app to lastvoyages

[bodyreads]

User Name/Nick: Kal
User DW: queensland
AIM/IM: walkthedawn
E-mail: otherpromise@gmail.com
Other Characters: N/A

Character Name: Cassandra Cain
Series: DC Comics
Age: Between 19-ish...? Comic ages.
From When?: Post-Red Robin #17

Inmate/Warden: Warden. Cassandra has spent most of her life avoiding killing others after her father sent her to murder someone when she was a child. Seeing death through another person's eyes shocked her so much that she ran away to avoid helping her father do his work. As Batgirl - and Black Bat - the lives of others always come first. Batman has taught her to never fail, and that letting others die is the worst thing that can ever happen. Once, she even had a death wish that eventually was fulfilled in a fight against Lady Shiva, and she came back from the dead wanting to save others instead. Under the influence of Deathstroke's drugs, she was coerced to kill again, and has since been atoning for what she's done.

She has a great deal of understanding from both sides of the spectrum, of death and life, and she has taught others that her way - saving others and preventing death - is better. She's saved killers to teach them this and she's always tried to fight on the side of the angels, even when being hated and despised for carrying the mantle of the bat. She would work better as a Warden because she could continue teaching this lesson.

Item: A batphone!

Abilities/Powers:
As a child, Cassandra was never taught to read or write. Instead, she grew up knowing only violence. She understood physical actions and, thus, learned how to read a person's body. She can see their thoughts through their actions and can tell exactly what someone is going to do based on their body language. With this ability, she can anticipate her opponents' moves and act accordingly, making her one of the greatest martial artists in the world. She's bested Lady Shiva, considered to be one of the top assassins in the world.

This "ability", however, had its drawbacks. She couldn't read or write, nor could she speak. She couldn't understand vocabulary. It left her social skills to be extremely flawed until someone switched things around in her mind so she could think in words and thoughts instead of symbols and pictures. Her language comprehension skills are all over her brain instead of simply in one hemisphere or the other. This gives her a form of dyslexia and it's difficult for her to sometimes put full thoughts into words at once. She often mispronounces long words as well.

Other Abilities:

- Very skilled in martial arts
- Knows how to use nerve/pressure points to her advantage. (She can even stop someone's heart)
- Her strength, agility, and prowess border on metahuman abilities, but she has no actual powers.
- She can shatter glass and brick, and she's broken a sword once on her own.
- Acrobatic skills. She can also dodge bullets most of the time.
- If she IS hit by bullets, she's learned to push through anyway, regardless of the pain.
- She's a master of various weaponry, though she prefers not to use them.
- She's proficient at detective work, mostly because she can discern other people's disguises and identities from their body language.
- She can learn new moves and abilities simply by studying an opponent or engaging them in combat. (She's a visual learner)

She is resistent to most toxins and poisons but is not immune to mental suggestion.

Personality:
On the surface, Cassandra appears to be a very quiet and distanced sort of girl. She listens and watches before she speaks, content to wait and then respond. She's not very talkative because she learned to speak and write only much later in life and so while she is unsure of how to say and describe things, she still understands everything around her. Highly perceptive to the changing moods and movements of the people she engages, she can usually adapt herself to what they need without being told. She doesn't need to survey a scene before she moves in; with one look, she knows. It gives her an advantage in combat and on the field, but it also makes it difficult for her to interact with others in a social way. She knows what to say but not how to communicate it. If she does know, she will do her best to convey what she wants to say, but it often comes out in short bursts of conversation, things like "Not sure" instead of "I'm not sure." She tries to be to the point with everything she says, matching her desire to be precise and perfect in everything she does. To her, a mistake can cost anyone their lives.

Cassandra Cain was born to two of the greatest assassins in the world and separated from her mother at birth. Her father trained her from her infancy to be the greatest assassin who ever lived, one who could read the language of the body and one who would be incapable of being defeated. As a child, all she knew was this language. Her understanding of how people moved, how they thought and how they were going to respond in any situation. As this was her only language, it made her an unstoppable force but it didn't help her understand the world around her. She could see the world in her opponents' eyes but only as one might see a chess game: she only saw the next move. As such, she only understood life as a game. When she took her first life, she immediately saw death through his eyes. In that moment, Cass' childhood shattered and she recognized what it meant to destroy a life.

It is this moment that makes up the core of Cassandra's personality: she is entirely devoted to serving the people and protecting every single life there is. Her fixation towards this cause is what makes her a perfect candidate for Batgirl, for any position in the Batfamily, despite her upbringing. Her eagerness to prove herself worthy not only of Batman's recognition but for own sake made her an instant candidate for the Batgirl mantle. Cass' life was dedicated to proving to herself, and others, that no life should ever be wasted and that she wanted to pay the price for taking a life herself. This led to a death wish that ultimately ruled her very existence for quite some time. While she could see that no life should be wasted, she also knew that she had to pay the price for what she had done.

Cassandra is obsessed with becoming better, faster, and stronger because it will make her a better protector and fighter. It makes her come off as paranoid, especially when she already can do so much. In reality, it is her fear that she will fail and she will allow others to die that keeps her going. No matter what, she puts the lives of others first. In this way, she understands the duty of "Batman" better than anyone else, and she understands Bruce's goal and ideals better too. Of all of Bruce's "children", she makes it a point to say how she wants to be all he is. She tells Tim how dedicated she is to follow in his footsteps and to one day be Batman.

