Grim
Zoey Kasimir
| {Age} |19
| {Species} |Human
| {Gender} |Female
| {Appearance} |Standing at 6’2’’ Zoey is a rather tall woman, strong and active with a lean muscle over her body. Her red hair is such a light shade that it almost appears to be orange, the strands falling in an orderly fashion to just below her mid back, with long bangs that go past her chin. She’s fair skinned, sometimes dipping into a light tan in the summer months. Her features are elegant and perhaps a bit sharp, hard lines with high cheekbones and brows near constantly furrowed above the grey-blue eyes that run in her family. This all adds up to Zoey having a natural ‘resting bitch face’.
However, as of a few months ago her looks are no longer the most striking part about her. At least, not in the same way. Zoey is missing her left arm at the shoulder, and has harsh scarring not only around the area but continuing up the left side and back of her torso, neck, and jaw with some of the lines there going as far as her nose.
| {Equipment and Personal Belongings} |Exo Suit Prototype: The most important part of Grim’s gear, this Exo Suit is absolutely a work in progress. It has plates around the front and back that act as both protection and the main housing for the components, having the side effect of making the wielder appear bulkier than they may be. Similar plates run along the legs, and the metal skeleton of the suit wraps around the entire body up to the neck. The technology allows Zoey to move and provides protection as she fine tunes the movements into something more dexterous. Currently the sprint is decent, but maneuverability in the legs is below average.
Prosthetic Arm: Zoey possesses two prosthetic arms that can be interchanged. The first is a somewhat standard one in terms of abilities, capable of moving the fingers and wrist in limited capacity. It’s also quite beautiful, painted silver with real gold accents, slim and polished. The second is one of her own making, made of black metal and more for function than pretty looks. This one reacts better, but is bulkier, heavier, and has more abilities. On top of being made of heavy duty metal, the arm also houses various tools in the fingers, with the palm able to be electrified as taser or defibrillator. There’s also a grappling hook built into the forearm. The grip itself is above human strength, but not by much so far.
Half-Face Mask: Being protective of her identity, Zoey wears a somewhat bulky mask over her lower face. It’s built off a gas mask for a future gadget she has in mind, but more importantly she’s added a voice changer to drop her voice into a decidedly more masculine version.
Nightvision Goggles: Exactly what it sounds like, a pair of flat lens goggles. Though she’s been fiddling with nightvision binoculars to try and combine them.
Titanium Blades: A simple set of seven eight-inch blades, five primarily for throwing and two with actual hilts.
Release the Drones: Literally dozens of drones of all different models from the past decade. One is bulletproof, due to being the one that got sent to Bludhaven on occasion. It still has a few dents from trying.
Home and Home Defense: Zoey’s penthouse is the tip of the largest residential building in Central City, owning the top two floors for an absolutely ridiculous suite, and the third floor from the top for security. Her home contains multiple weapons that she doesn’t carry, firearms being AR-15, Tikka T3x Tac A1, Mossberg 500, and a Glock 19. She doesn’t need more than one, but she likes having them. Has a few hunting knives as well.
Personal Belongings: Her parents’ rings, on a sturdy silver chain around her neck. The latest smartphone. A multitool. Her wallet. Probably hundreds of dollars at a time in said wallet. Sometimes, her dignity.
Stickers: Zoey’s absolutely ancient black lab, and a good boy.
| {Physical Abilities} |Unfettered Genius: Zoey’s greatest strength has always been her intellect, even if it can get her into trouble as well. As her grades can attest, she absorbs knowledge like a sponge and has a certain curiosity that lends to this. More than once as a child she’s managed to take something apart just to see how it ticks, and before his disappearance one of her favorite hobbies was building battle bots with her cousin in her home’s custom arena. While she seems to have at least base information on almost any topic under the sun, her specialty has always been anything mechanical or technological. She treats her cars as her babies, always owns the latest tech, and has made more inventions in her short life than many adults - though admittedly not many were made to be useful outside a specific purpose. Paintball claymores are not cheating!
