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Kamala Kuhn

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  1. Name: Kamala Kuhn Age: 27 Height: Yes Weight: Yes Hr: Usually Eyes: Almost always Quote: “People lie, both the living and the dead. Books only lie when people force them to.” Appearance: Kamala Kuhn has no love for the skin she was born in, so she's resolved to spend as much time as possible in someone, or something, else's, dressing appropriately to try and not draw negative attention. When forced into it by official business or the demands of essence expenditure though, she presents a pettite if more pretty than usual facade with blue eyes and the dusky skin of her Linowan heritage. This takes a turn for the more monstrous in her warform as a great pair of raiton's wings sprout from her upper back like a living cloak and her eyes darken to the souless black of a born scavenger. Personality: Kamala is not a people person, almost painfully awkward outside of academic discussion and debate, reflexively prickly when challenged on something she knows is correct. She uses her other skins the same way she uses a good read: something to hide behind and distract herself from an area where she isn't good at all. She enjoys trying new foods, old memories making her acutely on edge when even the prospect of hunger is on the horizon. History: It is said that a magus walks with death, and by this measure Kamala Kuhn has been qualified from the moment she was born. Native to the troubled Linowan region, she was brought up in the obscure Guivre faith, promised an imminent apocalypse by the 5 dragons even as famine, plague, foreign exploitation, and skirmishing between local warlords destroyed any sense of security Kamala may have developed. The first 10 years of her life were spent scrabbling for food and avoiding the kicks and blows of her elders. Strikingly intelligent even then, she caught the attention of UES missionaries who set up a school to educate and convert the Linowan natives once an uneasy peace settled on the region between power struggles. This was her way out of the mud and blood that was her life, so Kamala threw herself into the academic challenges presented to her, hungrily lapping up the lessons presented. The jealousy this engendered in her peers, the taunts and abuse it drew, only encouraged her to keep going. If they hated her for doing well, well, she had to be doing something right. This place had never done her any good, cost her happiness, family, health. The praise of her teachers was the closest she'd ever gotten to positive attention, and hints of a place in the UES if she continued to thrive and said the right words. Given the unsavory and just-plain short-lived options available to her in Linowan, it was too easy to bury the traditions she was raised in, and when the opportunity came in her 19th year, she immigrated to Nexus, letters of recommendation from her tutor's helping her get into one of the universities there, working multiple jobs and public loans to keep herself fed and housed from month to month. Motonic theory became her focus of study, a practical application of the traditions she was raised in, the weirdness of Essence Reactor run-off too reminiscent of those tales of angry spirits for her to look away. It was enthralling work for her first 3 years, but that was nothing compared to the buzz when the shadowlands abruptly reopened and brought the unquiet dead with them. Suddenly, the forgotten and derided, the old stories of Sijan and it's unliving legions were relevant, and Kamala wanted a piece of that body of research to have her name on it, another key to comfort and prosperity and distance from her origins in the mud and the blood of a place that was so often a by-word for backword and violent from her college peers if it was mentioned at all. A sealed letter of invitation from Miss Green of the Sijanese Research Foundation as she was suffering through her graduate studies seemed like the perfect validation, and she couldn't say yes fast enough to the internship offered inside. How unfortunate that she was barely out of orientation and on but her 2nd night of sampling when a group of the hungry dead ambushed her research group and it's escorting SRF soldiers She ran, and two of them broke off to chase her, a harrowing hunt through the sterile streets of the dead city. She kept moving, seeing the monsters vanish into mist behind her even as they stalked forward more like animals than people, the angry ancestors from every childhood tale she'd been told by firelight, the cries of more panicking soldiers and growls of more ghosts adding urgency to her feet and alertness to her eyes. It was only with the hint of sunrise and the fading sounds of conflict that she realized she had survived whatever the hell that was. And with that realization, she collapsed to her knees and looked up at the sky. She felt something flow into her., cool and reassuring and so much larger than herself that she felt like she was going to burst yet somehow managed to contain. She felt the very weave of her being melt and flow with energies she'd never been aware off, shift without the risk of damage or corruption. Knowledge she had never learned flooded her head, applications of essence that she would have scoffed at as improbable, if not impossible. She needed time to think, so she succumbed to a new instinct and took to the skies as a raiton. She wandered, lost in her own thoughts, for a few weeks before a senior No Moon named Titus Pym found her and brought her into the loose order of Luna's chosen and showed her their purpose in Creation. He