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"There's order in the chaos of the natural world, in instinct and base desires."

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GODLY PARENT

Epimetheus

FULL NAME

Kefira Faline Toran

NICKNAME

Keke // a childhood nickname still used by her little brother and close friends (by which she means her animal friends since she has pretty much none of the mortal kind).

Fal // what her mother calls her. She treats Kefira's middle name as her first since that was what Darlene had wanted to originally name her daughter- she'd been too blissfully in love to argue with Kefira's father when he suggested something else (which actually hadn't been 'Kefira' but some Ancient Greek equivalent that sounded quite similar). Considering he wasn't around anymore, Darlene has decided that as her daughter and no one else's, she could choose whichever name she wanted.

GENDER

Female

AGE

20

FC

Malese Jow

PERSONALITY

Most of her friends are beasts, and they've certainly had a hand in raising her. Harsh and wild, Kefira finds peace in the brutal fight that is survival, and sees nature as one harmonious and beautiful battlefield. She does not shy away from violence or death, yet neither does she revel in it.

Her words can be sharp and shocking, but there's a charm in her mischievous and untamed eyes that can be quite persuasive. When she wants to, Kefira has a silver tongue- but most of the time she doesn't care to try, considering she doesn't see most people as worth the effort. She has the attitude of someone who doesn't care what others think of her, even when the reality is quite different.

Kefira is desperate to prove herself as more than the daughter of the most foolish god in the pantheon- she wants to show others that she's capable and powerful, not just a strange, insignificant child. There's a fierce tenacity in her that refuses anything but success, and she's willing to bite and claw her way to recognition.

Even though she tries to be cautious, unfortunately she's naturally as reckless as her father, with a tumbling imagination that dreams in 'what if?'s and a curiosity that demands she tests the limits of her powers and abilities. Once a dumb thought enters her brain (like, as a completely random example, trying to summon Cerberus from the depths of Hades just to see if she could), it will be an itch at the back of her mind that only ceases when she finally gives in and discovers what happens (like immediately falling unconscious in a coma-like sleep for almost a full day, though she swears she felt three large noses sniffing at her hair as she was coming to).

Kefira likes to have fun, and she likes to share the wonder of her world with anyone who will listen, though few do. She sees people as inherently flawed, but finds no fault with the animals and beasts her father created. Keke can be somewhat childish and self-centered, having grown up around animals who for the most part treated her as some kind of princess, and judges people before she really gets to know them.

She is very loyal, but feels no guilt being dishonest and duplicitous to those she loves, especially her mother. Kefira sees it as a way to protect her, and with all her practice it is very difficult to tell when she's lying. She only does it out of what she considers necessity, but others would surely disagree.

Just because Kefira does as she pleases for the most part, doesn't mean she feels no sense of responsibility. In many ways, she's learned how to fend for herself and how to care for her little brother, giving him all the attention she had only gotten from animals as she grew up. She is very observant, and is clever when it comes to piecing these observations together into a story- it's made her very skilled at tracking and picking up on body language.

BACKSTORY

The L.A hospital where Kefira was born had something of a pest problem during the hours that Darlene Chow was in labour. Seagulls diving through open windows, raccoons scurrying through the front doors, and a kaleidoscope of butterflies and bees blocking out the sun and leaving the building in shadow. It was behaviour that has baffled animal specialists in the years since, and has given plenty of fodder to the doomsday conspiracy theorist crowd.

It wasn't their fault- they were just excited their creator's daughter was soon to arrive into the realm of mortals. The last time it had happened the world was a far different place, and the deer and squirrels gathering by the mother's side had been idyllic- twenty years ago, with cockroaches flooding up the hospital's drains and shrieking nurses using brooms to defend against crows flying through the halls, it was a little less peaceful.

Darlene hadn't known the man she met a year ago had been anything more then the kind who left the moment the woman he was seeing told him that she loved him and was pregnant with his child, so hadn't thought the screeching and chirruping crowd fighting their way into her delivery room was meant for her. And besides, she'd been a bit too preoccupied to think much on it.

