She's dressed with little flair, save for three earrings in a row on the inside of the very end of her right ear, and a metal bracelet she wears on her left wrist, which seems to give off a faint blue glow. Other than that, her drab wardrobe simply consists of a faded blue jumpsuit and scuffed tan workboots. The jumpsuit, conservatively unzipped only about an inch and a half, is faded, moreso and somewhat rough in places of high movement- elbows, knees, etc. Above the left breast is a faded printing: "PROPERTY OF TRITUS LABS, LTD." She's rolled the sleeves of the jumpsuit up to just past her elbows- that's the most skin she's showing, and the entire suit fits on her somewhat loosely. Her boots, similarly, appear to be a size or two too large; they fit, but clunk around more than they should due to the excess size. They have large scuffs on them, apparently from heavy use, but are neatly tied with a double-knot.
Meet Variable. She's afraid of what you're thinking. In her experience, others' thoughts have not bode well for her. She hopes you aren't thinking of her. When she sees you sizing her up, she flinches, then quickly acts nonchalant. Variable has a secret.
This is Variable's secret: if you think it, she will become it, or will become as close to it as she possibly can. This is almost always against her own wishes, and is extremely embarassed of her shapeshifting ability. She does everything she can to hide it, and she just hopes that you won't think about her. If you see her in a non-gecko form, she'd likely appreciate being changed back to her normal form.
Her makers? They're an intergalactic corporation known as the Tritus Slaving Company. Once upon a time, Tritus was involved in kidnapping hapless souls from various planets across the cosmos and giving their mind, body, and soul a complete workover, turning them into the desired product. This was somewhat inefficient, however, and eventually the kidnapping process was replaced by Tritus' state-of-the-art engineering vats. Their slogan soon became "Tritus Slaves - Bred to Obey."
Tritus, to most customers, only offered a variety of standard models at expensive- but moderately affordable -prices. To other, more aristocratic and eccentric customers, though, Tritus provided the service of custom-breeding a slave to the customer's exact specifications.
The product was properly matured both physically and psychologically in the vats, using growth drugs, special sexual maturation hormones, and a constant stream of subliminal conditioning. In Variable's case, she was allowed to mature to be a young adult, with definite sexual features, but the sexual features were subdued some in order to achieve a more virgin feel, according to her buyer's desires. Her psyche was manipulated to produce a larger level of submissiveness than normal, but also have a small level of rebelliousness- she would have a need for a male figure in her life to guide, her, whom she would trust indefinitely, regardless of what he did to her. She was designed to never disobey, even to a fault, but also to beg and plead for the pain to stop, and to think that perhaps she deserves to be treated equally.
The engineers at Tritus were particularly proud of Variable (whom they called Project 43), though, due to the new feature she had. Her buyer was particularly rich, and funded research and development for Tritus to create a controllable shapeshifter. It was entirely possible for the engineers to create a shapeshifters, but engineered morphs had a nasty tendency of murdering their masters due to the sheer power their ability gave them. It was against Tritus company policy to engineer shapeshifters. After seeing absolute loads of cash sent to them for R&D, though, Tritus agreed to attempt to develop one which could be controlled. It took seven years, but Tritus had finally done it- Variable was the product, the first one off of the assembly line.
How the Tritus engineers did it: they developed Variable to have a full ability for morphing into whatever form she pleased, but then removed that same ability through implanting a suppression device in the shapeshifting center of her brain. The engineers also developed her to be highly telereceptive- that is, highly telepathic, but only in terms of recieving. The suppression device in her brain is designed to give way to telepathic commands, and given her submissive nature, she would have no choice but to morph to her master's every desire with simply a thought, while not being able to use the ability to her own will.
Following maturation in the vats, the product was released into a "boot camp" of sorts. Here the subject would be trained for whatever purpose the customer had for it- which was usually sex of some sort, although the odd housekeeper or labor worker would be trained. The product, at this time, would also be given an intensive education (again according to the customer's desires), while learning drugs were administered to it. Variable's purpose in life, her reason for being, was to be an unquestioning, loving companion and almost constant torture victim. Her life was to be devoted to being in an abusive, humiliating relationship, as Variable's buyer was quite the sadist. She did, however, get a very good education, covering all the major subjects- it seems her buyer wanted to be able to have an intelligent conversation with her in between beatings.
