Username - bat-ty
Name - Isra, meaning "the journey through darkness"
Age: 925 (as of May 11, 2018 on Earth ; Year 8435 LOC)
Gender - Female
Elements: Life and Death
Rank - Rebel Healer
As a rebel, her ideals are aligned against the Pride.
Tradition is meaningless to Isra, and a fight for
dominance aligns with her pursuit of power. She is
ruthless and would do anything to maintain her personal
power, even if it meant taking the lives of other lions.
As a healer, she is relatively low in the bottom of the
hierarchy of the Rebels. She fills a necessary role but not
a highly valued one. Her purpose is to be there when
necessary, a creature of burden. She carries this
burden dutifully and sees it as serving the higher power
of achieving justice for Arknon, and would do most
anything within her power to help raise him to become
the most powerful lion of all history, so long as she
doesn't have to die for his sake.
LifeA lion with the gift of life can:
Bring life back to anything they touch,
heal the dying, sick or injured,
can increase strength of others by touch.
Death A lion with the gift of death can:
Kill anything they touch,
create crippling wounds,
can visit the dead, see dead souls
Elemental Abilities
Deep Sight -- Through a few centuries of training after losing her eyesight, Isra has achieved the ability of Deep Sight. Through this method, the life force of those living (lions, prey, plants, et cetera) are clearly visible and distinct to her at all times. This is a passive ability and through experienced and long-standing use, it no longer requires a high energy requirement from Isra. Any energy expended in usage is recovered by a good night's sleep. Depending on the strength of each lion's individual life force, she is able to further distinguish between lions by brightness, aside from their unique shapes and sizes. She is also capable of seeing the souls of the dead, although they appear more dim and have less of a crisp appearance as living lions, and appear less often.
Judgement Touch -- Just by a simple grazing touch of her tail blades, Isra can choose whether to heal, wound, or kill an intended target. The decision she makes determines the energy draw from herself and how many times she can use this skill. The more intense the effect on the other lion, the more energy it draws from her. She can only bring one lion from the brink of death or kill one lion in a given battle, before having to rest for at least half a week or face severe consequences. She is capable of passively healing someone for an extended period after touching them, but must be careful not to drain her energy reserves or distance herself too much, otherwise she will render herself useless.
Persistence -- With this ability, she turns a simple bite or scratch into a decaying wound. Left untreated, this can lead to blood poisoning and the loss of limbs, among other more serious effects, including death. The wound does not ache or hurt after a while, as it goes numb relatively quickly. This can make it more lethal as it may minimize the mental effect of the wound.
Cure -- Health regenerative ability. This is more direct than Judgement Touch and is intended for healing only. She touches her nose or paw to the affected area for quick healing. This is done for injuries that can be treated in confinement and not on the battlefield. Isra would much rather use a paw than her nose, but sometimes she is unable to tell how deep a wound may be with her reduced "sight".
How Does She "See"
Her elements allow her to sense the life force of the world around her. Elsewise dark, the world is lit up with life and death. Lions appear to Isra brightest around their vital organs in their head and chest, with the color, shape, and size depending each individual lion. Plants and prey appear similarly, having their own distinct appearances around their most vital structures. All living organisms do not have "auras" to Isra, as one might inquire about themself, but rather vitality. The strength of their life determines the brightness and distinctness of a lion's appearance and this aids Isra in triage on the battlefield. She outright refuses to tell someone how strong their life force is, for this often leads them to take unnecessary action when they find out their life force is "stronger" than another.
Color is often dependent on the elements a lion possesses, although the amount of kills a lion may have received in their life may take a toll on their mental state and therefore dim or alter the color of their life force by making it murky. A lion with the Color element might be able to change the color of their own soul or of another's for disguise against Isra, and a Psychic lion may be able to do the same. Disguising their voice sufficiently, however, is another matter entirely.
