Chakat Swiftwind

Swiftwind has a love for two things: speed and showing off. That was what led her to leave behind hir engineering expertise to find a home behind the consoles of experimental starships, where she can push the envelope of what hir piloting can do, while utilizing hir engineering skills to identify flaws and suggest fixes to the development teams shi works with.

Even on the ground shi has a tendency to show off, between hir tight-fitting outfits, and the fast bikes that shi tinkers with on hir downtime. Despite no longer being in Starfleet, shi still keeps up hir exercise regimen as well. Though shi finds it a bore, shi considers the end results worth it.

As a fully-functional hermaphrodite, like all hir race, shi exhibits the anatomy of both males and females. However, hir personality mostly leans towards hir male side, apart from a preference for corsets and other outfits that draw attention to hir generous bustline.

Lastly, while shi has had several Companions over the years, shi has yet to settle down with a denmate or lifemate, which some find unusual for a chakat. Some speculate shi may be afraid to commit to such, but when asked, Swiftwind simply gives a sly smile, and a comment about not being ready to slow down just yet, usually followed by an invitation to hir bed for a quick romp if shi finds the asker attractive.

Chakat Swiftwind is the daughter of Fireflash and Tailchaser, and was originally named for hir tendancy to run everywhere as a cub. But while hir parents were content with a groundbound life on Chakona, from a young age shi felt drawn to flying among the stars. As soon as shi came of age, shi followed hir sister, Cliffjumper, into Star Fleet. Hir entrance exams placed hir into the Engineering track. Despite exemplary service, shi found hirself unsatisfied with hir role, and put in a request to transfer to Operations as a pilot, as fixing and maintaining equipment was not what had drawn hir out there, even if the view was worth it.

There weren't any immediate openings, but shi was able to trial as a shuttle pilot, where shi quickly proved hir mettle behind the helm. Shortly after, shi was reassigned to take a tour of duty as the helmsman of a larger ship, where shi again showed hir worth, though not without a couple incidents of recklessness that thankfully did not result in any damage or injuries. While hir skills were undeniable, hir captain found hir discipline a bit lacking, and sent hir back to Earth for reassignment. While waiting for a new berth, shi managed to hit it off with a stellar foxtaur engineer named Nexus, who eventually became the closest thing to a denmate shi's ever had.

After a whirlwind fling on Earth, both were assigned to the F.S.S. Excalibur, where they quickly became valuable members of the crew. After the Excalibur returned from its 5-year mission on the Stellar Federation frontier however, shi chose to leave Star Fleet to pursue life as an independent starship pilot, working for various private ship development firms such as Anaheim Electronics and Shinsei Industries. Nexus however did not wish to leave Star Fleet, and the two parted on amicable terms, choosing to remain Companions rather than risk what they had by forcing one or the other to give up their dream.

Swiftwind was created in 2005-2006, back in Second Life. I'd recently learned of chakats after playing around with a foxtaur avatar, and considered what I'd want to be or look like as a chakat, which led to hir design. Shortly after, working out who shi would be in the chakatverse led to the engineer to hotshot pilot pipeline, with hir piloting becoming central to hir concept. In 2006 when I woke to my inner dragon however, I moved hir from fursona to a separate character. I ended up not doing much with hir for a while after that, until around 2015, when improved avatar tech in Second Life inspired me to rebuild hir, and re-awakened my interest in hir and chakats. I started to get a few pieces of art, then wrote a story about the chakatverse version of my Star Trek Online Caitian captain, M'Rel, and brought Swift in as the helmsman, giving hir a concrete placement in that universe. While I have yet to continue that storyline, I did get some other art of hir that I enjoyed, and found a new destiny for hir - that of test pilot. This was about the time I picked up on hir being a fan of motorcycles out of a need for speed.

Shi eventually gained a AU doppleganger named Mistral as well, thanks to a Traveller campaign that include homebrewed chakats as a potential race, so I filed off the serial numbers and brought hir in as pilot/engineer for a small five-man crew, under the name of Mistral. (I've actually waffled back and forth on making that hir actual name as well, but there is already a Chakat Mistral, and Swiftwind is already established as such.) That story has reached its conclusion as well, leaving hir future an open book.

Mistral - Chakats were a rarity in the Third Imperium, but not totally unknown, the remnants of genetic engineering trying to create Earth's own Uplifts. Mistral landed a berth in the Imperium navy as a engineer, but then did too good a job despite wanting to become a pilot, but eventually managed to transfer into being a shuttle pilot and astrogator. After an unfortunate crash though during a assault, shi left the service to go see the universe on hir own four feet. Shi was called to a noble's house for a job, but kidnapped, drugged, and shipped off to a world under development in the Tobia sector, in the Trojan Reaches.Teaming up with others who had suffered the same fate, they managed to make their way back to civilization, eliminate the group that had kidnapped them, and take their ship as "salvage." From there they ran cargos, deposed the king of New Moscow, dealt with him after he chased us across several systems, dealt with some psychic black ops lab and experiments, encountered some Droyne ancients, uncovered ancient Sindallian records, claimed an Aslan colony for the Imperium(personally ruled by one of the other crewmembers), got knighted, traded our ship for a much larger ship designed by Swiftwind hirself, and proceeded to get hirself and hir crew in and out of quite a few more scrapes. In the end, shi retired again to become a starship designer and test pilot, while hir genes were used to clone and genetically modify a new colony world of chakats by a seemingly mad scientist trying to repopulate a supposedly dead world.