Mekong Cara Cam
Jade-In-The-Mist

Thundered Chakram of the Vritra
Kali of the Custodians of the Jade Coil
Gold Guardian of the Sheltered Waters
Stormy Eagle of the Court of Bamboo Talons
Fist of the Grim Venom of Mother's Vengeance

Description


Balaram: ~Cam slips into view with uncanny silence. The young woman, marked in her early twenties, moves with confidence, self-assurance, and a natural regality. She's either clad in plain farm girl attire: brown wool slacks, a white silk button-up shirt, and a pair of sandals, or totally black garb of cottons and silks. A wide-brimmed, straw jingasa hat completely covers her head. Only long, silky black hair that flows freely down to her knees is immediately evident. Were one to catch a view of her face, one would discern that she once possessed the face of an Asian goddess, an immaculate beauty, but it has largely been ruined by a set of terrible scars that horizon her visage, as if clawed by some great beast. Her head is inclined down at almost all times in a pose of demure humility. However, strangely-colored jade-green eyes pan her surroundings with discomforting astuteness, almost shining through the jingasa's covering. There is a quiet, effortless lethality in every step taken, every gesture made, and any word uttered...~

OOC: Appearance 3; Pure Breed 1; Lack of Scent, Silence; Glory 9, Virtue 6, Wisdom 5

Silkaram: ~Her hair disappears and in its place form bony ridges. Her nails lengthen and webbing grows between every digit. Her wide-brimmed jingasa continues to enshroud her visage. Were you to see it, her face seems flat, her flesh scaly. But the eyes are still relentless and bore into everything like an analytical machine.~

OOC: Appearance 1; Pure Breed 1; Lack of Scent, Silence; Glory 9, Virtue 6, Wisdom 5

Azhi Dahaka: ~Nowhere remotely human, she becomes the war-machine of Kali. As she changes, the jingasa is flung away and she becomes the feared predator spoken of, if ever, in only hushed whispers. In short, she has become a terrible, giant cobra with a human torso and muscular arms. From hooded head to thick tail, she must be nearly twenty feet long, most it hardened muscle covered by even harder scutes and scales. Nevertheless, she possesses a lithe, serpentine flexibility, as swift and deft as the striking snake she has become. Every scale on her body almost glows with emeraldine brilliance, a feature of that royalty only felt when in human shape. Her resilient underbelly is almost golden, and ritualistically scarred with exotic, obscure glyphs. A simple circle is branded over her chest. The regal hood encases her reptilian head. On the lower back of this hood is set another branded glyph in silver sparkle, as incomprehensible as those in front. Set within are those golden slits that at times nictate to their original jade-green. A forked tongue flickers out of her scaled lips as the wicked talons that end her powerful arms extend. While some profess to know Kali, she is evidently a beloved servant of the Black Mother, and woe to the unfortunate who invokes her wrath. For here is the mortal servant of the gods, the exacter of the Mandate that applies to all. Ignorance is not an excuse. And to the ignorant or infernal alike, she is their Judge, Jury, and the Executioner.~

OOC: Appearance 0; Delirium; Pure Breed 1; Lack of Scent, Silence; Glory 9, Virtue 6, Wisdom 5

Kali Dahaka: ~The woman becomes a gigantic snake, similar in proportion to the great sea-snakes found only in the depths of the oceans. As thick around as a man's leg and approximately twenty feet in length, she is as lithe, ferocious, and as deadly as ever. Slender arms slowly retract as she takes this shape to become, in essence, an especially long snake. Her scales remain the same distinct, brilliant coloration, though the unusual scarring is less visible.~

OOC: Appearance 0; Pure Breed 1; Lack of Scent, Silence; Glory 9, Virtue 6, Wisdom 5

Vasuki: ~Here then is yet another shape of a killer so easily underestimated. Evidently of the species of naja nigricollis, she is nearly an impressive seven feet in length or so, and about as thick around as a man's arm. She glides along the ground, almost seeming to float with her natural agility and speed. A beautiful if deadly serpent, she still bears that regal hood, its appearance a sure signature of her displeasure...~

OOC: Appearance 3; Pure Breed 1; Lack of Scent, Silence; Glory 9, Virtue 6, Wisdom 5

"...baby killers."

History


Youth

Mekong Cara Cam was born in the late winter of Shanghai, 1977. Her mother was a slave in the flesh courts of prostitution; originally, she was a refugee who had fled to Saigon in the latter days of the American-Vietnam War. When the Americans withdrew and left South Vietnam to its own devices, those peasants who weren't executed or essentially enslaved by the new Communist regime were illegally sold to the Chinese Triads. Cam's mother was one of these unfortunates. There her mother was subjected to a great deal of sexual torture and Cam was the result of this rape. Cam herself was subjected to this sort of sexual deviation from an early age, as she promised to be a beautiful flower. It was borne with the hopeless apathy slaves so often show.

First Skin & Tutelage

Had it not been for the mystical spirit-markings, her great-uncle might have never found her. But he did, and he purchased Cam from her "owner", as if she were a good to be sold. To this day, she does not understand why her great-uncle had not outright slain the slaver, and it is a source of bitterness that she has been unable to avenge herself and her mother yet. Nevertheless, Cam proved to be an outstanding student of her trueblood's ways. She underwent her First Skin during a vision-quest that her great-uncle, her teacher, prepared. She diligently trained in all the secret methods of killing and more importantly, figuring out who needed to be killed -- the hated duties with which the Nagah, the weresnakes, were chosen to accomplish, as the Judges of Gaia. Within a few years, she was a blooded and hardened warrior, more fearsome than a Vietcong sapper. She proved her skill as an infiltrator, saboteur, assassin, and warrior time and again for her great-uncle's Nest, the Whispered Blood.

