Penlink Sinowdyne

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"'We are cogs of the beautiful machine.' - Penlink Sinowdyne"

Summary
Penlink is an academically achieved roboticist and entomologist from Gnomeregan. She was originally trained in combat by her aunt, Dr. Commander Soila Cogblade, a veteran of both the Alliance and Gnomeregan military. A few years after the chipper inventor’s employment with Luminous Technologies Inc., Gnomeregan was flooded with radiation. She learned that her family's escape was possible because Soila fended off the assault. Penlink fought her way back in to save her.

She succeeded. As a result, they were both diagnosed with cancer and radiation poisoning. Soila was going to die anyway. Penlink stood a chance. As she remained unconscious, Soila dedicated the last year of her life to the most ambitious project of her career: Penlink’s body. She was forced to make her niece almost 90% machine to ensure her survival. The cybernetic shell was the commander’s final act of love.

After processing her grief, Penlink joined the Alliance military with nowhere else to go. She fought valiantly in Silithus, Outland, Northrend, Shadowmoon Valley, the Broken Isles, and Darkshore, along with smaller skirmishes. “The Indigo Needle” became her alias for her staple headband and insect-inspired gadgetry. It took months for her last platoon to learn the degree of Penlink’s cyborg existence. Once they did, however, they were less than accepting. The squad’s weakened morale began to concern their superiors. This resulted in a new assignment and promotion in a purely PR-motivated act. She was transferred to the Fighting Fifth. Most of the Fifth's soldiers have learned the same about Penlink but embrace her for who and what she is, and she found peace in Mechagon. Yet after enduring the exacerbated insecurities and challenged identity that had burdened her since rebirth, she continues struggling to wrap her head around this sudden acceptance and normalization. Her challenged identity continues in a new light.

Appearance
Penlink is curved in hills of muscle. She has a soft face with acute edges, allowing dramatic adjustment between friendly and severe. Her nose is fine and pointed, her lips small, pink, and round. Illustrating a whimsical, damp quality, she befits a crystal cave or glowing marsh. Ruffled bangs jut over her indigo headband like leaves hanging over pottery, while the rest of her jagged, dark-lilac hair sputters to her chin and shoulders in wet disarray. It's parted by broad ears hemmed by several iron hoops.

Her left eye is like aquamarine glass, sharp and expressive. The right is a cybernetic marvel. Its midnight blue structure is host to a kaleidoscope of silvery-bronze gears spinning behind a glowing cyan lens. Simple shapes glow along the rims of her cheeks. They reach from a jawline crafted of the same silver metal. Below, her tool belt is densely packed with folded up robotics, gadgets, tools, and a wicked insect claw. She often smells of the oil outlining her fingernails, along with an odd musk that can best be described as magic crystals in a fizzy drink.

A hugely animated woman, she speaks with her hands and appears ready to barge-waddle through a wall. Her movements are methodical, and at times, eerily systematic. Although plucky and high-pitched, her voice isn't grating.

Armor, Weapons, and Devices
The colors and patterns of Penlink's plate armor reflect both her affinity for Zangarmarsh and her cybernetic aesthetic - blues, greens, black, turquoise, cyan, and some purples, with hints of silvery bronze. She bears a chainsaw sword, a nod to her Gnomish heritage. The insect claw originated from a Qiraji she had slain. Its incisors are coated with the venom of the giant Zangarmarsh firefly, which is reapplied before every mission. Her gloves can project a blue reflective HoloShield, though it doesn't always work.

The tools at her disposal are vast. Many typical engineering tools are stored inside her robotic limbs, but the ones that would fail to function properly in such a manner rest on her belt. Robotic insects are densely folded into respective sections there, crafted in silvery-bronze metals. There is a metallic brick (Locust Prism XT-9, which unfolds into a swarm of 100 robotic locusts), along with three separate clumps of curled insect segments (ST823 Centipede Grenade, Moth-o-Matic Dispensor 18-MK-BETA, and the Firefly Flashbang X32-B). Her pack contains a reasonable amount of gold, blueprint sheets, a water flask, and lightweight anatomy books - one for humanoids and one for entomology.

Gnomish Gadgetry
As a roboticist and mekgineer, Penlink is known for being heavily inspired by entomology in her designs. She's created patented works such as the Locust Prism XT9, ST823 Centipede Grenade, and the Firefly Flashbang X32-B. Still in its testing stage is the Moth-o-Matic Dispenser 18MK-BETA. She's also announced in the Gearhead Times that her lifelong dream is expected to enter its first testing stages soon: the Dragonfly Phanoblaster 3600. Although critics have generally given positive reviews for her projects, none of them are especially famous or profitable.

Gnomeregan Project Teams
Luminous Technologies, Inc. was a company of Gnomish engineers who specialized in robotics, cybernetics, and software. Not many of the team survived the radiation when Gnomeregan was first evacuated.

Silithus and Ahn Qiraj
She spent a lot of time studying the peculiar entomology of the Silithid and Qiraji when the gong was rung, working closely alongside the druids of the Cenarion Circle.

Zangarmarsh
Originally she worked with the Cenarion Circle there, but left for unknown reasons. Penlink spent ample time studying the local insects and eventually made the marsh her home.

The Dread Wastes
She studied the Mantid, at times conversing with the Klaxxi. (If anybody had watched her in conversation with one, she probably looked uncomfortable.)

Battles
Penlink fought beside Draenei in Outland, the Alliance in Northrend, helped the Wildhammer Dwarves defend their homelands, defended a garrison in Shadowmoon Valley, and fought yet more demons on the Broken Isles. She also defended Kaldorei civilians in Darkshore.