Name: Blaze

Gender: Male, straightish

Age/DOB: 23, unknown dob

Origin: Aperturth, St. Louis

Family: Unknown parents or siblings, but has one child among the Hippies (Jitter with Haley) and when he meeds up with the ELL Jenell, they hit it off unsurprisingly well; their twin children are Aeolis and Aella in early RY9

Other: Is a tweaker through and through, so if he ever slows down he might be dead

Height: 5'4"

Weight: around 100ish, muscular but quite compact and hardly imposing until you get him out of the loose baggy outfits

Hair: Very black, silky, heavy and long, though he does put it into a pretty nice pony tail, the girls would love to play with his styles more than he allows; has a nice trimmed goatee

Eyes: medium-dark brown, heavily Asian looking, under big brows, usually red and bloodshot

Appearance: Yellowish tan skin; only because he's kind of forced to eat, isn't as full on emaciated as he used to be, which is a bit of a flip from the many refugees who started out healthy and wound up as skinny as he already is; prefers those loose outfits, but he is admirably ripped; he may hide under them because he does have gang tattoos, but since those gangs are not only long dead, but on another dimension, he really doesn't need to any more

Genetic Abilities: none overtly, but he does have a remarkable tolerance for stimulants both artificial and natural.

Icarus Processing: none, unlikely to benefit, but it wouldn't harm him either; his kids may wind up being speedsters in the Vortal sense, though.

Image Credits: Doll Divine Prince/Hipster

Skills or Profession: Does 'finding the best meth' count? No? Making it? Sure! Let's call him a 'chemist'. He can recognize scientific gear by name, and has used most of the equipment available to make stills, bongs, or meth labs. He could stand a little more formal education, but even though he's clearly 'on something', the scientists at the Rookery think he's got potential. He does help produce any new strains of 'medicine', but also to reproduce and enhance lab-grown innoculations and the like to be used among the refugees. See, drugs can be beneficial!

Events or History: Yes, his family was in a gang, he was tatted up when he was only 13. He was also doing the drugs right along side them, but prefered to be in the lab with his uncle, rather than dealing with his mom.

As the Rookery and the Grounds become more solid and useful, he and Racer tend to start at Dragon Tower 1, but flit around the place like, well, like tweakers... And the reason they're up near the rice paddies is because no one wants to deal with an exploding meth lab near other crops...

Dragon

Name: Racer
Gender: Male
Size/Shoulder/Length: Medium 11'2" s / 60' l / 52' ws very wide scoop wings
Colors: eyeshadow, chin and muzzle, neck, belly, under tail, tail tip, paws, under wingsails rusty orange; back from head to tail, limbs, body, backs of wingsails darker red-crimson; bright orange-yellow narrow stripes on chin, neck, limbs, tail, and backs of wings; claws, horns ivory grey; eyes brilliant yellow
Features: Standard dragon, four legs with paws having 4 and 3 claws, forelimbs are shorter and have thumbs, he's somewhat bipedal and hind-heavy; two leathery wings with three visible fingers under only, wrist thumb, all with long sharp claws, wings are scoop shaped and get a lot of lift; body is hide, not scales; head is boxy with muzzle, two conical back facing horns, large eyes; body is chonky but not flabby, tail is long and slender, no other adornments
Powers: Winged Flight, Racer is quite fast, among the fastest at least here in the Mansion area, but also in the top ten for his size in the Rookery at large. He's designed for short, hard flapping to gain speed, and can stop as quickly as he starts. His wings are durable, but he honestly prefers to race around smacking things out of the air, to lifting or dragging big old heavy shit. He's quite capable of doing so, can lift a medium sized pickup truck worth of weight. Complains the whole time. Also he can run like nobody's business, as a biped he can keep up with those weird wingless dudes Quincy likes to hang with.
Communication, Racer is chatty, but not loud, and can understand more than he lets on. Though not particularly tech minded, he can keep up with Blaze when he's talking to those eggheads at the Rookery. His voice is gravely and gritty but that seems more because he's affecting the 'stoner voice' than anything else, as his bellows for long distance communication are very smooth and deep. Though he does have a moderate Vortal connection with his human friend, he cannot communicate to anyone else mentally.
Metabolism, Racer is fast at everything, including digestion and health. Even if he's injured seriously, he'll recover in a very short time, though breaks or gut wounds take longer. He can eat nearly anything and get some form of nutrition out of it, even if it's metal and plastic. So he's known to chew through the rubble and trash that is left over when they're exploring, though he does truly enjoy a nice fresh cow. He's basically a goat in dragon form, in that regard.
Speed Tricks, though unable to teleport, it almost seems like he's using a speed cheat in the air, when he hunts down those Combine. He'd be really super good at dragon-sized dance dance revolution.
Parentage: Unknown, unrelated to anyone in the Rookery, but he's likely to start flirting, there are some fancy dancy lady dragons here!
Origin: Adopted from JackalynTerrium, base by snow-n-scales, Deviantart
Other Info: If ever there was a dragon that could keep up with a guy that literally jitters when he's asleep, it's Racer. Not only is the dragon fast in the air, but he's got a really quick eye for detail, and can smack individual Scanners or Hoppers out of the air before they even realize he's watching them.

