Linda Schneider (Short-Stuff)

Name: Linda Schneider aka “Short-Stuff”

Age: 25

Sex: F

Basic physical appearance and attributes: An attractive, petite woman in excellent health. 5’2”, 120lbs. Brown eyes and long blonde hair that goes down to the middle of her back when she lets it down. Linda has a curvaceous figure, and a bosom just slightly larger than proportionate for a woman her size….both of which she uses to her advantage whenever possible. While in excellent physical shape, due to her size she is not very strong and could easily be overpowered in hand to hand by a average man.

Weapons and armor:

Pump action shotgun, 9mm Pistol, switchblade knife. Substitutes shotgun with a Infiltrator, 9mm with a silenced .22 pistol (with hollowpoints), and switchblade with a combat knife as appropriate.

During her time as a Paradise Falls slaver, she usually wore a Mercenary Charmer outfit…at the insistence of Jimmy, Al, and Petey. She will usually seen wearing either that or a variety of Pre-War women’s wear, all clean and perfectly tailored to fit. Wears headgear appropriate to her outfit, along with authority glasses. If hiding her allegiance is not a concern, she wears Raider Iconoclast Armor and a Supervisor’s helmet when expecting action or back at The Pitt.

Personality: Presents a warm and friendly demeanor, but behind that is a cool and calculating mind, as the years of being a conscript soldier, Pitt Raider, and exposure to Calypso’s influence have hardened her somewhat. While other Pitt Raiders find her genuinely approachable, she has a hard time resisting keeping people not aligned with Ashur at a distance as she doesn’t want to get hurt if she needs to sacrifice them to the Cause. While she will not kill on a whim like Calypso, she has started to show a taste for killing people who have aroused her personal hatred creatively.

Occupation: nominally a Pitt Raider, her main role is as a Spy. Linda is also a talented seamstress, and occasionally dabbles in prostitution.

Faction: Moriarty….for as long as it serves Ashur’s interest.

Backstory: Born in 2254 in Eerie (formerly Erie, Pennsylvania), what then was a prosperous settlement of around 300 people on the Trade Routes between The Pitt to the South, the settlements around Detroit to the West, and Buffalo and Ronto to the North East. Her parents were Tailors, and began training her to follow in their footsteps from a very young age. She had a happy childhood, and if not for events outside Eerie, would have eventually taken over her parent’s shop, married and had children. By 2265, Eerie began having increasing problems from raids by Raider gangs, driven away from The Pitt and it’s environs by Ashur’s increasing power, looking for a new place to settle and less dangerous people to prey on. Then in 2268, a bitter war broke out between Ronto and the self-styled “Empire of Buffalo” over trade routes. The fighting cut into the income Eerie got from traders, and to make it worse as Buffalo began to lose the War to the better armed and organized Canadians, they sent raiding parties to settlements around them to “requisition” crops and “recruit”.

Press-ganged into Buffalo’s self-styled Imperial Army…little more than a rabble of Raiders Ashur didn’t consider worth recruiting, press-ganged Wastelanders, and poor quality mercenaries…at 15, after minimal military training, she found herself on the losing side of a war that was no concern of hers. Being small and pretty in this situation became a curse, and she was forced by necessity to learn to manipulate people to protect her from her fellow “soldiers”….and fight with knives. The first man she killed wasn’t a Canadian….it was a fellow recruit who attempted to force himself on her.

In 2272, Buffalo launched a ill-fated major offensive intended to end the War. End the War it did, though not in the way Buffalo’s Emperor intended. Advancing up the Old Queen Elizabeth Way, the Buffalo troops fell into a carefully prepared trap outside of Grimsby, a mere 35 miles from Ronto. Buffalo lost one third of it’s Invasion force… including the Emperor and his Headquarters…in a afternoon, and by evening was in full retreat towards the old US-Canadian border, hotly pursued by Ronto’s Army. Separated from her unit, Linda found a lonely scavenger she could charm into hiding her from vengeful Ronto forces in exchange for her affection. She stayed with him for a month, until word reached her that after a two-week siege Ronto’s Army had taken Buffalo by storm and the war was over.

Making her way back across the border, she returned home only to find Eerie had long since been destroyed. The once prosperous settlement was now a ruin where a succession of Raider gangs squatted until they incurred the wrath of either Ashur or Ronto…or both…and forces were dispatched to evict them. In the derelict settlement, she found a force from the Pitt that had just wiped out the latest group of squatters. Now alone in the world and with nowhere to go, she didn’t resist when they ‘offered’ to take her back to the Pitt with them.

