Chelsea is a Black Halo, a type of synthetic spiritual creature that is used to assassinate a single target. They inherit a hazy version of the memories of their target, which fade quickly, but otherwise have their own personality and emotions. They are permanent and complete creatures, except for a psychological flaw that, if not corrected, causes an obsession/fixation depending on their target's personality. Chelsea was one of the first to show symptoms and she could not be corrected before the full manifestation of her fixation with flowing blood.
Black Halos serve their creator, a god of luck, death and shadows, utterly. Chelsea is no exception, but after her uncontrollable bloodlust led her to slaughter her team mates she fled the Black Halos in fear and shame. Her master came to find her, and offered to allow her to return, but her shame led her to refuse, and instead her master ordered her to find a new life on the planet she had taken refuge on, as he preferred her to live happy than to live serving him.
She found the SZ while trying to hide and used the Human Digit to take refuge from creatures she could cause to bleed. Mavrick offered her a position on his team when he realized her incredible combat talent and experience, and she accepted. She works there to try and keep busy, and to try and continue to contribute to what was once her cause: the universal preservation of balance.
Personality
A Black Halo is much the opposite in personality of their target, and that forms the base of their personality. Their experiences early in life shape the rest.
Chelsea's target was a powerful necromancer who enjoyed experimenting with sewing creatures and souls together. Therefore Chelsea, as his opposite, possesses great respect for the sanctity of life and nature, even if she herself is a creature of large cities. She considers the repercussions of her actions on those around her when planning an operation or tactic, and is willing - albeit reluctant - to sacrifice the lives of innocents for the greater good. Her soft-heartedness has repeatedly been a weakness in her combat duties, but she is always able to circumvent it and get the job done, even though it takes a heavy toll on her.
Because of the risks this shortcoming has placed her under and the lectures those risks earned her, Chelsea grew a second layer that covers her soft, kind heart. This second layer is a cold and calculated perfectionist. Her priorities have not changed, but her approach to combat did, making her a much quicker thinker and planner. This perfectionist is what shows in most of her daily activities now.
Chelsea is a social girl and enjoys having people to talk to and interact with, even if she doesn't necessarily like those people (read: she can enjoy a good trolling). Being alone for too long can depress her. Though she enjoys keeping active, especially in combat duty, she is not a workaholic, and gets exhausted by continual service like any worker, though her endurance is remarkable even for a Black Halo. As a soldier she is familiar with constant risk and combat, but when she is not in that situation she tends to relish her free time - being social, learning and advancing one of her several hobbies, reading, etc.
Battle Capabilities
Even without discounting her spiritual prowess, Chelsea is a fearsome combatant, both alone and in a team. She has as much training as an entire black ops team put together and more combat experience than most generals. Her youth grants her great agility and impressive strength, allowing her to wield heavy weapons and sneak through enemy forces with equal proficiency. She plots out every move and the next three after it at least, making sure to go into every mission with a plan to get as much information as possible before advancing. Her impressive swordsmanship and marksmanship both make her a tough customer to bring down in a firefight, and her quick thinking and advanced training make her a tactical nightmare to face.
In addition to this, however, Chelsea possesses the ability to create various shadow-based illusions. The most advanced is the ability to create shadow clones. Shadow clones can either simply persist in the shadow of a creature, in which case she does not need to concentrate them and only needs to focus briefly to find them again, or she can actively control one, which requires great concentration but gives a convincing image of Chelsea herself even though she is not actually there. Unlike her master, she cannot control multiple of these shadow clones at once.
Shadow clones are created and attached to enemies when Chelsea attacks them. She can trade places with any shadow clone she is "connected" with on an instant's notice, and though it takes a moment to connect with one, she can stay connected as long as she's willing to spend the energy on it. This allows her to move quickly and suddenly through a battlefield, and to seemingly evade damage as though she were never there.
Tactics
In any assignment, Chelsea spends a great deal of time gathering information about her target before advancing. When working alone, she uses distractions to draw out enemy defenses and uses this opportunity to create as many shadow clones as possible without exposing herself. In this way she can focus on one and learn more about enemy movement and placement. She uses her ability to trade places with shadow clones to catch weakly positioned enemies by surprise, and uses tactical field advantage and surprise/stealth tactics to systematically defeat multitudinous opponents. She likes having access to several types of weapons for these sorts of missions, which she usually accomplishes by setting up a shadow clone near a supply cache and going back and forth between the mission site and the cache as necessary.
In a team, Chelsea is blessedly obedient, but is also intelligent and will not hesitate to question the orders of a commander she feels she should not trust, at least for confirmation. She thinks on her feet and tries to focus on the spirit of the mission, though at times can get distracted. Since she is so skilled at working alone, getting her to regroup in a timely manner can also be a challenge. Other than these minor pitfalls, she is a selfless team player and an asset to any combat team.
As a leader Chelsea is a zero-tolerance perfectionist, and will make this very clear to her subordinates, even if she is fond of them. She will ruthlessly test the limits of those she commands so that she knows who she can assign what tasks to, and once she has decided on the limits of a soldier, she will expect them to maintain that performance or better for the rest of their career. She coordinates her soldiers carefully and likes to split them up to deal with their own tasks; when the opponents try to gang up on one of her soldiers she shadow clone jumps to that soldier to assist. When her team cannot or should not be split up, she plays very defensive and does her best to keep all of her subordinates functional and effective. Though she keeps out of combat when split up so she can immediately jump to the aid of an ally, when leading a squad Chelsea is very active and takes on more than her share of firefighting.
Internet Statistics
Were Chelsea to be transferred to the internet - via Human Digit or other means - her abilities would carry over. Her combat statistics would like something like so, without accounting for her usage of battlechips:
HP: 1000
Element: Darkness
Attack 1: Rapier Fade
Several slashes from different angles, each concealed with a burst of shadow. If Chelsea is in Shadow status while using this, it penetrates auras, barriers and guards. 300x5 Sword/Darkness damage.
Attack 2: Shadow Curse: Verteriem
A complex blanket of shadows are cast over opponents, causing them to see darkness as light and vice versa; Chelsea appears as basically a sun, and those affected by the curse take 50% additional damage from her attacks since she is harder to defend against. When she enters Shadow status, enemies affected by Verteriem are treated as blinded and take 100% additional damage instead of 50%.
Attack 3: Shadow Curse: Noxite
Chelsea turns the shadow of one enemy into a semisolid mass, constricting their movement and paralyzing them. In subsequent turns they deal 75% normal damage to Chelsea as the solid shadows constrict their movements. If Noxite is used on the same opponent again, the damage penalty does not stack but they are paralyzed repeatedly.
Ability: Shadow Images.
- Effect 1: Enemies Chelsea attacks gain a "Shadow Image" tied to them after the attack ends.
- Effect 2: If Chelsea is attacked, she can substitute damage to her Shadow Clone by taking its place.
- Effect 3: If Chelsea switches to a Shadow Clone for an enemy that is attacking her, she can attack it for 300 Sword/Darkness damage.
- Effect 4: During her turn, Chelsea can destroy a Shadow Clone to gain Shadow status for a turn.