was a teacher and a mentor and brought magic into her hands by putting her through her initiation as a Sorceress in her own right. Still, there was her life to get back to, expanded as it was now, Kamala got help cultivating the ally needed to give her a paper trail to go with the new human faces she was collecting, gaining a reputation within the UES forces as someone to be consulted on all matters Shadowland. More to satisfy her own hunger for knowledge than any real desire to protect the people living around them. Still, everyone would be better off when she succeeded. After all, it was possible to make elementals and angels bend the knee with the right spell, and the Sijanese had somehow commanded armies of the dead without even being Exalted as far as anyone knew. That was the plan for a little less than 5 months. Then second miracle entered her life one month ago as she stumbled across the Exaltation of a new female Solar made her heart skip a beat whenever she looked at her. Maia knew nothing of their purpose and had nowhere to go, so the two of them stuck together, learning and teaching one another, and forming the kind of intense emotional bond Kamala had long discounted forming again. Stats
  2. "Most of the people I deal with can't read, so if all goes to plan, I couldn't use paperwork if I wanted to," Kamala added into the little debate, having absorbed Delgath's sad tale with the encouraging attentiveness of a very good listener. That was one to circulate on the dark nights around the fire. Stories and knowledge were better circulated by word of mouth anyway. The important parts survived over time and the details changed to suit the needs of the speaker. Write a story down and you still needed a reader anyway. She gave her fellow nomad a nod before focusing on her fellow Death God with a full grin and clap of her hands, "Gary, is it? It's a pleasure to meet you. What your Legion represents is amazing, a real beacon of cooperation that can only help all of us stop hurting one another. Will any of them be accompanying us on our quest?"
  3. Kamala was unruffled by the much larger godling's glare, smiling up at him from the shadows of her hood after glancing sidelong at the blonde dragoness with mirth in her eyes, "People needed helping, Delgath. So Maia and I helped them. I'm glad you and the others had fun, though. We may not have so much of that on the road ahead as we journey down into the tunnels below." She had that much certainty of the road ahead, and the dusky healer looked thoughtful, pondering just what shape the monsters below might take. Away from the sun and near something as powerful as this Genesis Seed was supposed to be? There might be some truly strange creatures down there, some of whom might not deserve the title monster or even dreamt of hurting humans. She could hope, couldn't she? "You have a very impressive companion," she continued, gesturing at the trail of fire from Ruin and certain something like that was more pet then vehicle, "Does it have an equally impressive story you can share while we wait for the others?"
  4. Kamala preened a little at her reflection, much as she would furiously deny it if anyone walked on her. Last night hadn't been the night she had planned on having, but it had been *so good*. So many people helped. So many willing to help given just a chance to. It gave her hope for the results when she did get a chance to hold her big meeting after they got back to the Arcology with the Genesis Seed. They were going to help so many people together. She wasn't quite 100% sure about this whole god thing, and she was worried about any of their new 'pantheon' who was to be honest, but since it allowed her to help more people... Then there were the petty, selfish benefits she couldn't quite refuse. At some point, people had started bringing old world hair dyes as gifts, and Maia had been kind enough get someone to hold them for her while she worked. She had such a trove to play with for a long time to come. It had cost her an additional two hours of sleep, two packages of the precious dye, and she had had to cheat with her healing magic to make it come out right, but the end result was so worth it. Her hair sported a brilliant orange-red shade that contrasted so nicely with her eyes and skin that she couldn't help but grin at her reflection, a self-indulgent joy in her eyes. A final pleased hum, and she turned away from the mirror towards the array of supplies on the bed in her temporary room, blue eyes scanning everything. Check once, check twice, and check one more time as you pack unless you wanted to discover it missing half-way to your destination. Armor? Cleaned and repaired. Robe with sigil? Fresh and gleaming. Travel boots? Still holding. Medical supplies? Replenished and reinforced. Arcane supplies? Four vials brimming with magic and the reagents needed to replenish them on the road. Food and water? Enough for strangers if needed. And... Knives, polished and sharpened in case words wouldn't be enough to bring the Seed back. The dusky healer's good mood was slightly spoiled as she secured these last items on her belt and slipped her white robe over her armor and other clothing. Her pack went up on her back, laden with supplies as she gave her hair one final glance of consideration and slipped the hood up over it. One of her... Well, followers would be the honest word now, right..? Followers would take care of making sure everything else would be ready by the time they go back. So she slipped out of her temporary room and started following the invisible path towards the gate square as night brightened towards dawn.
