3rd Imperium Universal Personality Profile
Appearance
Imogen stands a little taller than average female height and has a good physique due to an active lifestyle and regular serious exercise. She is naturally an appealing woman, but rarely dresses to take advantage of this. A lifetime of living in shadows, covert operations and keeping rogue secrets leads her to dress casually and unimpressingly, wearing whatever would help her blend in to the area and be unnoticed - unless she specifically wants to be noticed, in which case the opposite is true. When not specifically trying to blend in, she normally wears a Protec Suit fashioned to resemble a generic, casual suit suitable for most casual or general business (not legal or corporate) use. Her naturally wavy brown hair is uniformly kept just below shoulder level and usually loose (which helps to hide her face somewhat hidden from various angles. She tends to wear little make-up unless it would serve a purpose.
Biography
Background
Imogen has no real name, having been given an identifaction number after she was birthed from a captured Zodani agent and raised in a secret and illegal Imperial psionic agency run by Commodore Hadrian Norbury. She has had many names, but the one she is most associated with is that of "Stana Beckett" - the identity she is officially registered under as an agent for Naval Intelligence... but she has admitted to confidants taht this in itself was just another Legend.
Pre-Career Education: Psionic Institute [1066-1085]
Imogen was born and raised in a Terran facility with the sole purpose of becoming a shadow spy for the clandestine spy agency that, in Imogen's own words "is a spy agency within the Imperial spy agencies, that serves its own master's interests and not that of the Imperium, but with the veneer of serving the Imperium." As such her entire education was geared towards deception and infiltration. As she got older and her racial psionic abilities began to manifest, she underwent a broad psionic training, finding herself with an affinity for the psionic talents of Telepathy, Clairvoyance and Teleportation. It was because of this combination of talents that she was chosen to be a psionic spy rather than a psionic assassin or warrior.
Career
Term 1 - Career: Psion Agent (Operations) [1086-1089]
Officially entered into Imperial records as Stana Beckett, and entered service officially as an Agent for Naval Intelligence, Stana underwent various missions for her psi-agency/Naval Intelligence with success. In the first year, however, she was placed on a deep undercover operation on Twylos with an IISS (Imperial Intestellar Scout Service) espionage Agent named Korben Stryker. Whilst she was a good agent, Stana admitted to Korben many years later that she knew little about life outside the agency, and in her naivete and inexperience ended up becoming romantically involved with Agent Stryker. Though their mission to spy and report on the Confederation shipyard in Twylos was ultimately a success, completion was bittersweet. Not only was it hard for Stana to say goodbye to the only person she had ever really got to know outside the agency, but a short while after mission completion she discovered she had become pregnant.
Realising that if her masters discovered this, her child would be taken from her and trained as she was, and would have nothing but a life of servitude to a shadow organisation and no free will, she took the decision to conceal her pregnancy from her masters. Fortunately for her, psi-agents and deep-cover operations are often solitary affairs, with only irregular reports sent back, it was not too difficult for her to keep her pregnancy a secret. She managed to secretly deliver the child in a hospital on New Kovac, the capital of Kidashi, a world repleat with anti-Imperial sentiment and active Solomani Party terrorists. There she stole the identity of a Kidashian woman, using her contacts to help her changed the deceased Imogen Pendergrass' identity to her own image, and when she gave birth to a daughter had her named Penelope after her favourite character in "Star Fury II: The Star-Ninja Strikes Back" - her favourite movie growing up. She considered contacting Penelope's father, but as he was an Agent, decided it would be too risky for both Stryker and Penelope, and instead took the decision to keep Penelope's existence secret from anyone that knew her. She made arrangements for her daughter to be cared for in her absence, but would travel to Kidashi as often as possible to visit.
Term 2 - Career: Psion Agent (Operations) [1090-1093]
Although Stana was a successful agent, the apparent strangeness observed by Commodore Norbury in some of her actions (lengthier than expected delays; investigations that would seem to go off-course, involving space-travel, before returning on-track; etc...) - secretly attempts by Stana to visit and care for her daughter and avoid discovery - began to call her loyalty into question. Stana managed to successfully prove her loyalty and take attention off her (for the moment) by uncovering a Solomani Party cell on Kidashi.
