The ride to Miami wasn't the most plenty experience. Any other day he'd hold a conversation, see how Quinn and Claudette have been and if there was anything new in their lives, but he wasn't in the mood for that. It seemed like no one else was either. The car was uncomfortable to say the least. He couldn't stretch out like he needed to for his leg. He was lucky that he had the backseat to himself, so he made do with what he had. That included not having his seat belt on and leaning against the door. He slouched down, so he didn't hit his head on the roof. His only saving grace was that he'd lost some weight in the last week. It wasn't as tight of a fit as it could've been.
"I'm doing okay, Sin. Thank you. I'm content to stay back here. Being in the front would be worse for my leg."
They pulled into a gas station and parked. He hoped this meant they were almost there. A four ride in the back of a small car was hell on his joints. Before Claudette got out the car he handed her five dollars.
"Could you get me two bags of gummy worms, please?"
It took him a minute to get out the car. He leaned forward to the opposite door, opened it, grabbed his crutches, and scooted out the car legs first. He didn't need anything from the store, but he did want to stretch out. He hobbled to the hood of Quinn's car and sat on it, legs stretched out in front of him. He did arm stretches, bent his back, he felt it pop, and shook out his normal leg. He hoped they stayed for at least fifteen minutes. He didn't want to get back on the road too soon.
Preferred Pronouns: Doesn't matter. He/She/They will respond to either.
Affiliation:
The Green River Snakes are a matriarchal run child trafficking ring that started in Vietnam in 2011 and has kept the organization in the family, since the first Snake Lady, Dan Thi My. The organization left Vietnam in 2025, taking a chance on booming growth of New Malacca and is currently run by Snake Lady Akanishi Miho. The Snakes have control of Shin Ryushu Docking from alliances and later marriage into a prominent yakuza family, making it easy to export and import children without anyone asking too many questions. Once the children are processed and chipped with a tracker at level one they are given a new name. Usually one that's generic, because the name doesn't matter until they earn the respect with the Snakes to change their name.
They're very secretive about how they're run. There's rumors about what goes on in the organization, but no one knows for sure. They run on a strict take it to the grave policy. Anyone that's caught saying too much, or ages out/out lives their usefulness will die. Even allies of the Snakes only know what's need to know. Most of their business, other than monetary transactions, is done on paper. If their business doesn't involve another party, then they keep it to themselves.
Appearance: Xia is 5'2, slight, and made of muscle. Their body is nearly straight and mostly angles. Their hair is short, black, and straight. The left side is sheared to the scalp. Their eyes are black and they have a split in their left eyebrow from a scar. Their face is angular, lips not thin or thick, their nose is straight, and their voice is medium-low and a little raspy. Their chin, left shoulder to their breast plate, and thin piece of skin on their right shoulder are discolored, paler than the rest of their skin, because of body modifications in those areas. The clothes that they wear for commissions is a skin tight full body spectrum suit that changes colors to match the time of day or background, so they don't stick out and easily hide. Sometimes they wear a matching helmet, sometimes they don't. It's temperamental and obscures their vision when it doesn't want to work right. Their every day clothes are mainly colorful loose jackets that hide their body and make them look unassuming, black tank tops, matching tight pants, and boots.
YOUR SOUL
PERSONAL GOAL: Survival. Xia wanted out of the Green River Snakes, but that's only possible through death and they don't have plans to kick the bucket anytime soon. So they've been running from assassins they grew up and trained with, going from one zone to the other, disappearing for a time before they're found again. It's a snake and mouse chase all over the aquapolis with the exception of Shin Ryushu Docking. They could try to kill Snake Lady, but they're no saint and isn't looking to create a power vacuum in that part of the city.
LIKES: Yuzu flavored anything, tea, cookies, candies, peels, boba. If it's yuzu they want it. AR is fun. They're not addicted, but AR treasures hunts are a nice way to pass the time. They also learned a lot about diving into the Deep by living in a Precipice house one time when they were in hiding. Music, mainly NM hiphop. It's a mix of traditional East Asia instruments, dialects, and synths with deep 808 bass. Most of the music is underground, because it can't compete with digital J-pop and K-pop market.
