Name: Selena Wodan Chilver
Nickname/Alias/Etc: Tally (short for Tallymark).
Gender: Female
Age: 19
Height: 5'8
Weight: 150 lbs
Status:
Appearance
Hair Color: Platinum blonde or a dark hazel. Yeah, I'll get to it later.
Eye Color: Brown.
Ethnicity: She is 1/4th Greek, 1/4th Italian, and 1/2 Cherokee.
Physical Appearance:
To address the immediate question-how the hell is someone of Selena's lineage platinum blonde-I will address that later.
Selena's a visibly tough girl. She's pretty, but tough. Consider a whitewater river, coursing with too much force to possibly try and raft down. Or a mother bear eviscerating the dumbass tourist who wanted a picture of her cub. This is Selena. Magnificent to behold, terrifying to be held by. She's in excellent shape-she's not bulky enough to be a bodybuilder but not thin enough to be a runner. Selena's athletic, and while she's not butch or masculine, she has a firm physique and some visible muscle. She moves calmly and with focus-as strange as that may sound, it aptly describes her. She walks with the poise of someone who's entirely relaxed but ready for what's coming-as if she's expecting trouble to come her way, but not necessarily afraid of it. Selena tends to move in a way that may be considered self-assured or arrogant-she's fond of holding eye contact when she speaks, and her general posture and mannerisms almost seem to subtly suggest she considers herself to be dominant or superior. Selena has a nice smile, but she doesn't show it off very frequently-she prefers a faint grin, just a notch or two above absolute calm. Selena's hands are callused, with a fair amount of faint scars and nicks on her knuckles and one or two on her arms. She's not one to use much makeup, and has a fair amount of natural beauty-if she put a bit of work towards it, she could be gorgeous, but as is, she's a diamond that's still in the rough. Her face is heart shaped, with a small round chin and slightly higher, slightly prominent cheekbones. Her skin tone is a blend of a Mediterranean olive tone, the more reddish complexion of her Cherokee heritage, and the tan of many an hour spent outside. Suffice to say she sunburns very rarely. Her eyebrows are angled a bit sharply and thin, a dark color (that lightens slightly, in sync with her hair, but not very much). Her eyes are a warm brown and seem to have a few speckles of green. Her forehead is average sized, perhaps a bit small. Her mouth is a little small but her lips are full, a light pink.
Selena's voice is a bit breathy, a tiny bit raspy-nothing so severe as "I used to be a smoker" commercials, but she doesn't have the higher pitches that most girls have. It's nothing close to butch or gruff, but she's a few notes lower than most of her teenage girl compatriots. She's also not one to laugh often-you'll normally get a bemused grin out of her, or perhaps a chuckle. When she does laugh all the way, it's an uncontrollable belly laugh, a very unladylike guffaw. Her anger, however, is far more quick to surface. Well, perhaps anger isn't the right word-she gets a fire in her eyes and her posture shifts-chin juts out a bit, the same grin a shark gives a slow fish appears on her lips, and she normally goes through a handful of routine tics. Her fingers dance and curl up into fists then relax a few times. She rolls her wrists around. Trigger fingers twitch. Casually stretching out the hamstrings for a sprint.
Her hair is also interesting-it's in sync with the phases of the moon. At a new moon, her hair is dark hazel. The closer it gets to being full, the lighter it turns, becoming platinum blonde and then glowing a faint silver during the nights of a full moon-after which it begins to dim back to brown. The cycle repeats. Her hair is about shoulder length and she has several dreadlocks-neat, well-maintained ones, not like nappy fat ones. When hunting or doing physical activities she normally pins it back in a ponytail to keep it clear and out of the way.
Attire:
Selena dresses pragmatically. She's more used to colder, woodsy environments, so she prefers utility and durability over fashion. You can normally count on several shirts for layering, normally earth tones. She's fond of camouflage jackets or a rugged, leather/shearling coat. Jeans or khaki-style jeans tucked into scuffed and scarred boots normally do the trick. She likes comfy wool socks and this nice leather belt she got for Christmas a couple of years back-it's etched out with a lot of different scenes you can't really see without an up-close look, and if you did that, Selena would probably slap you for sticking your face in her lady area. Tsk tsk. A little class goes a long way, friend.