Cheerleading IS Athletic!: Healthy body equals healthy mind, as the saying always goes. Zoey keeps in shape, both Kasimir Castle and her penthouse having regularly used home gyms. Throughout high school she also chose cheerleading as her sport of choice, enjoying the teamwork and gymnastics involved. (Plus, though she won’t admit it, the cute outfits were a plus!) On a more serious note, due to the high crime rate of Gotham City Zoey was obligated to learn how to defend herself on top of the specialized ‘kidnap prevention training’. As such, she was taught Krav Maga and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, though has never had to actually use it before Central City.
Stellar Aim: As part of her love for all things with moving parts, Zoey has taken apart numerous weapons, mostly guns. She owns several in her penthouse, more in her family’s home, and her father took her hunting almost yearly. It was one of the least lavish things they ever did, but she always enjoyed the quality, quiet time. Along with shooting ranges, this has left her with a very good aim, and throwing knives were added for fun later on in an attempt to offset the apparent uncoolness of attending science camp. (As an aside, she does know a bit of tracking from the hunting trips!)
Polyglot: You’d think with that big brain Zoey would know more languages, but her primaries are English and Russian, due to her father’s side being slavic. On a lesser note she can read Chinese and Japanese, admittedly due to wanting clear instructions when buying interesting tech from overseas.
| {Superpowers} |Transference: The ability to heal any injury by taking it onto your own body.
| {Limitations} |Squishy, mortal human body.
Particularly vulnerable to technomancers.
Suffers from debilitating injuries, both physical and mental after the incident that lost her arm.
Won’t admit it, but she’s terrified of using her power again.
[Future] Even if she makes something for every situation, Zoey can only carry a limited amount of gadgets.
| {Personality} |Ever since the incident, Zoey’s personality has changed in some rather drastic ways. Though in initial impressions she could come off as a bit of a brat, or at worst a bitch, she was for the most part vivacious and full of life - tempered only by the need to appear as the perfect heiress in certain situations. Further, she had a certain brash confidence in herself that wasn’t hard to come off as arrogant. Hints of this personality still shine through at times, but for the most part it’s been overlapped with something new.
Moody, withdrawn, and obsessed with vengeance. The wounds of what’s happened are too raw right now, the drastic changes too much to focus on. It’s all Zoey can do to concentrate on what she needs to do - at least in her mind - to stop everything from closing in on her brain like a hand around her throat. Everything she has is now dedicated to her goal.
The one thing that hasn’t changed is her very core defining trait; a strong sense of justice. Even jaded as she is now, Zoey would do anything in her power to help someone in need, though sometimes it can seem slightly deranged. Because of this, though her gadgetry was originally built with nothing but selfish ideas in mind she can’t help but stop for every person along the way who might need it.
| {Place of Origin} |Born and raised in Kasimir Castle of Gotham City, which is indeed an actual castle her father purchased in his youth owing entirely to the streak of ‘extra’ that runs in the Kasimir line.. He could do it easily as well, considering the Kasimir’s wealth has increased exponentially in the past few generations. While their fortune began generations ago in all things medical, from supplies to machinery to having a family of well-regarded Doctors, the Kasimirs have since expanded operations. Real Estate, Technological Advancement, Legal Services and more - it seemed like the only thing they weren’t into was weapons, due in no small part to their roots in medicine. There’s even a distant Aunt that’s started a successful clothing line of dresses with pockets.
This afforded Zoey a life of luxury people can only dream of, and a fertile ground to exercise her creativity. It helped that her father absolutely spoiled her every whim. This only increased after her parents’ divorce, leading to things such as an entire room being converted to a battle bot arena and workshop. Or maybe a better example would be the several million dollar car for her sixteenth birthday.
| {Background} |Of course, no price tag on any fancy gift can render mute the hurt of your parents falling out of love. Zoey was six years old when her parents decided to end their relationship, even if on paper they were still married. It was an upsetting time, a time she often spent with her cousin as her Uncle and Aunt were kind enough to allow the children to spend more time together. When Mal wasn’t around though, it wasn’t hard for her to find trouble herself. A curious and gifted child, more than one shiny new object found its demise at her hands as the Kasimir heiress took it apart. She loved seeing how things worked, being able to see the layers strip away, how they worked together, and sometimes she even put it back together again. Particularly at a young age it gave her a sense of control that was comforting. When there wasn’t anything that caught her interest in the moment, Zoey absorbed other knowledge like a sponge. Zaden Kasimir more than once found his young daughter stubbornly slogging through his medical texts, the papers he had, and the research he was investigating.
