Codename: Sheol

Real Name: Esther Jean Balthazar

Affiliation:Hero

Origin:
Esther is the daughter of a time-traveler from the 1800s, Ernest Balthazar. On one of his many trips, he stopped in the 70s, and stuck around long enough to get her mother (a Woodstock-certified hippie) pregnant. Ernest had actually gotten her mother pregnant not because he wanted to start a family, or because the condom broke. He knocked her up purposefully as he already had a son from a previous time-traveling mishap and needed someone to care for the boy.
Her life was normal (well, sort of) until her time-traveling father returned and instructed her to become caretaker of Leonardo. Not long after she agreed to raise her younger older half-brother, Esther’s powers began to develop. Finding her powers to be useful and way better than becoming an art teacher like her mother, she originally planned to be some sort of police detective. Unfortunately, she found out that no one would believe her that her powers did indeed exist unless she registered for CAPE. Once registered, she didn’t see any point in working for law enforcement when she could work with other PEs.
Most of her "super" work involves solving crime, not fighting it.

Esther is a curator at the Metro City Museum of Arts & Industry. She does her own artwork in her free time.

Powers/Abilities/Skills: Ability to “collect” (read) memories from the formerly living, provided she can touch the body/bones/what have you.
She also has a greatly reduced capacity to feel pain.

o Level 1 She can read the memories of anything that has died in the last 48 hours but doesn’t have any choice as to what memories are read. Any pain that would be considered a “three” or below goes unnoticed. Major injuries are more annoying than painful.
o Level 2: Memories of anything that has died in the last 2 months can be read. She has increased ability to pull a specific memory, though this means that she can select it from a large time frame (chunks of approx. 6 months). Any pain considered to be a 4-7 goes unnoticed. More serious injuries are comparatively less painful.
o Level 3: Memories of those than have died in the last three years can be read, and the memory accuracy time frame is reduced to 72 hours. Doesn’t feel any pain short of a 10 on the pain scale, and even that doesn’t hurt too bad.
o Level 4: Memories can be pulled from anyone or thing that is considered deceased - it’s just as easy to read the memories of a mummified pharaoh as it is someone that has been shot and killed in front of her. She can pull the memory she is looking for. She feels no pain whatsoever, even if she is shot/stabbed/limbs are detached.

Weaknesses: The inability to feel pain often means she is injured and does not know it, and has no understanding of how badly she is injured. Esther would probably never go to the hospital unless someone else made her do so.

Equipment: Hand-sanitizer (eeeww, dead things!), a book of blessings for the dead

Appearance:
o Civilian: see avatar [Marion Cotillard]
o Costumed: Long robes and a headdress. Looks like some sort of old-school priestess. Her costume is rarely used, but Esther keeps one around "just in case"

Team (if applicable): none

Miscellaneous: She is Leonardo’s older younger half-sister (yes, you read that correctly). They have a fairly horrible co-dependent relationship and are more or less constantly in the middle of a power struggle. Esther focuses excessive amounts of her energy on being concerned about Leo and most of his daily life choices.

Previous Metro City Experience: It’s ladies night!

Thread Tracker

APRIL

What Do We Say to The God of Death? You might be wondering if Esther or Leo is the worse human being. You will probably be surprised at the answer. Also they sort of half-ass solve a murder.

Are You The Gatekeeper? Esther and Leo attempt to solve a haunting at O'Houlihan's. Actually, Esther tries to solve and and Leo tries to undermine her the whole way.


MAY

Leave The Light On Esther apologizes and the Balthazar siblings proceed to do nothing for like, 17 pages. In the process someone gets beat up and they totally get banned from a restaurant.

Something, Somewhere, Sometime Esther goes to CAPE to do some paperwork and makes a new friend.

Too Bad, It Builds Character Esther cons Leo into having some fun family time. Leo cons Esther into semi-public humiliation.

Flowers On The Wall In a strange and totally uncharacteristic move, Esther harasses Leo about his poor life choices.

Deals to Die For Leo asks Esther for a favor and she uses this as a chance to pry into his personal life. Shocking.

Hilduara's Indefinite Academics Esther drops fatty cash on a lot of weird stuff, including the filing demon's blood. It's as uncomfortable as it sounds.

Familiar Faces More proof in the mounting case against Esther's ability to be a normal sensible person. Leo may or may not have painted naked portraits of her. She's impressed.

JUNE

House or Home The Balthazars go into real estate.

If I Told You More bad choices. For a change of pace, Esther makes them at work instead of home.

The Magic Word It has six letters - go ahead, guess!

Hey, Soul Sister Can things get even more uncomfortable? Yes they can. Awkward, party of two.

Press 3 for Therapy A delirious Esther decides that the best person to call for advice at 4am is her pal Kristján. Kristján is about as pleased as you would imagine him to be.

Stand By Me Esther and Leo have a normal, loving conversation via text.

Cheers! Puzzled by what to do when someone is nice to her, Esther is total fucking asshole.

Goodbye Another stepping stone on Esther's path to rock bottom.