Clara Durant

• Has various scars across her body from her time with the Galra. The only one that's visible while her jacket is on, is the scar just below her right elbow.
• Has yellow Altean cheek marks
• Hair slightly parted to the left (our right)
• Eyes glow purple when her quintessence powers are active
• She only usually has her hair down when she's in her pajamas or dressed up for a formal event

Confident | Impulsive | Loyal

Clara can be seen as anything but friendly at first glance. Those who have encountered her would describe her as hot-tempered, intimidating, or even cold. She rarely gives soft smiles, often smirking instead. Being brought up without her mother and a father that barely gave her the time of day, she developed a bitter and untrusting personality toward the world. She believed that she could only depend on herself and everybody else would inevitably betray her if she gave them the chance. Because of this, she built up walls and never learned how to communicate with others properly. This led to her getting in multiple fights and arguments throughout her school years, with teachers and peers alike.

It wasn’t until she joined the Garrison that she found someone who was willing to put up with her attitude long enough to break down her walls and get her to open up a little more. Even though she is more tolerant of people nowadays, she is still as stubborn as ever. Once she has a certain opinion on someone or something, especially a negative one, it is extremely difficult to get her to change her mind. On the other hand, if someone earns her trust, she will be very loyal and protective of them. Clara is very intelligent, especially on the subject of science and space. She had known ever since she was small that she wanted to study it, and travel through space to see it for herself.

When she’s with her friends, Clara opens up more and shows her friendly side. She loves to have the freedom to be goofy once in a while. She also has an adventurous and childlike spirit and loves to play games or explore. Along with her sense of adventure, she is also a big risk-taker and won’t hesitate to do crazy stunts that she’s confident she can do. Her sense of humor often includes sarcasm, somewhat dark humor, and pranks.

Clara doesn’t like to talk about her inner emotions to other people. As hard as she tries, most of the time it’s blatantly obvious when something’s bothering her, but she never wants to talk about it. When she does feel ready to talk about her thoughts and feelings, it will only be with the few people she trusts the most. This is also true for when she experiences nightmares or anxiety from her past trauma with the Galra. Clara tends to get upset easily and will not hesitate to argue or call someone out on something. When especially angry, she will turn to aggression to let off steam, often going to the training room to destroy a few robots. She has been known to punch walls as well. In addition to this, Clara hates being told what to do. She is fiercely independent and constantly has the need to be in control of her own life and decisions.

Although she has a tough exterior, Clara is a bit softer on the inside. She loves her found family very much and would do anything to protect them. If one of her friends needs someone to talk to, she’d gladly help as much as she can. She would never admit it, but she’s secretly very touch starved and adores being hugged, held, etc. However, she will only allow her loved ones to do so and will immediately back away if anybody else tries to touch her. Since she didn’t get very many compliments growing up, she’s unsure how to react when she receives one. She shows her loved ones how much she appreciates them through pet names, encouraging words, and small touches like elbow nudges and shoulder touches.

As a young child, Clara lived in a middle-class home with her mother, Helen, and her father, Lucas. They were a happy family, with her father being an architect and her mother working from home to care for her. Unfortunately, by the time Clara was 5 years old, her mother grew incredibly ill during her second pregnancy and passed away. Her father was distraught and became very depressed. Instead of coping with the loss, he tried to make himself as busy as possible. He became distant from his daughter as a result and never put aside any time to spend with her. Clara grew up spending most of her time alone, filling it by studying various subjects ranging from astronomy to sewing, or walking around the city. Her attitude shifted from being overall joyful, to being closed-off and unfriendly. She never made friends and didn’t learn how to socialize with others, leading to attitude and disciplinary problems throughout her school years. It got so bad that in middle school she got in a fight where she beat up one of the school bullies and ended up getting expelled, having to transfer to a different school.

After having discovered the Galaxy Garrison around the age of 13, she decided that she wanted to join in the hopes of improving her life and getting away from home. She figured that she would learn how to be more disciplined and structured. The minute she could, she applied without telling her father and did everything she could to make sure she was accepted without his knowing. She passed the exams with flying colors and when she was accepted, she packed up to leave. When he figured out that she was leaving, he was furious. He demanded that she stay at home and go to a normal school. Clara refused, and after an argument, vowed to never come back.

