Tunnel Rat
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Tunnel Rat is an odd looking mutate who has no idea what she is or where she comes from. But she has learned one of the things she’s good at, beating people up with things. Thus, she wanders Millennium City as a semi-vagrant vigilante trying to make her way as a strange strange thing in an equally strange world.
Contents
Background
Neverwhere
Tunnel Rat has no idea what she is or where she came from. Her earliest memories are from around 24 months ago, scrounging and scavaging in the underground infastructure of Millenium City. She was smaller then, perhaps a quarter of her current size as best as she can estimate.
Most of what she remembers is vague. Smells, sounds, textures, lights and dark. As the first few months passed things are more clear. She remembers exploring the city, seeing things and knowing what they were without name or language for them. Her friend Reginald thinks she had some sort of manufactured instinct built in that helped her learn and fit in to the urban environment.
As If!
TR's favorite stomping grounds were and still are City Center Park. She spent many days squirelled away out of sight and just observing people and events.
Her first summer in MC lead to a chance encounter with a young coed who would, unbeknownst to the young woman, shape Tunnel Rat's personality greatly.
Brittney Connors was interning for the summer in Millenium City. On break from Stanford and originally hailing from the Valley she spent most of her lunch hours in the park and on her phone to friends back home. It was by eavesdropping on these conversations that Tunnel Rat learned most of her vernacular.
Lightning Bolt! Lightning Bolt!
In much the same way, Tunnel Rat's "career" as a vigilante came about as a result of hanging out in City Center Park.
She was crouched in the shade of some large shrubs watching a group of teenage boys dressed in odd clothing and fighting eachother with oversized shiny silver weapons.
Still fuming over an incident that morning with a shop clerk that had misunderstood her intentions when she tried to buy something for breakfast Tunnel Rat was caught completely off guard when a red and yellow flame painted tennis ball flew off target and struck her in the head.
Crying out in surprise, she saw that she didn't have much choice having drawn the attention of the boys, and so picked up the ball and loped out to give it to the nearest boy.
Most of the people Tunnel Rat met were ok with her. This was Millenium City, people have been through a lot of weird things. But there were those few people who just couldn't handled a bedraggled looking mutant rat thing. She was 0 for 1 so far that day and so when the short fat kid in a robe started making fun of her before she knew it she'd planted that tennis ball between his eyes.
Misunderstandings developing as they are won't to do, it was not long before a melee insued. Luckily, for the boys, the weapons were simple padded boffer types. Tunnel Rat had taken a good few licks of her own but after getting her claws on one of the pvc and foam weapons had soundly left all but one of the boys, who had declined to join the fray, lightly bruised and smarting.
Holding up his empty hands in the universal signal for not wanting trouble the young man introduced himself as Reggie. Despite what had just happenend TR found herself returning Reginald's grin with her own.
Teachers open the door, but you must enter by yourself
Tunnel furthered her education greatly through her friendship with Reginald and his group. She learned a little bit of weapons play from them and then sought out other sources and taught the new stuff to them. Most weekends they practice in the park and TR has had great fun travelling with them to several large LARP events and running around pretending to be some different sort of monster than she actually is all weekend.
They've taught her a lot about the city and how to live in it. Finer points of society and even how to read a bit. It was this last topic that piqued Reggie's scientific interest. While none of them could say exactly what Tunnel Rat's origins are, a series of experiments did lead to some general knowledge of how she is different than normal people outside of a purely physical difference (such as her odd eyesight). Likewise, things like her rapid pattern learning skills (which allowed her to adapt to life in MC and pick up English at a rapid pace) have given significant basis for all sorts of guesses and theories.
It is also due to this group of friends that she gained her monicker. One of the boys, Paul, coined it as a general observation during their first conversation and mutually they decided to go with it "for now" until TR decided on something else. It's a decision she still hasn't made, though she's self conscious about her lack of a "real" name at times, she just can't yet bring herself to think of herself in terms of a regular name such as a Sarah or Julie.
Appearance
Tunnel Rat is some sort of rat mutate, and looks the part. Her fur is mainly brown though she has taken to dying parts of her "hair". She's rather spindly of build, with her limbs, fingers, and toes being longer than the average humans. Likewise her ears are a rather difficult to hide feature along with her tail which is nearly 3/4 as long as she is tall.
She favors odd colors in subdued tones. No doubt influenced by her partial colorblindness. Her most prized possession is her purple leather jacket, given to her by Reginald.
Personality
Alone around strangers she is painfully shy, including the random bad guys she fights on a day to day basis. But when emboldened by a group of friends or when amongst those she knows her bubbly personality comes out. Given that most of her ability to speak English was learned by listening to a summer's worth of hour long cell phone conversations had by a college girl from San Fernando Valley interning in Millennium City who frequented, on her lunch breaks, the park which Tunnel Rat liked to hang out in a lot of people have a short tolerance for long conversations with her.
Because she's only a few years old, as far as she can tell, Tunnel Rat doesn't have a broad base of knowledge. She's not dumb, per se, but her general cluelessness about everyday things certainly makes her sometimes appear that way.
Abilities
Tunnel Rat's unique physiology lends her traits that make her quite suited to the vigilante trade. She's extraordinarily nimble and has excellent hand eye coordination. This allows her to avoid a lot of the nastiness thrown her way while making the most of whatever she's armed herself with at the time.
Additionally her knowledge of the Millenium City underground along with a natural affinity for burrowing enables her to get around from place to place mostly unseen.
Unknown to most is the fact that Tunnel Rat's eyesight is rather poor, a commonality shared with her presumed rodent roots. This has resulted in her tendencies towards odd colors and trouble reading and using computers. Her ability to track motion is excellent however. That, combined with heightened aural capabilities and a generally enhanced ability to quickly detail out her situational surroundings and keep minute track of the world around her makes her a natural fighter in close quarters.