Term 3 - Career: Psion Agent (Operations) [1094-1097]
After a series of successful operations, and growing ability with her teleportation talent, Stana underwent a period of extensive training and surgical augmentation. During this period she received a teleportation suit and personal PSI-battery to maximise her utility to the agency, and her nervous system was augmented to make her more effective at deception. For several years she managed to succesfully juggle visiting and maintaining the secret of her daughter with conducting operations with little incident.
Term 4 - Career: Psion Agent (Operations) [1098-1101]
In 1098 Stana encountered Lexie Leigh and Arlen Glaver; other psionics. Arlen was part of the (illegal) underground psionic network, and Lexie was a young psionic healer who, although not formally affiliated with the network, was sympathetic to psions living in secret from persecution and provided assistance. Instead of turning them in, Stana helped them get deeper undercover and in return they would provide greater care and, more importantly, psionic testing and tutoring for Penelope who's psionic potential would soon beginning to manifest.
Things went well for the first few years, but 1101 would become the year that Stana refers to as the darkest period of her life. WIth Lexie and Arlen caring for her daughter and taking care of her education, and Penelope becoming a teenager and thus harder to control and keep secret, and wanting to know more about everything - her father, her mother (and her job/secret), psions, etc... keeping the secret and keeping contact became harder. Once again, Commodore Norbury began to suspect she was up to something, that perhaps she was going rogue or sympathising with the psion underground network. In 36/1101 Stana's secret was uncovered by another shadow psion agent loyal to Norbury. Although Stana was able to "silence" the agent before he reported Penelope's existence to Norbury, initial contact reports revealed to Norbury that Stana was on Kidashi instead of where he believed she was operating. Stana knew that even by concealing the agent's body, this report and one of his loyal agents suddenly disappearing afterwards would never be considered coincidence by Norbury.
Stana knew she needed to buy time and throw Norbury off the scent, and in an act that was equal parts callousness and desperation, she initiated an emergency plan she had started working on back in 1092 when she first came under suspicion. Activating her personal network she "leaked" hints as to the existence of an illegal black ops facility on Terra to an agent she belived would be peaked and follow the trail; who was good enough to uncover enough that Norbury would have to divert his attention to throw the agent off-track; and who [she hoped] was good enough to extricate himself from the situation - she misled Penelope's brith father and her former lover, Korben Stryker, to uncover the clues.
It worked a little too well. Agent Stryker came dangerously close to uncovering the truth - he uncovered that there was indeed an illegal black ops facility, with its own spies in both IISS espionage division and Naval Intelligence, run by Norbury and manipulating the intelligence agencies under his own orders instead of that of Imperial Intelligence. But Norbury was too experienced (and had far more powerful networks) and Stryker was never able to prove his findings. Unfortunately The distraction worked and Stana moved Penelope into the heart of New Kovac, in an area so dangerously anti-imperial that even Imperial lawkeeping forces would not enter with less than full battle dress, and left planet, leaving various false traces which went silent. She knew Norbury was after her, and so the best thing was for her to go silent. Using Arlen's contacts, Stana became officially involved with the underground network, setting herself up completely under the identity of Imogen Pendergrass as a 5th Columnist IISS mail operator on Basse Terre. Here was close enough to be able to regularly visit Kidashi and worked hard with the sole intention of creating a network of contacts, allies and bribed starport agents to be able to extract Penelope, Lexie and Arlen from Kidashi when the time came.
Norbury, however, quickly pieced that Stana and Stryker had been on operations in the past, and presumed that Stryker was willingly involved with his now-apparently-rogue agent. Although he has succesfully deflected Stryker, Norbury was not a man to forgive and forget, and Stryker knew too much. Norbury decided he needed to be silenced before things got worse.
