Changeling Arete [READY]

[Dio]

Arete

Information is my business. And business is good.

RP Type: Canterlot Chronicles

Name: Arete

Sex: Female

Age: Unknown

Species: Changeling

Eyes: Green

Body: Dark grey, slightly lighter than normal changeling bodies. Minimal decay holes.

Mane/Tail: Morpho blue.

Physique: Slender and alien, yet effeminate.

Residence: The true whereabouts of her home hive are unknown. She takes up residence where it is convenient for fact finding or negotiating the next exchange.

Occupation: Proxy for a mysterious master. Spymaster and information broker.

Unique Traits

Arete is an infiltration specialist with a knack for administration and management. Like other changelings, she can use her glamours to assume the form of any similarly sized and shaped creature. Unlike most other changelings, however, Arete has been given substantial autonomy by her employer. She acts as an information broker, negotiating the sale and trade of secrets and on occasion delivering the intelligence herself. Her keen understanding of species-specific psychology and physiology allows her to gain the information she requires while keeping any unintended information leaks to a minimum. She also possesses an eidetic memory and an uncanny ear for determining whether or not someone is lying.

She also has at her disposal a vast network of contacts spread throughout Equestria and Aquellia. The Web, as it is known, feeds her information from all over the continent and is growing all the time. This information is in turn relayed back to her mysterious master. Each member of the Web is highly trained in infiltration and espionage and able to operate independently or in small squads without support for months or years at a time. Like Arete herself, each agent has multiple identities that they can assume at will. Each identity is carefully crafted by the changeling agent as an individual to prevent recognition by national governments. Very rarely do Arete or her teams assume the identities of known individuals.

Finally, being a proxy has its perks, as Arete is never at want for housing, food, funding, and creature comforts.

Character History

Arete spent her youth in the “home” hive, learning the ways of infiltrators. As she matured, she turned out to be an exceptional one, in addition to being able to evaluate and review other infiltrators. Her talents quickly moved her up the chain until she became a mid-level administrator. She even participated during the attack on Canterlot, though she quickly learned to regret that decision.

Arete was ejected from Canterlot in the aftermath of the attack, landing somewhere north of Hoofington, alone. Thinking quickly, she assumed one of her default identities, making her way into town and taking her place as a lowly bureaucrat in the local mayor’s office. There, working a quiet paper pusher’s job until she could regain her strength, she had a lot of time to think about her life choices.

The hive was scattered and her queen possibly dead. She had found a way to survive out of her own foresight and fortune itself, but it was unlikely that she would ever be reunited with the hive. But the more she thought about it, the more she realized that she didn’t need the hive, nor did she want anything to do with Chrysalis. The queen was a fool, assaulting Canterlot directly, confronting the princess, and allowing her hubris to get the better of her when dealing with the newly-wed captain and princess. Arete could do better-- and she would.

This epiphany also revealed another thing to her. Information, not force of arms, was power. Using the mayor’s office as a hub, Arete assembled personnel records and requisitioned Royal Guard files on potential contacts and ponies she could tap for information at a moment’s notice. This in turn she would sell to others desiring that particular information, but only if they provided the right price. She could make a comfortable living out of doing this, the thing that she did best.

Of course, her sleuthing did not go unnoticed. A mysterious stranger contacted her during her research, masking his or her own identity with proxies and strange ciphers. Arete dug through her files and called in her favors in a mad scramble to find this stranger, the only one who had managed to discover who she truly was. But lead after lead dried up and trails ran cold. Finally, Arete was issued an ultimatum. She was to meet her rival at the appointed location or have her cover blown.

With little choice left in the matter, Arete arrived at the meeting place at the appointed time, alone, and more than a little bit nervous. Never before in her life had she been outplayed before; she was the best at what she did. Was there one better still?

When the stranger arrived, Arete was expecting extortion or perhaps being “disappeared” for moving in on someone else’s operation. But instead, she got what she least expected: a job offer. Her mysterious rival, a sleuth herself, had been so impressed with Arete's work that she insisted on poaching Arete for her own purposes. With the offer of lavish living, near bottomless resources, and nearly free reign over her own operations, it was an offer that Arete could not refuse.

She continues to work for this mysterious boss to this day, though Arete consistently keeps the identity of her master shrouded in mystery.

Character Summary

Highly intelligent and darkly beautiful, Arete is an enigmatic mare who makes her living in the buying and selling of secrets. Despite her fey origins, her personality is far less fickle and volatile than the typical changeling. She is instead a mare who enjoys reading, scholarship, intellectual curiosities, and fine wine. She finds politics as vapid as gossip and often just as entertaining, but plays no part in shaping them herself. Those decisions are instead left to her master.

Arete herself is a versatile individual. She is taciturn while observing, but while grifting she can force herself to act up and take on more extroverted tasks. After her job is complete, though, she prefers to retreat into her hollow or wherever she decides to take up residence for her current job. Disturbing her during her downtime is ill-advised, as she tends to be cranky, irritable, and petulant when not engaging on her own terms or at the very least being given time to prepare.

While Arete is technically on a leash, it is a very long leash with ample leeway and even more stretch. Arete is essentially free to make her own decisions and run the operations as she sees fit. However, she will occasionally receive directives from her master, which she carries out with utmost precision and alacrity.

Because of her autonomy, Arete has little use for the reverence that other changelings may place upon Queen Chrysalis. Instead, she insists on being treated as an equal regardless of ostensible rank. To Arete, the only one above her is her own master. Though the master’s intentions are often inscrutable, they are never malicious and do not smack of sadism and destruction like Chrysalis’ historical plots.

Arete plays by only one rule and that is to sell her acquired secrets to the highest bidder. Many come to her from all sides of the intelligence game, but none have any real advantage since all secrets are readily available on the market. It is this uncertainty that keeps Arete in business.

[Armony]

How's this one going?

[Dio]

Still working.

[Dio]

Okay ready.

[Armony]