***

"We think there's a good place to," Keenan ducked a wing and then a tail, "to get your --" he had to teleport to avoid the brown and orange dragon that time, "to get..."

Keenan stood there squinting, what was the dragon even doing? There was no doubt that he was agile, fast, confident. But this seemed rather odd even for a speed addict's dragon. Finally he had enough of this, and waved two stiff fingers at the dragon and his rider. Time appeared to slow and then stop around the rider and mount, though Keenan did notice that the dragon moved significantly farther in that short 2 second interval, than he'd expected. He had been crouched a little and about to spring, and by the time he was frozen in place Racer was at the top of his arc, head down and twisted halfway back to his shoulder.

Ah - that was it. The dragon was chasing a wasp? A single wasp? Held in that moment of time, hovering improbably in the air, there was indeed a single bright striped wasp that was angrily aiming its stinger at the dragon's nose, and that dragon's nose was somehow keeping it at bay. Carefully, Keenan looked at the trail only he could detect - the dragon's movements were truly impressive, particularly in such a small space. That space was under a crafted canopy of trees in front of what must have been the most dangerous building in the Grounds - a methamphetamine lab that Blaze used to craft ... well, whatever it was he was working on. Truly it wasn't actually speed or other drugs right now, it was more helpful pesticides based on the coffee plants they'd imported to the place.

But what this dragon was doing assured Keenan that he'd made the right choice. At last he pushed his mind into both dragon and rider's, speaking clearly of what he wanted to convey, rather than waiting for them to stop playing with the wildlife.

"There is a female dragon at a place called Lantessama," he said, and could detect the 'perking up' of both of them, "she - and her rider - would like dancers. Now, you were definitely around the Carnival long enough to pick something up, I imagine?" He looked at Blaze, who managed the start of a smile. Keenan relaxed the time-freezing hold on the pair - leaving the wasp frozen - and they both visible settled to the ground (... Blaze was in mid-air? what was he even doing? vibrating himself off the ground?) and paid attention. "I know you can move smoothly and quickly," he addressed Racer, "but do you know how to dance?"

"Pfff do you?" Blaze muttered, sure that the suit-and-tie wearing man would get grumpy.

"You would be quite surprised to know that I learned the old fashioned way," Keenan smirked, "and if you need lessons, I might even be convinced to teach you some of it."

**

They spent several days at one of the warehouses in town, Keenan didn't feel like moving it into the Grounds just yet, but it certainly worked well for a mid-sized dragon and nervous rider to learn some moves.

That ballroom dancing was pretty intense, Blaze realized. He had known some hip-hop moves, a bit of break dancing, what was common back home. When he was sure that he'd learned the last bits of that Spanish Bolero (he still had a little trouble with that arm-in-the-back, if he had a partner that knew the dance she'd help with any position problems, right?) Blaze watched his dragon, who was... also practicing that same dance. Racer had more limbs to deal with, but he used them really well! He curled his tail like a dancer's coat, used his wing to 'hold' his partner's back.

And those things were nice, for slower dancing as well as for a sped up version. They couldn't help but do sped up versions.

"That's all very fine and good," a woman said, "but... the rising dragoness will be leading the flight." It was Marissa, visiting the Grounds to check out their family homes - perhaps interested in settling down but more likely learning what things would be necessary to stock the Ranch with as more families came there. "You'll want to learn how to follow, rather than lead, in some of those dances," she addressed Racer specifically.

"I don't think that will be much of a problem," Keenan assured her, "If he keeps his wits about him."

Blaze proudly nodded, and gave a flourishing bow to Marissa and Keenan, then to his dance partner Melissa. The music picked up again on a loop, and Mel got a grin, raised her eyebrow.

Keenan carefully walked closer, and they showed the kids how it was done, Blaze wondered first off whether he looked even half that cool and collected, but second if his partner would know these moves? Or if they would be dancing some foreign thing? Marissa's small and dramatically marked cream dragoness put a little effort in to emulating the dancing too, by the end of the afternoon two dragons and four humans were fairly exhausted doing two-steps, boleros, and tangos!

Keenan would take the pair to Lantessama and back, and reminded Blaze that perhaps... he ought to remember not to be quite so obvious in his use of substances. (Not to... not use them? But to be on the down-low about it.)

When they got there, Racer was absolutely positive he knew which dragon it was that he would be dancing with - "that one there, look at her, look at her!" A burnt-orange color with lighter wings, which almost matched Racer's underneath! "I will do my best, I'll show her, you just watch!"