Shaka's Backstory

Shaka grew up on the streets of a large metropolis under the care of his older brother, never knowing his parents or even his family name. The pair stole food to survive and looked after one another, but when Shaka was seven, his brother was shot down for no reason by a primal gang member who simply hated the mammalians.

Taken in by an orphanage, Shaka was a quiet and antisocial child who never quite gelled with the other children and was never adopted by prospective foster parents visiting. He was academically unremarkable and seemed to pay little attention in any classes except technology subjects like woodwork and electronics at which he displayed a natural talent. Faced with becoming homeless again at 16, he enrolled himself in the military.

Military life suited Shaka right down to the ground. Everything was regimented and any situation could be solved by referring to the correct protocols. Given clear instructions, he quickly rose to any standard he was set and was directed deeper and deeper into special operations where he received training as a sapper and distinguished himself as a skilled demolitionist, able to maintain an icy calm and unwavering concentration even under fire as soldiers died all around him.

But there was a darker side to Shaka's military drive- every primal militant he got to shoot or blow up was an avengement for his brother and, he rationalised, several people just like him who now wouldn't have to suffer the loss of a loved one at the savages hands. He saw the fascist military as a force of justice and order, taking few lives to save many.

However this all came to an end when he was assigned to a black ops team tasked with eliminating a troupe of insurgents who had been believed to be receiving support from a poor primal farming village in the countryside. An informant had reported that one of the leaders was heading into town one morning in a truck to speak with a contact in the village. They were to set up camp in town and sniper was to shoot the rebel leader as he got out of the truck. His task was to wire a bridge on the outside of the town to explode, as a backstop in case the commander got away.

Just as the sniper was about to take his shot, an off duty rebel discovered a member of his team and shouted out, raising the alarm. Under fire, the rebel commander grabbed a motorcycle and tore off up the road towards the bridge. At this moment a school bus bringing children in from the farms to the school in the village came around the corner and onto the bridge. Shaka shouted that he did not have a clean shot but his commander pointed a gun at him and roared that he would be shot if he did not follow orders and detonate the bridge.

Shaka pressed the detonator and watched in abject horror as twenty three innocent children, two civilian teachers and one rebel lieutenant died in the resulting fireball. Calling the mission a success, his team returned joyously to base, laughing and telling him that the villagers had gotten what they deserved for helping the rebels spread discord.

For the next three nights, Shaka lay awake in bed, unable to close his eyes without seeing the bright yellow bus consumed by fire. Exhausted and mentally broken, he held a gun to his own head but couldn't bring himself to pull the trigger. Gathering together his weapons and belongings one night, he snuck out of camp. From a safe distance he produced the same detonator which had destroyed the bridge. This time, it was his own murderous comrades caught in the blast as the ammunition store of the base went off in a series of chained explosions.

Now wanted by the government as an enemy of the state, Shaka wandered aimlessly for several weeks, attempting to organise his thoughts and making several more unsuccessful suicide attempts.Eventually he heard that a fascist sergeant had been kidnapped by an idealistic group of rebels who wanted to topple the government and replace it with a democracy and a constitution of equality.

Through a chain of several farmers, he managed to arrange a meeting with Pablo, a leader of the rebel faction and several of his lieutenants. Upon seeing the dishevelled leopard wearing the tatters of a fascist uniform, the rebels panicked, expecting a trap. Before they could shoot him, Shaka revealed that he was wearing a self-designed suicide vest and if he dropped the detonator he held in his hand, all of them would die. His reasoning for this, he said, was that while he felt that he himself did not deserve to live, neither did those who would shoot another without hearing their case.

Forced to listen, the rebels heard Shaka's story. Setting the detonator safely on a nearby table, Shaka calmly asked that he be allowed to join their ranks but if they saw him as unredeemable, they were welcome to shoot him and end his suffering. Angered by the tense atmosphere of his introduction, some of the rebels argued that his story was a lie and that he was too dangerous and unstable to be allowed to live. Pablo however could see the desperation in Shaka's eyes that was only found in a man with nothing left to lose.

Offering his hand, Pablo granted Shaka his chance at absolution.