Term 5 - Career: Underground Psion Network (Fifth Columnist) [1102-1105]
In 347-1103 Agent Stryker's operation in Solomani Confederation territory went completely sour. The official report has it that Stryker made some mistakes which were picked up by SolSec that led to their discovery of an Imperial agent in their territory - although it was actually Norbury's psionic agents that secretly blew Styker's cover in an attempt to have him discredited as an agent and killed in action. Stryker would have certainly died had it not been for a brave Imperial Luriani Marine extraction unit that went in to recover him (not just to save an imperial agent - but for the intel Stryker had accumulated, and the fear that if captured and broken under interrogation would confirm his allegiance and threaten the response of renewed war on the Solomani Rim). The extraction was successful, but resulted in a bloodbath in which almost the entire marine squad was lost, and many SolSec officers killed in a public area, much of which ended up televised over the Solomani Confederation as proof of Imperial aggression. Although Agent Stryker's mission was considered an overall success intelligence-wise, the political fallout meant that the IISS had to publicly disavow him to keep the peace with the Confederation. As war was not something either the Imperium or the Confederation desired, this public disavowment allowed the confederation to save face and not pursue the issue, although behind the scenes concessions and agreements had to be made to ensure this turning a blind eye.
In 34-1104 Stryker was officially deleted from the IISS espionage division's official records. Ironically, this disavowment may have ended up saving Stryker's life - as being discredited and no longer in IISS espionage, he no longer had the contacts, authority or weight to either further investigate his findings about Terra, or credulity if he revealed his findings. This meant that he was no longer deemed important to Norbury, who went back to looking for Stana, who's trail had gone cold.
Whilst Norbury did not know either of Penelope's existence, or Stana's hiding and alternate identity on Basse Terre, analysis of past reports, information and other trails over the last two decades slowly identified a pattern - that Stana had been sighted multiple times in the areas around Basse Terre and Kidashi when she was supposed to be elsewhere. Reports that at the time had meant little, but now under scrutiny revealed a pattern. Norbury knew whereabouts she either was, or would go, but not why or when, so he had agents (psion and otherwise) and military support placed in key locations, and waited for Stana to step into his spider's web.
The Extraction
Stana had been careful and stayed distant as much as possible, and remaining only one parsec away from her daughter allowed regular communications via her carefully-arranged network. When the time came that she realised Norbury's agents were squeezing her in, she knew she had to get Penelope and her tutors off Kidashi, and with legal identities, documentation & permits (obtained via bribes or forged), key starport personnel bribed and other such arrangements made and ready, sought out a tramp trader willing to help get them out - a job that would likely be risky and would need to try to avoid the Amber zone Imperial scrutiny. She only had one shot at this - as she was sure that by now Norbury would be close or waiting, and setting up this operation burnt every favour, contact and almost all of the credits she had left.
By pure chance, or destiny, on Basse Terre she re-encountered Korben Stryker and the sole marine survivor of the unit that had extracted him - and discovered they had gone into business (with another Aslan Imperial Navy engineer colleague) as tramp traders on a J-3 capable vessel. Whilst she felt a certain degree of trepidation and guilt due to the knowledge that her machinations nearly got him killed, and got him thrown out of the IISS, she did not hesitate in gaining his support. She initially held from him details of who needed to be extracted, but made it obvious there was a degree of illegality involved in requiring avoiding Imperial attention in extracting the personnel. She accepted his offer to go out for a meal at the Traveller's Aid Society's Hostel at Basse Terre starport, which led to drinks and further conversation in his hostel room, which led to their fiercely rekindling their romance.
In the morning light Korben pushed for answers about what was happening with her, and succeeded in learning the truth - that he had a daughter, that Stana was a rogue agent wanted by her former masters, and that Stana needed to extract her from Kidashi and go on the run to prevent her discovery.
