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Description

Known Aliases: Donny, Detective Candi MacHugh
Height: 5’4”
Weight: 140 lbs
Hair: Blond
Eyes: Blue
Ethnicity: Scotch-Irish American

Appearance:

Candi has a cute, petite, pixie-like build. Her face is round, with pronounced dimples. Her short stature tends to under-emphasize her solid core and shoulders, and people tend to assume that she is even smaller than she actually is. Candi wears her hair short, sometimes braiding the sides, but never past the line of her chin. She tends to wear baggy, oversized t-shirts when in civilian clothes, along with loose-fit, comfortable jeans or shorts. She almost never wears dresses or skirts, and only wears heels to court. When on duty, Donny generally wears a pantsuit with black loafers or her CAT-Gear, which is colored orange, blue, and grey.

Personal Quote:

“I grew up with a cheerleader’s name and a hockey player’s body; is it any wonder I’m touchy?”

Background/History:

Candi’s parents, Melissa and Ron MacHugh, have never been wealthy. Melissa teaches a third grade class at Chase Grove elementary, while Ron MacHugh is a day laborer for a landscaping business. Despite their modest incomes, the MacHughs have always managed to have enough money to feed and house their family, and enough pride that they were unwilling to ask family or friends for aid.

Growing up, Candi was always a bit of a tomboy and got into frequent fights. Part of that was her reaction to the tendency of people to assume that she was vain and shallow because of her name, part of that was just her natural temperament, and part of that was her response to people who assumed she was fragile because she was pretty. As a result, Candi had few friends until she reached middle school, where her natural athleticism earned her a place in several sports, including fast-pitch softball, soccer, and field hockey. Even then, her friends tended to be other jocks, and students who were less athletic still tended to ostracize her as a bit of a weirdo.

In high school, Candi caught her first serious injury; in a field hockey game, the ball got popped up by an unlucky strike and Candi, in the wrong place at the wrong time, was hit full in the face. The initial strike was bad enough, crushing her nose and snapping her head back, but it was compounded by her tripping over an opposing player’s stick. She fell backward and smashed her head on the hard turf, knocking her unconscious. When she didn’t immediately recover, she was rushed to the emergency room where they determined she had not only suffered a broken nose, but also crushed her left lacrimal and her maxillary bones. Further, the fall had resulted in a bad concussion and doctors worried that she might have suffered serious brain damage.

Candi remained unresponsive for over a day, but late the following evening woke suddenly. She was disoriented and had trouble understanding that she’d missed the end of the game and the following day as well, but overall seemed not to have suffered any sort of detectable loss of mental function. After observing her overnight, the doctors released her into her parents’ care in the morning with a stern admonition to watch her carefully over the next few days.

From that point on, Candi, who had always been prone to getting into scraps, was easier to provoke than ever before. She was no less intelligent, but it seemed as if her ability to perceive insults had been magnified tenfold. What few friends she’d had before her injury evaporated like mist almost entirely, and she remained close friends with only a couple people afterwards. Candi became unmanageable for her parents; she found excuses to argue with them at every opportunity, her grades slipped, and her constant fighting resulted in her being suspended and expelled from several schools. Finally, her parents gave up and sent her to boarding school.

Despite how bad she’d been at public school, she’d still had a couple friends who had acted as a stabilizing influence. With those friends removed, Candi was even worse. She was argumentative, aggressive, and unruly. When her teacher took her to task for her wildness, Candi hit her and tried to bite her, failing only because several students ganged up on her and pulled her back.

With nowhere else to turn (and running out of money to pay lawyers and settle lawsuits), Candi’s parents finally sent her to a Marine boot camp for troubled teens. The D.I. proved to be every bit as good as advertised; he deliberately pushed Candi’s buttons and, when she went for his throat, handily twisted her into a pretzel. Eventually, Candi got the message that she could not fight her way through him and she settled down enough to learn from him. He, in turn, directed her (and her parents) to a local Tae Kwon Do dojang, where Candi began studying martial arts for the first time.

Surprisingly, Candi was an excellent student of martial arts, in time earning a black belt in Tae Kwon Do as well as rankings in Muay Thai, Aikijujitsu, and Hawaiian Kenpo. She also took up escrima, fencing, and as many of the wide variety of weapon forms as her diverse martial arts classes made available. Although her grades in school did not significantly improve, at least her discipline did and she managed to finish out the remainder of her high school career with a low C average and the notation in her file that she did not live up to her potential.

Given her low grades, Candi was unlikely to receive many scholarships; certainly not enough to make a significant dent in her college tuition. Her parents, however, were adamant that Candi had to attend college and earn a degree. With no other alternatives, Candi went back and spoke with the drill instructor who’d first got her involved with martial arts. He suggested that she could join the marines and make use of the GI Bill to pay her way through school, a suggestion she thought sounded workable.

