POWER DESCRIPTIONS

Oh, Múirne is just great with her powers! Controlling them reliably, at least the shifting, is another matter altogether. Her enhanced acrobatics are more or less a passive thing on her part. She doesn't need to actively think about using it she just excels at acrobatic feats like climbing, jumping, landing, twisting in mid air, and the like. It isn't entirely the most useful of powers but it keeps her from breaking her neck when she forgets she isn't a cat.

Her animal shifting came upon her rather suddenly; going from occasionally shifting a body part accidentally (such as eyes or ears) to being, for all intents and purposes, a cat. She was stuck in her first shift for so long being a "people" is rather difficult for her. She's gotten a modicum of actual training now and can usually manage to at least keep her underthings around when she shifts into a cat and back, but originally they just fell off her suddenly small and furry body leaving her naked as a newborn when she figured out how to human shape again.

APPEARANCE

Pale; that's what this child is. Her skin is the pallid hue of an albino and her long white hair certainly seems to match that. Her eyes usually appear to be an unusual golden color but they are naturally a muddy pinkish hue. She just tends to have her eyes partially shifted to a cat's; not enough to change her pupils or how her retinas work, but enough to lose that funky color. With her wide eyes and narrow, rather dainty, features, the unnatural eye color gives her a rather eerie look sometimes.

As pale and almost unhealthily scrawny she is, Múirne looks positively uncanny. She's short; not even quite 5 feet tall yet, though the single human doctor who examined her seemed convinced she would grow more. Her body and limbs are thin and delicate looking, but she's surprisingly resilient. She still looks about as tough as fine china, though.

On Múirne almost everything is oversized.  That, however, is just the way she likes it. She hates constricting clothing and will intentionally get clothing with too long of sleeves and hems just to feel more comfortable. She doesn't seem fussy about colors. In fact, one might wonder if she's perhaps partially color blind since sometimes the things she wears just... shouldn't be on the same body at the same time unless the wearer is immune to the horrendous color clash.

PERSONALITY

To be blunt, Múirne is a rather strange child. She seems to have missed some rather vital socialization lessons because sometimes the most basic of social cues go right over her head and she does and says things completely against conventional social norms. It isn't that she's stupid or slow or anything like that; she just sees the world through a entirely different lens then most. At times she seems almost unaware of her surroundings but it isn't quite the case; she just doesn't always react to stimuli in expected ways. It's never safe to assume she isn't paying attention just because she doesn't look actively engaged. She just has her own way of doing and processing things.

Although sometimes she's rather scattered and spaced out when she likes a thing she likes it. A lot. Obsessively, almost. Ask her about history and you'll get the most perfectly blank stare your eyes have ever beheld. Ask her about cats or the science of scent and you might as well make yourself comfortable. She can go on for a while. On the other hand, sometimes she's about as conversational as a brick, especially when she's overwhelmed.

Múirne isn't the sort to have many friends. She neither socializes well nor especially wants a hoard of people around. Since she doesn't always express herself efficiently, those she cares for are more likely to know she likes and trusts them by her actions than her words. Rather than say, "you're my friend" she'll just turn into a cat and fall asleep on a person's lap. If she really likes them they can even touch the belly.

BIOGRAPHY

Múirne certainly didn't start out life as a stray ally cat. She was born a perfectly normal human child. More or less normal, that is. She was premature, and albino, but she was healthy enough once she was released from the premie ward of the hospital. The last of three children, she was more often in the care of her oldest sibling rather than their overworked parents.

At first this wasn't so bad. Aoife was a responsible big sister and tried her best to keep an eye on her little siblings. But as the years went by, Aoife wasn't the only force in young Múirne's life. Her older brother, only older by about a year and a half, was a bit of an ass who constantly harassed his sisters when their parents weren't around. That, to be frank, was most of the time.

Things didn't improve when their father lost his job. Through no fault of his, the company was close to going under and had to cut what the considered dead or simply unnecessary weight. Unfortunately, that included most of the unskilled laborers, of which Iain was only one. While he searched for a new job, the only paycheck was Etaine's and they had been struggling to make ends meet even before the loss of an income. It made things... rather unpleasant for everyone.

With none of the children yet old enough to get an after school job and Iain having no luck finding new employment, their belts had to get even tighter. Etaine, when in her cups, blamed her husband for their situation. He, in his, blamed her. The ones who truly suffered though, were their children. 

When Etaine found a second job before her husband had found a replacement job things really got dicey. The harsh words and brusque treatment from their father got worse and more frequent for the unlucky children. One night, husband and wife got into an unholy row. When Iain dared rase a hand to his wife she made it inordinately clear that she could do without him quite nicely, thank you very much, and the next time he dared threaten her, he would be out on his ass in the street.

From then on, he found a new outlet for his anger and frustration: his children. Aoife took after their mother the most, in looks, and initially she got the worst of it. Causal blows and verbal abuse came her way almost daily until Iain found another job. Things settled down in the Ó hAodha household for a time. Only problem was, now Iain realized how much he enjoyed having total control and power over another. 

He couldn't threaten his wife and now they had made up and he didn't especially want to. Beating on Aoife was almost like beating on Etaine. At one point that was idea but not anymore. His son was his son, and no son of his would be beaten down. That left Múirne. She'd always been a weird one and she didn't have a lot of friends like her older siblings. When he started abusing her the only one who even seemed to notice was Aoife. She confronted her father and was kicked out of the house at the age of sixteen for daring to defy him. 

That left odd little Múirne, an indifferent mother, and two abusive males. Her brother was bad enough, always trying to get a rise out of her and poke and prod at her. Her father was worse. She was only twelve when his touches became more than just harsh and cruel. 

When she was barely thirteen, Iain tried to force himself on his own child only for her to vanish, leaving her discarded clothing in his hand. He had no idea what had happened to her and for a moment, neither did she. Over the past few months she had found herself able to make her fingernails into claws or turn her eyes into a cat's (sort of). Now, all of a sudden it seemed, she was much much smaller and hiding under her bed. She was, it seemed, a cat.

As a small, white cat, Múirne ran and hid, escaping her family home through an open window and fleeing into the night. Now she was safe, but she didn't know how to become a people again. She wasn't even sure she wanted to. Life as a stray cat wasn't easy, but it was better than the one she had been living. At least no one hit her and the other cats knew she was no threat to their standing, seeing as she was so small and young.

She spent more than a year as a cat, more or less, only turning back into a human occasionally and at great need; to free another cat from a trap or to steal her colony food when there wasn't enough to be found scavenging and hunting. It was, she had decided, the life she would have forever. It was better to be a cat than a people. Cats made more sense.

That changed one day. A kindly human who did more than let her and her fellow cats scavenge, who actually left out food, did another service to Múirne. This time, she had gotten her paw hurt; stuck in the crevasse of a crumbling brick wall; and, not only did he notice the small cat limping, but he took the time to coax her and tend to her, making sure the paw wasn't broken and that she would be ok. 

In time the bruised paw healed but the little white cat seemed to have taken a liking to this human. She began inviting herself into his home in that imperious way cats so often seem to have. If he wasn't home she might shift into a person shape to open a window and let herself in when she wanted to. It wasn't long before this kindly human had adopted his curious feline friend.

Some months later a shocking discovery was made: the little white cat was slightly more then met the eye. True, the writing had been on the wall, but it wasn't until Callum caught a slightly less than half-naked child raiding his cupboards at three in the morning that he really realized that his pet cat was a whole other kettle of fish.

Against her will, Múirne was enrolled in Aurora Academy after Callum brought her to the attention of the school. So she is enrolled, but getting her to stay human shaped and attend all her classes regularly is an entirely different problem for the poor man. All he can do is his best.

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