The final step for Tritus slaves, before being relinquished into their new owners' hands, was final inspection. It worked quite similarly to a test drive on a new car- the prospective buyer would come to Tritus Labs, and could check out their product however they liked- they could dress the product up, undress the product, feel the product, have the product feel /them/ up... There were even a few cases of products dying in these tests, and their buyers paying up in full, completely satisfied.
Variable did not meet this stage, however; her buyer, CEO Ivan Tantalus Komsky II of the intergalactic crime organization known as the Red Hook Corporate Syndicate, was assassinated while on his way to Tritus Labs for his test drive with her. Normally, according to Tritus policy, when a buyer is unable to pay up in full for a custom slave, the slave is simply ground up, then dissolved into base organic material, to be recycled back into the vats.
The engineers, though, proud of their creation, managed to convince management to take a different route with Variable. Instead, Variable was to be marketed to other rich customers who were looking for something new and different. Months went by, and it seemed that Variable was to be recycled after all, when a buyer with strong monetary backing came to Tritus Labs, interested in her. It was now that Variable had her test drive. After several hours of using and abusing her in every way humanly and inhumanly possible, the buyer was satisfied, save for one small complaint- he had noticed that whilst he was fucking her, she orgasmed several times. He wanted her to only feel pain, so he demanded that the engineers clitorectomize her. The engineers, not wanting to lose a sale, happily complied, and scheduled the operation for the next morning, before the buyer left to take Variable home.
While the buyer and the engineers thought that Variable had passed out in the testing room, this was not so. She had gone into shock shortly, but soon left it and was lying still in pain. She heard the discussion of her operation, and she had been educated enough on anatomy to know that one of the few ways for her to experience in pleasure in life was about to be removed. She laid there for a while, pondering this, worrying and silently sobbing to herself, when something snapped in her mind. The slight rebelliousness kicked in, and she realized that although she was terrified of being without a master, she had to take a chance and try to escape. Grabbing one of the scalpels used to torture her earlier, she snuck out of the test room.
She chose to avoid sneaking back to the slave quarters, because her smart little mind had the idea that the orderlies would look there for her first. Instead, she went in the opposite direction, towards the elevator. She began to hear clunking footsteps, so she ducked into a janitor's closet. The clunking footsteps were those of the janitor, who was wearing big clunking workboots and a faded blue jumpsuit.
Variable pleaded to whatever powers may be to please, please, not let the door open. They weren't listening, though, and the door opened. The janitor stood there, somewhat astounded- who wouldn't be, if they found a naked salamander girl hiding in a janitor's closet and holding a scalpel? That said, the janitor held the scalpel soon- right in his windpipe. All psychological conditioning had been bypassed by now for Variable; she was operating on pure instinct. Quickly, she stripped the janitor of his clothes, putting them on. They fit loosely on her, but at least she wasn't naked anymore. She didn't want to be naked.
After hiding the body in a spare bin in the closet, Variable pushed the janitor's cart down the hall and into the elevator. It was just her luck, for once, that Tritus Labs was part of a huge commercial nexus, centered around what is possibly the largest intergalactic shuttle station. She managed to leave the station before the orderlies had even realized that she had left Tritus Labs.
Her life after that is too inconsequential to this origin story to go into huge detail, but it largely involved traveling from city to city, doing odd jobs wherever she could, and generally trying to avoid the general populace, not wanting to be taken advantage of. From time to time she did get taken advantage of, when some being somewhere would discover that they could make her turn into things simply by thinking about it, but as time went on she became better at disguising her ability and filtering out the thoughts of passers-by. Eventually, when on her travels, she managed to get a ride on a Zipway and ended up in the Mess.
And that brings us to the present.
Using Variable is a fairly straightforward process. Once your character is aware of Variable's secret, they may 'send' thoughts Variable, describing the new form they desire her to take. She will (likely unwillingly) comply and change form.
Simply OOC page her player with the new desc you wish her to take on. Broadcasting that your character is the one who sent the command is entirely up to you.
Commands can only be sent regarding her shapeshifting ability. It is impossible to change her personality or instincts, nor is it possible to force her to do anything but change shape.
Notes: