Oh yes, the wrench solves a great many problems. Best of all, it can make idiots stop asking me stupid questions while I'm trying to work... all it takes is a little percussive force applied to the right spot.

Linza, being diplomatic

Name: Linza
Species: Cheetah
Gender: Female
Faction: Crew of the Kestrel
Campaign Chapter Appearances: 1-3
Background: Part of Mr. Finch's crew of eclectic, reality-preserving individuals, Linza serves as the Kestrel's mechanic and artificer, charged with keeping the flying ship running, as well as activating, disarming, reverse engineering, or modifying ancient devices that the crew encounters during their many assignments. This lengthy experience has granted her an extensive knowledge of magics and mechanisms used by multiple civilizations, both current and former, as well as a knack for jury-rigging various magical devices out of scavenged parts and materials. While not a conventional magician herself, Linza does have a couple of innate supernatural talents, such as being able to ascertain the condition and function of devices via a sort of visual scrying, and even being able to manipulate simpler mechanical items by handling them, such as picking a lock with a touch. She also wields a long-handled wrench that is capable of reshaping itself into 'the right tool for the job', as well as serving as a capable melee weapon in a pinch.

While Linza is quite capable in her role, she's hardly what one would call a 'people person'. She tends to have little patience for fools or other 'useless people', particularly when they're in her way. She carries an almost perpetually sour disposition when around others, with most conversations being combinations of terse, irritated, and blunt, with a few snide remarks here and there. She spends most of her shipboard time in her workshop, just off the power room, considering it a private sanctum, not to be violated by anyone on pain of being punched really hard.

Linza's past is not something she talks about. The notion is that, at some point, she branched into some line of magical/mechanical inventing that would've eventually posed a risk to reality itself, something that caught the attention of Mr. Finch's superiors, and lead to her being taken into custody, with her work, whatever it was, being confiscated. There were apparently some backroom discussions about her fate, but it was eventually agreed that she might be allowed to return to her work if she proved herself responsible enough to handle it, and as such her time aboard the Kestrel is considered to be an extended vetting period (though she would probably sarcastically prefer the term 'penance' or 'punishment').

She was assigned to work with Finch, given his own lack of mechanical know-how and extensive field experience. Linza quickly took a dislike to the skunk, finding his dapper and charismatic demeanor excessively annoying. She did, begrudgingly, accept the fact that he was good at working with people and generally knew the score, but his personality would forever have her thinking about kicking him in the teeth. She found that she got along much better with the other two crew members, Mercer, the navigator, and Sulon, Finch's manservant, mainly because neither of them actually talked.

While the team was monitoring the situation in Govorya, rumors spread about the possibility of magical weapons being manufactured by the Kalsto gunsmithing company, and Linza was sent in the do some investigating. Unfortunately, the Kalsto group had tightened security, and she was detected before being able to learn much. She managed to escape, but in the process, was separated from her wrench, which was recovered by Kalsto craftsmen and put under study. While Linza avoided being caught by the Kalsto guards, she was picked up by the local constabulary and held under suspicion of being a Loyalist spy. While cooling her heels in lock-up, she was approached by a group who also wanted to infiltrate the Kalsto compound, and had heard that she might know a way in. They offered the break her out in exchange for information, but her counteroffer was to guide them in personally in exchange for helping her recover her wrench, which they agreed to.

While they were able to enter the compound quietly, once inside, things quickly went south, and the group ended up deciding to focus on their own assignment rather than helping Linza, at which point she angrily split off and managed to recover her wrench on her own, using the group's engagement with Kalsto security as a distraction, though there were a lot more close scrapes getting out than she would've liked.

This would, unfortunately, not be Linza's last encounter with these people, eventually identified as elements of Ironheart's Legion, a revolutionary group that Finch was acting as an erstwhile 'ally' of every now and then, more so when it became clear that their prime enemy, the Black Dragon, represented a significant threat to the world at large.

Linza would play a supporting role in a number of their subsequent actions, such as sabotaging an ancient Nejiri submersible warship to prevent it's capture, reactivating the defenses of a Nejiri fortress in the northern wastes to help destroy a massive corrupted water elemental, and eventually making landfall with the expedition to the flying island of Suraxis, though at this point it became clear that while the expedition wanted to secure the island, Finch intended to destroy it to prevent anyone to obtaining it's secrets. To do this, he quietly tasked Linza with finding a way to drop the island, which she duly did, finding out that the source of pure elemental water that served as the island's power source could be inverted with elemental crystals, which would burn the island from the inside out and cause it to drop like a stone. Tensions arose when the expedition became aware of Finch's plan, but ultimately, they agreed that this was probably for the best, provided that the island's few surviving inhabitants could be evacuated first. This plan would ultimately succeed, and as a bonus, took most of the Black Dragon down with it, when Linza's crystals activated and sent half-molten chunks of the island plummeting into the ancient lake below.
Fate: Linza returned to base with the rest of the Kestrel's crew once the operation was over, presumably continuing with their other various missions.
GM Thoughts and Comments: After the party essentially abandoned Linza in the middle of the Kalsto compound when things got a little too hot, they would cross paths again a few weeks later at a boathouse where the Kestrel was having some work done. Knocking on the door, Linza answered, immediately showing a facial expression of "Oh. It's YOU." The party lead attempted to rattle off some bullshit explanation about how things had all worked out in the end for everyone, blah blah blah, only to be cut off in the middle when Linza punched him solidly in the middle of the face and then slammed the door. One repeat knock was met with an immediate knee to the groin and another door slam, at which point the party decided to just wait for Finch to get back in hopes of a somewhat more civil conversation.

I really liked Linza, the no-nonsense, irritable magical mechanic might be a bit of a trope, but it worked with her.

Artwork by  ThePrettiestTip of Linza wondering why you're wasting her time.

Main index of campaign factions, plot, notes, etc can be found here.

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