Personality
Outward & Innate Personality:
Selena is a huntress. This encompasses all aspects of her psyche-she is honorable, competitive, territorial, fierce, assertive, and reliable. Selena is by no means a bad person-she is a little lacking in social graces, which can often convey the impression of her being a bitch, and her difficulty in walking away from a challenge tends to make enemies, but she's not malicious. She's had her fair share of misinterpreted comments, and her lack of fashion sense can often cause her to butt heads with those who are more socially aware/stylistically inclined. Selena's somewhat judgmental-rather harshly, she doesn't tend to forgive easily, and someone who acts like a douche or lies very rarely regains any sort of respect in her eyes. She has burned a fair amount of bridges in the past this way.
Selena's competitive, as mentioned before. Proud, Selena enjoys friendly competition and especially winning. However, that being said, honor is another component of her personality-she is not only a terrible liar, she's averse to it. To Selena, there is no joy in cheating to secure a victory or lying to secure a happiness. Selena's abruptness and upfrontness often lead her to not understanding the nuances of social scenarios or the intricacies of situations-she can very easily miss subtleties that extroverts notice with no effort at all. Her pride and honor often make her squirm when forced to be quiet about something-Selena's never one to back down from a challenge, and often has trouble picking her battles. She has trouble allowing short-term losses for long-term successes.
Selena's an outdoorsy sort. She loves nature in any form-rock climbing, hiking, hunting, swimming, boating, mountain biking. The wild calls to her, and she can only tolerate being stuck inside a classroom or building for so long. Her eyes wander, and she always sits next to the window, always finds the balcony or way to the roof of a building first. Not to say Selena doesn't have a more mellow side to her-secretly, she has a few passions that she's rather embarassed to be public about. She's pretty good with yarn and enjoys making scarves and whatnot. Selena also likes to write poetry, as well as do sketches. She also loves bubble baths but will never admit this to anyone, under pain of death.
Selena's rather harsh on herself. Ambitious and headstrong, she has trouble admitting when she's gotten herself in too deep and isn't one to ask for help very often. She detests apologizing as well, even when she knows she's wrong. However, her desire to set things right normally outweighs her shame. Selena can more readily admit when she's been beaten-while she doesn't like losing, she has a very healthy respect for competition and her rivals (whom, oftentimes, don't realize they are her rivals). Selena's also somewhat hindered in the romance department-she understands fighting and competing and all but is at a total loss with flirting. Watching Selena try to flirt in comparison to her running a race or hunting something is almost hysterical-she's got no clue what she's doing and not very sure how to act on it. There are usually two extremes with this-Selena is hilariously. She often winds up "friendzoning" herself, and her physical prowess and competitive nature tend to scare off most guys. She can be rather lonely, and yearns for friendship and relationships more than she lets on.
She also gets stage fright.
Hobbies/Interests: Anything outdoors. Hunting, fishing, falconry, whittling, sketches, poetry. She likes hiking and wandering around exploring places. Any form of physical activities. Challenges and competitions.
Skills/Talents: She's an excellent huntress. Selena is a skilled tracker and pretty adept at most wildernessy, survivaly activities. Most people who know her think of her whenever that "who would you want to be stuck on a desert island with" question comes around. She's very good at moving about quietly and camouflaging herself. Selena's a skilled markswoman, whether with a long rifle or bow (she's not quite as good with handguns). She has no martial arts training, but has been in a few scuffles and knows how to handle herself in a fight. Selena's also quite good with animals, and able to sniff out a liar fairly easily. She's in excellent condition physically and has a high pain threshold.
Prized Possession: Selena's not a materialistic person, overall. However, she has a small retinue of items that she treasures dearly. These include her leather coat I mentioned earlier, her bow, her boots, and her knife. She loves her
motorcycle Also, her teddy bear. Shhh.
Quote(s): (Selena clamps her hand over your mouth as you ask for a quote and points at a nightingale that just fluttered down and landed nearby. She forgets about you and watches it curiously for a little while.)
History/Bio:
Selena's mother left at an early age-her childhood was spent in-between her uncle who lived in Wyoming and her father, who lived in North Carolina. Her father's work on an oil rig kept him away for a month or two at a time. As an only child, Selena never had much in the way of a strong female figure in her life, and as such had to learn a few lessons about femininity-more basic ones such as bra shopping and periods and more complex ones such as how to deal with guys and not hate oneself more or less on her own. She had a varying degree of success with all of these, and her negligible fashion sense is also a result of her upbringing. Suffice to say Dad wears crocs and socks.