DISLIKES: Blood; they're not squeamish, but it's hard to wash out of their full spectrum suit. Peroxide doesn't take well to the fabric and it tends to leave patches of their body exposed, because the proteins in the blood conflicts with the camouflage functions. The Green River Snakes. Not because they kidnapped them from wherever the hell they came from, but because they won't leave them alone. Like damn. They just want to live their best life and they can't do that with trafficking ring out to get them. They're not going to tell any secrets. They don't have a reason to. Shin Ryushu Docking for being the only place in New Malacca to sell Yuzu products.
REPUTE: In Shin Ryushu Docking they're a threat to the safety of the Green River Snake's business. They gave a wanted poster to all the members of the organization from level one to the top. To the rest of New Malacca they're a nobody. Just an average person with the exception of old clients from their level three escort days, but that was almost a decade ago. They'd be surprised if any of them recognized her.
HEEL: Depressed, but high functioning depressed. Nothing bothers them beyond a mild inconvenience. They aren't passionate about anything. Green River Snakes sucked out what passion they could've had or rage, anger, happiness, and left a disinterested husk in its wake. They don't realize there's anything wrong with them. Each day it's the same thing, if they're not running from assassins, then they're doing AR treasure hunts or completing freelance jobs for people that don't have money to afford the Ambassadors, or hunting down all the sweet shops in whatever zone they're in to find a yuzu produce. It's rinse, wash, repeat, and Xia's content with it being that way.
CODE: Loyalty. The Green River Snakes weren't good for a lot of things, but instill loyalty in them was one of the goods Xia took with them. They're loyalty extends to keeping their mouth shut, but they also don't have the energy to go around shopping for buyers for everything they know. It is really loyalty or are they just lazy...? Naw. Loyalty, yeah, that one. They haven't been sprung up by their toes and beaten for information about Green River Snakes yet, but if they were they wouldn't tell a soul. No point. Once the interrogators get what they want they'll kill them anyway.
QUIRKS: Xia has a knife they got from an escort client they like to do tricks with. Nothing major, just tossing it up with a forward or back spin and catching the tip of it in their fingers. It's not good for anything and it's ugly, but it's the first gift they received and it'd be weird if they didn't have something in their hands when they're thinking.
YOUR PAST
Xia could tell you where they came from. They know they're from outside of New Malacca, because they remember the boat trip being too long be close, but that's about it. They were six years old when the Green River Snakes track tagged and gave them a new name. Lang Xia is the only name they remember. Xia spent the first year and a half of their time with the Snakes at level one in the factory from lack of trying to get points. It wasn't until about nine months in that a lot of the kids that were with them on the boat to Shin Ryushu Docking either died from lack of nutrition, only so long the body can survive on congee, they disappeared while on errand runs, or they moved up in levels. Xia didn't want to be the Xia number eight to die, so they worked for points, until they were almost eight. Level two wasn't hard to get through, but they did linger on the last few hundred points they could've gotten if they did errands, since the parties or meetings were few and far between. After the first few times of being felt up by creepy yakuza, triad, or kkangpae they weren't eager to move on to sex work. None of the kids they were in level two with were, but when the first left, and everyone heard through the level grapevine that he was doing well, eating better, and got paid many were eager to go. Xia got the last few hundred over with, then went to the worst level of hell they've ever been through.
Dodging knives flying out of walls was better than having to learn Kama Sutra and taking practical exams on it. No one knew that many ways to fuck. Xia knew, because most of their clients weren't that creative. Before the cyberware surgeries and assassin training, Xia had a pretty soft face, long black hair, and looked like the type of young girl anyone would want to dress up like a doll. The only normal thing they did when they were ten was play dress up, but with creeps instead of friends. The nightmares were fun too and the vomiting from getting sick at the thought of sick fucks having their way with them. Unlike the other levels where Xia took their time, they didn't with level three. The most points came from escort or leasing business. With the escorts they ran the a higher risk of being bought and stuck with an owner forever, so they had to create a persona that was desirable to get more points, but undesirable to spend more than a night or two with. So Xia became a brat; learned to never push too far when getting on a client's nerve, but just on the right side of sweet to make them forgive whatever bratty thing she did. That pushed them to their goal points to get out by the time they were twelve.
