Basic InformationName: Maki Sato
Nickname/Alias/Etc: Angel by most people, "The Ghost" to others.
Gender: Female
Age: 21
Height: 167cm
Weight: 50kg
Home District: Westgate. Sort of. She squats in the Library.
Appearance
Hair Color: Dyed bright brown, natural black.
Eye Color: Brown
Ethnicity: Japanese
Physical Appearance:Maki is a short, slender young woman. She is pretty with a small frame, but well defined and toned muscle from her constant physical exercise. Combined with the hint of tattoos on her arms and poking out over the collar on the back of her neck, most would assume she's involved with gangsters and is used to life on the streets, or that she's one of those aspiring rock stars. She has piercings on her left ear, and her fair porcelain skin betrays her nocturnal living schedule. She has few visible scars, most of them hidden by clothing on only visible if you look closely at the usual spots - hints of cuts and scrapes on the arms, elbows and legs, but nothing major save for a bullet wound below her rib.
She has a rounded face and despite her pretty face, usually manages to blend in - she
can turn heads if she puts the effort in, but wearing her hair up most of the time with her short height and low profile demeanour usually covers her presence. Soft lips, almond shaped eyes and a hint of mirth in her usual expressions makes her seem like a cheerful party girl, but a small scar on her lip and the occasional steely set of her jaw betrays the fighter underneath.
Maki has a set of tattoos that identifies her almost anywhere she goes where her reputation has been made known - a cross that the top of her spine, peeking just above her neck and adorned with fiery wings that span her shoulder blades. The horizontal arm of the cross bears a Bible verse on it - Ezekiel 25:17. The actual words of the verse itself spread below. "I will execute great vengeance on them with wrathful rebukes. Then they will know that I am the Lord, when I lay my vengeance upon them.” The second tattoo is a
simple one of a dragon on her left arm. Along the dragon's spine is a latin phrase "Nemo me impune lacessit" meaning
No one provokes me with impunity. The third, more frivolous and less meaningful, is a line of roses that run down the left side of her waist and hip.
Attire:Maki's broad style can be described as functional but stylish. Her default attire is a white tank top under either a black short sleeved leather jacket or plaid shirt with rolled up sleeves, baring her mid riff, coupled with tight jeans and boots. She varies it from time to time, occasionally forgoing the outer layer to show off the tattoos for some semblance of intimidation. She almost always wears a pair of leather half-finger gloves, sometimes studded at the knuckles. Those who bother to think about her attire would obviously notice she's usually ready to fight or run in them.
Her only other attire of note is the uniform of a bar she works at from time to time. A white form-fitting dress shirt and black skirt complete with stockings and apron.
PersonalityPersonality:Maki on the surface, is your typical street girl - she's snarky, flirts around, swears like a sailor and stubborn. She doesn't tolerate bullshit from anyone, something a bartender cum waitress might consider an essential skill, and one always knows where they stand with her. Sarcasm and insults are her usual way of doing things, but she's not above getting in fights either.
Deeper down though, Maki has a sort of rugged charisma to her. She is always around when some drunk doesn't know how to handle being rejected by a lady at the bar, and despite her brash attitude she's actually quite intelligent and patient when she needs to be. Certainly, being polite and kind is her default approach to people unless they prove they deserve otherwise. The people she works with defer to her when things crop up and they can't handle it themselves. She's reliable, and she sees things through to the end. They also know that Maki is the last person to ever give up hope on them or leave them in a lurch as long as she's able to do something to help. It would also be another really admirable trait if it didn't get her in more trouble than most people. Her need to take action often trumps her prudence or more cool-headed side, and Maki is impossible to deal with when she has to admit she's helpless or in over her head.
Regardless, her determination cuts both ways - she will do anything to help those in need and on the end of the other extreme, she's willing to go to great lengths to punish bullies. Despite appearances and her usual attitude, Maki despises thugs and gangsters that prey on the weak, especially women. It's earned her a fearsome reputation in the areas she frequents. She spends as much time in trouble with the law as she is helping them, and the only thing that holds local police from pressing charges against her most of the time is that she (usually) does things with good intentions.
Maki mistrusts the law and the system, and has a personal vendetta to avenge her parents' killers. While she's moved on with her life for the most part, she cannot find peace within herself until justice has been served for her parents' killers. The incidents of her childhood have also left her with a strong dislike and at times fear for guns. She struggles with suicidal thoughts, but her faith as a Christian tells her she survived the night of her parents' murder for a reason. The two sides of the argument are at constant war within her, however, and Maki's known to get into depressive moods, especially when the subject of family is brought up. In fact, it's not rare to find her sodding drunk when she gets in one of those moods, though sobering her up proves a difficult task especially when she insists her drunkenness is the only alternative to not killing herself.