Aside from her elemental usage, Isra requires on all of her senses to "see". From hearing to touch, all of them are necessary to interpret the non-living and non-dead aspects of the world. She is known to ignore rough terrain and wind up having to mend herself on-the-go, stumbling over otherwise difficult to detect aspects of her surroundings. She usually relies on her fellow Rebels to aid her when she goes out onto the battlefield, but is otherwise completely familiar with Rebel territory and needs not worry about her surroundings unless someone decides to pull pranks on her for fun.
Personality
Apathetic
It is hard to move Isra to show any visible emotions or to gain her sympathy or empathy. She is relatively detached from all emotion, including joy and sorrow. The only "emotions" she feels on a regular basis, if you could even call them that, would be pride and avarice. In the face of seeing someone else's suffering, physical or otherwise, she easily turns away to deal with her own issues. Unless she owes another lion her healing skills, whether that be earned through their allegiance to the Rebels or through personally indebting Isra to themself, she rarely will go out of her way to do a kind deed for someone else. Similarly for someone else's joy, she sees no point in celebrating with other lions or causing them undue misfortune.
Merciless
Isra will take on any fight against another lion without remorse or regret. She has chosen to go unhindered by such emotions, repressing them for the future. As such, she refuses to take a mate or have children, in the advent that she develops some sort of romantic or maternal connection to another lion. She will not hesitate to cut down another lion in her (or the Rebels') path to power. She is observant of others physical and mental characteristics and takes note of potential weaknesses that she can exploit, should the time come to fight against them. Many view her as harsh in this regard, and they would be correct in that observation.
Patient
Isra bides her time for the perfect opportunity. This lioness watches and waits for the right time to strike, and does not hesitate when it is time to act. Other lions try to test the limit of her patience, but it is seemingly endless. Truth be told, when someone has used up her patience for them, she just bides her time to get back at them for the annoyance. She is a master of revenge, choosing to get even, rather than get angry. Some say that this has tainted her heart, and consumed her. However, there are few lions still alive that she still desires to exact revenge upon. She has either outlived most of them, or they have fallen to a swift slice of her tail blade. She is overconfident in her abilities and this could lead to her downfall.
Mostly Honest
There is usually no reason for Isra to lie. Her own personal moral code has few tenets, and one of those is to only tell a lie when it is absolutely necessary. Most of those instances involving necessary lies are those used to save her own life or protect the Rebel cause. These are mainly from her early history with the Pride. There was plenty of lying done then. She may choose to feign a straight face if another lion is being an annoyance to her, but otherwise chooses not to lie in her daily life, and especially not to fellow loyal Rebels.
Pragmatic
She is no-nonsense in her dealings and rather businesslike in all her actions. Nearly every personal interaction with her feels a little bit like a business transaction, as her outward appearance is cold and harsh. Once she has done her job, oftentimes she dismisses any gratitude she may have received, moving on quickly to the next task at hand. She is realistic and goal-oriented in her perception of the world, neither an optimist or a pessimist. She accepts things at face value and is not easily swindled or misled, unless the most logical of arguments is used to persuade her.
Distrusting/Suspicious of Others
She knows that there are those willing to take advantage of her, and thus is suspicious of every lion until they have time and time again tried to earn her trust in earnest. She will not readily disapprove of any lion, but it is difficult to cement a solid foundation of trust with Isra. Too many lions have tried to turn on her for one thing or another, even after being on the receiving end of her healing work. She understands that there is a hierarchy of power and the easiest way to climb to the top is to crush the lions beneath you. As a result, she has little reason to trust anyone unless they have been with the rebels for some time.
History
I was born to the pride and raised like any other normal cub. Once I realized my elemental powers, I was selected to be trained as a Support Warrior and agreed to take on that role, once I grew into adulthood. That was one of the few times I have ever lied. On my aging into adulthood, I immediately began planning my escape. 30 years in, I began pretending that I was unable to help some of the pride warriors, although I was using my death element to hasten their death, rather than prevent it. The first, and last, victim I ever took was Anouk, whose body I pledged to the cause of the rebellion, as soon as I ran away from the Pride.
