Ismene
Posted: Wed Jan 19, 2022 10:17 pm
Basic Details
Full Name: Ismene Stryke Navarro
Race: Hytori/Rathari (Secretary Bird)
Sex: Female
Age: 150
Height: 6'2
Weight: 157 lbs
Date of Birth: Ash 89
Place of Birth: Midden, Kalsazi
Profession: Secretary/Skyguard
Housing: Apartment in Low City
Partner: N/A
Titles: Soraken
Factions: Sky Guard
Fluencies: Common, Synskrit
Conversationals: Mythrasi
Ineptitudes:
Personality
For any soul that knows Ismene, they know that she has never been one easily rocked. A person of unshakeable calm. Additionally, they would also know her as someone with a regard for the rules as being close to law. Mandatory. Fundamental, really. There are few things that she lets slip through the cracks, but on the whole she's - rigid.
There's a certain level of perfection that she demands from everyone, including herself. Not a hair out of place, weapon without shine. She relies, sometimes, on the intimidation of a straight-backed posture and height. Outside of that, there's also the matter of her actual expertise. The assurance that she would not hesitate to put someone on their back is not something that can be easily overlooked. Someone that can handle situations with some social grace while also not withholding the chance of violence; intimidating, at the very least. But she's thorough with making an example of someone, diligent in getting her point across.
It is not often that one is able to see an empathetic side of Ismene, but it exists. Just in...very little measure. Someone with a compulsion for order and rigid conformation to the rules doesn't exactly scream empathy for anyone outside of certain constraints. But it exists. She's too old, in her opinion, to be heartless. It might come in the small form of lessening a punishment or perhaps going the extra mile with someone else's paperwork, but it's there. She doesn't like talking about it, so it's just best you don't, y'know?
Appearance
Ismene is tall — particularly so for the females of her mother's race. Stricken with this height, and made to seem taller with perfect posture, she carries herself with grace. Excessively, to some people. Long limbs accentuated with lean muscle lend to a lithe frame. There is little to differentiate her from those of the Hytori race; long ears and bright eyes. Tan skin and hair with the golden shine that makes it blonde. But for one thing — her eyelashes. They are the feature that give away the most. The rathari blood in her veins is displayed by feather-like lashes, and a small orange spot at the outer corner of her eyes.
It's there, too, in small gestures. Her walk and her stance. Legs lift a certain measure higher than necessary with each step, gait calculated at a walk. It's not unusual to find her standing with her arms tucked behind her back, not too far off from the way a bird might be at rest. There is also the habit of turning her head to peer out of one eye more than the other when staring at someone head-on. It translates, in some situations, into a sort of contemptuous gaze.
In her beast form, she is much like any other Secretary bird. Larger, as is the case with all others of her race, and with a very clear sentience to her stare. Her feathers take on a slightly darker coloration, not quite stark white, and the feathers around her eyes that would have the usual orange coloring are almost closer to gold.
The Rune of Negation is placed at her collar, often hidden with the high-necked shirts she prefers to wear. Most often, her shirts will be sleeveless and it is more likely to find her in pants than you would a skirt. A dress is less likely, but she will always leave her arms free in the case of needing to fly off at a moment's notice.
History
Ismene's clutch was not a successful one. It would not be the first for her mother, but it would certainly come as the last. As a rathari, there was a choice given that was unique to their race. Her mother — Antigone — had passed an age she felt she needed to have more children. With twelve older siblings, Ismene was certainly not without those that had come before her. Each of them caring for the youngest three of the bunch. Ismene's early years were spent in the comfort of being among the youngest when the others were present. But as her older siblings left the nest, the training turned on the triplets.
The Navarro family was not a name that carried any weight. If anything there was to be known for, it was potential. A potential for each child to do more than what they would eventually fall into. The poise, elegance, grace of nobility smothered by the stink of the Low City. Each child would find themselves doing menial labor and getting the family by. Spreading perhaps a stone's throw away before they started their own families and fell into the exact same routines.
But Ismene would not do so. Her whole clutch had chosen not to do so. They enlisted in the skyguard as soon as they possibly could, finding themselves in different regiments, but climbing the ranks all the same. And, well, Fate has a certain way of working. The triplets would swap regiments more than once, shifting from ranged warriors to battlemages to infantry. Within the ranks as a battlemage, Ismene had chosen Negation. Initiated just before her entry into that particular specialization, where she would attract the eye of the Hakumo.
And, once she had transferred back into infantry, she would marry that same man. For a short time, she would be allowed a time to spend with her children. An early, temporary retirement that came at the ripe age of seventy-five. Delayed for some, just right for others. She would wait until her children could get off the ground themself, her first and only clutch of five perfect children.
Her compulsions toward order would lead her to live a home life that mirrored the order of the sky guard. Prepping small soldiers within the walls of her home while her partner would do so on the outside. They would be apart for long stretches of time, but following that initiation into Negation, she had never quite shaken a need for isolation. The distance would not bother her as much as him, and soon they were parting ways amicably. As they shifted ranks, they would see each other in passing.
She lost her first child along with her ex-husband when she was 109. Devastating; she'd outlived a man she knew would not last long, not with his dedication to the people of the nation he so loved. But her child was more unexpected. A bright thing, a light lost that she mourned bitterly. Her detachment from her children grew worse and she made sure her involvement in their training was minimal. If she could not hold them close, then that would be for the best.
Ismene, despite this loss, had taken up a new conviction. To make so no other mother would have to worry about the loss of their children so long as they were in her care.