Keke had at first thought everyone could understand the animals around her, and Darlene had at first thought that all babies were gifted at mimicking animals as well as people. Keke would babble and hiss and trumpet, exploring every language that came to her like instinct while falling a bit behind on the one she needed to learn- because while Darlene loved her dearly, she was still a single mother and aspiring actress in L.A, and had to make the choice between spending time with her and making money so that Keke could eat.

It was Keke's babysitters that witnessed her first steps and first word (it was 'bird', directed at one of the many that would perch on the windowsill of their apartment to watch her), and it was them that would also witness her directing a hoard of spiders to retrieve her pacifier or cawing back at the birds outside with eerie mimicry. They often didn't stay past two months.

Once she was old enough to go to preschool, the reactions to her abilities ranged from friends who thought her impressions were super cool and hilarious, to those who found the sounds and the animals that cling to her exceedingly unnatural. She wasn't bullied- those who tried soon found a swarm of bluebirds pulling at their hair or a dung beetle's prize on their chair. But she was excluded, and went through those years feeling alone and cut off from her peers. It was only the animals who cared for her, who did not judge her, so she turned to them more and more.

They moved to Michigan when Kefira was six, after Darlene had finally called it quits on trying to make it big and moved states to start a job as a secretary, and also to be with her boyfriend at the time. A relationship that lasted three more months before Darlene got a call from his wife.

Her mother seemed to have a thing for arrogant fools, a roster ranging from a man who thought he could outsource his fraud scheme to a government official to a god half-responsible for all the horrors humanity is plagued with on the daily. And Kefira has had the chance to grow up alongside this ever-changing line-up and know what exactly she wasn't going to be when she grew up. Darlene was a generous, hopeful soul, and would always give too much of her heart (not to mention her finances) to these fools. Kefira determined not to be like that either.

But Keke still very much preferred Michigan- the babysitter she had there was her favourite, because he would turn on the tv and fall asleep right after Darlene left, and set an alarm to wake himself right before she got back. So Kefira got to spend all her free time in the forests surrounding her home, learning to run with the elk, swim with minnows, climb with squirrels, and fly right back down to the ground with sparrows. How to be persuasive with larger predators that pounced on and tore through her other friends, flashing her their fangs as they deliberated whether they were hungry enough and she was small enough to devour. Kefira did not hold their hunger against them, and embraced that danger along with the other aspects of animal nature, eventually learning just how to speak to them to win their loyalty. Unsupervised for the most part, she was free to run wild and track mud wherever she so pleased, becoming a friend to the animal kingdom.

When she was nine, another man entered her mother's life, who she was sure would be as much a reckless fool as the rest. Kefira had taken to being her mother's protector by that point, determined to defend her where she was the most vulnerable. Whenever the three of them went for a walk, Jeremy Toran found every dog that neared him snarling and snapping at his legs, more then a few drawing blood. She sent bees after him in a swarm when he leaned in to give her mother a kiss on the cheek, and every bird passing overhead either clawed at his hair and eyes or left something unpleasant on his shirt for him to wash out.

But Jeremy had taken all the punishment for weeks without cracking, turning it into a joke with an upturn of his swelling lips about 'rotten luck'. He didn't yell at the dogs or birds that clawed at him, forgiving them for all they put him through. And that was when Kefira wondered if Jeremy was a little different from the other fools her mother was fond of.

They had three lovely years with each other, in which Kefira learned what it was like to have a father, and then how to be an older sister. And then Jeremy had a heart attack, and all that happiness was gone in the blink of an eye.

If Kefira thought her mother was inconsolable after her other men left her, it was nothing compared to the blank and unrelenting grief that hit her at Jeremy's death. Her forest friends began to miss her as Kefira's time was split between caring for her infant brother and her depressed mother. She stopped going to school and learned to cook and clean and change diapers, locking away her own grief and frustration to care for her family. Kefira started working as a dog trainer, and any reservations adults may have had about paying a twelve year old as a professional were assuaged when they saw the results of the first free class she convinced them to take. It took three months for her mom to fight through her grief induced haze and begin taking care of herself and her family again, and by then Kefira was thoroughly used to the responsibility. She took another job working at a diner the next year and lied to Darlene about going back to school.

