Natalie Matteson
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<infobox> <title source="name"><default>Natalie Matteson</default></title>
<image source="Image"></image> <image source="image"></image> <group><header>Basic Information</header> <label>Civilian Name</label> <label>Aliases</label> <label>Gender</label><default>Unknown</default> <label>Death</label> <label>Age</label><default>Unknown</default> <label>Post-timeskip</label> <label>Ward start</label> <label>Relations</label> <label>Family</label></group> <group><header>Professional Status</header> <label>Occupation</label> <label>Classification</label> <label>Unique Features</label> <label>Alignment</label>
<label>Status</label><format><label>Location</label> <label>Teams</label> <label>Previous Team(s)</label> <label>Base of Operations</label></group> <group><header>First Appearance</header> <label>Worm Debut</label> <label>Ward Debut</label></group> </infobox> Natalie Matteson is a law student and legal contact for Breakthrough.
Personality
Sees things through the lenses of her profession. Is interested by her new job. Tries to make sure everyone is keeping to the rules.
She considers her own stress response patterns atypical, worrying over ordinary things and yet very calm in the face of danger.<ref> “At a television studio? I wouldn’t mind, I don’t think,” Natalie said. “But I’m weird. There are a ton of things that bother me that other people treat as normal, and a ton of things I wouldn’t blink at things that annoy or freak out other people.”
“I respect that,” Chris said. “Yes, you have to find that nugget of you and cling to it. That stuff that makes you different.”
“It’s not anything fancy,” Natalie said. “I’m anxious about the stupidest stuff and I can get zen with routine work and chores. There are maybe three times in my life something horrible happened near me, and I kept my cool while other people were breaking down. That’s basically it.”
“Fancy enough,” Chris said.
“It’s really not,” Natalie replied. - Excerpt from Beacon 8.10</ref><ref name="weirdly calm">How could she feel so weirdly calm like this, and panic to the point of crying over an exam for a class she was doing well in? She could be held at knifepoint with zero idea of what to do and be almost okay, and yet when her sex buddy said he wanted to fuck her, she didn’t know how to deal. - Excerpt from Beacon 8.x</ref> In the face of deadly danger, she considers regretting not acting to protect others a worse fate than death or maiming.<ref>She was finally here and she might die or be maimed for it.
No, that wasn’t even the worst possibility.
She was here, finally, and Kenzie or Tony might die, with her left intact, agonizing over how she’d had no heroism in the end.
For that, she couldn’t move. - Excerpt from Beacon 8.x</ref> She'd thought capes were cool and imagined getting powers since she was a kid.<ref name="kid capes">This… she’d always thought capes were cool. It felt like just yesterday that she’d been Kenzie’s age, utterly enchanted by the idea of getting powers and doing something.
...
As a kid, she’d imagined getting powers and facing down impossible situations and weirdness like this made her think maybe it was what she was meant for. She could trigger, especially if it was only during the bad events, and-
And people who thought they might trigger didn’t. Wasn’t that the rule?
- Excerpt from Beacon 8.x</ref> In her imaginings, it was the critical defining moments that stuck with her, good or bad,<ref>When she reflected on the fantasies of childhood and adulthood both, it was the moments that stuck with her. Endless replays in her head of a given monumental scene, the crux of a decision.
Not even all good moments, either. Just moments, the key scenes. When she’d wanted to be a lawyer, it had been with a mind to having those moments in the courtroom. When she’d started working with the capes, a part of it was that she’d wanted to be adjacent to those moments. - Excerpt from Beacon 8.x</ref> and she was disconcerted after the interview at the way time just kept flowing, continuous.<ref>Tonight had had a few of them. She’d been adjacent.
Except they weren’t any moments. Time didn’t stop, and there was no room to think about each decision. Events came, they went, things moved on, people adapted, conversations led to them and from them. - Excerpt from Beacon 8.x</ref> Kinda like Chris.
Relationships
Carol Dallon
Her mentor. She admired her confidence<ref>Natalie didn’t miss those fleeting moments, when Victoria was mid-stretch or talking about how this was expected or wanted, when she looked a lot like Carol had a few times back at the Wardens’ office. Not happy, far from happy in this case, but fully confident.
...
She did her best to switch to unflappable lawyer mode, like Carol so often did. - Excerpt from Beacon 8.x</ref> and talent.<ref>Even when Mrs. Dallon took the gloves off and made it look like she was a superhuman lawyer, not just a superhuman in costume, Natalie had kept her perspective in check, or so she liked to think. Mrs. Dallon was a person to look up to, one with a lot of talents, but she was a person. - Excerpt from Beacon 8.x</ref>
Breakthrough
Gets upset with the team often especially during the undercover operation.<ref>Past the curtain, I could hear Ashley’s power.
