Biography

Thaily is a genetic construct made by her parents, specifically her mother; Satomi Brimstone, a leonine mutant scientist from the Yuro space station, who came to Earth to settle down and start a family in the brief time afforded to her. On Earth she met with a vulpine "dog boy" scholar, Cicero, who had managed to slip away the Coalition's servitude. They hit it off, but when they realized that they, predictably, weren't genetically compatible Satomi solved it the only way she knew how; through science!

So Thaily was born and doted on by both her parents. They inspired a deep love of knowledge for the sake of knowledge and she enjoyed a decent education. Especially considering the region. Her own natural curiosity provides her with enduring motivation to keep reading and learning.

But while Cicero, as a dog boy, had psionics (natural mental abilities), Satomi considered such things ludicrous and puerile, not unlike magic. As such Cicero didn't encourage Thaily's psionic abilities until the last few years of his life, after his wife's passing.

After he passed away, Thaily inherited their modest apartment and lived there until she crossed her employer; an art collector (and unbeknownst to her, figurehead in organized crime) who refused to let her restore a 19th century pendant, citing financial reasons. Working as a curator, Thaily pleaded her employer to change his mind for months until she finally she absconded with the item.

She hadn't thought that cunning plan all the way through; while she succeeded in restoring the pendant to it's former glory, she was now a fugitive with a price on her head.

Personality

Her curiosity is likely both her biggest strength and her biggest weakness. She is often seduced into dangerous situations despite her caution; Having lived a sheltered life and being so suddenly thrown in at the deep end into a world full of monsters (both animalistic and humanoid), bandits, slavers and bounty hunters has given her good reason to watch her step.

Due to her upbringing she is especially leery of magic and psionics, including her own. She prefers to do things the old fashioned way; i.e. one of her abilities is speed reading (30 pages a minute), but prefers to read normally, unless it's something boring and mandatory, such as grading book reports and even then she considers it "cheating".

Additionally, it's typical for dog boys to have an aversion to magic, as they are sensitive to and can detect it's presence. Thaily is no exception to that rule and cannot block out those senses, making her especially vulnerable to Ley Line storms.

Physically Thaily is about twice as strong as regular humans, with most of that strength centered in her lower body she's an excellent and fast runner. In combination with her feline claws she's a competent climber and she inherited an unnerving degree of agility from her mother's side. In school she did well in sports, but gave up on those extracurriculars when she realized it was taking time away from her studies, where her priorities lie. So despite her physical strengths she considers herself a paper pusher, and is quite content with that position.

As such she's not easily impressed with physical strength and such in others, but she's easily enthralled or intimidated by people more intelligent than her, depending on their personality.

Thaily's mother instilled her with the pre-Rift morality she was accustomed to on the Yuro space station. As such Thaily often struggles with the actions she feels forced into by her status as a fugitive.

Likes

More book smarts than street smarts, the reason for that is obvious. Thaily spends a great many waking moments trying to read anything she can get her eyes on. She takes after her father in that aspect, whereas her mother was quite upset when Thaily announced she wanted to be a curator instead of a scientist, which is what the lioness had been trying to groom her daughter for. But while Thaily has great respect for science, her passion lies with pre-Rift art and literature.

She draws a little on the side, but has no great aspirations to become a famous artist in her own right, more interested in reading and looking at art and sharing her passion with others. To the extent that she'll teach others to read and write beforehand if necessary. But while a passionate speaker on the subjects, she has a tendency to go off on tangents and into great, unnecessary detail, boring her audience if not reined in a little.

Dislikes

Coalition, and the feeling is mutual.

As a non-Coalition, non-purebred "dog boy" she'd be shot on sight by Coalition troops. Inside their own territory, but also outside if they think they can get away with it. If they realized she could read and write and taught others they'd shoot her twice, just to be sure.

Bounty hunters that come after her; she sort of understands why they do what they do, but she knows that if she's caught it and returned to her former employer it'd mean execution or being sold into slavery. So she feels the bounty hunters force her to do things that are against her morals. Even if it's a matter of survival, she struggles with guilt over her actions.

Though less so the more evil the person, with her morals she has a very strong dislike of murders, rapists, slavers and the like. She's unsure of thieves as she considers herself one, even if her act was a one-time occurrence born out of idealistic desperation, she considers it hypocritical to hate thieves.

Psymbiote

In direct defiance of her aversion of psionics, Thaily has become host to a psymbiote; a small, tentacled, worm-like creature nestled securely around her cervical vertebrae and connected directly to Thaily's nervous system. What the psymbiote lacks in physical prowess, she makes up for in psionic abilities she shares with her host, including but not limited to: telepathy, telekineses, elektrokineses, bio-manipulation, bio-regeneration, healing touch and levitation.

Thaily inherited the psymbiote, named Lhisun, from a friend of a friend who was dying of old age and despite her aversion of psionics, Thaily was the best host available on short notice. Feeling somewhat morally obligated to help out, Thaily consented and Lhisun was transferred to her.

For her part Lhisun is a caring and compassionate being who loves experiencing and learning new things. Her worst fears are to be alone and the Splugorth; an alien race of slavers that capture psymbiotes and lobotomizes them before selling them for implanting in customers who want to benefit from the psymbiote's ability to enhance psionics, but without the "burden" of sharing their mind with another person.

For that reason, Lhisun's presence is a carefully guarded secret, lest they attract people who'd want to try and extract her from Thaily to their mutual detriment.

Rifts, a little background

If you're interested in learning more about Rifts; it is a tabletop RPG created by Kevin Siembieda and published by Palladium Books. You can find more information about it in their Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rifts\_%28role-playing\_game%29

Bits relevant to this character bio:

It's the late 21st century when Global nuclear war destroys most of human civilization and, in combination with a specific alignment of planets, opens rifts through which all manner of creatures spill forth from their own dimensions. Some on purpose, some by accident. Some races are familiar, such as elves and dragons, others entirely alien. The humanoid dimensional beings are referred to as D-Bees.

The game picks up 109 years after the incident, Earth isn't what it used to be. Many D-Bees have taken up residence on Earth and while some are dangerous and hostile, many are just trying to get by. In addition to D-Bees and aliens, magic has made a resurgence and some people find themselves infused with magic abilities. Sometimes combining it with tec