Heartbreak

Heartbreak

Rigger/Medic
Former Child Actor
"My wheelchair is smarter than you."
Discord	@discogoblin#9660
Reddit	https://www.reddit.com/user/Discowhor
Metatype	Human
Street Cred	0
Notoriety	1
Public Awareness	0
CDP	4
D.O.B.	6/4/2060
Age	25
Folder	https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1qbLI6-ZldkX4yy_ChTCJOeTH6fCldSHV?usp=sharing
Priority	Metatype - D Attributes - C Magic/Resonance - E Skills - B Resources - A
#Max IGs/Ascension	1

Character Information

Summary

Fatima Kumar is a dead woman walking, a failed designer baby whose body is slowly falling apart. A suite of cybernetics is all that's keeping her together. Once a famous child prodigy, she's fallen into obscurity as broke, bitter med school student. With no job, no scholarship, and a monstrously expensive illness, she's forced to make her money using less than savory means.

Goals

• Finally get that stupid doctorate
• Gain recognition for her self-evident genius
• Improve her ailing body in any way possible

Background

Designer babies are a common enough thing in the UCAS. Almost everyone above a certain class gets some level of augmentation before birth: tweaks to their appearance, protection against disease, and in some cases, pre-cultured bioware to give them an early leg up. Even among the most conservative corpos, natural births have fallen out of style. Of course, these changes always come with some inherent measure of risk; a dice roll, however unlikely, that tweaking one gene will lead to the collapse of another. Reputable clinics are very careful with their work, and always make sure that their clients are aware of the danger. BetterNetics Inc., on the other hand, promised their kids would be CEOs. Fatima Kumar's parents bought this hook, line, and sinker, and spent an obscene amount of money on the company's "executive package". With a photographic memory, enhanced cerebellum, and extensive beauty augs to boot, the unborn Fatina was poised for great things. On the day of her birth, both parents and company were patting themselves on the back. Then the problems started, and there were a lot of problems.

The neural augmentation worked, but at the cost of pretty much everything else. Fatima's heart, lungs, and kidneys were almost completely non-functional, requiring round-the-clock maintenance from specialized nanites. She was horribly frail, prone to bruising at the slightest touch, and dangerously susceptible to all kinds of disease. The young girl lived in chronic pain, and could only afford to live due to a very public lawsuit that would prove to be the death of BetterNetics Inc. Even with all these disadvantages, Fatima proved exceptionally bright, studying medicine and cybertechnology in order to take an active role in her care. She became something of a child celebrity, an inspirational tale of success in the face of adversity. She starred in commercials, appeared on the news, and even got the chance to give a TED talk. Her parents gushed to anyone who'd listen that Fatima was destined for greatness, and at 16 years old she enrolled in the University of Washington to a great wave of fanfare. This young genius, the media cried, would be the future of the medical profession.

Seven years later, and that young genius is an opiate-addicted burnout. Living at college, isolated from her older peers, she quickly began to buckle under the immense weight of expectation. Every minor failure was examined under a microscope. Her GPA slipped, her condition got worse, and after screaming out a professor during a public mental breakdown, her full ride scholarship disappeared. With the snap of a finger she was no longer a prodigy, just an angry student with a growing mountain of debt. Everyone's got sympathy for cute, sick kid, but much fewer have a heart when it comes to an ugly adult. Without that stream of charity money, Fatima's been rapidly running out of credit, and her condition is only getting more expensive. The same medical industry that held her up as a hero is probably going to kill her because she can't afford their fees. Ironic, to be sure, but not going to happen if she has any say.

Some would consider her to be entirely unsuited for shadowrunning. Dr. Wells did, when she approached him about his profitable little "side project", but a few demonstrations with her Transys Steed quickly shut him up. Her body may be unreliable, but in machines she's an undisputed god. That's what she tells herself, anyway, and whatever the case it was good enough to get the job. Now she uses her medical training to babysit criminal psychopaths. Truly the heights of success. It's not exactly the career she had in mind, but it's the one that she can get, and it is rather freeing to work outside of the rules. Maybe this could be a second chance, a catalyst for new ideas. What does it mean to "do no harm", anyway?

Narrative Significant Qualities

Positive

• Prototype Transhuman - Heartbreak was, quite literally, bred to be a genius, with specially cultivated bioware to enhance her neural processes. She's also got flawless skin.

• Smart Cookie (Analytical Mind, College Education, Speed Reading, Photographic Memory): Genetics mean nothing if you don't put in the work, and Heartbreak's done nothing but. She is academically brilliant at the cost of everything else.

• Subtle Pilot - She's spent her life navigating hostile architecture, and by now has gotten rather good. She used to use her skills to hide from the press. Now she hides from cops.

• Insured - Not strictly a mechanical quality, but it is worth mentioning that Heartbreak subscribes to DocWagon gold. Better safe than sorry!

Negative

• Held Together with Tape (Infirm 3, Mild Allergy (Soy), Asthma, Paraplegic): To put it bluntly, Heartbreak has the constitution of a Mayfly. She's allergic to most foods, can't walk on her own, and needs constant support from her implants to stay alive.

• Pretentious (PSC Attention Seeking, DYJCMD): There is no such thing as a well adjusted child star, much less one who was constantly praised as a genius. Heartbreak both resents those around her and constantly seeks their approval.

• SINner (UCAS): Her disability pension's about 500 nuyen a month. The rent on her apartment is 6000.

Run History

Name	GM	Metaplot	Threat	Date of Run
Haunt My House	Fangblade_		High	31 January 2085
Fly, Little Blackbird	Fangblade_	Amhrain na Preachan	Medium	24 January 2085

Affiliations

Contacts

Contact	Connection	Loyalty	Archetype	Profession	Aspects	Chips
Dr. Wells	2	1	Fixer(K,N,G,A)	Professor	Numbers, not names, Corporate and Country, Seattle Specialist, NA Corps, Japanese Ingenuity	Even
Ameline Laurent	4	2	Custom(A,N,K,G)	Docwagon HTR Pilot	HTR, Solid Reputation, Mercenary Connections, Angel of Mercy, Flight Clearance	Even

In Character Information

Matrix Search Table

Threshold	Result
1	That stupid fragging video. First result when you search her face is a clip of her shoving a guy onto an open cadaver. It's exactly as gross as it sounds.
3	Fatima Kumar, huh? Used to be famous when she was a kid, some kind of baby genius. Spokeswoman for all kinds of charities. She even had a few cameos in the trids.
6	Heavy digging turns up an old lawsuit against BetterNetics Inc., a now-defunct biotech firm specializing in genetic engineering. It seems her condition was not congenital, but the result of reckless augmentation in the womb. She is, in short, an artificial human, and a poorly made one at that.

Shadow Community Table

Threshold	Result
1
3
5

Assensing Table

Threshold	Result
1	Her aura is a dull, sickly brown, the color of clotted blood, terminally ill and choked with spite.
2	As mundane as they come. Her head and chest are filled with the negative spaces of ware.
3	Hers is a condition she will never be rid of. Organs groan beneath the strain of their duties, kept alive only through the merciless driving of steel.
4	The body may be dying, but the brain is still alive. Artificial neurons fire faster than should be possible, a marvel of cultured biotech. The flashing of the lights is painful to look at. One can only imagine how it feels to think.
5	The more one looks, the less natural flesh one sees. Heartbreak is a human, yes, but one built artificial from the ground up. She's a copy of a human with none of the pieces quite right. Her aura is swarmed with black, microscopic ants: nanites, only real reason that she keeps drawing breath.

SINs

Fatima Kumar (UCAS): Though born to an EVO corporate family, Fatima has avoided the company in favor of academia, due in no small part to bitterness towards her parents.

Jen Chopra (DocWagon Lmtd.), Rating 4 Fake: An off-duty DocWagon EMT. If she had known it'd be this easy to get a medical license, she would've bought a fake one from the start.

Appearance

Clothing

Most people wouldn't describe Heartbreak as "fashionable". Her style is comfy, practical, and tinged with the occasional anime character. When she wants to dress up it's all white shirts and slacks, classic doctor style. She even has a lab coat. Her drones and gear are painted baby blue and white, with bright red "+" signs to mark her as a medic. She isn't sure whether that'll stop anyone from shooting, but one can hope.

Matrix Persona

A long, spindly surgical robot, all grey metal and shining chrome with red and white highlights. Her drones take the form of modular limbs, each a different tool.

Character Plot Hooks

Here are characteristics of the character that GMs may take advantage of to add complications to runs, or to otherwise use when in use. If you want to use them in unrelated to runs, please ask first.

Aspect	Information	Related Run(s)
Bills piling up	Heartbreak needs a lot of money to live. She owes hundreds of thousands to UW Medical, to the point where they're rationing her life-saving medicines. Hippocratic oath be damned, she'll do just about anything for a payday.
Desperate for validation	It's not enough to simply be brilliant, one has to be acknowledged as such. For as much as she shit-talks the academic establishment, she really really wants to get published again.
Compassionate streak	She may have lost the plot these days, but Heartbreak became a med student to help people. For as tough of a face as she puts on, it's hard to say no to an injured person in need.
Cybertech nerd	Medical science has always been Heartbreak's passion. She's fascinated by people with highly advanced ware, even if they're the enemy, and will put herself in danger to learn more. Maybe, just maybe, it could be applied to improving herself.
Family drama	Since she was a kid, Heartbreak's parents have fed her a specific story about her birth: namely that BetterNetics used experimental augs without getting their consent. This is a lie, and her parents were far more complicit than they let on. Most of the corporation's data has been lost or classified since it went under, but Heartbreak's always felt curious about her origins. Perhaps there'll be more information on the other side of the law. '

Media Mentions

From Seattle StarWatch, December 2079

"...and for some more recent drama, a SHOCKING video of Fatima Kumar, University of Washington's medical whiz kid, having a total meltdown in class! You may remember Fatima as the spokeswoman for the Heal Seattle Charity Run, or from her guest appearances on 'Healthy Eating with Lester Clark'. Well do as she says and not as she does, cause this little genius putting on the HURT!"

The feed switches to a commlink video inside of an echoing lecture hall. A half-dissected cadaver sits on an operating table. In front of it stands an aged, portly professor, who seems to shrink before a frail woman in a wheelchair, putting up his hands in supplication. He mutters something too quiet to hear, but it only seems to incense the woman. She shoves him back, hard, ass first into the open chest. He tumbles back to the gunshot pop of ribs, pitching over the table in a shower of smushed organs. She grabs a chunk of viscera and chucks it down on him.

"Talk about bedside manner! I don't know about you guys, but if this was my doctor I think I'd just stick to Advil. In other news, star of The Real Housewives of Tir Tangire caught CHEATING..."