“Hey!” Prancer called out. “Civilian property. They pay us, we leave their stuff alone.”
Ashley said something I didn’t hear. Nailbiter sniggered.
Natalie was going to get upset with us again. - Excerpt from Shadow 5.5</ref>
Defends Kenzie in the face of armed attackers <ref>“I’m not making them desperate and I’m not making them anything,” Kenzie said. “Because I’m giving myself up.”
“No,” Natalie said, seizing Kenzie’s arm as Kenzie walked past her. “No.” - Excerpt from Shadow 5.5</ref> including getting stabbed for her sake. <ref>The knife’s point penetrated skin, stabbing her in the sternum, just below the collarbone. It might have been the particular spot, but the contact of metal on bone was surprisingly painful. - Excerpt from Shadow 5.5</ref>
Tony
A "sex buddy"<ref name="weirdly calm"/>, not her boyfriend: she didn't want to ruin what they had.<ref>“Kenzie, it’s complicated. I like things the way they are now.”
“But he’s not your boyfriend.”
“Not exactly.”
“And you want him to be your boyfriend.”
“Yes, but. It’s weird and it’s fragile and I don’t want to ruin a good thing by trying to shoot for a maybe-great thing.” - Excerpt from Beacon 8.x</ref> Found him intimidating and very attractive.<ref>He was intimidating. Doubly so by candlelight. He was growing out his red hair, and it was long enough that locks curled around the tops and to the backs of his ears. His red hair and beard looked amazing in the warm light, and the play of light and shadow made the shape of his face, his neck and his adam’s apple very noticeable. He wore a long-sleeved t-shirt, what might have been silk pyjama bottoms, and slippers.
Approaching to stand closer meant she wouldn’t stare at him, but now she could smell his body soap, shampoo, and whatever else it was he used. He’d just showered recently. - Excerpt from Beacon 8.x</ref>
Appearance
Natalie is five foot two inches, shorter then average and squat. She keeps her hair shorter then normal and wears large glasses.<ref name=4.1e1>Natalie had her arms folded. Her hair was shorter than most boys wore theirs, with a curl at the forehead, her glasses seemed oversized for her face, and her forehead was wrinkled in worry or concentration. She dressed in clothes that made me think she’d picked clothes out of a magazine without reading the rationale behind those clothes. She wore a blouse that fit her body closely, made of a faintly reflective material, with a black ribbon tied where it drew the collar together. She wore a straight-cut skirt that started at the waist and ended at the knee, and dark hose, with tidy, heel-less business shoes. It was the kind of thing that made a model in a magazine look stunning, but Natalie was five-foot two, she didn’t really have a waist, and the outfit made both of those things very obvious. - Excerpt from Shade 4.1</ref>
Victoria did not like how Natalie dresses,<ref>Shade 4.6</ref> even though she dresses well.
Abilities
Smart and knows her work.<ref name=4.6e1>Natalie had her arms folded. Her hair was shorter than most boys wore theirs, with a curl at the forehead, her glasses seemed oversized for her face, and her forehead was wrinkled in worry or concentration. She dressed in clothes that made me think she’d picked clothes out of a magazine without reading the rationale behind those clothes. She wore a blouse that fit her body closely, made of a faintly reflective material, with a black ribbon tied where it drew the collar together. She wore a straight-cut skirt that started at the waist and ended at the knee, and dark hose, with tidy, heel-less business shoes. It was the kind of thing that made a model in a magazine look stunning, but Natalie was five-foot two, she didn’t really have a waist, and the outfit made both of those things very obvious. - Excerpt from Shade 4.6</ref>
Equipment
Briefcase.
History
Background
Unknown but likely normal and sane. Thought capes were pretty cool, and imagined getting powers and being a hero. <ref name="kid capes"/>
Gold Morning
Survived, when many didn't.
Early-Ward
Was matched with victoria and her new team<ref>Shade 4.1</ref>
Helped plan the Mathers compound assault.<ref>Shadow 5.6</ref>
Post-Fallen fall
Was at the interrogation for one of the people who helped sabotage the portals.<ref> - Excerpt from Torch 7.6</ref>
Trivia
- Natalie is derived from a Latin phrase essentially meaning Christmas Day.
- Probably a fan of the Bet versions of Pact and Twig.<ref>She’d been enchanted by the magical powers of one book, the biological alteration scenario of a television series. - Excerpt from Shade 4.1</ref>
References
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