Addendum to the earlier background file
(Riffing from Malich's layout)
Name:Jocasta "Cass" Colburn
Call Sign: Joker
Rank:
Unit Assignment:
Vehicle/Mech: PXH-1K Phoenix Hawk
DOB: 03-31-2987
Age: 45 (as of 1-1-3033)
Nationality: Federated Suns
Home Planet: Benet III
Ethnic Background: Caucasian of Greek and Scandinavian roots
Height: 6’ 0”, 183cm
Weight: 145 lbs (66kg, 10 stone and 5)
Hair: Black
Eyes: Light Green
Major Identifying Marks: Small burn scars on her right leg
Player: Stormcrow
Background:
Born on New Ivaarsen, Cass knew the hardships of growing up on the border of the Draconis Combine. For scores and scores of years, members of her family have given blood and lives for the Federated Suns. It was a difficult legacy to live up to and she was not always up to the task.
Given her family’s history, it was not difficult for her to gain admittance into the Robinson Battle Academy (RBA). Graduating in 3009, she was in the top 3% academically, excelling in languages (Japanese and Spanish) and information analysis. However, she was in the bottom 15% in her Mechwarrior training courses and was forced to spend two years in additional training with the RBA Training Battalion finally making it into the top 25%. Despite her academics, she missed out on an assignment in of the front-line and was sent to backwater March Militia on Bryceland.
Her career was neither failure nor success. She served as a lance and company command in the Third Battalion of the Bryceland DMM (BMM) before moving to Planetary Militia Liaison Officer on Pascagoula and Fallon II. After five years as a Liaison Officer she returned to the BMM with Major’s pips on her colr and was assigned to the BMM’s General Staff as Assistant to the Staff Intelligence officer. Six years later, with the Fourth Succession War drawing she put in her retirement papers after twenty-one years of loyal, yet relatively uneventful service. Her combat record would show that she had seven ‘Mech kills and more than twice that many assist spread out over a dozen separate small actions, but she had seen no action in the last eight years of her career.
Retiring, with her husband of fifteen year, Ruben Vaccaro, to the planet of Fallon II that she had come to like as it so unlike her homeworld of Benet III. Prior to her divorce, she and her husband spent much of their time in their seaside cottage. However, mere months after arriving on Fallon II, her husband closed out their joint accounts and attempted to flee the planet with his new young lover, a barista at a local coffee shop, and nearly 300,000 C-bills of her money. Local authorities were unable to recover the bulk of her stolen fortune as he had already moved it off-planet and out of the Federated Suns. While she had over 100,000 C-Bills in her private accounts, she was forced to sell her retirement home at a loss or risk foreclosure.
With her Phoenix Hawk stored at the main militia base, she decided to offer her services as an analyst to both the planetary militia and the Forty-Second Avalon Hussars. She also joined the Ready Reserve of the militia so that she could get access to her ‘Mech and keep her skills sharp should the Dracs ever decided to return. She’s been living off her nest egg which was even further diminished by legal fees as a result of her divorce and trying to regain her stolen monies, of which less than 20,000 C-Bills was recovered.
When she is able she gets as much simulator time as she can get through her connections with the 42nd. Otherwise, she has been getting four hours of real seat time a month with the militia.
Cass is fluent in both Japanese and Spanish, having spent most of her life speaking the former. She is a better than average shot with a pistol and can hit the broadside of a barn with a rifle.