Naturally, things did not go smoothly. Candi made it through basic, but an incident during her AIT resulted in her being discharged without prejudice and earned her the nickname “Donnybrook.” Her former D.I. heard about the incident and called in a favor, dumping Candi’s case on the desk of an old friend, Captain Zebediah Slade, who was putting together a police task force to tackle metahuman problems. Zed grumbled, but eventually excepted the fiery young woman onto his team, where she proved to be a surprising asset once he got past her prickly temper.

Since joining the MRT, Candi has continued with her martial arts training, of course, as well as earning degrees in physical education, sports medicine, and law enforcement. Zed has insisted that Candi also take courses on anger management (their efficacy has been a subject of much debate) and legal use of force, and Candi has become something of a barracks lawyer regarding those particular subjects.

Personality:

Candi is short-tempered and vicious unless she’s under attack. When she’s fighting, she calms right down and is among the most professional combatants you’re likely to encounter. Her greatest flaws are that she tends to infer offense even when none was intended, and she is an Olympic-level grudge-carrier. In fact, unless some outside force is providing significant stress, Donny can be downright vile, with an acid tongue and a tendency to launch into physical attacks as soon as she possibly can, even when it’s her own vitriol that sparked the confrontation in the first place. As Zed has expressed it, Donny would be fine if only someone could be found to randomly toss a grenade at her every half-hour or so. Unfortunately, thus far no one has volunteered for the duty. Candi tends to be both overconfident and proud, and has no difficulty in expressing her perceived superiority to nearly everyone around her.

Powers/Abilities:

Donny has no metahuman powers, but she does have the training and equipment of a typical MRT detective, including CAT gear. She is an expert in unarmed combat, knife fighting, and stick fighting, and she specializes in hard forms that focus on breaking an attacker over blocking or dodging attacks. She is a better-than-average shot with a pistol or shotgun, but not an expert, and generally prefers to do her fighting close in where her speed and power work more to her advantage.

Donny is a trained detective, and is well-versed in police procedure and methods, but she prefers to leave more intellectual or social pursuits to her partner, as she (reasonably) figures that she, herself, is not well-suited to non-violent tasks.

Donny has an excellent tactical mind, but is not very good at strategy, although she would never admit it.

Description

Known Aliases: Donny, Detective Candi MacHugh
Height: 5’4”
Weight: 140 lbs
Hair: Blond
Eyes: Blue
Ethnicity: Scotch-Irish American

Appearance:

Candi has a cute, petite, pixie-like build. Her face is round, with pronounced dimples. Her short stature tends to under-emphasize her solid core and shoulders, and people tend to assume that she is even smaller than she actually is. Candi wears her hair short, sometimes braiding the sides, but never past the line of her chin. She tends to wear baggy, oversized t-shirts when in civilian clothes, along with loose-fit, comfortable jeans or shorts. She almost never wears dresses or skirts, and only wears heels to court. When on duty, Donny generally wears a pantsuit with black loafers or her CAT-Gear, which is colored orange, blue, and grey.

Personal Quote:

“I grew up with a cheerleader’s name and a hockey player’s body; is it any wonder I’m touchy?”

Background/History:

Candi’s parents, Melissa and Ron MacHugh, have never been wealthy. Melissa teaches a third grade class at Chase Grove elementary, while Ron MacHugh is a day laborer for a landscaping business. Despite their modest incomes, the MacHughs have always managed to have enough money to feed and house their family, and enough pride that they were unwilling to ask family or friends for aid.

Growing up, Candi was always a bit of a tomboy and got into frequent fights. Part of that was her reaction to the tendency of people to assume that she was vain and shallow because of her name, part of that was just her natural temperament, and part of that was her response to people who assumed she was fragile because she was pretty. As a result, Candi had few friends until she reached middle school, where her natural athleticism earned her a place in several sports, including fast-pitch softball, soccer, and field hockey. Even then, her friends tended to be other jocks, and students who were less athletic still tended to ostracize her as a bit of a weirdo.

In high school, Candi caught her first serious injury; in a field hockey game, the ball got popped up by an unlucky strike and Candi, in the wrong place at the wrong time, was hit full in the face. The initial strike was bad enough, crushing her nose and snapping her head back, but it was compounded by her tripping over an opposing player’s stick. She fell backward and smashed her head on the hard turf, knocking her unconscious. When she didn’t immediately recover, she was rushed to the emergency room where they determined she had not only suffered a broken nose, but also crushed her left lacrimal and her maxillary bones. Further, the fall had resulted in a bad concussion and doctors worried that she might have suffered serious brain damage.

