Back Story on Jezebel 623 Final

The climate on KA-7247 is dry. Very dry! The indigenous life here is scant at best. This makes tracking off world prey that much easier, even for an off world predator.

Jezebel 623 stands motionless atop a rocky precipice as the hard, dry wind grudgingly pushes against her lanky, six-foot, four inch frame, carrying approximately 246 pounds of hardened muscle. She stands with a Golem's resolve, in protest of the stinging wind, and she feels no discomfort at all.

The company spares no expense when it comes to their most prized assets (and Jez was one of the very best of them). The woman's bio-engineered exodermal modification is able to combine with great precision, by pulling any catalogued molecules and particulates directly from whatever environment she finds herself immersed in. Once collected, the suit, itself is designed to internally manufacture meds, enhancers and stabilizers, to aid in preserving the Reaper. 

Jezebel 623 was the unfortunate recipient of decades of systematic abuse, and from early childhood, she endured countless degradations at the hands of too many faces to remember, as was so common in the outer regions across the better part of the known galaxy! Somehow, she survived into young adulthood but the price was high, and the person she may otherwise have become, had long since been buried beneath so many thick layers of self loathing and a slow burning, psychotic rage.

Her natural athletic prowess, and years of physical combat, had honed the woman down to a keen edged hand-to-hand fighter, so it was the most obvious choice for her to enlist with one of the countless mercenary organizations peppered across the known expanse. In those years, she took her vicious brutality to a much higher level, becoming something of a legend within the mercenary ranks. It was only a matter of time before she caught the eye of a one of the Hurk-Stalwart Group's recruiters. 

Each year, HSG would deploy "head hunters" (to troll the known military and private organizations) to enlist potential prospects into the "Reaper Trials". Around eight to ten thousand warriors would be picked for the preliminary trials and only about Two Hundred would move forward to the final test. These candidates had successfully survived anything ranging from multi-directional blitz attacks by other candidates, to evading attacks from heavy-fire ground support on flat, sparsely populated terrane. However, what would come next would far exceed any previous obstacle.

In order to be fully received into the most exclusive group of assassins in the universe, each candidate would be dropped off onto one of many of the absolute most inhospitable (yet, potentially survivable) systems discovered and logged into HSG's database. Each candidate would be left with nothing. No food or water, no equipment. Not even clothes!

Each candidate is implanted with a vitals monitor and given one simple directive. Survive here for Eighteen months! If successful, you will be collected and fully instated as an HSG con-scribe. Each survivor would be given an entire system for your own personal rest and recreation, as well as an endless supply of credit for the entire duration of service to the company. Both, service and credit would only cease upon a Reaper's death. The rewards are great but the price is (for most) too high!

Generally, the first hundred or so fall within a month. These worlds are populated with a wide variety of venomous creatures and deadly microbes, as well as climates so savage they can strip the flesh from a person's bones if not properly housed and clothed. Over the next year, most of the rest of the candidates fall to a plethora of demises. Many to predatory attack. Some to diminished health, due to poor diet and extreme exposure, and in the last month, the remaining few prospects (usually only five or six) have reached an existential crescendo that transcends any superficial want! The only presence is the constant hum of basic survival.

At this point, the prospect is physically, mentally and emotionally prepared to take on the weighted duties of a Reaper. Two weeks prior to a scheduled retrieval (and unbeknownst to the prospect),  HSG sends a ship to collect any prospect showing a vitals reading, and touching down a few kilometers from the intended target, a dozen hired killers (most dropping from the reaper trials before getting killed) are sent to collect the prize.

Every merc has been well trained, well fed and well equipped with state of the art weapons and rations. They've all been incentivized with the promise of enough credit to retire, and they have one simple objective. Locate the target and neutralize with extreme prejudice. The team has twelve hours to complete the mission, and failure is not an option!

Even after surviving a multitude of unthinkable adversity, few of the prospects survive an engagement with such superior forces! Some would be lucky enough to spot the danger in time. Maybe enough to begin a counter-offensive and even wipe out a handful of the enemy, but in the end, almost everyone falls.    So, so close....

Four ships had been deployed at the end of Jezebel 623's trial. Hers and three others, and by the time the last merc realized he'd been outflanked, Jez had slit his throat with a bone and collected any resources from the still twitching, soon to be corps of the two hundred sixty pound beef sack. She had to rely on her senses of hearing, scent and touch (since she'd lost both her eyes, half her face, and her left forearm to a particularly nasty indigenous predator), which warned her of the hired soldiers' initial presence. 

She'd been counting the days until extraction and these guys were way too early! She remained at her base location for the duration of the two weeks, dining on the rations collected from the dead mercs and even enjoying a few doses of meds that relieved the ache of stiffening wounds.

Met by medical and security drones, Jez was unceremoniously led to the ships infirmary. Seven years had passed since that trial and Jezebel 623 had served HSG and the Reaper Corps with great distinction but none of that matters now. The only thing that concerns the monster is tracking and terminating her high priority prey and the only sensation is the slow, dull hum of self preservation.