[Beriadan] Neva {Starjammers}

Full Name
Neva
Codename or Alias
Calico Jack
Anonymity
Anonymous, as she is on a lot of Wanted Individuals lists across the Galaxy
Gender
Female.
Race
Unknown Humanoid Feline
Age
23
Place Of Birth
An unknown spaceport
Occupation/Status
Thief
Smuggler
Hacker
Charlatan
Rogue
Starjammer
Alignment
Chaotic Neutral
Factions
Starjammers
Canon Or Original?
Original
Powers/Abilities
Master Thief / Cat-Burglar
Neva is an incredible thief, gifted with the art of lock picking, pickpocketing, sleight of hand and slipping into places unseen
Expert Smuggler
Neva has been smuggling since she was young, and has a knack to avoiding authority, bypassing officials and sneaking in illicit goods to whatever port she focuses her attention on
Expert Con Artist
Neva has a serious gift for trickery and underhanded tactics aimed at parting people with their money. She knows how to manipulate a deck of cards, using sleight of hand to distract and fool folks at dice, and how to trick anyone into parting with their money if they foolishly enter a game of chance with her
Expert Escape Artist
Neva can escape pretty much any bonds or cell that she likes. There's not a lot that can hold her, whether it be chains or prison. Neva has plenty of techniques to allow her to slip free from the grasp of authorities or enemies
Expert Tinkerer
Neva has a compulsion with tinkering and playing with objects. She can take apart and put back together simple mechanical objects, and can figure out how more complex systems and items work. Most electronic equipment is almost putty in her hands, allowing her to hack into software quickly or disable electronically wired systems without much hesitation. Neva also creates her own gadgets, a variety of items that can hinder opponents and allow her to escape from danger easily
Expert Tactician
Neva had a talent for scoping out a scenario and finding the best way to handle it. She has a keen perception for then location of both enemies, friends and every possible escape route, and can then put that into practice with swift reactions and definite tactics. Neva won't go into a situation without first analysing it, and won't go in against the odds unless it really calls for her to do so
Expert Hand-to-hand Fighter
Neva has spent her life fighting with bare knuckles and savage unarmed attacks. While she isn't the strongest individual, she is fast, feral and vicious. Neva fights with tooth and claw, most of the time looking to incapacitate or distract an enemy enough to escape. Her sharp natural weapons can find weakness and relentlessly pursue them, forcing an opponent to go defensive unless they want to end up blinded
Adept Marksman
Neva knows how to handle firearms, ranging from pistols to rifles. While she doesn't like to use them often, she will revert to them in a pinch if needed, and is no slouch when it comes to hitting a target
Adept Pilot
Neva has been flying ships for a long time, and has also been in further training while part of the Starjammers While she is no ace pilot, she can handle a vehicle deftly enough, maneuvering small to medium sized ships in fairly simple routes across space, as well as flying then in a planet's low orbit without sweating it
Feline Physiology
Neva shares a lot of traits with the felidae genus of Earth (though she has never been to Earth, nor met a cat to know this). These include cat ears, sharp teeth and a long, furry tail that swishes when she is annoyed. Neva also purrs when she is content, and her hair seems to bristle and puff out whenever she is annoyed

Weapons/Items
Teeth and Claws
Neva's go-to are a set of sharp teeth and vicious claws. She can bite and slash her way through many protective materials, relying on her body's natural defences if she is ever put into a corner without escape. She often prefers to use her claws over actual weapons as they are easy to hide when retracted and quick to enter the fray when needed
Thief's Tools
As well as her claws, Neva carries a satchel filled with tools of the trade, from the high tech to the devilishly simple. She carries a Scanner, a device like a hand-sized computer which can interfer or communicate with electronic software, allowing her to attempt hacking into systems more complex than simple mechanical locks or passcodes. Neva has several pouches that are empty but can be easily filled with physical loot and attached to her person. She has a pouch of ball bearings and caltrops to scatter behind her as she runs, and a length of simple fuse rope, as well as a box of flint and tinder. Sometimes it is the simple items that make a good thief into a great thief
Gadgets
Neva collects and creates gadgets in her spare time which she thinks can put to good use


Appearance

Image

Physical Appearance
Neva is a short, skinny girl, with pale unblemished skin smattered with freckles across her face, back and shoulders. While lean, Neva has a fair amount of tight muscle beneath her skin, aiding her in her acrobatic skill.

Neva's hair is a wild affair, a great thick mane that falls heavily around her neck and dances about her shoulders. It is a mousy brown in colour, straight as an arrow and like running one's hand through a bush of coarse heather.

Neva has cat-like ears, darker than the rest of her hair with deep red interiors. They swivel and twitch independently of one another, and often convey her true mood when she doesn't speak of it herself. She has a bushy tail as well, tipped with an inky black. Like her ears, Neva's tail swishes and wags with her true feelings, something that close friends and allies can use to determine when they need to back off and give her space.