By the time Zoey was a young woman, her father shouldn’t have even been surprised the first time she brought him an article on something new in his own field.
The first time she invented something all her own, Zoey was seven and wanted to make a robot. It was harmless enough, and Zaden always encouraged his daughter’s pursuits. So really, Bitey McFlameburp was his fault. The most dangerous roomba that ever existed, Zoey had failed to provide a kill switch for her first working build. After replacing the burn carpets and his eyebrows, her father kindly contracted his daughter a largely concrete room with a small arena for her little robots. And begged her to remember an off switch. She spent days there, not only stretching her creativity and how far she could push her nanny’s frayed nerves, but as her own safe haven. Her mother never really approved finding her daughter covered in oil, with little nicks on her fingers and parts strewn around the room, and her father often worked long hours.
It provided the groundwork for when her Uncle passed, and the first drone Zoey sent to see her cousin was destroyed in Bludhaven. Stubborn and determined, it took three more tries to not only find a powerful enough drone to stand the armor plating, but to modify it with what was essentially a swanky video phone. Thank god her father never asked questions over the supplies she wanted. Of course, that just expanded her scope even more, as now Zoey was ordering anything new that caught her fancy. That’s the danger of a child with a large pool of funds and little parental supervision.
That changed when Zoey hit her teens. It had taken a bit, but her father finally realized that despite his indulgences his daughter was growing, and fast at that. He didn’t even know that she had become a bit of a car fanatic, that she was signed up for some sort of science summer camp, that she stopped learning the piano from her mother, even that she was planning to try out for cheerleading starting high school! So that summer, after her camp, Zaden took his first vacation in quite some time to spend time with just his daughter and himself. It was a bit of a comedy of errors the first hunting trip they had, especially when Zoey ended up taking apart all the firearms the first night (he should’ve seen that coming), but they were closer than ever and she promised to research everything before their next hunt. These trips happened right up until she graduated.
By the end of High School, there was no doubt that Zoey was a genius. Part of her time fiddling with technology, with reading all these things far above her grade, the staying up for days on end working on some pet project or another were often motivated by boredom. The best private school Gotham had to offer had nothing on her, and she breezed by honors classes with ease. In truth, she likely would have graduated early had her parents not been of the mindset that school was an experience as well as an education. Rubbing shoulders with the children of other elite families couldn’t hurt for when she took over as the family head, and having an incredible brain didn’t always help if you had no idea how to handle people. As such, despite Zoey’s love for her family she was practically salivating at the thought of an actual challenge. She was accepted into numerous Universities, but ended up choosing Central City as her new base of operations, in no small part due to the Particle Accelerator that STAR Labs had erected there. How cool was that?
Admittedly, Zoey was also influenced by how close it was to Keystone. She hadn’t visited her favorite cousin’s grave often. No one could blame her, with the ache in her chest.
While it was a bit of an adjustment, the first month of classes saw Zoey settling in just fine. She had her own apartment close by in one of the skyrise penthouses, her dog Stickers’ latest check up cleared him for the move, and she had just bought a new car. Again.
And then she got the knock on her door from her home’s security personnel.
The attack had happened so fast that by the time the news was relayed to Keystone, it was already confirmed that both Zaden Kasimir and his ex-wife Aurora Larkin had been murdered. Slaughtered, in fact, along with everyone else in their respective homes. The bodies were so mangled there couldn’t even be open caskets for their funerals.
It was no surprise that Zoey went into a numb shock. Her parents were gone, and though they had their rough patches over the years she loved both of them. Their funeral preparations were handled by the family’s majordomo, with the daughter merely going along with everything. It had made no sense. Her family had enemies, sure - anyone at the top would tend to accrue a few. Yet this wasn’t just a hit, if it was then they might’ve survived. This was … something that seemed far more dangerous than a mere assassination.
