Elise Sawyer

Taken to the gutters of a once great utopia, Elise lost the pigment in her skin that would be considered “attractive,” or at least “normal.” Void of any coloration--aside from the grime and crud that clings to her as she maneuvers through the sewers--Elise looks more like a ghost that haunts the underground rather than a human being. She has long come to believe that exposure to direct sunlight would incinerate her skin on contact, so she sticks to the darkness and lives in the night. Almost bluish in color, she looks deprived of oxygen, or dead, really. The skin on her body is surprisingly callous and tight, though she always looks like a slimy product of grease and dirty water.

Elise’s lifestyle choice has also had an effect on her hair. It always looks like she just jumped out of the shower—though the stench of sewage says otherwise—and has a fine layer of oil on it that makes the sheen a bit too noticeable to be stylish. It is thick and black as the ace of spades, always in disarray. It frames her face in a wild mess, her bangs cleverly tousled to hide her bad eye. If she had access to a decent shower once in a while, Elise might have a rather beautiful head of hair that would reach to the small of her back in delicate waves. Instead, it’s a mop of black that is more of a nuisance than a beauty. What Elise’s hair fails to hide are her lips. And it is very obvious that her bottom lip is more pronounced than her upper lip; a result of constantly biting at it, probably. Her fangs—sharper than a normal human’s—pierce skin easily, especially her own. Behind those lips is yet another abnormal body part, a very long tongue. It constantly swipes over her fangs and lips, as if she was a hungry beast. Maybe she would not be so hyper-aware of her tongue if she did not get the thing pierced.

Elise’s glasses are the only thing that manages to stay clean. They are very important, after all. Even when she had both eyes, her eyesight was subpar at best. Right, had both eyes. Now, Elise is down to one, and it’s a doozy. Over time, the white in her eye has darkened to yellow—a product of an addiction best left forgotten—though her iris maintains its pretty blue hue. As for the other eye, it is a constant reminder of a lover’s betrayal—as storybook cliché as it sounds. It is a cruel scar. The eye is completely missing from its socket, gouged from its place in a painful display of scars that look like jagged crow’s feet. If only those were just wrinkles… At least she was gifted with a more than adequate replacement. Hidden by a lens darker than its neighbor is a "cyborg eye," a gift that surpasses 20/20 vision. where there was once an eye, there is now a piece of modern technology, seamlessly adjusting to its organic host. composed of tiny chords that work as an electrical stimulator for her visual cortex--only the result is far more advanced than vision. on the surface, however, it only appears as a collection of metallic fibers surrounding seven tiny orbs that glow. fancy, huh?

Life in the underground is not as easy as it seems. Elise is constantly on edge of impending danger, or threats from her enemies. She has no worker’s comp, so she has to constantly be on the move. She has trimmed down immensely, looking almost sickly skinny. Her activity outweighs her time for eating. However, when she plunders from the gangs she is hired to infiltrate, she dines big. And those spoils tend to last a month or two. In that time, she bulks up and builds her muscles mass. Her body is in a constant cycle of gain and loss—the stress causes her blood pressure to be higher than normal. She is not a complete robot, after all. Elise still needs to maintain her body just like any other organism, she is just sturdier.

It was not just her eye she lost, but a limb to at one point long before. Her arm was completely ripped from the shoulder in a massive catastrophe in a factory. In its place, a robotic arm made of stainless steel. No longer flesh, her replacement arm serves as a powerful new weapon that has the potential to bust through concrete or grind bones to dust. There are drawbacks, however. She needs to keep the arm finely-tuned, or else suffer painful complications. The weight of it can be daunting as well. Overtime, the arm has sustained quite a bit of damage, scratches and dents take time to repair. There is always something marring at her arm.

not only did the factory accident damage elise's arm, but her hearing as well. the explosion wounded her hearing to the point she became near deaf. luckily, technology fixed her disability in the form of a cochlear implant. elise found the gadget to provide her with a greater sense of hearing, much more fine-tuned and accurate. the cochlear implant is tucked behind her ear, hidden in her hair.

Elise gives a wayward first impression. She takes orders from no one and adheres to her own desires. Her life goes along to the beat of her own drum. If Elise follows a command, it is only because she wills it. It has to adhere to her agenda. Elise’s rebellious tendencies can be a bit of a problem for herself and others involved. She is stubborn enough to deny anyone anything unless it plays into her plans well. She only does what she finds acceptable, nothing more, nothing less. Obedience has to be beaten into her, literally. If someone wants to get through that thick skull of hers, they better put a boot to it. Something strange happens when the demands of Elise become violent—she submits. Her mindset is so primal that a straightforward conversation does nothing but waste time; she needs to get whipped to obey. If she associates disagreement with pain, Elise slowly becomes conditioned to serve rather than rebel.

There is always something bubbling under the surface. Elise has a powerful collection of rage she keeps locked down; unfortunately, her grip on it is as shaky as rusty shackles. When the beast breaks free, all Hell comes loose. Blinded by fury, Elise says and does things that are meant to harm and destroy. Her anger does not discriminate; it does not matter how close she is to someone, they will bear the brunt of her tantrum and maybe even the worst of it. It is amazing how easily Elise can hurt someone close to her. All it takes is a little tick. The smallest of things can push Elise over the edge, and she does not come back until the aftermath is beyond repair.

As a bounty hunter, Elise is keen on her prey. Obsessive, even. When she gets a new target, she becomes a restless insomniac in an attempt to learn every pattern of their life. When they eat, what they eat, where they eat, how they eat. The list goes on and on. Elise does not rest until she is sure she acquired every detail of her victim. They become her life. She stalks them when they least expect it, keeping a polite distance despite invading every aspect of their life. It is terrifying, really. How much information she obtains in such short amounts of time… It is like she stops everything in her life and becomes a part of someone else’s. Of course, this hurts the pieces of Elise’s life that are still intact. She is such a workaholic, in the strangest sense, that she becomes lost. What does she do when she has no target to stalk? She finds a new one… The new one does not even have to have a bounty on their head, either. She just needs someone, anyone, to occupy her and distract her from the ugly truth: her lonely, pitiful life in the sewers.

When she is around people it becomes clear she is not used to… being around people. Elise does not say much and what she does say is not very appropriate. To say she is awkward is an understatement. Her sense of humor is quirky and her speech is slurred with hisses. It becomes so painfully clear that something about her is… off… when she starts talking. The things that prick her interest would disgust the average person. She can go on and on about slithering through sewage and watching rats get it on in the tunnels… Elise does not realize how weird she can be. She can talk about blowing criminals’ heads off with ease, but start talking about the stock market or the taste of the coffee at the deli and she becomes a confused little girl.

She is quite the tinker as well. Elise has a knack for making and fixing gadgets that she comes across in the alleys. She can tinker with anything from can openers to car batteries. She is not afraid to get some oil under her nails. When she is pent up in her fortress underground, Elise occupies herself with all sorts of gizmos that the people above throw away. One man’s trash is another’s treasure. When Elise goes from bounty hunter to grease monkey, she becomes a lot more intellectual and a lot less… bloodthirsty. It is as if she can lose her rage in the wires and bolts of mechanics. Elise usually focuses on little projects—it is hard for her to lug a broken down car into the sewers, after all.