She, however, did have a few male cousins with whom she spent a fair amount of time. As such, Selena spent most of her time doing the sorts of boyish hobbies most girls her age got too involved in-and her ability to keep pace with her cousins physically kept things interesting. The events of her mother's absence were never really delved into-however, secretly, childishly, Selena always clung onto the idea that she was the daughter of the old goddess Artemis, that the little fairy tale a denial-ridden dad had told her about how her mother was waiting for her up in the night sky was true. Selena still fancies this idea but would never, ever, EVER admit it to anyone. She, underneath the gruffness she developed to deal with the cousins who treated her as a little sister (complete with pranking and constant teasing), had a pretty big hole in her heart, and never really moved past it.
In school, Selena was an average student. She liked certain stuff but wasn't really phenomenal at anything. She wanted to be a veterinarian-Selena, stemming from her time spent outdoors, loved animals, but figured she didn't have good enough grades for it. Her life was fairly uneventful otherwise-she had no major disasters, no unforeseen trauma.
Family: Uncle, cousins, dad.
Relationships
Relationships: (Basically a section where you put your character's thoughts on the other ones they've encountered. You can also talk to other people and decide what your characters relations will be.)
[Character name] | [Impression (Good/Bad/Neutral]] | [Relationship (Friend, Rival, Crush, etc)] | [Character's thoughts [EX: I think Bob is quite the amiable fellow, has a great head on his shoulders, but is kinda daft]] |
Abilities
Power Class: Other
Power:
Super-System
The Huntress Selena has an innate predator's drive. This is nothing so cruel as, say, the Dresdenverse's mantle of the Winter Knight, but she has an edge for bloodlust and passion. Selena, I should clarify, is not bloodthirsty, feels no senseless cruelty. However, she's got a rush she only feels when she's stalking her prey, when she's lunging in for the kill-in whatever form that may take. She feels the same rush at winning a race, at killing a deer, at beating someone in wrestling-at securing her position as apex, queen of the jungle. To this end, her body is more capable than the average person. Her strength, speed, endurance, reflexes, and senses are all enhanced-particularly the latter two. She is not able to pick up cars or sprint like the Flash-however, if she continues to develop, she could easily be an Olympic athlete (in several categories) later on in life. She's able to, by more fully embracing her predatorial, instinctual side, become more powerful, however in doing so her rational thought and levelheadedness begins to ebb. This is by no means permanent, but if she moves and operates fully on instinct, she becomes a force to be reckoned with. Her senses make her a keen hunter-she is able to track scents, move near-silently, and function without much impairment at night. Her abilities are more powerful as the moon is fuller. Additionally, she can camouflage herself rather easily-this applies to muffling her scent, noise, and presence as much as it does her appearance.
Queen of the Wild Hunt. For centuries, legends have existed of the Wild Hunt, a cavalcade of beasts and hunters that stormed the skies of Europe and took prey wherever they so desired. Now giving Selena this kind of power would be ridiculously OP, but she does hold sway over wild beasts. She cannot directly control animals, but they are more inclined to obey her-particularly predators (prey animals are mostly scared by her presence). She doesn't have to fear being attacked by wild animals and can normally communicate with them to a crude extent. She's also able to sense disturbances in nature around her, and has a natural gauge for life around her. This effect is more pronounced when she's outdoors, or in the wilderness-in a concrete building,it's greatly muffled. She's also got an edge against any animal-based metahumans-as Queen of the Wild Hunt, their abilities are not as effective against her, and a natural fear and reverence (usually subconscious, something they can't put their finger/claw on but can't ignore) is present there. This is not to say that she is immune to them-however, they may have more trouble picking up on her scent, may be more shaken by her threats, more wounded by her attacks, etc.
The Daughter of Artemis. Legendary markswoman that she was, Selena is an excellent markswoman. This applies to rifles and bows mostly-she's got very little with pistols (unless they're scoped, but who does that). This is nothing really supernatural-she can't, for instance, hit a fly with an arrow or anything ridiculous. However, she is a peerless shot, especially with a bow. As the moon grows more full, her skill increases. Her arrows are capable of dealing slightly disproportionate damage-especially during the full moon, they gain an armor-piercing quality that tends to cut through most supernatural defenses. During the new moon, they still pack a punch, but aren't quite as damaging.