Unbeknownst to them, Stana had been discovered by some of Norbury's agents at Basse Terre starport, who reported that she had taken passage on the Twylosian Dream destination Kidashi, and took passage on the same vessel to observe and follow. The two agents were mis-matched - a loyal, battle-hardened though idealistic army veteran and a ruthless agent who considered the completion of a mission objective (no matter what it was, legal or otherwise - those decisions were for others to make, just his to follow) to be the only important outcome. This would prove an important factor in the future, which was set in motion indadvertedly when Korben Stryker held a "meal with the Captain" evening where he treated all the passangers to a meal with the crew and himself, and made an impression of being a congenial person and new trader trying to succeed in a difficult business. During this meal Stryker met the two agents, under the aliases (which passed the crew's normal background check) of Mr and Mrs Malcalm and Sellia Bluth.
Arriving without incident at Kidashi, Stryker and his colleagues followed Stana to the heart of New Kovac and met Penelope, Lexie and Arlen at a popular cafeteria. They conversed a while, unaware that Norbury's agents had followed them, until the army trooper who they knew by the name Sellia Bluth appeared to them in Battle Dress and announced they were under arrest on charges of Terrorism. When the agents had followed Stana to what they believed was a psion underground terrorist cell meeting, they had called in backup, realising there were too many people to attempt to arrest without the risk of an incident in which civilians could get caught in the crossfire, something Sellia wanted to avoid. Sellia simply wanted to hold them (at gunpoint) until the backup came in and arrested them safely.
A terse discussion occurred, in which Stella was made aware that she was on a mission of false pretence, working for unofficial and corrupt superiors, and that she was capturing innocents to be taken for torture and possible execution, with Stryker using knowledge and information gained during his IISS time to add credulity. This gave Sellia pause and, realising this, Malcalm (who was in sniper position) opened up and assassinated Arlen with a head shot, throwing the already tense mood in the public area into outright chaos.
Stryker realised quickly via Sellia's hasty comm-conversation with Malcalm that she was under the belief that they were to arrest Stana and her companions, but Malcalm had other orders/intentions. This created a conflict of ethics/interest in Sellia, which Stryker exploited, managing to get from her the location of her sniper partner, and convincing her to "miss" shots and let them reach an area where she could claim to have lost them and be unable to pursue without backup due to pro-Solomani populace in an area renown to be a hotbed of active and well-armed anti-imperial resistance.
The quick ruse worked. Given a distraction so that Malcalm would not see her seperate from the group, the ex-marine Afira Khii managed to locate and silence the sniper, giving Stana, Striker, Penelope and the others the chance to flee into the hotspot and Sellia allow them to escape whilst still be able to report to the incoming backup that she had attempted to capture the fugitives, blame the fracus on her trigger-happy partner, and leave out the names of those with Stana who she had been convinced were innocents who's only crime were knowing Stana (something Korben convinced Sellia that knowledge of would ultimately end up in Sellia meeting an "accident" on an operation like he did to silence her as well).
They eventually regrouped back at the Twylosian Dream, the bought credentials (and bribed officials) enabling Penelope to get into the starport departure lounge without incident and, once they had gained cargo and passengers, disembarked.
As they travelled to the 100-D limit, and knowing that in Kidashi's military-rule, amber-zone area an Imperial Navy search would be unavoidable, Stana hid in the ship's smuggling compartment. A brief exchange occured, and a grateful and relieved Imogen (she declared that the Stana identity would not have to be permanently buried) was convinced by Stryker to reveal exactly what about her and Penelope was so special that Norbury wanted to get them so eagerly, and willing to kill to cover. Stana revealed that she was racially Zhodani, taken from a captured Zhodani spy at birth and trained to be a shadow psi-agent for a rogue agency that influenced and manipulated all of Imperial Intelligence (and other agencies of Norbury's interest to influence). Although Stryker was Solomani ethnic human, Penelope was half Zhodani herself, and psionic as well, and that if captures would be forced to live the same life as Stana had... if not treated worse because of her now-age. The truths between them finally all aired, the two had an intimate moment before the approach of Imperial Navy patrol forced them apart.