Early Years

She was often lined up to battle with the decadent members of the Cathayan Golden Courts, terrible Goblins of those feared spirit-jungles, Kin-jin immigrants, and all the ugly darkness that the supernatural of Southeast Asia provided. Granted, these shen were not her kind's true targets. But it was unavoidable, for they aggressively pressed into the Nest's territory. However, Mekong (so-named for the river by which she was first trained in Kali's ways) Cara Cam treaded a thin line. She preferred to work alone and only grudgingly accepted the aid of her brethren. Perhaps her pre-change days had made her somewhat antisocial. But the Nagah do not care about personal proclivities: the Judges never work alone. Not after Vinata's treachery.

When a new hatchling underwent his First Skin, taking her place in the Nest, Cam was sent to aid a new hengeyokai Beast-Court arising in the New World, in the West -- in America. The Court of Waking Dreams had been established in Kansas City's Little Asia. There she became a Courtier of note for the short time that the Court prospered. She permitted herself to mate for the first time, and laid a nest of a half-dozen healthy serpents. But when this Court fell apart, she returned to the Middle Kingdom. There she learned her great-uncle, her teacher, the man who had basically been her father, had been murdered by other shen. After a thorough investigation, her need for revenge became a hateful fit of rage. Her beauty was forever marred that day in the vicious battles that ensued, and she even lost a good chunk of her long-term memory from a nasty blow to the skull, losing some of her precious training. But her great-uncle's killers were brought to justice. When she returned to her home, she found that the Rats had bitterly slain her hatchling children. And the circle of vengeance exploded anew. In the course of it all, the Nezumi population of Saigon plummeted...

Recent Years

But all of this behavior was frowned upon, and she was set back a full Rank as a result, suffering both the Rite of the Quiet Burial and Punishing the Improper Strike. She had only one way to make amends: to become a loyal member of a Vritra Nest slowly being formed for the Kansas City-Little Asia area. This Nest's job would be limited to observing the hengeyokai and shapechangers in the Little Asia area. This included the Court of Bamboo Talons as well as any "freelance" hengeyokai in the area; outside of Little Asia was the Zuzeka's business. These Vritra immigrants were to be a part of the Beast-Courts, earning quiet respect of the Changing elders, while watching for the imbalance and imprudence that the West can so infectiously spread. Cam icily accepted and has become more attuned with the winter than ever.

Nest


Cam now belongs to the Nest of the Custodians of the Jade Coil, counting among her Nestmates Venkatakrishnan and Jilal Dattavalaram, the Nest replenished after a demographic re-shuffling. This Nest was charged with observing the hengeyokai of the Beast-Court of Bamboo Talons and all other shapechangers in the territory of Little Asia. Intrusion on other areas of the Kansas City region impedes on Zuzeka jurisdiction. For every such intrusion, Zuzeka may enter Little Asia and judge hengeyokai as they find them. Thus, this Vritra Nest treads carefully.

Fetishes


Scar Fetish
Level: 3
Gnosis: 4
Origin: This fetish was emblazoned into Cam's back back in the Middle Kingdom prior to her assignment to the Court of Bamboo Talons and the pending Nest.
Description: This is a mystical Vritra glyph branded in silver in the small of Cam's back. A Chameleon-spirit was worked into the branding.
Effects: 1) disguise true nature against Scent of the True Form (and similar powers)
Activation: She must simply concentrate to activate the fetish's power. With extra effort (spending a Willpower point), she can attune its magic for 24 hours.

Battle Scars


Class: Superficial
Description: Three six inch gashes
Location: Down her face, cutting down past the nose and both eyes
Origin: A Nezumi claw slash when she took her revenge
Effects: Permanently knocked her Appearance down a couple notches

Significant Other


Nest-mates since 2003, a sexual relationship between the two wereserpents was almost inevitable. The emotionally-scarred Cam needed the comfort that the artistic and fiery Asah Rathnam could provide. Soon, the pair relied on each other on every level. To a degree, they admit love for one another. Theirs is the quiet and tender kiss no one sees. Due to the lack of suitable mates, either Asah or Cam may yet mate with one of the male Nagah in their Nests if the auspices bode well. But even if that day comes, these two will always have something special.

In 2008, a major reshuffling of local Vritra saw Asah away from Little Asia to a new Nest. The numbers of weresnakes was imbalanced. Cam was again left alone until Asah contacted her not long later, and Cam realized that her lover had been reassigned to a new Nest nearby but outside the Beast-Court. Fine by her!

Asah

Weakness
Bigotry


A subjective judge is no judge at all. Cam's ability to perform her duties properly is compromised by her unwavering spite for Nezumi. Of course, she is able to observe other hengeyokai without this roadblock. But she will never be able to act objectively in regards to Rat's Children. She must overcome this before she does something insane and gets herself executed.

Likelihood of Corruption


Average.

Cam accepts her Nest and Court. But she remains aloof of the supposed affection Nestmates should share. Their presence, however, helps to keep her from falling off the thin rope. But even their proximity cannot prevent the seething anger beneath the killer's surface. Cam may explode again.

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