KHoS:Elspeth

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Profile

Name: Elspeth Trelawney
Gender: Female
Age: 16
Height: 5 foot nothing
Weight: 93 lbs
Hair: Blonde
Eyes: Blue

Statistics

Physical Stress: 3
Mental Stress: 4 +1 mild consequence
Refresh: 3

Background

Born to English emigres who have set up a small colony in the mountains of the Himalayas after the destruction of the British Isles, Elspeth is also the great grand-daughter of Horatio Trelawney, wielder of the great cannon Trafalgar Blue, the man who gave his life holding off the kaiju to enable as many of her people to flee as possible. It was his heroic sacrifice that enabled her culture to survive the initial kaiju onslaught, and her family has always striven to live up to his example. Her grandmother, Elizabeth Trelawney, reforged Trafalgar Blue into a succession of adamantine weapons which she distributed among her children, who went on to have distinguished, if unspectacular careers as hunters of kaiju.

Only one, Cantata Ivory, refused to answer to the voice of any of her offspring, and Elizabeth died without ever knowing who would wield her finest creation.

Elspeth was raised on stories of heroism and sacrifice, and her pre-eminent idol has always been her ancestor, Horatio. Her earliest attempts at commanding Cantata Ivory, however, were failures, and her ego was brutalised throughout her adolescence as she struggled to gain the strength to master the weapon. She shouted and sobbed, swore at it and scorned it, but the strip of bright metal refused to answer. While other children played and learned to survive in their rugged mountain habitat, Elspeth spent her youth sitting in her grandmother's mausoleum where Cantata Ivory was kept, plaited into the shape of a simple Moebius strip.

And then the kaiju Tremor came.

Aspects

High Concept: Scion of Legends

Elspeth is the descendent of one of the premier generation of kaiju-slayers, and has been trained since birth to take her place among the legends of her generation. She will brook no insolence! She will leave no tea untasted! She will make herself heard! This Aspect supports both her skill and her heroic heart: selfish and self-indulgent as she is, Elspeth is a heroine through and through, and would not hesitate to put herself at risk to help others, confident that history will remember her glory, whether in victory or in sacrifice.
Invoking: leveraging on her family's reputation, upholding the family name, acts of heroism
Compelling: obligations due to family connections, high expectations, acts of vainglory

Trouble: My Skill is All I Have

As emotionally-fragile as she is talented, Elspeth's entire self-image is invested around her fighting abilities. This makes her determined, but also brittle. She doesn't take well to failure, and as Cantata Ivory responds directly to her mood and emotional state, her bouts of depression tend to create a downward spiral in which her weakening abilities and her self-confidence become a negative feedback loop. Only by accomplishing something worthy does she shake off her fugue.
Invoking: asserting dominance, being independent
Compelling: anxiety, insecurity

First Adventure: Listen to My Song!

Cantata Ivory claims its new master! The coming of the kaiju Tremor scatters the people of New Scafell from their cave dwellings, lest its vibrations bring their village down upon their heads. The tomb of Elspeth's grandmother is buried in a rockslide, and she finds herself trapped! Scared and alone in the darkness, she sings a lullaby from her childhood... and Cantata Ivory comes alive! Her triumphant shout breaks through the rockfall, and she soars to the rescue.
Invoking: performance, making a social impact, attracting attention
Compelling: immaturity, impulsiveness, selfishness

Crossing Paths: Follow the Leader

When she was first posted to the academy, Elspeth found herself disgusted by the lack of professionalism exhibited by other cadets. So many provincial yokels, convinced of their specialness and their manifest destiny, when it was obviously only Elspeth who would truly rise above the others. On her first training mission, paired together with a gearhead who couldn't focus on anything but her fancy toys and how unique they made her, Elspeth found herself being forced to assert her superior leadership and tactical skills in order to keep them both alive. While relations between herself and Valeria Kleinburg haven't been exactly cordial since the incident, Elspeth is now utterly confident in how much of a difference her leadership makes to a team, and she doesn't hesitate to wield that influence at every opportunity.
Invoking: devising a plan, assisting a team-mate when leading through example
Compelling: being ignored, plans going awry

