@mndies

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mindy's general fashion sense is a sign of the times. growing up, she was taught that clothes were a tool that had no purpose beyond function. that image had no factor. however, being integrated into real social settings after the loss of her dad quickly disproved that statement : bombardments of bullying and social outcast at 12 from girls her age leaving a lasting impact on the image mindy demands of herself when in a circle of what she'd otherwise consider normal people.

her fashion sense develops with those she's surrounded by, being a social chameleon who's even subconsciously good at blending with / absorbing traits of the environments she's nestled in during the moment. it's a trait she'd developed as she stepped into adulthood as a result of being such a reclusive person -- going from an adultified child to an actual adult woman was a strange transition with plenty of mistakes made along the way. the easiest way to adapt to it was to simply mirror what she witnessed.

she does still tend to stick with things that are moreso for comfort as opposed to simply looking good, but a crisis in identity and bdd ( body dysmorphic disorder ) in her late teens, she started to properly experiment with the way she presents herself to other. it's an exhausting process that's never quite finished, but being so adaptive and susceptible to change is arguably the most human thing about her.

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the biggest development shockingly came with the addition of a handbag. while femininity isn't tied to it, she's always been a rucksack or shoulder bag kinda person, and the sort of sense of maturity that came with carrying a handbag with her was a catalyst of figuring out the way she wants to be perceived as an adult outside of her serial killing persona. while she still sometimes carries weapons on her person in social settings, they're seldom used, or otherwise only used when she finds herself in a secure enough situation to.

rarely does she carry anything identifiable on her person. if she knows she's going out with a purpose, she'll adjust the contents of her bag to suit it, and only take what's needed when needed. the same can be said for small weapons, fake IDs, and burner phones.

while she does bank digitally under a pseudonym, mindy typically only carries cash in person.

like any woman, she does end up carrying around crap she doesn't need or simply forgets to switch out. hair clips, scrunchies, pens, earrings, etc. receipts are something she beats herself up over however, for she hates the idea of her mistakenly creating her own papertrail.

essentials are considered her glasses, small first aid kits, pain killers, and cash. but headphones and books for long distance travel.

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mindy didn't fully start caring about the way she looks until the tail end of puberty, which she spent in mumbai, india. a lot of what womanhood means to her was learnt from a transgender woman called prema, as well as her community of hijra sisters : while being a woman herself at face value doesn't carry much weight to mccready, having a nurturing woman mentor in her life, albeit briefly, was impactful. the dynamic helped mindy somewhat with the challenge of looking inwards and identifying in herself that she will not forever be a bloody red stain in memory of a dead father and living mother - and that she's allowed to surpass what was once expected of her.

femininity or rather feeling like a woman is something mindy still, at times, struggles with. but that's not a result of gender identity or dysphoria as opposed to the depersonalisation and total ego death that transpired during her childhood, and the lasting impact of not having true personhood.

in actuality,   damon mccready was an ex-cop turned accountant with a mentally ill wife who despised him, and he her in turn.   damon married kathleen cause she was pretty and once-reckless,   kathleen married damon because she was young. beyond their anticipated child,   there was little substance to the sanctity of their relationship.   when damon was arrested and imprisoned for two years   -   8 months if he worked hard enough in his defence   -   for fraud and forgery,   kathleen was left with overwhelming ransoms and bills enforced by corrupt officers and local gangsters.   as a result,  a week before mindy was due,   kathleen made an attempt on her own life  &  overdosed on quetiapine.   with the fortunate timing of a family friend  ( marcus williams ),   the barely conscious mother was rushed to the local hospital where her daughter was cut from her womb without complication or struggle,   and both survived the experience.

only two months later damon would be released from prison,   and two months after that, he abducted his daughter in the dead of night and began to plot his madness. he raised mindy on the lie that her mother was murdered by the very same people who put him away,  fabricating some twisted comic-book origin story to feed his own sick unreality and render himself entirely blameless  --   all the while refraining from specifics to keep mindy none the wiser.