Zoey couldn’t help but latch onto that with desperation. It was something to cling to, something productive to focus on. It was entirely self-destructive.
The new Head of the Kasimir Family, Zoey once again found herself sloughing through her father’s work. This time she wasn’t a little girl that needed a dictionary and context clues. It was an absolute scour, looking for any hint of what could have caused this. The Gotham police were useless as usual, corrupt and fat with their laziness and greed. If her parents were to find justice, the she could have to be the one to find it for them. Maybe she could find peace, too.
In truth, there was little to find at first. Everything was business as usual, the only things that even came up in the last few months were some new contracts, some amicably finished deals, a new up and coming vaccine from Kasimir Pharmaceuticals. Even her father’s investments in STAR Labs were just so he could get an excuse to get his daughter a tour of the Particle Accelerator. A Particle Accelerator that wasn’t even successful, as many people found out six months ago.
Then the phenomenon occurred with it.
Normally Zoey would’ve loved finding out about everything that was happening in the wake of this incident. The newness of powers, the excitement of how these people’s very DNA must’ve changed, the awesome opportunity for *science!* All of it was ash in her mouth, as the increasingly bitter young woman was single focused on her goal. And at last, it bore fruit.
It was such a little thing, really. A lot of her father’s work had been erased following the attack, and with it any hint of whatever he might’ve been working on. Even Zoey’s certified genius couldn’t seem to turn back the hands of time when it came to this. What she could find however, was that her father’s investment into STAR Labs wasn’t just for her. Somehow, it linked back to her cousin’s accident. The details were lost, only smoldering spiderwebs connecting the dots, but it was all she had to go on, and she latched onto it with the ferocity of a drowning man.
In truth, maybe it was the snooping that caused this. Maybe it was just pure coincidence. Either way, before Zoey could do more than get her fingertips dirty, her abysmal luck struck for one more devastating blow. It was a Memorial Gala for all those lost in the Particle Accelerator incident, one that at this point in her life Zoey would’ve brushed off as unimportant, were it not for some STAR Lab representative attending. That was enough to pique her interest into going. In turn, the event was enough to pique the rage of some of those who not only lost loved ones, but were one of the earliest instances of these strange powers, and how not to use them.
Zoey can’t remember much of the night if she’s honest. One moment she was laser focused on the man she sought, moving to introduce herself. The next, a ringing in her ears, blood dripping in her eyes, screams and smoke with fire licking at her back.
And when she turned her head, one of the children of an attendee. A little boy, his rumpled tux burned away in areas, buttons melted to his skin, body mangled and twisted and still breathing despite being so close to the apparent explosion.
All that Zoey could think was that she had to help him, even as the very air burned in her lungs. And as she reached out with shaking fingers, the veins in the very tips beginning to glow white, the thought just pounded louder and louder in her head. Help. Help him!
The pain seared like molten lava through her veins. Zoey couldn’t even tell if she was screaming as her bones cracked, as skin blistered and peeled. Even her face felt like a knife was being carved through the flash, and then the snap of her spine even as the little boy’s seemed to correct itself-
Doctors told her later that she must’ve shielded him, because while the boy’s right side was quite injured, his left seemed fine - and the opposite for her.
Zoey lost her arm completely, as well as her ability to walk. Nothing could be done for the arm, but doctors were hopeful that with time and effort the spinal cord injury could be overcome. After all, as her very company knew, advances in medicine were happening everyday!
By now, with defeat after defeat, some people might’ve given up. Some might’ve wallowed in misery at their bad fortunes. Some might’ve even just decided to retire then and there, if they had the resources Zoey did. Yet it had taken her all of three days to know she wasn’t down for the count. It had taken her all of three hours on returning home to once again lock herself away in her lab, focused on drawing her latest blueprint. It had taken all of three months to reach the New Year, and Zoey hadn’t spent her time lamenting what could’ve been - after all, her story was just starting, with the whir of a hand built machine and eyes locked on the future.
Simple Unicycle
ThisIsFine
