RANDALL HEYES
Randall has difficulty with boundaries and often finds himself in trouble he doesn’t always necessarily start. He doesn’t mind that- even welcomes it, but with this sometimes comes an inability to understand authority. Others label him rebellious, but Randall would probably call himself individualistic.
Randall is an interesting fellow; he picked the short straw growing up. His parents started out as lowlife mechanics working for a large car company in Falls City before incriminating evidence suggesting they were part of a black market scheme selling hard drugs to underfunded hospitals surfaced and effectively destroyed their careers. Randall was a small child throughout the scandal, but he remembers snippets of it as it pertained to his upbringing- he eventually began resorting to petty street theft in his later youth in order to provide for both of his parents. They couldn’t hold down another job after such a devastating loss. This type of childhood was quite common- nearly 40% of youth in the year 2084 reported having trouble at home financially, and you were considered lucky if you didn’t have to worry about what you’d eat for dinner every night. Things got worse before they got better, but Randall eventually found himself making a living doing odd jobs and deliveries around town for doctors, other mechanics, etc. His parents drifted away, but he found brief periods of community in other ways.
SEVIA CROMWELL
Sevia only took the raffle opportunity because she had no other options. She swiftly learns that space living doesn’t fit her- but she can’t leave. She has no trouble advocating for herself on the station, which brings her more trouble than she can often anticipate, and Randall finds her interesting because of it. The feelings aren’t mutual.
Sevia grew up lucky- luckier than most of the population, at least. Her parents worked at one of the largest biotechnical companies in Falls City for decades before leaving her to run away to New California for better job prospects when she got older. As a result, her family was filthy rich for most of her upbringing until she realized she actually had to start working to keep the money flowing in. Nobody taught her how to live independently. She was confident, self-assured, but that would only take her so far. She quickly learned how challenging it was to get by in a place where jobs were handed out so scarcely.
Her defiant personality gave her all kinds of problems as she grew into her early twenties. She couldn’t hold down a stable job, but she believed it was no fault of hers; so, right before the raffle, she found herself completely unemployed and at the real risk of eventual starvation, illness, or whatever else could kill her if she didn’t have the money to pay for it.
Side note on Stevia’s hair: it’s obviously genetically modified, but more so than the average person. Her hair glows and floats now, but it used to be a curly mousy brown.
SALEM SMITH
Salem grew up with her brother, Cael, in a rather unfortunate part of town. She’s the younger of the two, and much more optimistic about her future- reality hasn’t truly set in yet, and she really believes this raffle has the potential to turn things around. Salem would be constantly teased about how aloof she was as a child, but her parents would say her creativity made up for it. They thought she was destined for greatness. Throughout her adolescence she honed her artistic skills and found a love for fashion and knitting- any crafty activity, really, and she likes to tell every new person she meets about how she created half of Cael’s wardrobe. She talks a little too much for her own good, but means well; in fact, she doesn’t really have a malicious bone in her body. She sees the good in everyone to a fault, and has lost close friends over tiny misunderstandings, but any time her brother tries to lecture her on shutting up she gets argumentative, often rebuking with the fact that Cael almost never socializes.
On the station, she finds it a lot harder to make friends. Many of the passengers seem suspicious of her, which she doesn’t understand and intensely dislikes. She also hates the drab interior of the rooms, and has filed many requests about possibly getting a redecoration, but no responses have come back.
CAEL SMITH
Cael, Salem’s older brother, lived most of his early life trying to provide for his sister as best as he could. As the older sibling, it was his responsibility to take on part of the parenting- which included getting a job, which he grumbled about at first. The experience was humbling and he eventually came to understand the importance of family and what it means to provide for them, and now values them above all else in his life. It was painful for him to leave them behind, but he had to choose between them or Salem after she entered the two of them into the raffle without telling anyone. He was understandably furious at first and tried everything to get her disqualified, but in the end nothing worked and he felt like he couldn’t just let her go off into the void of space without someone to be there for her. He gets reminded constantly about how she isn’t actually all that young- only about two years younger than him- but he can’t shake that deep-rooted habit of providing for her after all that he’s done for her in the past.
He struggles with purpose and what it means to be happy if not by getting it from helping another person. He sometimes wishes he had the creativity that Salem has; maybe then, he’d be better at figuring out what he wants for himself.