Batman serves as her guide, mentor, and father-figure during much of the Batgirl series and it because blatantly obvious that she'll do next to anything for him. In fact, the only time she ever directly disobeys an order is when she thinks she can protect a life. Barbara Gordon acts as a mother-figure to her, and because Barbara and Batman have two very different philosophies when it comes to justice, Cass often finds herself between a rock and a hard place and incapable of choosing. This is, in part, because of her lack of nurturing as a child. With no mother in her life and a father who taught her only violence, her wish for love and care of any kind, coupled with her moral compass and martyr-complex, often leaves her conflicted and uncertain when she isn't in the field.

Beyond her Batgirl and Black Bat cover, she is kind, devoted, and loyal. She wants to do what's right and she wants to take care of the people around her. When people are upset, when they are angry, she can feel it. She wants to get rid of those negative emotions and she genuinely wants to see people happy. She hates when people lie and she hates causing others pain. It bothers her when she brings someone disappointment or distress, even when she's taking the moral high ground or doing what's rational. She serves the people before she serves herself, and that sometimes extends into her friendships. This makes her rather difficult to befriend outright when she's "Batgirl" and "Black Bat"; as Cassandra Cain, a normal girl who lives in the house across the way, she is easier to get along with because she doesn't talk about her crime fighting or her beliefs.

Her loyalty extends far beyond the cowl and the bat symbol; she wants to protect human life around her. Her past may have been tragic, but she moves on from it with grace and dignity, rising above her father's torments to make herself into a better person for the good of humanity and for innocent lives. She never sees herself as abused. Instead, she's thankful for the training she's undergone. Now she can use it in her fight and she can ensure that no one suffers how she did.

Unfortunately, a run in with Deathstroke breaks this vow of "do no harm" and she becomes blacklisted by many as a murderer, even by her own "family". Cassandra often finds herself struggling with her inherent capabilities as a killer. More than once, she remarks how easy it is to let go and how freeing it feels. Several issues go into exploring this side of her and it's frequently remarked upon that she should be a killer. It's in her nature. In fact, in the remaining issues of the original run of Batgirl, Cassandra was unwittingly destroying more lives than saving them because she was too focused on keeping everyone alive. It's this problem - and her brainwashing from Deathstroke - that often comes back to haunt her in more ways than one. In some issues, people are appalled at her murderous skills. In others, people berate her for her restraint because she refuses to kill.

Because of this, she often seems on the outskirts of the Wayne family. Tim often has to assure her that she's still wanted and needed, both as a crime fighter and as a person, an addition to their home. Alfred remarks upon this once or twice to Bruce, too, trying to make it clear to him that Cassandra could feel left out. She never speaks up, though; because of Slade's brainwashing, she feels she deserves to be shunned. And even if she is demonized by those around her, she will still put her duty first and foremost before any of her feelings, for better or worse. This makes her more relative to Bruce than to the others, and it's sometimes painfully obvious how much people disagree with him when he gets like that. Her duty and determination come at a high cost for her, but she pushes through just the same.

Path to Redemption: [(INMATES ONLY) Please outline possible ways a Warden can get through to them, possible triggers, methods, motives for them to change. This section can serve to give Warden players some idea of which route to take in working with your Inmate. While we don't expect every Inmate to become redeemed, they have to AT LEAST have potential for it. Irredeemable Inmates are not acceptable.]

History: Wikipedia and DC Wiki

Sample Journal Entry:
[Frankly, it's smart that she's had some time to put on something new to wear, because people might be a little baffled at her outfit of choice. No longer looking like an assassin or vigilante, Cass looks at the video feed curiously for a moment. Then, she lifts a hand in greeting. And no, she doesn't give her name.]

I've had a look around since I've arrived. It's...interesting.

[Not at all like stories she's read about ships and brigs, inmates and wardens.]

Do you think a ship is really the best place for rehabilitation? [A frown of consideration.] ...It must be. It wouldn't be used if it wasn't successful.

[With another curious look at the screen, she bites her lower lip.]

I'll get used to it.

[It's a quiet utterance, mostly to herself, and then the video snaps off.]



Sample RP:

This wasn't how it was supposed to be. Cassandra Cain had given up on being a bat some time ago, leaving it for Stephanie. She held no ill will towards her friend, but the timing left a bad taste in her mouth. First, Bruce died. He asked her to give up the mantle to Stephanie, to let her be the new Batgirl. It was a title Cassandra didn't deserve anymore, not after the actions that had led her to murder others. Deathstroke.

Did she hate him? Did she want to see him die?

After the initial fact, she found that she didn't. In fact, she felt so disgusted with herself for wanting his death. Hadn't she advocated life for so long? Hadn't she fought to save people, not to let them destroy themselves? That had been her goal and she wanted to stick to it still, even now. Even...Even though she was alone and in Hong Kong. Tim assured her that things would be okay, that Bruce had returned, that she had family...but there were things for her to do, people to save, and lives to fix. She owed Batman that much, even if she wasn't calling herself by a Bat name any longer.

Or was she?

When she finished her work that night, when she encountered the Barge, when she climbed aboard and made a deal with the Warden, she knew she might not touch the mantle again. Not really. But she knew it would be worth it...and that she would always be a Bat at heart. She still walked under his mantle and his name.

Special Notes:
Is it all right if she comes with her costume, since she had it at the time? If so, I'd like for her to have it.