Candi remained unresponsive for over a day, but late the following evening woke suddenly. She was disoriented and had trouble understanding that she’d missed the end of the game and the following day as well, but overall seemed not to have suffered any sort of detectable loss of mental function. After observing her overnight, the doctors released her into her parents’ care in the morning with a stern admonition to watch her carefully over the next few days.

From that point on, Candi, who had always been prone to getting into scraps, was easier to provoke than ever before. She was no less intelligent, but it seemed as if her ability to perceive insults had been magnified tenfold. What few friends she’d had before her injury evaporated like mist almost entirely, and she remained close friends with only a couple people afterwards. Candi became unmanageable for her parents; she found excuses to argue with them at every opportunity, her grades slipped, and her constant fighting resulted in her being suspended and expelled from several schools. Finally, her parents gave up and sent her to boarding school.

Despite how bad she’d been at public school, she’d still had a couple friends who had acted as a stabilizing influence. With those friends removed, Candi was even worse. She was argumentative, aggressive, and unruly. When her teacher took her to task for her wildness, Candi hit her and tried to bite her, failing only because several students ganged up on her and pulled her back.

With nowhere else to turn (and running out of money to pay lawyers and settle lawsuits), Candi’s parents finally sent her to a Marine boot camp for troubled teens. The D.I. proved to be every bit as good as advertised; he deliberately pushed Candi’s buttons and, when she went for his throat, handily twisted her into a pretzel. Eventually, Candi got the message that she could not fight her way through him and she settled down enough to learn from him. He, in turn, directed her (and her parents) to a local Tae Kwon Do dojang, where Candi began studying martial arts for the first time.

Surprisingly, Candi was an excellent student of martial arts, in time earning a black belt in Tae Kwon Do as well as rankings in Muay Thai, Aikijujitsu, and Hawaiian Kenpo. She also took up escrima, fencing, and as many of the wide variety of weapon forms as her diverse martial arts classes made available. Although her grades in school did not significantly improve, at least her discipline did and she managed to finish out the remainder of her high school career with a low C average and the notation in her file that she did not live up to her potential.

Given her low grades, Candi was unlikely to receive many scholarships; certainly not enough to make a significant dent in her college tuition. Her parents, however, were adamant that Candi had to attend college and earn a degree. With no other alternatives, Candi went back and spoke with the drill instructor who’d first got her involved with martial arts. He suggested that she could join the marines and make use of the GI Bill to pay her way through school, a suggestion she thought sounded workable.

Naturally, things did not go smoothly. Candi made it through basic, but an incident during her AIT resulted in her being discharged without prejudice and earned her the nickname “Donnybrook.” Her former D.I. heard about the incident and called in a favor, dumping Candi’s case on the desk of an old friend, Captain Zebediah Slade, who was putting together a police task force to tackle metahuman problems. Zed grumbled, but eventually excepted the fiery young woman onto his team, where she proved to be a surprising asset once he got past her prickly temper.

Since joining the MRT, Candi has continued with her martial arts training, of course, as well as earning degrees in physical education, sports medicine, and law enforcement. Zed has insisted that Candi also take courses on anger management (their efficacy has been a subject of much debate) and legal use of force, and Candi has become something of a barracks lawyer regarding those particular subjects.

Personality:

Candi is short-tempered and vicious unless she’s under attack. When she’s fighting, she calms right down and is among the most professional combatants you’re likely to encounter. Her greatest flaws are that she tends to infer offense even when none was intended, and she is an Olympic-level grudge-carrier. In fact, unless some outside force is providing significant stress, Donny can be downright vile, with an acid tongue and a tendency to launch into physical attacks as soon as she possibly can, even when it’s her own vitriol that sparked the confrontation in the first place. As Zed has expressed it, Donny would be fine if only someone could be found to randomly toss a grenade at her every half-hour or so. Unfortunately, thus far no one has volunteered for the duty. Candi tends to be both overconfident and proud, and has no difficulty in expressing her perceived superiority to nearly everyone around her.

Powers/Abilities:

Donny has no metahuman powers, but she does have the training and equipment of a typical MRT detective, including CAT gear. She is an expert in unarmed combat, knife fighting, and stick fighting, and she specializes in hard forms that focus on breaking an attacker over blocking or dodging attacks. She is a better-than-average shot with a pistol or shotgun, but not an expert, and generally prefers to do her fighting close in where her speed and power work more to her advantage.

Donny is a trained detective, and is well-versed in police procedure and methods, but she prefers to leave more intellectual or social pursuits to her partner, as she (reasonably) figures that she, herself, is not well-suited to non-violent tasks.

Donny has an excellent tactical mind, but is not very good at strategy, although she would never admit it.