Crossing Paths: Be the Leaf

On furlough from the academy, Elspeth was travelling by railway to visit her home-town, when disaster struck: the kaiju Thunderhead began rampaging through the countryside, draining voltage from the railway and bringing it grinding it to a halt. Forced to intervene before the raging electrostatic fields created by the kaiju created thunderstorms and worse, Elspeth was at the same time restrained by the presence of a large number of civilians. Her plight was made somewhat easier by the intervention of fellow cadet Takeru Nagasumi, whose superior physical strength and resilience proved essential to getting close enough to the kaiju to deliver a decisive strike. She found herself running interference for him, using her own advantage of superior manoeuvrability and agility to divert the kaiju's attention away from both civilians and her fellow hunter. She denies the allegation that watching Takeru, clothes shed to prevent an electrostatic charge from building, deliver that titanic blow, impressed her to any extent.
Invoking: being flexible, adapting to situations on the fly, using manoeuvrability or agility
Compelling: being forced to 'go with the flow', facing insurmountable obstacles

Skills

Great (+4)	Will
Good (+3)	Fight	Provoke
Fair (+2)	Athletics	Empathy	Rapport
Average (+1)	Contacts	Lore	Notice	Physique

Stunts

Get Up and Fight! By challenging others to be improve themselves, Elspeth can inspire others to shrug off pain, fatigue, and injury. They can be more! While they aren't likely to appreciate what Elspeth has done for them, at least they survive. This skill allows her to use Provoke for recovery actions to treat one Minor and one Moderate physical Consequence per day.

A Leaf on the Wind: Raised amidst the rough terrain of the Himalayas, Elspeth gains +2 to overcome actions with Athletics when moving over difficult terrain through superior acrobatics and agility.

My Sword, Like Lightning: Although it appears she may be only defending herself, Elspeth in actuality sees the potential in every parry for a devastating response. When the opportunity presents itself, she can strike like a thunderbolt! If she succeeds on a defensive Fight roll with style, she imposes a 2-shift hit instead of getting a boost.

Cantata Ivory

Aspect: Empathic Weapon

The most strong-willed of the adamantine weapons forged by Elizabeth Trelawney, Cantata Ivory maintains a high level of autonomy, and can be said to almost have a mind of its own. It acts to defend its wielder, and can when necessary do so without guidance or prompting; this makes it unpredictable, and in its short history of usage, it has been known to even outright defy its wielder. Some whisper that it is possessed by the ghost of Elizabeth Trelawney, and that it sings to itself in her voice when left unattended.
Invoking: reacting when surprised, acting unobserved
Compelling: penalising actions which pose a risk to the wielder

Flaw Aspect: Fragile

Powered though it is by a mysterious psychoreactive process that draws on the mental strength of its wielder, Cantata Ivory is at the end of the day a strip of flexible adamantine. It lacks the raw robustness of more massive weapons. It is much, much stronger than it looks, of course, but even that may prove insufficient in the face of kaiju might. It has never been broken outright before, but unlike other weapons, Cantata Ivory has shown signs of damage after battle. It can heal itself, but requires time to do so. Elspeth has reported having 'redirected' damage from Cantata Ivory to her own psyche before: how such a thing might be possible, nobody knows.

Stunt: Open Your Heart!

Elspeth challenges her opponent to be receptive to her feelings, usually in the form of a lightning blast! She can use her Provoke skill to make Shooting tests. The most distinctive feature of Cantata Ivory is its ability to form a suspended, conductive coil. It draws on Elspeth's voice, magnifying those vibrations to an intensity that weaponises her spoken words. A curt reprimand can crack stone, a shout can knock a house down. At its highest setting, it can generate an electrostatic differential that expresses itself as a bolt of energy carving a plasma channel through ionised air.

Her song is the fury of the sky itself, and it can bring a kaiju to its knees. The world will hear of her greatness, and roar its approval!

Stunt: Soaring on Song

Cantata Ivory can reshape itself into an airfoil-configuration suitable for use as a parachute or hang-glider: by vibrating along with Elspeth's voice, it can even sustain powered flight as a microlight glider. Elspeth can use Athletics to cover distance as if she were Driving a flying vehicle.