Hobbies/Interests: Reading. It's the reason why she even squats in the library in the first place. Though she hates non-fiction books. History? Sure, a little dry at times, but the wars and famous rulers are always interesting. Latest breakthroughs science and technology? Forget it. Give her a good fantasy epic any day. Probably a little soft and strange for a young woman with her lifestyle, but it's one of her rare joys that don't get her in trouble.
Music. Maki's a decent singer, even without training. While she doesn't make this fact public knowledge, one can usually catch her humming a song or tune in her private moments or in the midst of work. She's an amateur guitar player, again with no training but whatever she can learn and practise by herself with an instructional book. It's also why she chose to work in a bar that hires different bands to perform.
Mixed martial arts. While not exactly an interest or hobby and more a necessity, Maki enjoys the physicality of her training, and the fact that it's free. Mostly. It's a way for her to let off steam and gain the satisfaction of knocking the wind out of men twice her size.
Social Work, and she's using the term loosely. Maki helps out at-risk youths in the city, either by offering them leftovers from the bar at the end of her shift or helping them find places to stay. Occasionally, she helps them stay away from drug dealers and gang recruiters. Very rarely, she helps them run from abusive parents or partners or trouble in general. She leaves the work to the official channels most of the time, but those that slip through the cracks in the system always end up needing her help in one way or another.
Skills/Talents:Singing and guitar - Decent for an amateur with no formal training, Maki's voice is pleasant enough that most enjoy hearing her sing and passable enough on a guitar that people don't cringe while she's playing.
Mixed Martial Arts - She's good and she can hold her own in a fight against your run-of-the-mill street thugs, but she has no delusions of fighting law enforcement or military or even some guy with a gun. In her own words, she knows "how to throw a punch and kick a guy in the balls and that's it", though she's selling herself a little short.
Parkour - Some semblance of it. A young woman on the streets like her spends a lot of time running, and being able to jump chain link fences and fire escapes without breaking your leg or neck is an important skill. It's not like she can scale a building like Spiderman, but she agile and quick enough that most people won't be able to catch her if there's even a table in the way. The most difficult thing she's willing to attempt with her skill is maybe jump from rooftop to rooftop and even then, not without a running start.
Prized Possession: A nazar given to her by a Turkish boy she used to date. It's the only material possession she has that she's willing to risk life and limb to retrieve.
Quote(s):"They might call me Angel, but I think they're just too lazy to add 'avenging' before it."
"Fuck. That."
"You have got to be kidding."
History/Bio: Maki usually tells people she either fell from heaven or rip off some comic book hero's origin story, but Maki Sato was born to a lower-middle income household. Her parents had moved to Blackfall to find work after eloping from their homeland, where their marriage was disapproved. So, if anything, Maki had the consolation that she had indeed been born out of love between her parents even if she didn't have much else to be happy about growing up.
They lived in a rough neighbourhood. It wasn't violent in the way that people were used to gang shootings or gang wars erupting, but it was definitely seedy and crime-filled. Maki knew what prositutes and sex trafficking meant at a young age, knew what drugs did to you, and to never trust anyone she didn't know. For the most part, her childhood years were rather unmolested - the fights she witnessed were in the schoolyard with other kids, not between gangsters. The only gun she ever got hit by was a BB gun, and while she had learned what a real gun sounded like, she had never seen one.
It all changed when she turned thirteen. Her father was let go from his job, something about downsizing. He tried looking for simple jobs to tide the family over, but there were few in her area that didn't involve criminal associations in some way. Desperate to feed his family, her father swallowed his morals and took a job at a pharmacy that was owned by some drug ring. The money was good enough to let the Satos live a little more comfortably, even if her father had to deal with his own conscience, watching teenagers barely older than her go to him for a drug fix.
It was a year before things really went bad for her family. Her father, unable to deal with the guilt of ruining lives by peddling poison into his community, started to work with the police to help bring down the drug ring. He'd keep up the pretense of operating the pharmacy while feeding information to the police. When they were finally ready to make arrests, Maki's father was spared the wrath of the law... but not of those he betrayed. It was in the middle of the night when it happened, a few remaining runners for the gang had burst into their home on orders kill Maki and her mother while her father watched.