  5. "Sounds good," Kamala agreed, but any further talk of the complexities of their confirmed more than status was cut short by the sight of the unicorn-emblazoned van. She increased her pace, features setting into the determined consideration she wore when confronting suffering. And wherever these people had found or taken the gem, they had suffered for it. Nonfatal wounds, thankfully, but fear and stress leave their own scars. "You. What's your name?" she called to a young girl doing her best to staunch the bleeding of one of the guards, the guard scarcely older than the young nomad. The girl started, at her call, all of them did upon seeing two of the newly-proclaimed pantheon homing in on them, but recovered, "Grace. It's an honor to..." "Bowing later, Grace," gently interrupted Kamala, kneeling next to the pair, "Helping now. Now who is this?" "Tedd. One of the monsters got him and, I'm afraid he's going to..," the girl answered, voice getting louder and faster as fear took hold now that the danger was past. "Shhh. All will be well," the healer countered, resting both palms on the young man and whispering a single Word under her breath. Light bloomed from her flesh and into his, a cool blue glow that spoke of full moons and safety. When the light faded, the wound was sealed in fresh new skin. She looked up at Grace and smiled softly, trying to sooth the fear she could see struggling in those eyes. "He's safe. He'll need his rest, but no further danger is here," Kamala breathed, looking up at the rest of nomads and speaking a little more loudly, "Take him somewhere to recover, and bring me your wounded one at a time. I'm here for you, and my friend Maia will keep anyone from crowding you. You're all safe now." Her gaze flickered to the fiery blonde for a heartbeat, asking for just that kind of back up, sensing the beginning of a rush forming in the square's crowd. Manage the crowd. Heal the wounded. Godling or not, she couldn't do both tasks at the same time, not without crossing a few lines in her personal code.
  6. "Me? Get back out into the wastes, spread the word, and if I'm right about this new feeling I have, track down the people who already worship me," the dusky healer answered with an embarrassed laugh, "Give them any of the knowledge they need to succeed and see if they're on the right path. Crazy as this is, it honestly just makes my plans bigger, doesn't really change them. Whatever word we use to describe ourselves, there's too much bad out there and too much good we can do to bind ourselves to any one place. Not forever." She gestured dramatically with her arms, indicating the whole arc of the sky above them with a twirl, "Stars, Maia! Can you imagine it full of them?! Sure we have the moon and the five planets, but stars… Anyone could find their way with that many lights in the sky! No one would ever be afraid of a sunset again, not the way we've been since the First Night." Kamala recovered from her outburst enough to resume progress towards the van, still positively floating with happiness.
  7. "Maia! I was hoping to speak to you before we departed," Kamala greeted with an incandescent grin of her own, the smaller woman turning on one heel at the dragoness-in-disguise's words. A last few fireflies of invisible information flew home to convey good news of good health, cheering her even more. She gestured at the van as it forged it's way to the designated side of the square, the milling crowd that was not-so-covertly listening to the pair of godlings. "I actually need your help with a few things. Much as I'd love to stay here and help here all night, I have preparations to make. Think you can help me get clear once we take care of the refugees and their needs? Also, I have a meeting to organize with my people about what we need to have them do so that we can help them the most. I'd love to share that meeting with you and your people so that we can start getting all the help we can," she continued in a softer tone, working her way around the words 'god' and 'worshipper' in the best way she knew how, tucking a lock of blue hair behind one ear, "And of course, catch up, too. It's always too long between times seeing you."