Actaeon's Hound. According to myth, Artemis was gifted by the god of nature, Pan, with the seven finest hunting hounds in all the world. During the full moon, Selena is capable of giving in entirely to her predator's side and transforming into a wolf. While in wolf form, she's not capable of much but instinct-based action. She can't transform back until the moon's light has left the sky-this, predictably, can leave her in a somewhat vulnerable state if she's up against enemies who have any modicum of intelligence. If she embraces the Wild Hunt/transforms into the wolf, prey will flee before her. It doesn't really do much but it's funny as hell to watch.
Weaknesses/Limitations/Drawbacks:
First and foremost, the moon. While the moon is new, during the day, she's more or less your average human, albeit in great shape and with a considerable amount of training (in the form of many years spent hunting). Direct daylight hampers her abilities somewhat, and she's not quite as sharp. Her ability favors the long, drawn-out nature of a slow hunt-stalking her prey for weeks until the opportune moment to strike.
Her ability also plays a lot with predatorial instincts, and to what extent it affects her. Her territorial/aggressive nature is passively affected by this. The more she draws upon her powers, the more Selena slips into that mindset. If she's drawing upon her powers fully, she'll be fully obsessed with the hunt, with the kill, with catching her prey. Predators' eyes are focused in the center, on the prey before them. Selena can be lured into traps, outmaneuvered, and defeated more easily when she develops this tunnel vision. She also becomes more aggressive and willing to take risks, as well as more...base? Challenges will not go unanswered, and threats will not be taken lightly. These can be turned against her easily. Primal desires are more prominent over complex ones.
She is, innately, the Queen of the Wild Hunt. Whenever she is bested, however, this mantle may briefly flicker to another individual. If Selena's let her predator side take over while fighting, then she may have difficulty shaking it-establishing your status as a predator above her may result in Selena acknowledging defeat and falling into the pack underneath the new alpha until she regains her senses.
Selena's also prone to suffering the fallout of her actions. If she pushes herself too far, she can deal with anything from soreness to torn ligaments as a result of her overexertion. She prefers the slow, drawn-out hunt-exhausting her prey and then lunging in for the kill when it's weak. In an outright battle, head-on, she runs the risk of tiring herself out. Predators don't normally like confrontations where they don't have the advantage-if the tables turn, Selena may leave to lick her wounds and return another day rather than risk being bested. Her pride, however, can interfere with this.
Additionally, her powers leave her more prone to psychic attacks than most others would be. She's also, as a result of her inexperience in the romance department, a little more easily swayed by infatuation based powers or emotional powers than most others would be. Selena has a weakness to solar-based powers as well, and is not as potent within very urbanized areas.
The smell and taste of blood will also cause Selena to become somewhat riled up. In large quantities, it can trigger her more predatorial side to take over, and cause needlessly aggressive actions and reckless decisions. Think a shark near a bloodied fish. She generally prefers long-range, relatively clean kills to avoid this. Curiously, if the creature is dead-or the hunt over-this effect isn't anywhere near as strong. She can skin and clean her game with minimal adverse effects, but if she's wounded it? Its blood calls to her, an irresistible trail on the ground as it flees from her, beckoning to be bested, to be slain...
The wolf thing is meant to be a one time gig. She's never done it before and is totally unaware that she can. Her active resistance to fully "going over" and the fact she'd be completely drained for the next day or two means it's not something she can do frequently at all-it's an ultimate last resort tactic.
Other:
Writing Sample:
Selena was quiet, which was in and of itself unsurprising. She was, more alarmingly, in suburbia. Humming softly to herself, she brushed some of her hair back behind an ear and scanned her nearby surroundings. Nope. Not here.
"C'mere, Chaser," she called, her voice warm but with an authoritative undertone-perhaps it was something people would've missed, but a squirrel scampering across a branch stopped and glanced over its shoulder at her before squeaking and running away. She chuckled softly, continuing her pursuit. It was a pretty windy day, which was making this whole ordeal somewhat more difficult-she couldn't try and track down the pup without eau de soccer mom's trashcan flooding her senses. Selena was promptly reminded of why she avoided cookie-cutter neighborhoods, just on general principle. She also didn't have her bow with her, which was...annoying. A part of her felt almost naked-well, metaphorically naked. Selena wasn't quite as bothered by being naked as other people were. Not to say she stripped frequently, or enjoyed being naked around others-but alone, sunbathing or something, it wasn't really an annoyance to her. Felt normal. Felt natural. And not having her bow felt like not having her right hand. Or maybe her finger.