Neva's eyes are heterochromatic, one an electric blue and the other a vivid yellow. They have slit pupils, which allow her to see in the dark. Neva has thick lashes which sweep out in wings from both eyes, and highlight the colour of her irises with dark lines both above and below. She has thick eyebrows as well, which can be fairly expressive when she wants them to be.

Neva has petite features otherwise. Her nose is soft and short, peppered with freckles across the bridge. Her mouth isn't very wide, though filled with sharp teeth behind her lips. Her jawline is smooth, ending in a round chin. Neva has a fairly short, slender neck.
Clothing and Armor
Neva usually wears whatever she can find. Such is her sense of scavenging that she often just grabs whatever comes to hand, or cobbles together outfits with more usefulness in mind over fashion. There isn't anything she won't wear, up to and including her crewmate'a unattended gear.

Neva has a uniform, of sorts, that she wears as part of the Starjammers. A red body jumpsuit that covers her torso, ending half way down her thighs and leaving her shoulders, upper chest and arms bare. Merged into this is a black armour piece that covers her entire right arm down to her hands, ending in fingerless gloves, and a mantle that covers her upper shoulders and neck while leaving a window of skin in the centre of her chest. Her other hand has a similar fingerless glove, though only covering up to the middle of her lower arms. Neva wears armoured boots that cover just over the knee, leaving her toes and the soles of her feet (and her retractable claws) free. Framing her face is a red guard that covers her forehead and sweeps down both sides to reach the top of her jawline. This helmet contains a visor that materialises at the press of a button, creating a space-friendly helmet to allow Neva to survive in the inky void.

Personality

Sexual Orientation
Homosexual
General Personality
Neva is a complicated individual, with a fickle temperament and a jarring personality. On the outside she is a sarcastic, slightly mean, kind of arrogant and partially cold, with a pinch of ego and a dry edge to her humour. Neva might come across uncaring to other people, and maybe a bit lazy or blasé about life, with a kind of hard streak that doesn't welcome others into warming up to her.

Yet what it comes down to is a wariness to get close to anyone. Neva has faced plenty of trauma and loss over her life, and takes a while to warm up to anyone. Even among the Starjammers, Neva has yet to come entirely out of her shell. It is perhaps an unintentional armour that she puts up around herself, though as time goes on, Neva becomes more open and friendly, in a sarcastic, mean kind of way. People who know how she speaks can understand when she is trying to be friendly, and when she is actually annoyed at someone.

Neva is a terrifically loyal person. Her friends would find her dying for them, even against her natural instinct to stay out of danger or trouble. For those who have been genuinely kind and selfless with her, Neva dedicates her life to making sure they get the best of her. She is an invaluable person to have on side, but a dangerous enemy to make. Neva holds a grudge, and holds on tight. She is not above taking petty revenge on minor dismeanours, and finds pleasure in making those who make her or her friends miserable even more miserable.

Neva is highly cautious, perceptive and mindful. She won't intentionally walk into a situation without first knowing how many others there are, how many have ill intentions towards her, where the escape routes are and whether it's really necessary for her to be there. She keeps her proverbial nine lives close, as she has already burnt through nearly half of them. Neva is careful with her own mortality. She will, however, disregard this if there is danger to a friend, or to a true innocent at the hands of someone nefarious. At heart, she is a good person, but layered with prudents that makes her come across as cold and uncaring.

Neva might come across as lazy and apathetic, but really she just doesn't waste any energy where it isn't necessary. Give her a job and she will do it to the letter, but will make sure that she doesn't exert any extra time or effort into doing it. Neva doesn't cut corners, persay, but definitely verges on the side of breaking rules in order to get the job done. She likes being busy, but hates spending more time on something than she really needs to. Napping and lazing around is also nice.

Face/Voice
Tenkou (cosplayer)

Anything Else

Character's History

Siblings
Fourteen others in her litter. No further details known
Mother
Unknown
Father
Unknown
Other Family

History
On a rough spaceport in a cold alley by a surging sewer beneath a pitch-black roof was the start and end of a normal life. Fifteen small mewling kittens, tiny Catkind babes that had only just entered this uncaring and cruel world slowly crawled around the inside of a dark sack. Whatever had led them to this point, whoever their mother may have been or what motives the individual who gripped the sack so tightly had, it was all unknown to these poor blind souls.

There was a splash, drowned out by the noise of the sewer river, by the sounds of the spaceport, and all was wet, cold, as black as if they hadn't left their mother hours before. The sack wasn't waterproof, and the bricks within it made sure there was no chance of escape. The kittens sank like stones.

It wasn't all over. One kitten survived as something swam fast against the current, alerted to the strange object. While it's siblings didn't survive the callous act, this one tiny creature did. Luck, perhaps, was on its side.

It had been saved by a group of creatures who called the sewers of this particular spaceport home. They raised who became to be known as Neva as if she was their own. While they were obviously not related by blood, these creatures were her family. The matriarch raised her with her brood, teaching her about being quiet, sticking to shadows and scavenging for food and materials that were needed to survive.