for all of mindy's most essential developmental years,  the very centre of her world was violence,  but it always began with her mother and ended with her father.   her life revolved around avenging a mother that was taken from her, and what time wasn't spent mourning was to reflect on all that had been stolen from her and her father. she was raised isolated,   rarely settling in one place for longer than a month at a time with damon making sure to change their names and identities frequently so that if anyone were to see mindy's face they'd be able to immediately change locations to avoid suspicion and attention from the authorities.  clothes were only functional,   and she never had anything of value to her name.  the complete depersonalisation of mindy mccready begins here.

mindy's home schooling was militant.   she was always a quick learner,   but adultified in her personality and worldview and considered developmentally inappropriate for her age.   never was she addressed by her father as the child she truly was.   she was responsible for feeding, bathing, and dressing herself as soon as she was physically capable of doing so, and before she was ten,   she was financially  &  politically educated,   self-nurturing,   and totally detached from what it meant to be a child.   her developmental years were overburdened,  and her upbringing would be classified and wholly  individualistic if not for the madness she developed alongside her father.   while she relied on herself for care,   she relied on damon for instruction   :   like any child should,  she looked to the man she trusted the most for guidance.   it was only unfortunate that his sense of direction was permanently selfish and haunted by the ideals of hurting people.

damon's madness didn't take long to spread and infect his daughter's worldview   :   mindy was easily influenced as a child,   and her father's lies and brainwashing extended far beyond simply lying about the fabricated death of her mother.  damon controlled the fictional media mindy was allowed to consume,   most of which revolved around stories of fathers rescuing their daughters or avenging dead wives.   the idea that men were constantly after her father also made her an extremely paranoid child,   driving her closer to him and encouraging the development of a personality disorder that would follow her into adulthood.

by the time he was done with her, the very word mccready held little value. it was no longer an identity to either of them. it was a name. a name that belonged to thousands. no longer was she the myasnikova she was born as, but instead girl who never existed at all.

mindy's   " hero training "   was physically arduous even for the well practiced ;  for a child,  worse.   every day of mindy's life from the age she could walk until her father died just before she hit eleven,   she was expected to balance her studies with a rigorous routine of exercise,   weapon training,   gymnastics and martial arts.   on the occasions they lived close to wilderness or out of the way of people,   she and her father would practice things like tracking,  navigation,  driving,   and anything in between.   if this weren't enough for damon's regimen,   he would subject his daughter to arbitrary acts of torture to make sure she was paying attention to his lectures.   these went as far as tying mindy's limbs and throwing her into deep water to assure she was retaining his escapology lectures, shooting her at close range,  and laying her on train tracks. her rewards oft being comics or movies.

for all damon's efforts, however, the humanity in such a little girl would keep her hands trembling and her eyes wet.   she did not flinch at being used as bait for child predators or solo ventures into drug dens,   but the one thing she couldn't bring herself to do was murder another human being.   on more than one occasion,   damon set up scenarios for mindy's bloodlust to emerge.   the very first was when she was seven :  a sniper job taking out a kingpin in southeast asia. of course when it came to pulling the trigger,   she couldn't bring herself to do it.   in her own words,   she froze up like an amateur  -   punishing herself even at such a young age for not being able to carry out what should be unthinkable.   the second was an exercise in point - blank execution.   her father had broken the arms of a man behind a restaurant,   and again,   all that was required of mindy was to pull the trigger.   once more,   she failed.   she regretted her father needing to finish the job himself and compensate for her flaws.   mindy would fail twice more before completing her first ever successful kill at only eight years old.

when out in the wilds at night time,   damon dressed four men in masks and gave them a sixty second head start to escape the pair of them.   after a while of mindy being on the hunt,   damon pretended to be apprehended by the men and insisted that the only way to save him was to kill them.   after enough fear and pressure, mindy did so with one bullet each   ...   but not without reducing herself to tears, worried about what her dead mother would think of her taking a human life.   her father insisted that she would be proud, and rewarded her atrocities with her very first hit-girl suit.