  8. "They manage to keep most of the actual shit away from the people, so I can't fault them that. Come get me when you've come to a choice about our departure," Kamala commented, burying her other concerns with the facts of life in a settlement this large, as she diverted course to intercept one of the van's guards. "You," she intoned, blue eyes intent on the shaken man, smile flattening as she relegated niceties second to triage, "Bring your caravan to the southside of the courtyard inside the gate, and I'll take care of your wounded, and see if someone here can see about getting you a place to rest and recover. Okay?" The man nodded and hurried back to the miraculously-restored vehicle, leaving the dusky healer to smile and promise herself to learn all their names and stories later given the chance. She reversed course and headed through the gates, inhaling and gathering her energy to deal with one of her major gripes about the arcology before she got to work. Drawing deep on her reserves, Kamala sensed something different, a thin collection of mental threads winding out in all directions. Putting the unsettling possibilities aside, she finished mustering the energy needed for the task at hand and shaped it with a single Word. It exploded in all directions and into the bodies of everyone within a half-mile like an invisible firework. Her mind drowning in green and yellow sparks, Kamala froze in place as she processed what she was seeing, sorting healthy green from stricken yellow, laughing as one by one they shifted from the latter to the former under her touch. It was inevitable that the taint would creep back soon enough given how close they lived here, but she'd do what she could, and for all her grumbles, they really were trying their best.
  9. Considerably underdressed for the occasion in her hospital scrubs, Kamala's thoughts were riveted by the brief glimpse of a sky full of stars, like hundreds of thousands of tiny lanterns. And they might be able to make them? A smile danced on her lips, waning only mildly as the gunwoman was talked down from her attempt to destroy the gem. She followed the trail leading to their first goal in her mind, comparing it to the familiar golden path laid out by her native gifts. At least two or three companions, maybe even a friend if Maia was game, and the problem wouldn't be getting there, but getting back. "We *already* have the path if we're ready to start the journey. Give me two hours, and I'll be right back here ready to go," she volunteered with an easy, eager laugh, deeply cheered by the idea of getting out of this hive as soon as she could get some final instructions to her people and fix up those injured by the battle, "Or you could have your celebration, and we leave first light tomorrow. Dawn and dusk are both good times to start traveling."
  10. As disorienting as she sudden shift in location was, Kamala's innate awareness of where she was at all times centered her in time to glance around the circle. Some she knew by reputation. Others not at all. Her gaze fixed to the one she had journeyed and fought alongside before, mouth shaping a question, "Maia, what...?" Then the second wave of Words hit. Words and Power and Knowledge and Change and Growth and a flood of insight that never-the-less kept her on her feet no matter the pressure. Her soul creaked and stretched under the surge, filled to bursting even as invisible hands offered something fleeting and delicate and oh so important. Offered freely and warmly and without even the chance of disappointment if she refused the gift. Parted of her wanted to, angry at the others for triggering this thing here and now when she didn't feel worthy of it. But when would she ever feel worthy of something like this, of actually being able to back up her big words about healing the entire world's hurts? Never. Never in a thousand and one pilgrimages through the wastes, a thousand and one treaties between warring tribes and peoples. And so, after an eternal heartbeat of hesitation, she nodded ever so slightly and the gift flew out of dusky, familiar hands that were never more than an illusion in her mind and took root in her mind, body, and soul. "Stars," she told the gem, not daring to breath as she voiced the smallest wish she could think was worthy of this moment, "I want stars like from the Before."
  11. Kamala blinked away the voice to find herself leaning against a chair in Patient Treatment Room #4, the nurse dealing with the confused questions of her patient. She had heard only one Voice even vaguely like that in her life, and *that* wasn't a day she was going to forget. her thoughts thundered through her head, rendering her deaf and blind to the other two people in the room. Holy crap. Where did that come from?!? Surprisingly, one of her Words supplied an answer and a path, a trail of golden fireflies leaping into existence in her mind's eye and leading out the door. Only a few miles away and closing. She pressed her lips into a frown, not knowing what the source was and not caring. Anything to do with one of the Wordbound, let alone more than one if it was talking about people like her when it used that big word 'pan-theon', wasn't something she wanted wandering around in secret. Especially among all these people. The dusky healer abruptly remembered she had an audience and replaced her frown with a smile, "Oh. I'm sorry. I need to go take care of something. The nurse will make you feel all better." Kamala didn't waste another word leaving the room with her bag securely over her shoulder, forging her way out of the building on an unconscious intercept course for the jewel.
