Background
Borbala's family was considered to be one of the greatest on Khar'shan, with extensive interests in illicit trade, red sand dealing, and the like. Practically born an aristocrat in a society that places inordinate importance on caste, she herself amassed such titles as the Queen of Smugglers or the Knife in the Dark. She was old but wiry, with a chartreuse complexion and red chin markings. A lifetime of assassination attempts, many of it from her own family, led her to acquiring an immunity to many poisons.

Members from other branches of her family tree included her grandfather, who used to chide Borbala for her obvious tics and tells whenever she lied. Her niece Gyula tried to kill her once by soaking her paintbrushes in Pauper's Pleasure, for the matriarch shorted her on a shipment of red sand and geth scrap. Gyula was put down the bottom of a swamp by Borbala's problematic youngest nephew Ignac, a knife nut who never liked girls, and was, incidentally, also put down the bottom of another swamp eventually by Borbala herself.

Borbala bore 17 offspring but killed some of them for one reason or another. Four of her children unceremoniously removed her from power, a fact she seems particularly impressed with. Her sons Erno, Kelemen, Tiborc, and Muz conspired to gouge out her lower right eye, dump her in a crate of nutrient paste, and trade the entire thing to quarians for a couple of old terminals and just one shoe to drive home their "attempt at humor".

Her sons turned on her because she actually left the family business and tried to convince other batarians to use their ships and manpower to spread their culture, and in order to do that they had to create some first - ignite a batarian renaissance of art, music, etc. Borbala herself was an avid painter, but her people did not take kindly to the suggestion of fewer guns and more songs, and wanted her eye for that.

Despite her financial accounts getting drained by her sons, Borbala managed to bounce back enough to smuggle items aboard Keelah Si'yah she thought would be extremely valuable in another galaxy: fish, for anyone nostalgic for a taste of home, and red sand.