to this day,   mindy's guilt regarding her initial failure haunts her in more ways than one.   her father would call those who refuse to bear arms conscientious objectors and pussies.   there was hatred in his words,   and the idea that it could have reflected his view of his daughter instilled her with a fear like no other.   this fear, coupled with the belief that her father was the only person alive who loved her, made her extremely susceptible to his fearmongering and indoctrination, and his reality detachment became her own.   in adulthood, she's forced to carry these symptoms with her through an incredibly difficult and non-linear healing journey that includes unlearning the blind obedience her father forced upon her. as well as grounding herself in the reality he so resolutely removed her from.

͙͘͡★ ˙②. sensorial. gentle reminders ...

ᵃ. smells. metal, lavender, osmanthus, coconut, gunpowder, argan, crisp cold air and the way it starts to hurt, sweat, kadam, vanilla, rue, reed, star anise, patchouli, diesel, skin.

ᵇ. tastes. black coffee, blood, aniseed, ( cinammon ) whisky, energy drinks, red meats, almond milk, new york style pizza, milkshake, well-balanced diets, tiramisu, sugars she was denied as a kid, peanut butter, nectarine, apple + honey.

ᶜ. colours. ( old ver. )

ⁱ. purple. a fantastical and intuitive colour that balances the fervour of red and composure of blue : creative yet insouciant. it's a balancing middle-ground if viewed positively, but unstable and untraditional if viewed otherwise. associated with the violet crown chakra, sahasrara, that represents pure thought and consciousness, linked to the crown of the head, the brain, and nervous system.

ⁱⁱ. deep blue. especially in blue-grey shades that emit an ominous and mysterious depth : a soulful expression of introspect, loyalty, and the cold.vishuddha, the throat chakra, is representative of self expression, communication, truth -- or in mindy's case, a therefore lackof : something she needs to work on.

ⁱⁱⁱ. maroon. dark with brown undertones, maroon oft evokes feelings of maturity, passion, and warmth, but the psychology of the colour is multifaceted : while it represents a reliability and authority, it is dominating to the eye, and can easily overwhelm if used in the context of anger or aggressive heaviness. the red chakra, muladhara, located at the base of the spine, is associated with security and stability.

͙͘͡★ ˙③. material. again, with feeling ...

ᵃ. flora. shameplant, a hypersensitive, creeping perennial with spines and a thigmotactic reaction to simulation that causes the leaflets to close. venus fly trap, a heart-shaped carnivorous jaw that traps and devours. sarcodes, fleshy, blood-red and parasitic. foxglove, an unassuming toxic plant that flowers - folktales once told of foxes wearing them to silence their movement. bittersweet nightshade, a poisonous plant with a sweet aftertaste and associated with fidelity.

ᵇ. fauna. stray cats, independent and self-serving, distrusting enough to hurt but reliant on her observations. feral dogs, with no heel to sit and nowhere to put her loyalty - entirely self sufficient and surviving of almost anything. microbats, analytical and lithe, oft invasive, leeching. lambs, once innocent in her bleating, shaved of everything gentle she had, unknowingly prepared for slaughter.

ᶜ. kitsch. engraved lighters, gimmicky switchblades, spirals, cat wall clocks, a vintage cat plush with a plastic face, repeating mirrors, vintage pinup ties, repurposed pieces of tech, thrifted bookends, weird postcards, punny doormats, horror deco, dartboards, novelty lamps, painted ceilings.