Support Warrior was a foundational role, but I wanted something greater. I wanted to join a cause where I would be valued on the basis of my own personal strength, rather than as a piece of the whole.
A century passed while I served under Arknon until he had received the news that his spies had successfully infiltrated the Pride. These spies were leading them straight to our territory. The Pride lions among them were under the impression that they would be able to bring back the location of our current whereabouts to the Pride. They were unsuspecting of the ambush that was about to begin.
We made our way, a band of about 25 lions, obscured by rocks and outcroppings just outside of Pride territory. As they drew nearer, I observed the familiar outline of a warrior's mane, among those who came from the Pride. His name was Ahriman.
Ahriman locked eyes with mine and it was evident he had not forgotten my betrayal to the Pride. Moreover, I was sure that his former helplessness became his current rage, as he was unable to send Anouk's spirit to the Lake. A low and monstrous growl shook through his chest and into the earth surrounding us. I felt the world yawn and trap my paws as it began swallowing me whole. Ahriman had made a sinkhole. I looked around and I was the only one being trapped.
I let it take me, as I accepted my fate. Ahriman charged at me, claws and fangs bared. The world went black and I experienced the most excruciating pain I had ever felt. The moment he touched me, however, was his last. Through the pain, I knew this was the price I had to pay to atone for my past. After all, if Anouk's life was only worth my sight, it was a small price to pay. My fellow Rebels slew Ahriman and pulled me from the earth. I declined to have my eyes healed, taking this as my penance.
I was walked back to the Rebel territory, a lion supporting me on both flanks, until I wound back into the Healer's Den. I dreamt of dancing lights, lions of strange form... both present and ethereal. I soon came to realize this was my waking state, not a living dream. Another few centuries pass, and as I trained back up to par, I could then live with my handicap. I had to learn everyone within Rebels again. This time, rather than learn them by outer appearance, instead by inner appearance.
Nearing 475, Aerona was named successor. My soul boiled with envy and spite of Arknon's nepotism. I knew then, and I know still now, that I am but the bearer for the burden of healing others’ wounds. That does not change my enmity. In the advent that Aerona takes reign of the Rebels, I refuse to grovel beneath her. Ultimately, I would seek out the fabled Oasis, and commit a second act of betrayal, this time to the Rebels.
Relationships
Rebels
Domani - owned by Vraska
As one of the oldest Rebels, she met Domani when he came to
the Rebellion, running from the Pride. She nursed his confidence
in doing the right thing in joining the Rebellion and could tell he
was adept at healing lions by observation alone. She thus took
him under her tutelage, helping him adjust to the Rebel way
of life. She did not join Aerona's Court and is thus now a long-
distance co-worker, who admires Domani's passion for work
from afar. She does doubt his willingness to fight other lions,
however, and sees this as a potential weakness.
Ambrosia - owned by Meddled
Their relationship is amiable, although she suspects this is
because of Ambrosia's love element. As a result, Isra is slightly
distrustful of her saccharine sweet demeanor and blunt honesty,
although it is probably unwarranted. Isra is quick to forgive
and forget when it comes to misgivings between her and
Ambrosia, as she is perhaps one of the few Isra has let into her
close circle of companions. Isra is quick to heal Ambrosia after
fights, noting her high need for attention by a Life (or Death)
elemental. Times near death are scarce but her rash actions in
battle often result in her returning for more medical attention.
Her wings are a key weakness.
Jamaria - owned by Rohan.
(tentative, needs discussion with Rohan for confirmation purposes)
Jamaria and Domani's closeness, especially to Aerona as co-
workers means that they are both fairly distant to Isra in the
present. In the past, Isra was among those who helped nurse
Jamaria back to health, although Isra kept her distance, both
then and now. Isra served in a tutorial role during that time,
ensuring that the other healers were doing a sufficient job.
She observes Jamaria from afar and offers advice when asked,
but it is obvious to Isra that Jamaria would rather be working
elsewhere. Isra feels that Jamaria looks down on her, due to
her position as a healer. Her ambition is a key weakness.
