Name: Zhang, Ping-An

Known Aliases: Pacifica Roberts

Species: Human brain in a cyborg body. Whereabouts of original body unknown.

Age:28 (at story beginning)

Associates: Lady Whitcombe, Vaela Smith, Betsy, Leederman, Captain Davies, Captain Hassan and Captain Ketch.

Enemies: Albert Tysen, Commodore Hanzo Vasquez, Grand Admiral Saint Rail

History: Zhang Ping-An was born in 2690 on Tester 80, in the Tester System, a slightly remote system inhabited primarily by miners and their descendants living in hollowed-out asteroid colonies.  As with most inhabitants of the Tester system her family were space miners, a hardy self-reliant breed, and this upbringing left her with a strong sense of individual purpose. Her parents were killed in a mining accident when she was age 4, and she was raised primarily by her grandparents and extended family of aunts, uncles and cousins. When she was 7 she was known as a chess prodigy in the system, and held a place as a minor celebrity who regularly played far more experienced players to a stalemate. During this time she met Sophie Roberts, a woman who would later become her closest friend for many years.

At age 15 she joined the Tester Colonial Home  Defense Fleet following a disagreement with her grandparents and showed a real aptitude for leadership, quickly rising in the ranks until she had a Executive Office position in the small fleet aboard one of their ships, the Naiad’s Kiss, at age 17. She served under Captain Weeks, and alongside the aforementioned Sophie, as well as with fellow junior cadet Solantro and the ship’s medical officer Doctor Nan.  They were a close-knit crew and continued to be so until two years later when secessionist elements in the colony took control and declared independence from the Empire. The Empire responded by sending in a fleet of ships and destroyed several colonies in a show of force, including the one on which Ping-An’s extended family lived. For a time after the surrender and until the Imperial Fleet left three years later, the members of the former defense force were wanted criminals, and following the capture and execution of Captain Weeks, Ping-An fled further out of the Imperial Sphere believing herself to be hunted by the Empire. (In reality the warrants only held sway in the Tester System, having been issued by the local governor as system-wide decrees.)

At age 21, Ping-An met a man known as Camus while working as a zero-gravity dock worker in one of the un-allied systems, he took a liking to Ping-An and when he was recruited to join the Volkstag Pirate Clan he asked her to join him. Ping-An, who had already been looking for such an opportunity, followed him and the two of them went to work for the Volkstag Pirates. As Camus rose in the ranks, he kept Ping-An close by him, considering her his “good luck charm”, although in reality much of his success could be credited to her advice behind the scenes. This continued until Captain Camus took his ship, The Belleflower, on a cargo raid on the Miraposa Three orbital transfer station in 2718.

Note- it is unknown exactly when Ping-An shifted from her natural body to a custom bioroid body, although this likely occured during the period after she fled from the Tester mining colonies. The shift to a bioroid body may have been in a misplaced effort to avoid the Imperial forces she beleived were tracking her at the time.