Whilst the search was thorough, it was standard and more aimed towards locating weapons and goods instended for smuggling for the Solomani Party cause, than actually searching for a fugitive. The low speed of intestellar communications, Sellia's silence about what occurred on-planet, and the briefness of their time on Kidashi meant that it would be several days at least before Norbury would even learn what was happening, and thus the standard imperial search failed to find the hidden rogue psi-agent in the shielded smuggling compartment.
Once in jumpspace Imogen and Stryker spent time with Penelope - who had read Stryker's mind back on Kidashi after he had made her a little wary by staring at her a little more than she considered normal, and discovered the reason was because he was seeing for the first time the daughter he had only recently learnt he had. Stryker, knowing when they arrived at their destination may never see his daughter again as they would have to keep on the run or at least travel far away to leave Norbury's reach, spend much time getting to know his daughter. Imogen realised they had much in common, saw that Penelope (who had asked about her father many times in her childhood) was also keen to know him, and at some point in that week-long jump, realised what needed to be done for the good of her daughter.
Current Activities
When they arrived on Limerick, Imogen invited Stryker to a gratitude final meal, just Penny and her parents together one last time, which Stryker accepted. The meal was pleasant and the food good, with plenty of wine. Pleading needing to go to the toilet because of the wine, Imogen left the father and daughter alone at the table... and travelled to a ship departing momentarily, to an unknown destination far away. As the ship was undocking, she sent a tearful video message to Stryker's mobile comm, telling him that Norbury did not know of Penelope's existence, and it was Stana he was after. As Stryker was always on the move, Penelope would be safer with him. She tearfully added that she'd had Penelope's life up until now, and pleaded for Stryker to give Penelope the life she could never have with her mother.
Imogen's current whereabouts, future destinations or current activities are unknown. The last indication Imogen gave was that that she would help the psion underground because others should not have to live in fear of people like Norbury or the Imperium's reactionary and cautionary anti-psionic laws. With her many experience of keeping secrets from the Imperium, avoiding detection, knowledge of Imperium agent tactics, and now the freedom of not having to actively protect her daughter - the psion underground has gained a resourceful and capable full-time ally.
Personality
Imogen is a master of deception, and her personality matches whatever she needs it to be for the Legend she currently operates with. Those few people who have gotten to know the true person behind the Legend find that she is a friendly person with a wry sense of humour, but hardened and jaded from years of deceptions and having to do things she did not want to, taking actions that burned allies and contacts alike, all to protect her daughter and evade capture. There is nothing she would not do to ensure her daughter's safety - suffering incredible personal anguish (physical and mental) and stress, and "taking out of the picture" any threats she perceives. She does not let people in easily, used to being always on the move, working with many contacts, and the possibility of having to walk away at any moment (and aware that a mistake - such as getting romantically involved with Stryker in her youth - could have major consequences). A few do, however, manage to break through her crystaliron skin and find that there is an incredibly emotional person with a lot of love and affection suppressed deeply within. Those few peopel who find it are amazed and surprised at what lies inside.
How this will develop now that Imogen no longer has to actively care/protect Penelope, and will help the Psion Underground - whether she will be a figure of hope and support to those who need it, or become the dangerous psionic terrorist Norbury brands her as being - remains to be seen.
Other Notes
Imogen is able to use the powers of Clairvoyance, Telepathy and Teleportation. Clairvoyance allows her to be able to remotely see or hear in locations, sense thingsout of the norm and gain tactical advantages. Her telepathy allows her to be able to detect life, connect to others minds empathically, read or transmit thoughts to others, probe minds, give psychic suggestions or, with effort, psychically assault others. Her teleportation powers allow her to teleport even great distances - although the reality of physics makes jumping long distances extremely dangerous, and a strain if she teleports with anything more than her teleportation suit.