She had been out with some friends when it happened, and returned home to find her door broken off its hinges, and voices of men she didn't know coming from inside. The next thing she knew, one of them had walked out and found her, before promptly drawing his gun and firing it in her direction. One of the bullets caught her below the chest and she fell backwards, tumbling down the stairwell to the floor below.
She awoke to find herself in a strange room, lying in a cot. Her wound had been bandaged and treated, but it hurt like hell. There was a man standing guard over her, who filled her in on everything that had happened. Apparently she had been 'rescued' by some meta-humans, who kept her from dying long enough for "The Doctor" to tend to her. It seemed that her neighbours, afraid to draw the attention of the gangsters, had left her for dead, but not the homeless in the area who rushed to her aid when they found she wasn't dead.
They had brought her to this Doctor, someone who had been a combat medic or something along those lines and was now helping the homeless and poor get medical help when they needed it. They didn't have the means to bring her to a hospital, much less ensure her safety long enough to arrive at one, and he was the next best thing. It had been days since the shooting, but it seemed the police had no witnesses, none who would risk getting killed next anyway, and even less evidence. As far as they were concerned, the drug ring had just been doing some housekeeping and so long as no more bodies turned up, they were willing to dismiss the case as a cold one.
With no justice for her family and no guarantee of her safety, Maki was offered a place among the homeless of Blackfall. While they weren't all on first name bases with each other, there was an unspoken code of honour among them. The city wasn't going to take care of them, so they had to take care of themselves. They showed Maki how to survive on the streets - either through the generosity of strangers or stealing what she needed. They also kept her safe from predators and scumbags who saw a desperate teenage girl willing to do anything for a bite or some money.
Some of them had been war veterans, men who had slipped through the cracks of the system when they had returned from war broken and battered. Most kept to themselves or were too paranoid to spend too much time around others, but one or two of them had been more than willing to keep an eye out for Maki. She reminded them of daughters or sisters they had left behind or lost, and took her in as surrogate family. They taught her how to fight and fend for herself, while a few other of the meta-humans helped her hone and develop the use of her powers.
The street rats who had super powers took it upon themselves to look out for the others. They looted stores when they needed medicine or food desperately for a hungry child or sick junkie. They kept thugs and drunk frat boys from picking on the older homeless. Maki saw herself as one of them, though at the back of her mind she still desperately wanted to get revenge for the murder of her parents. Sure, she owed these people her life and more for looking out for her, but she would never have needed to live like this in the first place if her parents had never been killed.
Maki started haunting her neighbourhood, looking for thugs to beat up. When that didn't work, she started looking through newspaper articles in the library. Richard Palmer, the custodian of the library, noticed her obsession. It hadn't been difficult really, since she was always poring over the same few newspapers and reports, sometimes falling asleep entirely when he made his rounds to lock up the place. He offered to help her, and when he learned she was homeless, offered to let her use one of the storage rooms in the library as shelter.
Maki was hesitant to take his offer, but whenever there was a bad storm or cold weather, she found herself in that storage. In time, he brought a cot, then some fresh clothes, and before she knew it, she came to settle down in the room as if it were her home. She never got far digging through old library records, but Richard moved her on to other books, tales of fantasy and adventure, or histories of famous kings. Those became her escape from reality when she wasn't trying to hunt down her parents' killers. Richard became a confidant and a source of wise counsel, whenever Maki was around for it, anyway.
So when she turned eighteen was old enough to get a job without raising too many questions, he found her one at a bar, owned by an old friend. The pay wasn't much, certainly not enough to rent an apartment when she had nothing to start with, but it was enough for food and clothes and the occasional luxury of a trip to the theater or music shop. The rest of her money, however, went to the people she had come to know as family - the homeless of Blackfall. They, in turn, came to her for help when there was trouble.
Family:Asami Sato/Mother/Deceased
Shirou Sato/Father/Deceased
RelationshipsRichard Palmer / The Librarian / Boring McDerpington - The custodian of the library who let Maki squat an unused storage room on the top floor. He is the man who inspired her passion for reading, and the only man she trusts enough to confide everything in. He is the only one who's able to get Maki out of her depressive moods.
Thomas Greene / The Boss / Slave Driver - The owner of the bar that Maki works at. He's aware of her status and history, but only in broad details and never presses Maki for information. Except when she shows up bloody with cuts and scrapes or with some poor kid hanging from her shoulder. He's generous enough to let her use his bar as a rest stop from time to time, or help patch her and her rescued victims up before sending them on their way to the hospital.