↷ media

mindy is very into cinema! with her genre preference heavily leaning towards action, horror, westerns, and sci-fi. she's less willing to sit and watch slice of life or romance stuff unless it's considered a vintage or classic … she wouldn't sit and watch the notebook but you can bet she's watched casablanca trice over. she also prefers documentary things over fiction, especially if it falls within the realm of sciences, politics or true crime.

even as a child, she was a very advanced reader : books being one of the few things she's willing to dedicate free time to. favourite genres are the same as her taste in film. but some of her favourite books include leo tolstoy's war and peace, fyodor dostoyevsky's crime and punishment, and mikhail bulgakov's heart of a dog.

mindy wouldn't have social media. she wouldn't risk leaving trails unless it were for the sake of baiting someone, but i've got reason to believe she's got like 4 different phones and 15 different sims she switches between for the sake of connecting with people she considers worth her efforts. though i can definitely see her having a dummy, entirely anonymous account on twitter or something for the sake of keeping an eye on what's trending based on geographical tracking.

↷ music

when it comes to music, mindy listens to and enjoys just about anything, but she does favour genres such as gothic rock, new wave, dark electronic, and dark wave. and surprisingly, classical. growing up, she mostly listened to rock and electric blues by proxy of earwigging on whatever her dad was playing, but living with her mum very briefly introduced her properly to modern pop. she listens to the radio, sure, but it's never anything mainstream - usually stations that cover world news and anything politics adjacent.

she listens to music more than you'd think! she lives a very lonely live, so she often resides to filling empty space and lonely holes with background noise when she needs it.

i don't think she'd go out of her way to see a concert or attend a big live venue, but she does enjoy bars with live music! though she prefers the slower, classier genres to fast loud stuff.

mindy can read most sheet music! :D and she can play the piano. she's self taught for the most part, but it's something her mother tutored her on in the short time they lived together when mindy was a teen. like most things in her life, she excelled at that too.

↷ language

mindy's first language is english, but a very close second is russian. despite being raised by an american father, he was a russian speaker, and he was pretty intent on raising her on both. she can also read and write both, but she does default to american english.

she has so many language experience under her belt. canon language families we know she can speak familiarly with include spanish, chinese, and hindi. but her studies in latin language means her familiarity with romance languages is also pretty prominent, so she can also understand and speak french, romanian, portuguese, and italian. she's very good at dissecting language when it's spoken or written, as well as tone, and she's good at picking up new ones.

asl, military jargon, and morse code are also languages mindy is trained in! she also knows the nato phonetic alphabet like the back of her hand ... courtesy of her dad, of course.

when it comes to writing, mindy's very precise - she's very good with quick, clear scribe - though she does tend to write in all caps despite her perfect punctuation otherwise (for the most part). an annotative force of habit. she also mostly writes in english unless it's sensitive / personal information, then she writes in russian. don't ask her why, she doesn't know.

↷ food & diet

regarding favourite dishes, they usually fall into the mediterranean category :] mediterranean, sushi, tempura and calamari, or anything that falls in the adjacent categories of healthy fats, plants, seafood, or red meats!

she appreciates mindful eating, the more stable she's feeling the better the meal planning is, but she's also not at all opposed to take outs and exploring popular places to eat in areas she's not entirely familiar with.

though she's definitely not a picky eater, in one comic even stating that if she could stomach her father's cooking, she'd be able to get used to stuff sourced from landfill and dumpster diving. thankfully, without having to endure her dad's stuff, she's learnt to cook herself, and she's pretty damn good at it!! her favourite things to prepare and eat usually include stuff that's butter or herb heavy.

↷ creative realm

knowing how to play piano, mindy's familiar with a lot of classical pieces, plays and artists, and she enjoys learning about such. she'd be rusty if she tried to sit at a piano at her current age, forget parts of songs she once knew by heart, but she'd be able to recollect it for the most part.

she loves coding!! she's been good at reworking and reprogramming things since before she could remember, and she still uses the skill in her spare and professional time. tinkering as far as mechanics and technologies have always been a necessity and an interest of hers! and she excels to the point she was hacking government security in her teens.

fashion and textiles are also an interest! but mostly in a practical sense. she puts a lot of time into modifying her armoury and her uniform, but she thinks it mostly as a chore these days, even if she does like doing it from time to time. she likes designing, and she likes protecting her image. win/win.