Ruby July

Nickname:

Age:

Race:

Praeternatural

Occupation:

Tinkerer/

Undercover Peacekeeper

Personality:

RJ is often found tinkering with gadgets. She loves nothing more to figure out how machines work, she is quite the gearhead. However more often than not someone or something at least will drag her out of her tinkering and into trouble. When she gets dragged away from her work, however, you can bet that she will bring her sarcasm and wit along for the ride.

Physical Description:

Ruby has a mass of curly hair that can never be truly tamed. She sometimes will throw it into a ponytail or bun if it starts to really get on her nerves. All in all, if it weren't for her hair, you'd miss her in a crowd, a fact that she curses when trying to work in peace. Her slim figure never fully blossomed into a full figure, and she has taken to dressing in a tomboyish style, as likely to be wearing leather trousers as a skirt. Her time around La Sang Noir shows on her face though, a winged eye and red stained lips are an homage to Ravina and her dolls.

History:

RJ’s father left her mother while Ruby was still developing in the womb. Her mother never forgave her for that. RJ wasn’t even deemed worthy of her mother’s surname. She was born in July and had a shock of curly red hair like her father’s, hence Ruby July.

Her mother remarried when RJ was five years old. Her mother and step-father treated her more like a slave than like a proper daughter, and she helped raise her half-brother Richard, and sister Estel as a nursery maid and not a sibling. When her step-father fell on hard times, it was her mother who made the suggestion to sell her. At thirteen, when most young girls start looking at boys and marriage, RJ was in the cargo hold of a ship bound for the new world, and the Land of Silver.

Sold to La Sang Noir, things had never looked bleaker for young RJ. Her new Mistress took one gruff look at her, told the man who had brought her that an ant wouldn’t be able to locate a curve on the young girl’s body, let alone her clientele and paid him half of what he asked for RJ before sending him on his way. As soon as he was gone, her new Mistress softened, almost seemed motherly as she showed RJ around the saloon.

RJ never felt pressured into doing any more than serving and cleaning up around the place. Mistress Ravina implied that she was waiting for some form of meat to appear on the young girl’s figure, but she also didn’t seem too disappointed when it never did. RJ happily cleaned and served the patrons at La Sang Noir until two events changed her life forever.

The first was when one of Mistress Ravina’s priceless treasures was knocked off of a shelf by a drunken dwarf. Amidst shrieking that would have made a mountain lion cower in fear, RJ cleaned the mess up, but instead of throwing it into the trash, she took the clockwork creation back to the living quarters of the girls, and for weeks, she spent her downtime studying the clockwork pieces, learning how they went together. On Mistress Ravina’s birthday, she presented the music box, fully repaired and gleaming in the lantern light. As the ornately jeweled tiger roared and incense smoke billowed from its mouth, Ravina eyed the girl, beginning to realize the girl’s worth was not as a barmaid.

The second was by happenstance. RJ was taking care of the trash in the back alley when a freshly turned vampire jumped upon her. RJ cried out as the flash of fangs rushed for her throat, the cry strangling in her throat as blunt teeth hit her neck and the newborn vampire suckled at her throat. Ravina watched from a window as the vampire jumped back, confused. His fangs reappeared and he lunged once more, RJ flinching as yet again, blunt teeth and a suckling tongue hit her neck. The third time, as he was rushing, Ravina called out, yelling that he couldn’t just sample the goods for free, her girls were magically warded against free samples, although once inside, RJ realized from her Mistress’s concerned look that it was not quite true.

The next night, RJ found herself being publically thrown out as damaged goods. She was told that her figure would never be curvy enough to be what Ravina paid for, and a total loss.

Once again in the alley, RJ was confused, until she came face to face with her Mistress, shrouded in a cloak to hide her face. Hastily Ravina explained that RJ was a special type of human, one that would face certain death should she stay in the boudoir. She gave the girl directions to a watchmaker who dabbled in clockwork trinkets. At 15, RJ found herself locked into a 5-year apprenticeship, her former Mistress checking in on her progress every few months and bringing her the tidbits that Ravina had learned about Praeternaturals.

Five years of hard work and study later, Ravina collected RJ from her apprenticeship, placing her in a small shop with a loft apartment not too far from La Sang Noir. Tasked with spying and relaying information to an organization RJ had never even heard of, RJ now finds herself in unknown territory.

Freed, but in debt to her former Mistress, now friend and ally. RJ holds no illusions though, she knows that if she is found a spy, her former Mistress will play the damsel card, and RJ will be out to dry. It’s probably for the best RJ doesn’t plan on being caught.

Equipment:

Does not believe in weapons, she feels that quick wits, a silver wrench, and some good study rope are all she needs to get out of almost any situation. She wears specially made leather gloves which protect others from her touch while allowing her to tinker, and glassicals that help her see that which is not what it appears.

Praeternaturals:

Praeternaturals are technically human. They have no distinguishing outward appearance or features that automatically label them as supernatural. They are an evolutionary abnormality. They are both natural, and a step above. Their unique powers can be compared to the concept of magnets. If humans that can survive transformation into vampires or shifters have an excess of soul, as some scientists hypothesize, then praeternaturals have an absence of soul.

Praeternaturals cannot cohabitate the same space, they repel each other like the negative side of magnets. They are a rarity because although they always breed true, the females are encouraged to take every precaution not to procreate. The child, the mother, or both will die before the child is carried to full term due to the repulsive natures of their species. Fathers are incapable of being a part of their child’s life, although many do not discover this until it is too late.

Being soulless, praeternaturals are highly practical and very resistant to glamours, temptations, hypnosis, compulsions, and other such tricks of the Vrykolakas and Were varieties. They are also capable of temporarily stealing the dual nature of a were, reverting a shifter back to their natural form, and returning a vampire to their human state. As they are repulsed by their own, they draw out the excess soul of those who can shift, returning them back to their base state (animal or human) and those who once were human. This happens through touch, and once the touch is broken, the creature returns to their normal state of being. It is painless but also can leave ancient creatures completely venerable for the duration of the contact in ways they had never been before.

Other supernatural creatures are unaffected, although if they have a humanoid component, they might feel a strange tingling as the extra portion is drawn to a praeternatural’s touch.

Argento