Yet it seemed like Neva was not going to have an easy life. When she was barely five, the sewers were flushed, cleansed by fire and water to eradicate the pests that lives within. For the second time in her life, Neva was the only one to survive an attempt on her life. She escaped into the ship yard, where she stowed aboard the first vessel she could hide on, and left into the Galaxy to try and survive.

Neva went from spaceports to planets, scavenging what she could and becoming a hardy, independent individual. She was a loner, not wanting to open herself up to new people after the loss of her friends and family (twice, though the first time was no more than a painful feeling within her heart). Soon she began to steal credits, trying to get enough money to buy a ship of her own.

When she was ten, Neva succeeded. It wasn't a good ship, slow and clunky, but it has character and a hold that could store plenty of goods. She started small, scavenging material to sell across different ports, but it was slow going. So she started trading a bit more illicit goods. Smuggling came naturally, and she spent time and effort making her ship faster, more covert and with plenty of hidden places for goods that were not allowed under Galactic trading laws.

Neva made a name for herself in the underworld. She was known to get the job done, smuggling anything as long as it paid well. She took on other roles, as being a thief was like second nature to her. Soon, Neva found herself on many wanted posters and sought after by many ports, governments and private bodies.

It didn't take long for her to be caught, her ship taken and for her to be thrown in prison. Yet for Neva it felt like child's play to escape, and she was piloting a prison vessel only a day later. This time she was determined to become harder to catch. Between the age of sixteen and nineteen, Neva was thrown in prison six times, and escaped every time.

Despite her luck, it left her in a poor position. She had no ship, no money. Her talents were useless if she was known to most lawmen and spaceports that she wanted to visit. So what could she do? It turned out, quite a bit. Neva found her way into no less than two dozen prisons and official security headquarters. For a cat burglar like her, it was easy, and she wasn't aiming for the obvious. She was heading to the record databases.

Using a handful of hand-made magnetic EMP devices, hacking tools and at one place a simple lump hammer, Neva reduced the amount of organisations hunting her to a mere handful. That, she could manage, but she had to be careful going forward. It was from this that she adopted a pseudonym that would be her moniker for crime. Calico Jack was born.

It was a hard, lonely world. Neva found herself yearning company after decades of solitude, smuggling on her own and solitary confinement. So when she landed in a rough spaceport with cold alleys and surging sewage systems under a pitch-black roof, she found the end and the start of her abnormal life.

The Starjammers, lead by the charismatic Captain Corsair, were recruiting. Or, at least, they were loud enough for Neva to overhear that they needed someone with light fingers and a knack for breaking into places. Or, at least, they inferred it. Whether or not she was invited, Neva was on the ship before anyone noticed, and it wasn't until they were deep in space that she made herself known.

There was shock, anger at first, but the Captain saw the talent that she possessed, and others had heard her alias in criminal circles, and what she had accomplished. It wasn't unanimous, but Neva found herself as a new recruit aboard the Starjammer's vessel.

A few years passed. Neva had a family, friends she trusted. She wasn't alone, and didn't have to watch her own back for fear of being attacked or arrested. She was, in fact, perhaps for the first time in her life, thoroughly content with her lot. Neva was ready to take on the Galaxy with the Starjammer's at her side.


Role Play Sample

The cries and howls of indignation were left in Neva's dust as her bare feet hit the ground running. The box was tucked under one arm, her other clenched hard into a fist. She was grinning, eyes wide and alert as she skidded around a corner, trying to figure out the quickest route to the docks. The spaceport was on high alert, but Neva was faster than they were.

She slid under a closing blast door, finding herself along a high open balcony. Below was her ship, a squat beast. A good drop, but she didn't think it was beyond her. Shouts came from both ends of her perch, and she froze. Guards were spilling out onto the causeway, weapons raised.

"Calico! Hands up!"

She slowly placed the box between her feet, looking left and right. Smirking. It had started as a simple smuggling operation, but this had turned into a full-scale heist. She didn't blame herself for what had gone down, but she had to sort it out.

"Alright, no sudden moved!"

Her hands were raised, one clenched tight. The closest guard noticed, perhaps too late, as she moved an object between her fingers, and flicked it with a simple, dangerous movement. It struck the wall and exploded in a flash of incredible light. Eyes closed, Neva laughed, crossed her arms over her chest and fell backwards off the balcony. The box went with her, gripped between her feet.

Neva twisted as she fell, grabbing the box in one hand and landing expertly on three limbs. She rose, diving towards cover as the guards who hadn't been blinded began to shout. Swiftly she danced across the dock, swung herself into her ship's hold and slammed her hand down on the ignition.

Blasts bounced off of the scarred hull as it rose. Neva waved at the array of guards who were trying to make their way down. A ship behind her was starting, but a small device that she had planted on it in passing detonated, a small EMP device that sent it back to the floor with a heavy crunch. She laughed and laughed as the ship shot off into space, clutching the box still in one hand, and connected her radio to the station's frequency.

"Try and catch me, arseholes! Calico's beat you again!"

She grinned, punching her rustbucket into high gear and screaming off into space, leaving behind a trail of destruction in her wake.

Overall, a successful mission.