[Note: it was never revealed during the Extraction, but during the week-long journey out of Kidashi, Afira got to know Lexie and Imogen futher, and asked why none of the psions appeared to use their psionic abilities during the cafeteria battle in Kidashi. It was revealed that the battle dress armour used had Psi-blockers in the helmet, making Sillia immune to telepathy, and a psi-disruption unit let off a powerful electropsionic field that made it virtually impossible to effectively focus psionic talents... effectively negating the psionic abilities of all four psions present until they got far enough away from Sillia - by which point the psionics were no longer needed]
Combat Style
Imogen tries to avoid combat as her purpose is investigation, infiltration, stealth and deception. She's a spy, not an assassin. Nonetheless, she is trained for the eventuality, and has some combat experience and is as capable in unarmed combat and with slug weapons as a typical experienced soldier - though not in the same league as a marine with her comparative experience would have.
In combat Imogen therefore relies on her handgun (usually a standard autopistol - easy to aquire almost anywhere, rarely raises many questions, and cheap enough to dump in a hurry and buy or steal another later if needed), and if the opportunity (and need) arises uses her clairvoyance to get a tactical edge, teleportation powers to get rapid tactical position, or telepathy to influence the actions of enemies.
Though trained and fairly experienced, Imogen would generally only rely on her unarmed combat skills if there was little other choice.
Social Style
Getting along with Imogen is easy as she will put up with almost anything, and react to anything said or done in whatever way she feels is necessary to get a desired outcome (ie making contacts, allies, keeping her Legend, etc...). However the only way to get to the real person inside under the hardened agent is by showing examplary levels of trust, loyalty and - the hard part - taking a leap of faith and showing proof of trust in her, although she may not have done much to deserve it.
She reciprocates to loyalty and trust, although she may neither show it, nor be aware of it. The only people she considers friends are Lexie, Arlen (now deceased), Penelope and Korben Stryker - all people who have risked much to help Stana and Penelope, and keep their secret.
Augments
- Skill Augmentation (Deception): Imogen's nervous system and impulse control has been rewired and augmented to be more suited to being deceptive. This allows her to keep a perfect "poker face" when lying and avoid traditional physiological tell-tale signs of lying such as: nervous sweat, heartbeat change, voice strain, breathing changes, fidgeting/shakiness, infrequent blinking, etc...
Signature Equipment
- Autopistol - commonly-available type that would be accepted as a commonly-bought, purely defensively-intended weapon.
- Personal Psi Battery - Allows Imogen to sture Psi energy during rest periods which can be used to fuel psionic talents when needed withouot causing strain or loss of Psi strength.
- Teleportation suit - cools or heats body after teleport, minimising damage from sudden energy gain or losses caused by jumps. Allows jumping further distances in one go, or in consecurive jumps, than normal and is psionically linked and effectively counts as a second skin (rather than clothing or carried object) making it less costly in psionic strength for Imogen to jump wearing only her suit.
- Mobile Comm [TL10]: Imogen's mobile comm runs a Translator/0 program (generally "good enough" for her purposes and does not use up notable bandwidth) and a Security/1 program which is constantly running. She has had to rely on her mobile comm to communicate with contacts, and constantly in fear of discovery, so she has a powerful security system running to provide as much security as possible.
Signature Quotes
- [to Korben Stryker when asked what she told Penelope about her father] "I didn't tell her much about you to be honest. Always tried to avoid the conversation. But she would go through periods of curiosity or wonder about why she didn't have a father like her friends; or that period where where she hated me like teenagers do and accused me of driving you away and causing her solitude. I told her only that her father was a sweet and caring man that I knew for too short a time; who made me feel like a real person, cared for, for the first time in my life... or I may have said he was some lothario who knocked me up in a motel rool and then just walked away afterwards... My memory's a bit fuzzy...
- "Korben I'm sorry to send this through a vid-message, but I know that if I tried to do this in person you might try to talk me out of it, or I might not have the strength to go through with it. Norbury doesn't know about Penelope - it's me he's after. As long as she's with me, she's in danger and sooner or later he'll find out about her and what she is. This is the hardest thing I've ever had to do - but she's safer with you. With you she can have the life I've always wanted for her, but could never give her. Penelope will be upset, and be angry with me... but I can live with the pain of her hating me, and not seeing her, if I know she is safe and will have a real life."