Name: Briar Rose Chadbury
Age: 10
Gender: Female
Appearance:
Personality: Briar Rose is highly intelligent, though she often seems to have the attention span of a gnat. Her mind is constantly leaping from one thing to another. Her notebooks and papers are always in a complete state of disarray, yet somehow she is able to actually find things (unless someone "tidies up" for her!). She quickly loses herself in reading, writing, and tinkering with inventions and research projects in varying stages of partial completion. She is easily intimidated, since most everyone is bigger, stronger, and meaner than she is. She is socially awkward and has a difficult time speaking persuasively.
History: Briar Rose was conceived by her mother in an affair, and she does not know who her real father is. Her nominal father hated her, but kept up appearances in public to protect the family from scandal. Her parents fought constantly whenever she came up in conversation, so she retreated into worlds of scholarship and invention. She raced ahead of children her own age in her schoolwork (which she viewed as an inconvenience to be dispensed with quickly so she could move on to more interesting things).
Her father had enrolled her into the exclusive private high school he'd went to as a boy, a nest of social climbers and rich spoiled brats, knowing full well that it would make her--and by extension, her mother--utterly miserable. Before the the time came to send her away however, the zombies came to the "rescue." She huddled with her parents in the family mansion while their supplies held out. Finally, the adults decided it was time to go out in search of supplies. They never returned.
She waited for them alone in the dark house until it became apparent that the worst had happened. She gathered her gear and set out with her
steampunk recumbent trike and
trailer. After several narrow escapes, she found her mother and father...shambling among the dead, and had no choice but to kill them with her slingshot. Sometimes she still wakes up screaming from nightmares of them coming at her, jaws gaping, hands flailing and grasping. Since then she's survived by hook and by crook, sometimes by sheer luck and her talent for squeezing through small spaces.
Briar Rose hopes to find a group of good people she can join up with, and help them rebuild civilization. She hasn't had any luck with this so far, because the people she's seen have either been too scary for her to show herself to, or less than eager to accept the burden of a child. Having been unwanted all her life, she picks up on the signs and lets people off the hook instead of guilt-tripping her way into safety in numbers.
Weapons:
18th century brass and iron fireplace poker (from home)
Hunting slingshot (found in a sporting goods store)
Education and Skills:
Bicycle repair, basic mechanics, basic electronics, technical drawing, mathematics (algebra and geometry, plus a smattering of calculus and trigonometry), a broad but not deep "general scientific knowledge." Her education is at a roughly "honors high school freshman" level (somewhat more advanced in areas that interest her most), the result of private tutoring and a quick mind.
Location: London
Other:
Gear:
Canvas and leather hiker's backpack she uses as a book bag. Contains a seemingly random collection of notebooks and papers inscribed with oddly whimsical "technical" drawings of various inventions and ideas in different stages of completion, and notes written in neat feminine handwriting. Drafting tools, measuring tape, small hack saw, a set of small files, an antique hand-powered drill she found being used as wall decor in a restaurant, a Leatherman multi-tool, hand lens, small ball peen hammer, fire starter, and a few cotter pins.