Kefira discovered who her father was when he strolled right back into her life and told her. She was fourteen and lying on the back of a grizzly, looking up at the stars as she forged her report card for the year, but then the bear rose and shook her off. She growled at him, asking what that was about, when Epimetheus stepped out of the trees. She'd had theories of course, had looked up the strange name Darlene had told Kefira her father had the moment she had access to the internet, sure she could find him on Facebook. Instead she'd found a Greek Titan (she was half Greek, who knew?) that was responsible for the creation of all animals. It had made perfect sense to her when she was seven (especially since animals liked to refer to her as 'Epimetheus's daughter'), and as she grew up and realized just how strange her powers were, the possibility never seemed too unrealistic.

He seemed surprised that Kefira wasn't, then told her it was about time she began training- with another demigod or at an Academy- to begin her calling as his daughter. Perhaps in hindsight he realized that materializing in front of his daughter after ignoring her for the rest of her life and immediately giving her orders would make her want to do the exact opposite. Kefira stubbornly avoided all things demigod and Greek for the next six years- it was only her curiosity and desire to expand her powers even further that finally had her heading to the Academy.

WEAPON OF CHOICE

Kopis

POWERS

- animal communication // she implicitly knows and understands the languages of all animals, and even though her biology is different, she is able to speak right back to them in their native tongues- from the enormous blue whale to the tiniest ant. To mortals it can be quite discerning to hear the screeches of a snowy owl or the clicking of a centipede coming from a young girl's mouth.

- beast summoning // there's a tie between her and every creature her father has created, and Kefira is able to grab the threads she chooses to bring them closer. She can summon animals across vast distances to be by her side, and after a certain time or when she so chooses, they will return back where they came from.

POWER LIMITATIONS

animal communication:
Since she's speaking to them not through their mind but as any other animal would, they must be able to see or hear her for her to communicate with them. Kefira is also limited by the languages themselves- for example, she wouldn't be able to have a philosophical debate with a beetle since they haven't evolved for that type of thought and there's nothing in their language that directly translates.

beast summoning:
She can't control the animals around her or those she summons (nor would she want to), so Kefira has to convince them to fight for her or help her- which depending on the animal, can be quite the ordeal. It can become frustrating when the Hellcat summoned in the midst of battle is in a foul mood because she just woke him up from a nap.

The further an animal is from Keke, the more effort she has to put into summoning them- as well as the size of the beast. Summoning an ant from a few miles over, for example, would take no more energy from her than a blink, but bringing a polar bear down from the ice caps could send her into a dizzy spell, or even unconsciousness if she doesn't have the energy for it. If she wants a specific animal, more focus must be put into her summoning. The beast she summons also returns to where it was after a certain amount of time, and this length of time is dependent on her energy level and focus, though it is typically much easier to keep a beast with her after the first hurdle of summoning them. If she wants to summon more than one animal, the amount of energy she needs to use will multiply.

TRIVIA

- there's three jagged lines on her right upper arm, a scar from the first time she summoned a lion to her side
- she got into the sophomore class because of all the practice and familiarity she has with her powers, but is very behind in everything else (all she knows about a Kopis is it's like a long dagger)
- she's never met her grandparents (Kefira has a working theory that they disowned Darlene either due to her actress career or because of someone she dated), and only saw her aunt twice, both times when she was supposed to be in bed. Not that spying on their hushed conversations actually helped, considering they were both speaking Mandarin. Kefira doesn't even know what her aunt's name is, but knows that they are related since the second time she had Google translate handy and managed to translate the word 'sister'
- one of her best friends is a red squirrel named Carlie, who goes almost everywhere with her on her shoulder or nested in her hair
- her mother still doesn't know about her powers, or that Kefira is a demigod
- she's usually a vegetarian

QUOTES

"She says you look delicious. I told her she could do far better."

"It's alright Ev, don't be scared- she's a tiger, not a dragon."

"I'm impressed- you speak pig even better than me."