The dilemma of what body part best constituted her bow distracted Selena for a few dozen houses until she broke out of her reverie. Right. Lost dog. Important matters at hand. She whistled again, sharp and fast. "Here, Chaser. I don't have all damn day, Chaser." Selena continued down the road, boots echoing softly against the pavement. With a teensy bit of effort, she could've walked very quietly-however, it was trickier to do on concrete, and she wasn't really worried about anyways. Selena yawned softly and shivered under her jacket. Should've worn another layer or two, which is what she'd normally do, but of course she had to get dragged out to look for a stupid lost dog, who of course had to be dumb enough to...
Selena stopped cold, almost comically so-her foot froze a few inches from touching the ground and she perked up, nose twitching softly, eyes darting around. She cocked her head ever so slightly, and a grin pulled at her lips. "Ah, I know where you are." Selena wheeled around ninety degrees, casually resuming her stride as she approached a six foot high wooden fence. With a two-step running start and grunt, she lunged up and clasped onto the top of the fence, pushing off with her feet and clambering to the top, where she perched for a moment as she looked around again. Another long breath in and slow sigh out. Selena dropped down into the woods behind the neighborhood, immediately feeling more at ease. Subconsciously, she landed in the spot devoid of any fallen leaves, and as she stood back up, her joints did not crackle and pop to betray her presence, her breath seemed to mist a little more transparently. The birdsong was louder. The smells on the breeze more prominent. Selena walked through the woods, hands in her pockets as she followed the faint odor she could just barely pick up.
After a little ways walking, she froze once again-not for any particular reason, but rather for the sudden, overwhelming urge that she should-Selena's eyes flickered down and she saw why. A silent curse escaped her lips-
Stupid, Selena, real stupid. Shoulda been paying attention, those boots aren't snakeproof.. Selena stayed motionless, glaring at the rattlesnake coiled beneath her. "Too cold for you to be out anyway. Go. Get."
It stayed still for a moment, quivering.
Selena snarled, her eyes boring down into the serpent. She put her foot down, not three inches from it. Its tail danced back and forth, rattling softly. "I. Said. Go." Selena growled, standing at her full height. There was a faint thud-thud in the back of her skull, and she felt her fingers begin to dance with anticipation. She didn't have her knife with her, just a little pocket knife in her pocket. That'd be four, five seconds to wrestle it out and flip it into place. Then another one to dive down. She'd stomp the son of a bitch and cut off his head.
There was a second or two of standoff and the snake hissed, recoiling back and slithering away. Selena watched it go for a minute then shook her head. "Cheeky little bastard." Undeterred, she continued a short ways on to find the puppy, yelping softly. It was stuck in a briar patch, wriggling to get free and only further worsening its conditions. It reminded Selena vaguely of American politics. "Hush. Hold still." The puppy, far too young to have been trained, did as it was commanded, and Selena knelt down a foot or so from the briars, scanning for a way to get the stupid thing out of there. She glanced up at the sky.
"You. You're lucky you're cute, Chaser." Selena began to take off her jacket and shirt, feeling a rush of goosebumps as she lay her clothes down on the frozen ground. Down to her tanktop. It'd take too long to cut through them with her pocket knife, dull and small as it was, and beyond that, the sun was going down. As many open wounds as the little mutt had, he probably wouldn't do too well out in the cold. So, that left the more unsavory solution. At least her clothes wouldn't get torn up. Biting down (perhaps, had she delved into her more predatory side, she could've shrugged off the pain and the cold entirely, but Selena preferred to avoid that whenever it wasn't necessary) hard, she shoved her hands through the briar patch, pulling the dog free (and holding it still with a visegrip) of the many branches it'd latched itself onto. Then, she guarded it as best she could and slowly began to work it back out, finally getting the puppy free. It yelped and rolled around on the ground, shaking furiously.
"I'm not giving you a bath, that's up to Melissa," Selena muttered, standing up. Bah. Blood was oozing down her arms in a couple of places and she'd have a couple of nasty scrapes, but Selena had tussled with briars before. Nothing that would scar, at any rate. Cursing to ease the pain, she took her jacket and shirts and bundled the puppy up, pressing him up against her chest. A shiver ran down her spine, and Selena took a deep breath, closing her eyes and listening for her heartbeat, the sound of the wind on the leaves. The pain receded a bit-the edge of the cold was dulled. She opened her eyes, shaped just a bit more like slits than they should've been. "Alright, Chase," Selena muttered, half-hoping they'd chance across that snake again. "Let's get you home."