Level four was the best level. They had more to do every day, no one touched them in a sexual way, and they learned a lot of useful skills in two years. All the classes were for twelve hours, espionage, martial arts, and marksmanship were three hours each with hour breaks in between. Xia wasn't the number one in class, but number two was okay. They got berated for always coming in second place to the girl in first, but they didn't care. They still got their required points at the end of two years to graduate and move onto something else. First in their class became a spy, while they came a assassin. Their first kill didn't bother them as much as they thought it would. Maybe it was level three that barely made them flinch at shooting a real person and not a dummy in the head. Or maybe Xia just stopped being bothered with live, death, and society as a whole. Didn't matter. None of their victims did. The next two years were spent saving money from assignments to get cyberware. Each year after that they got a new modification, something convenient to help with missions, until they left level four and went to five at eighteen.
They wanted a break from assassinations and more money to pay back the Snakes for taking part of the bill on their cyberware. Being bodyguard was the next best thing. No commitment to multiple underlings or other responsibilities would be great. The benefits of no debt outweighed anything else, until Snake Lady Akanishi Miho choice them to be her bodyguard. Not what they intended, but the paycheck was better than anything they were going to get with anyone else. It only took two years to pay back the Snakes along as they didn't spend their money on anything else. At most they couldn't give up yuzu, but that's the only thing in life worth paying for anyway. Guarding Snake Lady was exhausting. She liked to play games where she's give them the slip to wander around Shin Ryushu Docking like there weren't yakuza out there that wanted her dead. She could take care of herself, but that didn't mean her luck wouldn't run out. All the secrets and things they found about Snake Lady could set them up for a life in the East Sine Corporate Tradeplex with all the rich people if they sold the information. Which is why they now have a bounty on their heads.
It's been a year since they left the Snakes and they're getting tired of running, but they didn't work as hard as they did for sixteen years just to die at the hands of the people that made them.
YOUR PERSON
ATTRIBUTES:
Assassination - Are they best at it? No. They're plenty of others with more experience than them, but they're good enough to not only make a living, but had once been a bodyguard to Snake Lady. If they advertised that in the Deep they'd get a lot more business with higher pay, but secrets to keep and all that.
Sex Work - It's a skill Xia can't wait to die, but all information on how the human body works to get the most pleasure from is stuck in their mind. Alternatively, it also works as what causes the most pain. They don't make a habit of stabbing or shooting anyone in those areas, but it's good to know anyway.
BODY MODS:
All of Xia's mods are shoddy black market jobs. Everything doesn't work the way it should. Xia has phantom pains for the body parts they replaced, terrible migraines from the Deep interface, and blurry vision from the eye scopes.
Deep Interface - On left side of their scalp where their hair is shaved in place of skin is an interface that connects them to the Deep. They don't use it to Deep dive. The first they did it was because a Precipice friend convinced them it and it put them in a coma for a day. If they're not using maps or the music functions it's useless to them.
Eye Scope - Xia's eyes are augmented with scopes that can enhance anything 12 miles away. It's controlled by their thoughts, but the tech is shoddy and sometimes enhances when they don't want it to. They had to learn how to fight with their eyes closed, cause the first it glitched out when they in the middle of hand to hand they almost died. They're vision is blurry if they don't have it on all the time. They fear they're going blind. Have to save up to pay for a surgery to get them removed.
Jaw Replacement - They fell off a building during a New Year assassination attempt. It was a two story fall, but on the way down their jaw hit the corner of the building they were perched on. Shattered the bone to the point it had to be replaced, but they didn't have the money for the best job so they have a metal pale plate in its place.