The Homeless - A broad group of people Maki knows from her time on the streets. As far as she's concerned, they're her family and her responsibility. If they're cold, she gets them coats and jackets. If they're being harassed by some gangsters, she's the one who charges in and beats them up. If they're high... she's the one who helps them get rid of the evidence and get sober. She's not able to always be there for every single homeless person in Blackfall, of course, but those who know her usually end up pointing the ones in trouble to her anyway.
AbilitiesPower Class & Rating: (Cerebral, Super-System, Elemental, Power, or Other)
Power:'Blinking' - Or at least, that's what Maki calls it. It was a term from some video game that some idiot brought up and it stuck. Maki has the ability to teleport short distances with limitations. She has to be able to see where she's going, or know the layout of the room. The latter because it is impossible for her to materialize in a space another object already occupies. The good news of this drawback is that she never has to worry about getting herself stuck inside a brick wall, for example. The bad news? When she fails because there's an object where she tried to materialise, it feels like she ran into one. Secondly, the range is limited. She cannot teleport to her own room in the library from across town even if she knows it well enough. By her estimates, she can travel up to fifty meters. Anything - or anyone - in contact with her is transported with her. Momentum is conserved so if she was blinking out of a speeding car, she'd still be travelling at the speed of the car when she materializes. It's a useful ability in a fight and running away from trouble.
Superhuman Agility and Senses - Maki's incredibly quick and agile, able to climb and navigate simple obstacles with ease, provided she has sufficient hand and foot holds. Her reflexes are above human levels well. Her strength, while not superhuman, rivals the average athlete with her previous training and exercise. All this combined allow her to take relatively light damage in fights and falls, and allows her to recover quicker than your average human being. Her senses of sight and sound are heightened - she has excellent night vision, is able to notice minute details in a book cover up to a hundred meters away. She is sensitive to the slightest changes in tone and frequencies of sounds, and able to isolate individual sounds in the middle of crowded room, even if her actual hearing is just slightly keener than average humans.
Weaknesses/Drawbacks:Again, if Maki tries to blink somewhere already occupied, she gets a massive headache, and feels as if she was thrown against the object and deflected back to her original space. Excessive use within a short span of time also causes the migraines and dizzy spells. Maki also feels hunger pangs and acute pains in her stomach from excessive use, though a good meal or bottle of soft drink usually alleviates it. The limits of her range vary depending on her 'cargo', or what she's carrying. Size and mass are obvious factors, but the complexity of the object being transported contributes to how far she can transport them as well. One other person seems to be her upper limit for now, though at times Maki feels as if the strain of transporting someone with her eases over time, as if she simply needs to get used to the load as if she were physically carrying it over a distance. She also has no choice whether or not they come along for the ride, they will travel with her as long as they maintain physical contact.
Other: Maki is bisexual with a preference for women. [insert immature giggle here]
Sample Post:"What I wouldn't give to be drinking on the job." Maki sighed, as she stepped out into the chilly night air of the back alley. It had been a rather quiet night at the bar, presumably because it was Christmas and most people were spending time with their families at home. In fact, Tom had considered closing the bar that night, if it weren't for the fact that most of his staff were either from out of town or had no families to spend Christmas with. So, he kept the place open, if for no other reason than so the staff could at least spend Christmas together and not alone.
I wouldn't mind it though, if I could at least get laid. She thought wistfully. Preferably with some redhead.
She hoisted the bag of trash she brought with her into the dumpster and that's when she heard it. A whimper. "Here we go again." Maki muttered under her breath, with a roll of her eyes as she tilted her head back to look up at the night sky, speckled with white flakes of snow here and there. "You couldn't have given me a break today, huh?" She asked, as if she expected the Big Guy Upstairs to part the clouds and wink or chuckle at her.
God sure loves to make me the butt of his cosmic jokes. Maki thought, as she moved toward the source of the sound.
She could have ignored it of course, but as her pastor like to say, God worked in strange ways and perhaps she was working tonight instead of working her way onto Santa's naughty list with some hot chick because she wouldn't ignore some girl in trouble. There was always someone in trouble back in this alley. Either some poor prostitute getting roughed up by an over zealous client or some moron who drunk too much and got himself in a fight or argument with a fellow drunk. There were hardly any lights back there but it didn't matter. She could see just as well without them.
Right at the end of the alley were two guys holding down a girl trying to push them off her. From the way she was moving so feebly and could barely gather her voice to scream, Maki guessed she was just some poor soul who had had too much to drink and the two brutes thought she would be an easy target to take advantage of. Thanking her decision to have forgone the heeled boots tonight, Maki stalked up to the guys and whipped out her phone. "This is going to make a good video on Pornhub." Maki commented, loudly enough for the men to hear her. They whipped around at her voice and she clicked the shutter button on her phone's camera. There was a brief flash to illuminate their faces and the Japanese girl made sure she had their faces clearly stored before stowing her phone back in her skirt pocket.
