Trivia

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A few facts

Mirisma prefers Karse comb his bangs down instead of up. Her favorite flowers are a shade of violet. Karse prepares her a special breakfast every Tridas of her favorite poison plants with a special berry sauce that he is very secretive about.

Character

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History

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Mirisma had a happy and carefree childhood until she was about 15, when a slaver ship conducted a raid on Ditee-ath. It sent down several cloaked shuttles in the dead of night to kidnap rare gemmadites. As the gemmadites mustered a defense, the attackers got desperate and took whoever they could grab, which included Mirisma who had gone out of her familys tree dwelling for a walk when she couldn't sleep. She was walking back to her tree when they grabbed her, she immediately released her poison but the attackers wore a thick bodysuit. She twisted to bite and spit at them, but they held her by the wrist and were also wearing faceplates. She was too scared and overwhelmed to try to create a weapon with her gemstones, she hadn't even practiced it very much. She felt a prick in her neck and she fell limp.

She had awoken to find herself with a few other Gems she didn't know in a cell on the slaver ship, none were gemmismae. There were a few others of a species she didn't recognize. For days she waited with the others in silence and despair. There were half-hearted attempts to cheer each other up, but then they would hear the screaming echoing into their cell from somewhere unknown, and they wondered if they were next. No one could dredge up any hope. This ships shuttles had had rare cloaking technology, probably stolen from some governments military. How could they hope for rescue? Unless the slavers came to justice, which no one believed was likely.

As a week passed, then two, Mirisma became like a zombie, eating the gruel sloshed through a slat in the door robotically. One by one the others with her were taken away, Mirisma could only guess they had been sold. She was young, and female, she could only guess and agonize over her future fate, not realizing the reason she had not yet been sold into sex slavery was because of her poison. No device had yet been invented to neutralize a gemmismaes poisons without killing them, not ideal for clients who wished to live. And not a whole lot was known of their biology anyways for someone to try it. They didn't realize that eventually without poison plants her poison was getting weaker

Then one day, thirty-five days after her initial capture, the door opened, she was the only one left and they had finally found a buyer for her. The slaver stepped in with a woman in a skintight body-suit probably meant to look elegantly proffessional, but only gave off the impression of someone trying and failing. She smells like blood, thought Mirisma. Indeed, she was a purveyor of the bloodsport. A mid level manager in an underground arena. She was determined Mirisma would make for good sport, at least for while she lasted. Mirisma was taken to the arena, a gaping maw beneath some citys bustling metropolis.

A metal collar that she was assured would send currents of high voltage into her was clasped around her neck, and she was put into a cell with an older woman, a species Mirisma didn't recognize. She had the body of a hardened fighter. Cold eyes landed on Mirisma, "A little Gemmismae," She spat. "You wont last a week." She explained the reason they had sold her here instead of the sex trade was because of the slavers and buyers had thought her poison could not be neutralized. "Idiots. They think you'll be able to at least kill your opponents with poison. You're in luck though, they feed me Hochachka, highly toxic to virtually all other races, but my body needs the amino acids it contains. It might be similar enough to your poison."

Her cell mate was in charge of training her to survive in the arena. And Mirismas life for the next four years was nothing but the training area and the arena. She was mostly put against small species, untrained, in the beginning. Mostly of a species Mirisma had never seen or imagined existed, small and covered in fur, some had fangs protruding and she wondered if it marked their gender. She relied on her poison to win her battles, if she could only touch her opponents skin she could paralyze them. As she faced more opponents, they became more skilled and evaded her touch or came into the arena covered. So she eventually started to utilize her gemstone skeleton to her defense. The first time she used it, she was mortified as her gemstone skeleton had produced a sharp shortened spear from her elbow and it immediately pierced her opponents body as he held her in a choke hold.

This was a new level of violence for Mirisma, but as much as she shied from it, she was forced into it more and more often. She often cried at night, her cell mate would berate her for her weakness, it was kill or be killed after all. Her opponents were becoming more difficult, her plan to hide the fact she had an elemental ability was no longer something she could afford and she began training with it in earnest. It was two years into her imprisonment that instead of hedging around, shying from the fight until unable to avoid it, or getting shocked into attacking by her collar, she would immediately go on the offensive at the sound of the arenas buzzer.

Then one day, the ground rumbled. uniformed men were pouring in like ants, subduing anyone and everyone not locked up or wearing a shock collar. Finally she was freed. It was weeks however until she found a way to get back home. The slavers who had taken her initially had come to justice and their records examined, which was how they found the underground arena. They also found starmaps to Mirismas planet, Ditee-ath.

They sent her to the place she came from, but could it still be her home?

Home On Dittee-ath

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She went home to Bruli, now a woman of 20. Her family were thrilled to have her back. But no one knew how to act around her. She was not the same girl of 15 who had been taken from them, she was now an adult with a teary smile one moment, and a aura of imminent danger the next. Sometimes she screamed in her sleep, her parents learned quickly it was best not to wake her when her father ended up against the wall with a gemstone shaft against his throat.