Breast Plate - Their left shoulder to where their breast used to be was replaced with a cyberware bulletproof non-removable breast plate instead. Nothing says death like a shot through the heart. It wraps around to their back and is two made of two pieces, the largest part connects to the shoulder and long the edges of the plate, and the back piece connects to the back. As long as someone doesn't shoot them from an upward angle under where the plate end half way to the navel, then it'll work fine for the most part. It's been broken before by shotguns at close range and sniper shots. They've gotten lucky they didn't die both times and barely ran away with their life to make it to someone that can fix it.
Gun - On their upper right arm is a gun that constructs itself when mentality activated. It's as long as their arm when it's built up and often the weapon of choice if they can help it when doing assassin work. Unless the piece of shit gets jammed, then they have to get close an personal.
EQUIPMENT:
Arm Gun
Camouflage Full Spectrum Catsuit
Nail Gun - This one doesn't get used as much, because they don't make a habit of getting to close when they have a job, but if they have to the nail gun works. It's something they picked up on a job at a construction site once and had to use an impromptu weapon and didn't get rid of it.
Knife - Can't do anything with it. The point is dull and the handle kinda wobbly. At best it'll hurt like a bitch if they stab someone with it. At worst it could take out an eye. Everyone needs a last ditch effort weapon.
@Bork Lazer I'm interested in joining and I have a lengthy homebrew black market organization my character is affiliated with. Can I PM you my character sheet to run my idea by you?
Herik watched Vashti shrugged him off and move to another seat, taking herself out of the conversation. He wanted to join her, but figured she needed her space after everyone jumped down her throat. He could tell she was spiraling, barely keeping it together with the way she clenched her hand around the quarter he gave her. He wishes there was more he could do to make her feel better, help her, but he couldn't fix any of her problems. The only thing he could do was make sure she knew he was there if she needed him. He shook his arm and Asta appeared. He motioned for him to sit at Vashti's side so she wasn't completely alone. The giant lion brought him comfort during his first week with his cast on. Maybe he could do the same for her.
It took longer than it should have for Kimberly to point them in a direction to get what he, Emily, and Vashti needed. The problems were A) a dicey black market organization that could get them in trouble with DENS if they're caught, B) cost more money than he had, and C) they'd have to help Kimberly take out Annabelle Heart and possibly die trying. Just when he thought there was finally a solution to help his mother it dashed all his hopes and dreams, because he was too broke to afford whatever price the Dollhouse wanted. Emily suggested they dip into Blake Schmidt's wallet, but he didn't want to do that. That meant he'd owe him something one day or he'd come to collect if there's ever a moment he stops fearing the Coven. Taking money for a crooked man to give to a more crooked black market organization? Since when did the Coven get caught up in illegal activity and world saving events? He was so caught up in his own that he almost missed connecting to his sisters to watch Kimberly's memories. Or rather, someone else's memories.
And it was disgusting what happened to that poor girl. She didn't deserve to suffer what happened to her. Damn his empathy. Sometimes he thinks it's just better to not care, but he can't help it. His mother would ashamed of him if he didn't do the best he could for people in need.
"I'll take your word Kimberly that none of us will die helping you, but the Dollhouse doesn't seem like the type of place we should get mixed up in. Are you sure you don't know anyone else that's not illegal that can help us? I need to be sure before we go knocking on Mr. Schmidt's door asking for a hand out."
@The Ghost Note He can be Kim's contact. She'll need more people that knows what they're doing, since the Coven's a train wreck and more likely to get themselves killed.
@The Ghost Note Do you have an idea for how Stacey will be introduced into the story? You said you wanted him to help Kimberly or be part whatever she's got going on.
@The Ghost Note So extra-normals are immune to Stacey? How does emotional-field partial immunity work for one of his curses, but they're completely immune for others? Does Stacey's weakness depend on him hearing his own curse like in his original sheet?
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