Ghost

Elena 'Ghost' Parsons is a woman with a blank history.

Searches on her turn up almost nothing. What little there is paints a picture of a completely law-abiding young woman. She graduated from a rural high school, and drops off the radar from there. She has no criminal record, no prints or DNA in the database, no employment postings, no Facebook, nothing.

She is, for all intents and purposes, a ghost. Elena Parsons exists somewhere in the United States of America, but there are plenty of Elena Parsonses in the country. One in particular went to Berkley for a Bachelors and Masters in computer science, with a specialty in electronic information management (aka: protecting computers from hackers).

What Elena Parsons actually is is a criminal. One who makes a lucrative income from her work. She does not often leave her computer. Socializing with Ghost is done via computer, via phone, and she is always ready to stop a tracer. Her signals are bounced all around the world, her voice is modulated, and her motives are unclear. She is a skilled and persuasive liar, a decent enough procurer of goods, a creative craftsman and investigator, and a master hacker. All of these skills are backed up with her smarts and sharp wits. No wonder she's avoided the radar for so long. She makes her money by hacking, making false identities, and covering up tracks. She works only with selective clients and runs her investigations to ensure that she's not dealing with an undercover cop. Because she doesn't do business with or against legitimate customers, she tends to stay under the radar. It's a pretty damn good system.

Except, before all of the anonymity, before all of the skills, there was one thing that did find her. It was a hacker who happened to be a vampire. A vampire who could trace networks and who had been doing it for a hell of a lot longer than her. No doubt the vampire thought it was fun. It tracked Elena to her apartment. This was before she got smart and spent her time and money protecting herself. This was when she was young. When she didn't know what was truly out there.

It arrived at her place, which was its first mistake. A trap went off the second it opened the door, designed by a skilled craftsman, and a silenced submachine gun emptied its clip into the wall. There was no operator, and the vampire dove out of the way of most of the worst of it, unconcerned with her traps. The second trap as it came through her kitchen toward the bedroom went off a moment later, and her alarm system triggered.... sending her out the window, rifle in hand as she ran up the fire escape.

Desperate for air due to her poor physical conditioning, the Ghost nearly met her maker that day. The Kindred, healing its wounds as it came, strolled toward her slowly, purposefully. She fired a heavy rifle shot into it. It kept coming. Another shot into its head. It looked hurt, but kept coming. It drew a blade and cut her rifle in half...

And just in time, the hunters of Network Zero came to her rescue. Three men charged up behind the Kindred, hauled it to the ground, and staked it before cutting off its head and causing it to crumble to ashes. They had tracked it as it had tracked her, and destroyed it. The Candle was lit.

Since then, the whereabouts of the Ghost have been entirely unknown. It is presumed that she is in Atlanta, but the anonymity of her existence combined with the capability of her deceptions have helped her to become one of the premiere Hunter hackers in the country. Yet she does not swear her allegiance to the Network that saved her. She learns on her own, researching and becoming quite the resource for those who wish to know of the occult. But she has her prices...

Those who wish to make a deal with the Ghost can leave messages on the Network and other places. But for those Hunters who truly need the Ghost, they can rest assured she will find them, even if they cannot find her.

After all, the Candles must remain lit, or else even a ghost can become lost in the darkness.