Kelly

(a.k.a. Rambo)

Formerly a doppleganger for Saoirse "Zero" D'arcy, Kelly is a member-at-large of Licentia who was last seen serving time in prison for her involvement in Zero's jailbreak. In December of 2019, she was freed from prison by Worldforge. After this, the people who let who loose did not keep tabs on her. Her current location is unknown.

Physical Description

Body Features

• Although it is not noticeable under her hair, Kelly's skull is slightly misshapen as it did not quite heal correctly.
• Kelly does not have Zero's throat scars although she can approximately recreate them with makeup.
• Although Zero used to be the smaller of the two, nowadays, Kelly is noticeably thinner than Zero

Special abilities

Around the time Zero became an amalgamation, Kelly developed mushrooms on her arm, one of the first infected to have express fungus DNA via Xenoexpression. The mushrooms are mostly gone but she is capable of releasing a cloud of spores from her arm — they are not reproductive, but they can irritate.

Apparel & Accessories

Having previously worn bandages "to keep the damn thing together," Kelly has taken to wearing a red bandana around her forehead. This also allows her to wear a red bandana without being mistaken for Zero, who wears a bandana around her neck.

Mental characteristics

Personal history

"I grew up pretty sheltered. Not from hard work, but from hard feelings."

Kelly was born in rural California and lived a relatively normal life prior to her getting infected. She was one of the original settlers of Taqfleck (at the time called LCC) and was selected to be a decoy for Zero due to their physical similarities.

Gender Identity

Cisgender woman (she/hers)

Sexuality

Straight

Education

Kelly graduated high school, but never had any college aspirations, having planned on becoming a food producer like her parents. While this didn't exactly pan out, she is still somewhat farmcore.

Employment

Upon arrival at LCC, Kelly eventually joined the rudimentary farming effort. Once her likeness to Zero was noticed, she was quickly pulled into Zero's inner circle, where she ended up with more administrative roles back when Proto-Licentia was falling victim to the tyranny of structurelessness.

Failures & Embarrassments

Kelly is incredibly embarrassed by the events causing her head injury and refuses to talk about them. She is also embarrassed that the injury cost her some of her ability to perform basic math.

Mental Trauma

Following a head injury, Kelly's personality changed drastically. While she was always looked up to Zero as a strong leader, after the injury her interest became an utter obsession. Kelly corresponded with Zero in writing while in prison and was absolutely devastated when Zero stopped responding upon leaving Licentia (after the xenomorph incident). She likely is currently doing whatever she can to "earn" Zero's attention, such as becoming an expert on religion so they can have theological discussions.

Intellectual Characteristics

While she can tell which of two objects has more objects, when it comes to actually counting, she cannot count above five quickly. She can preform simple addition and subtraction if given enough time, on par with about a first grader. Anything more complicated than that is beyond her current abilities.
Kelly's reading ability was mostly unaffected by the injury, but she takes longer to spell words out loud than she used to. When writing, she tends to make a lot of spelling mistakes if she is in a hurry. If not pressured for time, her spelling skills are about that of an eighth grader, but her ability to actually construct sentences is normal.
Her brain injury, at one point, required her to relearn skills involving balance such as riding a bike and walking in a straight line. She has since recovered full functioning in that area with the help of physical therapy.
Kelly has always been a big fan of frameworks. Sharing this trait with Zero, the two would often get into discussions about how an ideal society could be created. This desire for structure has been retained with her injury and she is still seeking an answer to life's difficult questions.

Morality & Philosophy

Before the injury

CW: Slurs

Kelly: Did you just, like... the kiss on the cheek, is that a European thing?
Jang-mi: Do I look European to you?
Kelly: I, uh... I mean, she is. I didn't want to, it's rude to assume people are, y'know.
Zero: Gay?
Jang-mi: I'd rather be called a faggot than a European.

Kelly's sense of morality was more or less in alignment with those of a Christian but not all that hardcore about the whole thing. She was slightly conservative, but upon getting infected and meeting a lot of different people (or rather, eavesdropping on their conversations, as she wasn't the type to approach people) she became a little more accepting of "alternative lifestyles."

After the injury

Kelly has more or less substituted Zero's morality for her own. She has pored over all of Zero's public writings and political documents in hopes of devising a comprehensive moral framework.

Social

Family Ties

Kelly was the only member of her family to get infected. They elected not to come with her to Taqfleck, and since then they have drifted apart. This drift only widened as she ended up in Texas State Penitentiary. She has been visited by her parents twice while in prison, but they have more or less written her off.

Religious Views

Kelly is in the process of converting to Catholicism. Prior to her head injury, Kelly was spiritual, but only vaguely religious. She was raised by Baptist parents who were not very strongly connected to the church but who were keen on instilling religious virtues in their children.

Social Aptitude

Before the injury

Kelly was a shy girl, not least because she lived a rather quiet life. Ending up with the Z-virus left her separated from her family at early adulthood. She became somewhat withdrawn, usually only speaking when spoken to. Over time, she became a bit less quiet, but still wasn't much for conversation except with people that she knew well.