Too small and weak to work in the Mill, or work on the recycling details, her Overseers searched for a use for her. Discovering her skill as a seamstress, she was assigned to the factory that turned out armor for the Pitt Raiders. While a plum assignment, she quickly became bored spending 10-12 hour days altering old Radiation suits into Iconoclast armor, and chafed at the indignity of being a slave. When one day Ashur announced the Arena was being opened to those willing to fight to regain their freedom, she applied. Much to the surprise of everyone, she won. Standing in the Arena over the corpse of her final opponent, taking in the roar of the crowd as the announcer proclaimed her a free woman and Citizen of the Pitt, she had never felt so alive.

And then she went to Haven to meet Ashur, as all who survived the Arena did. Never before had she met a man like him. The man simply radiated power and charisma. He explained to her the meaning of the Arena, a Rite of passage based on his own struggle to survive after being abandoned after the Scourge. He took her out on the balcony and showed her the Mills and factories, restored to production after so many years, producing new things and building a future… the future she had just won the right to become a part of. He explained what he meant to do, to use the remnants of the Old World to forge the tools to build a New World, and put an end to the chaos so future generations could live without fear. She was completely won over. After years of being forced to fight for incompetents and thugs, she had finally found someone worthy of following.

Now a Pitt Raider, she proved a doggedly loyal, reliable and resourceful soldier. While popular with her fellow Pitt Raiders, they tease her about her size, bestowing on her the nick-name “Short Stuff”. While her size placed her at a disadvantage in unarmed combat, her skill with guns and melee weapons such as swords and knives are worthy of respect. Her skill at manipulating people was noted by her superiors, and eventually came to the attention of Ashur’s Lieutenants, and caused her to be selected for a special mission.

Summoned to Haven, she was granted an audience with Ashur, who offered her the most important mission she had ever been given. If she accepted, she would proceed to the Capital Wasteland and serve, along with others, as his eyes and ears there. She would also assist an ally of the Pitt in her plan to usurp control of the slaving industry there from Eulogy Jones…who Ashur considered unreliable and incompetent…and establish a steady supply of new workers to The Pitt. He also explained the...quirks…of this ally, and what she would expect of her if she accepted the assignment. She was also told it may be years before her mission was accomplished and she could return. She agreed.

Ashur then brought her in and introduced Linda to a woman only a few years older than herself, with black corn-rowed hair and eyes of different colors. She said her name was Calypso.

Travelling to the Capital Wasteland with Calypso and Shelby, Calypso helped Linda get established and make the right connections to be able to perform her mission, something that would have been far harder, if not impossible without Calypso to vouch for her. Calypso also taught her things, from how to better use melee weapons to how she could use prostitution to accomplish her goals. A successful mercenary contract here, a stint in a brothel or as a independent prostitute there, and slowly Linda built a reputation and made the acquaintances that gained her acceptance into the Capital Wasteland’s underworld.

Before the plan was started in earnest, Jimmy Leggio assassinated Eulogy and took over Paradise Falls. The change made no difference to Calypso, and little difference to Ashur. Leggio was an improvement, but too little, too late. But it opened a door for Linda. Leggio, keen to replace the work-force he inherited from Eulogy with a better class of slaver, began hiring people that Eulogy would never given the time of day to. Linda took a chance and went to the Falls and applied. As chance would have it, one of Leggio’s junior Lieutenants, Petey, had been a client of hers when she worked at a brothel outside of the Baltimore Barrens for a few months and he got her hired.

Through a combination of hard work, skill, charm, and the occasional sexual favor, Linda wormed her way into a position as a trusted slaver in Paradise Falls….all the while keeping her eyes and ears open and reporting to her real superiors. She impressed Jimmy enough that when he embarked on his shared venture with Moriarty, Jimmy picked her for the crew that would accompany him to Grayditch. Though having to be Petey’s bed-partner didn’t please her… accommodating his disappointing performance in bed was easier when she was being paid to sleep with him…the opportunity to ingratiate herself with Jimmy made it worthwhile. She thought things were going quite well, which is why being surprised by Calypso while washing up after another frustrating experience with Petey and given new orders was that much more shocking.