  12. Back in the Arcology hospital, Kamala Kuhn sighed into a table, wrestling between her need for more rest and the pressing urge to get back out of the breakroom and into the seemingly-endless task of mending the hurts of the people here. Four days into the second time she'd stopped here for supplies, she was struck by how *much* of everything they had here compared to the wastelands. So many useful things from Before. So many people. So many people getting hurt. So many getting sick. So many getting mad at not having enough things out of imagined and real need. All she had to do was open her mind's ear to the many deaths around her here in this 'hospital' to start feeling overwhelmed and insignificant. The blue-haired healer could understand how the other Throne-touched could be sucked into places like this, feel like they had to stay here and be unable to share their gifts with all those scattered through the wastes. Understand, but not condone, not in her heart of hearts. She made a deal with the leaders of this place. One week's work in exchange for a few mules worth of supplies and a volunteer or two to accompany her back out where those really in need of miracles dwelled outside the walls of this pen. She stopped herself before she let her frustrated thoughts take her any further into the city sheep vs country goats metaphor. They deserved her respect, even the ones who really did seem to have the survival instincts of a panicked sheep. She looked up from her arms at the 'clock' on the wall, doing math on the fingers of one hand to figure out it was only 22 minutes till her scheduled mass cure of the hospital and another 'shift'. Strange word, 'shift', as if there was a time it wasn't the right time to help people, but then again, given how much there was to do here all the time... A smile quirked at the vague memory of being helped to a couch by Dr. Niven after falling asleep on her feet. The speaker in the corner of the room squawked to life, "External Triage. External Triage. All personnel be advised we have an incoming External triage. All personnel be..." That banished her malaise in a burst of purpose, Kamala Kuhn shooting to her feet, grabbing her bag of arcane supplies, and walking as fast as she could for the emergency room in a set of borrowed scrubs.
  13. Name: Kamala Kuhn, the Serene Judge, Keeper of the Bronze Scales Description: Dusky-skinned, blue-eyed, and possessing the slender 5'2 build of a gymnast, Kamala positively exudes concern for and a devotion to others, her radiant smile and cheerful personality extolling others to exhibit the same virtues. This deep sense of love and compassion is tinged with sorrow when they fail to answer that call, shifting to a mildly disappointed frown when she's forced to take lives with blade and gift in order to keep others from being lost. Her typical garb reflects this practical whimsy, the kind of sturdy, plain clothing you wouldn't mind getting soaked with blood, a pouch full of the tools of her craft at her side, short hair she dyes a different color every time she hits civilization, and leather armor and white robes emblazoned with the insignia of a grain merchant's scales. Level: 1 XP: 0 Facts: Origin: Child of the Wastes (Born scant months before the apocalypse, she only has tales of what life was like Before, but has the day to day customs and patterns of the wasteland communities down pat. In fact, she likes them better than the arcology dwellers.) Past Career: Tribal Healer (Taken in a former doctor after her parent's death 18 years ago, she's good with medical treatment using limited resources, a lot of hope, and diagnosing problems on the fly when seconds matter.) Relationships: Archmage of the Merciful Hand (Having traveled with an entourage including several elven members of the benign adepts, she's mastered additional healing arts to augment her divine gifts to their shock and amazement.) Background Kamala Kuhn came to the Phoenix-Vegas Arcology the first time out of the wastes a little less than a year as a newly-ascended Godbound from nowhere and everywhere with big ideas about helping everyone, the living and the dead, thrive together in peace. She made the city a hub of her travels, her endless healing pilgrimage alongside a small band of like-minded healers, only staying long enough to pick up more volunteers and supplies before heading out again. Wearing the symbol of the bronze scales on your person is more often a not a sign of safe passage among those who know of her, but those who abuse that protection risk far more than merely being turned away in their hour of need.
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