The men grunted at the flash and knowing they had been caught, got off the girl and advanced. Well, one of them did. At least they had the sense not to both let their victim go and risk her escaping or calling the cops. Bad news for Maki, but she supposed she would have to deal with thugs that had two brain cells to rub together from time to time. "Oh, you shouldn't have done that." Her attacker growled.
"Oh, I know. Seeing that picture is going to be such a turn off if I do get laid tonight." Maki snapped back a witty retort. The man approaching her was cautious, and more than a head taller than her. Within the tight confines of the alley, she wouldn't be able to make use of her smaller frame and better agility. Mostly. The guy stank of alcohol, though, so she guessed he probably wouldn't be too sharp or quick to react. She remembered a lesson Ted taught her before though -
never underestimate the power of stupidity and rage. Besides, he just needed to get lucky and land a punch and she was sure it would send her flying.
"I'll show you getting laid you bit-" He swung at her, but he obviously had no training. He pulled his arm back, announcing his intention and leaving himself wide open. Maki had rolled up the sleeves of her uniform and even in the dim light he had to be able to see her muscle and know she wasn't some weak girl who had more good intentions than actual sense. Her fist snapped out before he was even ready to swing his own forwards and she caught his throat, causing him to lose all his momentum and stumble from the blow, gagging and coughing. She hadn't hit him hard enough to do any real damage, but a swift kick to his temple her booted foot settled that fight.
"Shit." His accomplice cursed, or maybe he was describing what he was doing now, letting go of the girl and scrambling to his feet. He pulled out a knife and Maki halted. Okay, this changed things. She was ready to take on a drunken brawl, but a drunk with a knife was dangerous, if not to herself than to the girl on the floor behind her next opponent.
"Walk away. I just want the girl safe." Maki tried negotiating, hoping talking some sense to this guy would work. Panic, alcohol and rage were not a good combination for that, however, as the guy charged anyway. She was right beside another dumpster and it narrowed the space she had to move and dodge the knife -
fuck it - Maki activated her ability, one she didn't like using in a fight because it felt like cheating and she didn't want to risk stepping on the girl, but she appeared just behind the guy, who just gave a confused "Huh?" as Maki materialized behind him. He was off balance since her body didn't stop his knife for him, and all she had to do was grab the back of his head and slam him into the lid of the dumpster as he slumped to the ground with a groan.
She would have managed a snarky quip then, but the girl was more important. She was still very drunk and trying to stand, but the events that happened to her still had her trembling. Maki helped the girl up, consoling her and helping her back into the bar through the staff entrance. She laid the girl down on the bench in their changing room, placed a jacket over the girl to keep her warm and another beneath her head as a pillow, after someone brought her an aspirin and some water. They simply shook their head with a wry smile at Maki as they left, muttering something about her always finding trouble. She shrugged it off, since she was used to her reputation here. The girl had to be barely eighteen, and soon fell asleep.
Maki was changing out of her uniform at the end of her shift and into her usual clothes when she heard someone whisper "An angel..." from behind her. She turned around and saw the girl from before, apparently waking up. Maki had just stripped off her dress shirt and no doubt the girl mistook her tattoo for an angel's wings or something. She pulled on her tank top and settled down beside the girl, making sure she was okay. "I'm not exactly an angel, ask anyone I work with." Maki managed to say with a dry smile. "You alright?"
The girl nodded. "Thanks for saving me. I was... really drunk. Got into a fight with my sister at home and... it was stupid. I'm Sarah."
"Maki." She introduced herself, and got back up to continue changing. "Well, if you're feeling up to it, I'll call a cab and send you home."
That she did, thought Maki went with Sarah just to make sure nothing else happened along the way. There was a frantic rush to open the door when Sarah knocked, and her sister's face was a mixture of relief and worry as she saw who it was at her door. The usual exchange of worried family members took place, apologies for the earlier fight were made, and Sarah was ushered back into her home gladly. As Maki turned to leave, however, she was stopped by Sarah's sister.
"Hey, miss! Thanks for bringing my sister back." Maki flashed one of her charming smiles and waved it off.
"It was nothing."
"It wasn't nothing, it's Christmas! Why don't you come in and have a seat?" Maki turned around again to reject the offer and then she noticed Sarah's sister was a redhead. And really pretty. She laughed to herself at an inside joke only she understood and nodded. "I'd love to."
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