After the injury

No longer quiet, Kelly is nevertheless not exactly outgoing in the strictest sense. She is still an introvert, but will speak up a lot sooner these days. That being said, there's now certain things that she doesn't quite do right, putting some people at ill ease. This can be anything from speaking too loudly to interrupting others to occasionally missing social cues. She recognizes this, and therefore makes a conscious effort to stay silent if she needs to make a good impression. Kelly has, a few times, become quite upset upon reflection of her difficulty in making friends, but this hasn't manifested in a social anxiety so much as a social caution. Kelly has a tendency to want full control of a situation when she is performing an important task, and has a tendency to threaten people whom she thinks might try to usurp her. Most of the time, this desire of control is dormant -- she isn't the type to go full Karen when her cheeseburger has pickles she didn't ask for. But, at the drop of a hat, she can assert herself as the leader and begin smacking people who don't listen to her. While she has no moral qualms with sucker punching those who don't respond the way she wants them to, she isn't a sadist and doesn't aim for torture, rather quick obedience to whatever plan she has. This "if I hit it, it will listen to me" behavior has been noticed by enough people in Licentia that Kelly has a mark on her ID card for violent acts and is forbidden from owning or taking care of animals.

Mannerisms

Before the injury

Kelly had a bad habit of fidgeting with hair ties, often breaking them.

After the injury

Not only does Kelly still break hair ties, but now she has become far! more! excitable!
While sometimes described as "bipolar" by other people, they mean in the weird ableist adjective sense, not an actual diagnosis.

Hobbies & Pets

Kelly likes small dogs and resents the fact that she's been banned from adopting one. She once stole a "stray" pug that turned out to belong to someone. The pug still recognizes Kelly and always snorts in greeting upon seeing Kelly or Zero.

Relationships

Kelly

acolyte (Vital)

Towards Zero

5

5

Honest

---

Zero

object of obsession (Important)

Towards Kelly

-3

-1

Dishonest

---

History

Over time, Zero has gone from dismissing Kelly to mentoring her to becoming seriously concerned. When Kelly was first selected as a doppleganger, Zero did not intend on getting too attached. As they spent more time together, Kelly began to charm Zero enough to help break down Zero's standoffishness. The two worked well together for quite some time, moving together from Taqfleck to Dallas Outskirts when Licentia began formally trying to clean up the CDC's mess.
When Sean D'arcy first got in contact with his sister, Zero thought he was an assassin and sent Kelly in her place. Kelly stabbed Sean, not realizing who he was, only to be stopped by Zero herself. Faced with the belief Sean was going to die, Zero became enraged and smashed Kelly's head against a metal light post twice before throwing her to the ground. Kelly was attended to by Kuneho but still ended up with an major brain injury. Kelly does not resent Zero's actions in the slightest -- in fact, she is ashamed of having nearly killed Sean and cries whenever she thinks about the incident for having let Zero down.

Nicknames & Petnames

After gaining some height by growing horns, Zero off-hand referred to Kelly as a "mini-me." Kelly was so delighted with the comparison that Zero never used it again because Kelly's reaction kinda freaked her out.

Relationship Reasoning

Although freaked out by Kelly and never happy to spend time with her, Zero blames herself for Kelly's mental state and feels a sense of responsibility to keep her happy. She also appreciates that Kelly took the fall for the jailbreak and the fact Kelly is not sexually aggressive, unlike some of the other acolytes.

Commonalities & Shared Interests

Prior to the injury, the two loved to discuss how to build utopia. Both of them love complicated, overarching frameworks and systems of connections.

Shared Secrets

Neither Kelly nor Zero talk about the head-smashing incident. That being said, a few other people know, and anyone seeing Zero's ID card knows she has a mark for unspecified violent behavior.

Kelly

minor annoyance

Towards Jang-mi Kang

-2

Subversive

---

Jang-mi Kang

thorn in the side

Towards Kelly

-5

Honest

---

History

Although Jang-mi and Zero were the first gays that Kelly personally knew, Kelly, being more involved in Proto-Licentia's administration and therefore being closer to Zero, took Zero's side when the two broke up over Zero getting pregnant. Ever since then, Kelly has slightly resented Jang-mi. This resentment has become toxic as Kelly became obsessed with Zero, but it has recovered partially as she Jang-mi living with Zero and help raise the kids as evidence of "having matured."
Jang-mi just thinks Kelly is batshit.

Nicknames & Petnames

Kelly was introduced to Jang-mi as Jamie and sometimes uses that name by mistake.

Relationship Reasoning

Kelly sees Jang-mi as an unsupportive girlfriend and has occasionally gotten on her case for not "doing enough."

Species

trifected

Conditions

• Rumase-Associated Illness

Year of Birth

1998 20208703 Years old

Birthplace

Ramona, San Diego County, California

Spouses

Siblings

Current Residence

Unknown

Gender

Female

Aligned Organization

Licentia

Other Affiliations

• Acolytes

Known Languages

Monolingual English Used to know some Irish but forgot it