Her attitude problems made her first couple of months at the Garrison difficult. She didn’t get along with her instructors or her fellow cadets and refused to work properly in team assignments. She believed that all of her classmates were idiots. At the same time, an instructor, Commander Holt, noticed that she was having difficulties and wanted to offer her his help. Before he could, Clara got in a fight with a fellow cadet after a failed team simulation. The fight nearly got her expelled, but Com. Holt asked that they spare her career and instead have her go to tutoring. They granted his request with the condition that he was the one to give the tutoring. He agreed and although Clara was reluctant about it at first, she accepted, seeing as the only alternative was expulsion. He enlisted his most trusted student, Shiro, to assist him since he had the patience and kindness for the task. Their first encounters with her were less than appealing, as she completely disregarded whatever they said and gave them attitude. That didn’t discourage them, though, as they continued to make attempts. While Com. Holt acted as her mentor, Shiro attempted to relate to her on a more personal level. She gave both of them a very difficult time and fought them every step of the way, but they kept trying to get through to her. Clara was convinced that they were inevitably going to give up on her like everyone else had and when they didn’t, the day came when she finally snapped. She had walked out on a tutoring session with Com. Holt when she had a spat with Shiro. He went looking for her and when he found her, she was very standoffish. Their conversation turned into an argument, which resulted in her punching him and having a breakdown where all her feelings throughout her life resurfaced. Shiro, worried, gave one last plea to let him help her. She hesitated, but finally agreed. Shiro helped her through her emotions and reassured her that he wasn’t going to give up on her. Upon seeing the commander again, he reassured her as well. Clara slowly made progress, eventually learning the necessary skills that she needed to succeed at the Garrison. She began getting along with her roommate, Ana, as well as some of Shiro’s peers. Shiro, however, became her closest friend. They spent a lot of time together and became practically inseparable. She was also introduced to Keith later, who she viewed as a little brother.

A few years later, when Clara graduated, she was lucky enough to be able to go on her first space mission with a team to study Europa, one of Jupiter’s moons. Among the crew was her roommate, Ana, and Ana’s father, Commander Greene, who led the mission. However, before they made it to Europa, their systems malfunctioned as they encountered a Galra ship. Before they could react, they were captured by them and taken prisoner. In an attempt to save the crew, Commander Greene tried to fight back, but was swiftly killed by the soldiers and the remaining crew was sent to a labor camp. A year passed and the camp was liberated by a group of rebel fighters. In the scuffle of the escape, Clara had to hold back some guards in order for the other prisoners to have enough time to board the rebel’s ship and was unfortunately left behind. As punishment, she was sent to Haggar and the druids to be experimented on.

During her time with the druids, Clara was subject to many experiments in an attempt to be turned into a super soldier for the empire. Among the tests, her DNA was spliced with that of Haggar’s to make her body more susceptible to receiving quintessence. She gained some Altean features as well as the ability to manipulate quintessence. Her hearing, sight, and physical strength were also enhanced. In addition to the tests, the druids sent her to the arena to keep track of the progress of her new strength and abilities. Clara quickly learned how to defend herself in order to survive.

Having been a prisoner for 3 years, Clara was put on a vessel to be transferred to Zarkon’s main ship so that she could be more closely monitored by Haggar. On the way, the paladins intercepted the ship and sent Pidge and Shiro with the green lion to gather information from their databases. They accidentally set off the alarms and while the guards were distracted, Clara broke free and started making her way to an escape pod. As they crossed paths, Clara ran into Shiro and nearly shot him in surprise with a stolen weapon. They froze in shock when they saw each other, but before anyone could react, the sentries that had been following her appeared and shot her in the back. Shiro and Pidge managed to escape with Clara and put her in a healing pod as soon as they reached the castle-ship. Once she woke up, they filled her in on everything that had happened since she disappeared and she decided to join the team in the fight against Zarkon.