The others on the island would avoid her whenever possible, and if they had to speak to her in town, they were careful to avoid eye contact. Mirisma was angry at the way her life turned out, she was free now wasnt she? But her world still felt like prison, her opponents less lethal, but there nevertheless. She wanted to laugh and be carefree, but those emotions felt foreign, and far away.

Mirisma avoided people now, and spent her time in the woods, although it was hard to do on an island. One day, she was sitting alone in the forest, and one of the elder women of the island approached her. She said nothing at first, only sat, as it appeared Mirisma was deep in thought, perhaps reliving some horror of her captivity. When Mirisma finally turned to the old gem, the elder put some dried reeds into Mirismas callused hands, and without a word picked up some for herself, and began to weave. Mirisma follwed it as best she could, and in the end ended up with something not fit to hold trash (and not just because of the gaping holes, it was terrible!) But everyday, wherever Mirisma was on the island, the elder would find her, wordlessly press the reeds into Mirismas hands, and begin to weave. Sometimes Mirisma would talk of her time in the arena, and sometimes she was silent. The elder woman merely listened, silently weaving her basket.

Three months after coming back to her home planet, Mirisma packed a satchel, mostly dried foods, a few clothes and toiletries, and sat on the shore. The elder found her, saw the satchel, and understood. She must have known the day would come for she had a small pouch of her own (or maybe she always carried a small knife, sewing kit, and a few coins and valuable gems in a pouch) and placed it at Mirismas feet. Mirisma hugged the elder woman, whom she had never even asked her name, went to a outcrop of gemstones on the shore, and left.

Her Future Mate?

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Mirisma traveled to a few different places, before she settled on Hanatui. She found a suitable tree near a river, of which she found the sounds calming. She had been there a few months, when a certain sunstone gem crossed her path. More like stumbled into her while she was weaving by the edge of the river, he had been going down the steep slope, not seeing her in the tall rushes where she sat when he had tripped and landed on her. In a mere moment he was thrown off, kicked in the groin, and a gemstone blade at his throat

Realizing he wasn't a threat Mirisma retracted the blade and watched as he writhed on the ground in pain. She rolled her eyes, he was definitely exaggerating. Probably?

"Ill never have children now!"

"Please, you have another set in there." She deadpanned.

Karse sat up at that, "Well, I wanted to use this set. Its damaged now I think."

Evidently there had been a minor earthquake in this area before Mirisma had moved in, and Karse had been meaning to see if it had surfaced any useful gemstones in the river for his Jewelry making. He'd finally had time and came from neighboring Eloisond to do a little river prospecting.

After their encounter, Karse found more and more reasons to see her. Not bothered in the least by her abrasive attitude, and made it his own mission to get her to smile, even if it was over him getting kicked in the groin, which happened 7 times over the course of the next several months. Soon, she found herself smiling when she heard him approaching, and would quickly hide it before he came into view to see what he might come up with to get her to smile. She would sit by the river weaving a basket, and he would come along with some excuse as to why he was there, maybe to commission a tiny basket to hold his beads or gems, maybe because he "heard there had been a fire and he was checking on her" when he had heard no such thing. Most days he would babble about jewelry, his stupid older brother, his Jeital friend, and she would pretend to ignore him while she worked.

One day while they were together by the river, him babbling as usual, a strange sound echoed through the forest, they found out later it was some invention that had gone wrong and made a terrible sound. But it had been close to the arena buzzer and Mirisma had gone into full fight mode. Rocks rose from the ground behind her ready to be thrown and she stood over Karse in a fighting stance, gemstone shaft at the ready. He dared not move, he barely breathed in fear she would unleash her energy at him. But then he saw a small bird in his peripheral and it reminded him of a song his mother had sung once, he began to hum it softly, and slowly but surely, Mirisma returned to her senses.

As the rocks she had been holding with her ability fell to the ground, Karse felt a jolt run through his body, exciting and new.

Mirisma looked startled, hope filled her for a brief moment, but then she realized what she had been about to do to this, semi-friend? A potential mate? She closed herself off, she did not send out returning pheromones.

She did not return to the river for several weeks, guilt at how Karse must feel, and uncertainty were her only emotions. She desired a mate, the idea sounded fine. But would it really be something she could have? And then the other aspect, she had avoided sexual attention in her captivity, especially after it became known her first and only attacker had endured a death by poison for his efforts. She had had offers from both genders, and some she wasnt even sure the nature of, but had turned them down. She had seen and heard enough in darkened corners of the training arena where guards turned a blind eye when bribed (or simply didnt care what their charges did as long as they werent fighting or sleeping,) to see it wasn't something she desired for herself.

But then, that was the arena, a twisted semblance of a real life. Karse would probably be...not like that. She thought of Karse, with his sweet smile, his ability to make her laugh despite herself. Him goading her into finally kneeing him in the groin when he pushed her too far with his antics.

But she had rejected him, and then avoided him, if he had even come around again. He probably hated her now, resented her rejection. When she finally returned to the river, she did not expect Karse to be there, it had been 6 weeks after all. But there he was, sitting at the river, his back to her with his feet in, wearing his goofy looking linen shorts he preferred. Looking for all the world that that was his place, and had always been there. Without moving he spoke softly, "I've come back everyday."

They felt the spark once more... She did not deny it.