Dawn Conley

Dawn Conley is humanity's first biopath, and XCOM's youngest soldier, being only nineteen. She is the main character of XCOM: New Blood.

## Biography

Born in Nashville, Tenesse, Dawn Conley had a normal family and home life, alongside her twin sister Grace, until after they both graduated from high school. Dawn, much to her parents' dismay, who insisted she go to college, visited a PRIEST testing center after the invasion of Australia, and tested positive for psioncs- telepathy, to be precise, and is as of now one of humanity's most powerful psions, measuring a 90 on the Trask Scale.

### Priesthood

Dawn was transported to a PRIEST training facility in Augusta, Maine. Her parents and sister moved there to be closer to her and visit occasionally. She quickly became good friends with her bunkmate, Mary Stevens, a teenage of a slightly younger age from Houston, Texas, who was a Magus Aegii. They became very close, and trained together well for several months.

### Rude Awakening

While conducting an experiment on a Sectoid, Dawn pushed deeper into its mind- deeper than she'd ever had before. What she didn't know was that she'd discovered the cellular bonds of the Sectoid, and melted its head completely. This sent her into a massive panic attack that rendered her unconscious for over an hour, and when she woke up, struggled to comprehend what she'd done. Over the next several weeks, she was tested and questioned by both scientists and other psions, repeating what she'd done. She thought her life had become insane enough- but what came next was something unprecedented.

### Climbing The Ladder

After several weeks of testing, she was called to the Magister's office, where to her surprise, both the Vicar General Finn Gerstner and a representative of XCOM, Iosif Bronis, were there. Iosif and Gerstner gave her some much needed answers- what she had done was biopathy, the telepathic manipulation of cells- and only Ethereals had been able to perform such actions (with the exception of certain Bringer units). Bronis gave her an offer to join XCOM, which she accepted. However, her parents were not pleased with this, which resulted in a verbal confrontation that sent Dawn into tears. Two days later, a Skyranger picked her up and sent her into the next stage of her life. This also caused a small split in her family, as her parents refused to move to the XCOM family base, and instead moved back to their family home in Nashville, while her sister moved with her to XCOM, staying in the family base.

### It Ain't Easy Being Green

Her first few days at XCOM were rough. Her age and Trask level raised many eyebrows, especially from the famed XCOM veteran Carmelita Alba when she was eating her first meal in the Mess Hall, leading to a panic attack. However, before she went under the knife for her surgeries, it wasn't all rough beginnings for her. She met Kunio Azuma, XCOM's resident non-Sovereign teleporter, who she quickly became good friends with (unbeknownst to her, at the suggestion of Sovereign Agent Fiona Dorren). She also was seen as a 'little sister' figure by many women in her section of the Barracks, like Swedish telekine templar Vihelmina Forslund and Chinese infantry Lian Zhao. She also briefly met one of her soon-to-be mentors, Geist, who she looked up do due to his fame, as well as his action of chopping one of the Battlemaster's arms off.

### Biopath Rising

After her successful surgeries and augmentations, she met with Geist, who, while a good teacher, had a lack of emotions and relatability to her. Yet, his experience as a teacher and telepath would go on to forge an effective student-teacher bond; Dawn would learn lessons from Geist, some of which would be eye-openers from her, and in turn, he had a true student. Next up on the list was the Ethereal Aegis, who would be her primary teacher in both defensive and offensive telepathy. Using his millennia of experience, he would help her hone her skills as a soldiers, as well as provide moral and encouraging support, as well as advice when needed. Last but not least was Runi'Carreria'Borelia, a Borelian defector who had joined XCOM along with her mate, and became a member of the Chimera Division. Her years of combat experience, combined with her caring mother-like personality made her a just fit for Dawn, and the two became close.

However, as her time progressed, and Dawn began to witness more tragic events, like the Destruction of Busan, as well as dealing with the stresses of being in XCOM, she has time and time again displayed massive mood swings- in fact, after witnessing the usage of the Reinarm Cannon on Busan, she entered an unusually bloodthirsty rage, using the Dreamscape to beat a copy of Patricia Trask to death with her armored fists, only snapping out of it when Kunio confronted her, leading to her crying about how she was afraid of becoming like Patricia with her power- another major concern for her. She initially tried putting enemies to sleep in the Dreamscape, but after several talks with Geist and XCOM Psychologist Hayley Yates, she dismissed it as a coping mechanism with the guilt and stress of killing. Although she awaited her first mission with some eagerness, she worried that she may not be able to handle, or was really worthy of being in XCOM at all.

On a more positive note, she has grown more used to the environment and has made more friends- in particular, two cases stand out. The first being Sierra Morrow, and by extension, Anna Pavlova and Ted Holden. After participating in a chance Dreamscape encounter, Dawn met Sierra and her two friends in the Mess Hall, after which she participated in several simulations with them. Dawn in turned earned Sierra's trust and respect, as well as a friend. The second one was one that on a surface level would sound like something out of a movie.

### Two Teenagers: One Human, The Other Ethereal

Dawn initially met Caelior during practicing for the First Annual Ethereal Basketball Game. They initially talked about human and Ethereal sports, as well as briefly discuss their past military experiences. After Dawn scored the winning goal for Caelior's team, they exchanged contact information. After watching an episode of the XCOM TV show, making sarcastic comments about the realisticness of the show, they later practiced with their Psionics in the Dreamscape, with Dawn commenting on his strong telepathic defenses. While showing Dawn snippets of his childhood, Caelior, feeling immense regret and anger over how he was used as a tool during his time in the Empire and Collective, summoned a telekinetic storm which almost killed Dawn, while showing her vision of the war, including a battle with a Synthesized fleet. While he calmed down, it made her feel immense sympathy for him. Realizing that the two were not so different due to their positions, Caelior informed Dawn on why he had failed before, and told her that he must learn from her mistakes, if she was to become a better person and soldier.

## Personality & Traits

Dawn, having relatively little military experience before joining XCOM, is somewhat nervous and cautious about herself in combat, leading herself to sometimes second-guess her motives for joining, as well as the benefits and consequences of her choices. Yet, she's slowly been overcoming this thanks to XCOM Psychologist Yates and her fellow soldiers. She also fears losing who she once was, and becoming a person unrecognizable even to herself. Yet even in XCOM, she finds moments where she can let loos and be a teenager again, like her nineteenth birthday party, or the First Annual Ethereal Basketball Game, or even going to an impromptu pool party with some of her bunkmates. Whatever the case, Dawn's mentality is getting used to XCOM- but at what cost?

Dawn tends to have an optimistic look on life, trying to find positive aspects of something to motivate her or keep her spirits up. However, her youthful actions and attitude, which would be seen as somewhat immature, is something she keeps to herself, trying to fit in by acting as mature as possible. This leads to her making constant snarky jokes and comments about events or people mentally, trying to put a comedic spin on things to better normalize herself with the situation. She also tends to be honest, albeit a bit emotional at times. She's seen by many in XCOM as a 'little sister' type of person, due to her age and maturity.

## Skills & Capabilities

Being a telepath with a Trask Level of 90, Dawn has the potential to become an extremely deadly psion. As she is constantly training and improving her abilities, there is no doubt Dawn will be a devastating weapon on the battlefield. However, what makes her stand out is her developing mastery of biopathy- an extremely rare form of telepathy only found in Ethereals and certain Bringer units. So far, she has gotten a basic control over destructive biopathy (performed by the Ethereal Mortis'Ligna), essentially unbinding the organic cells of an individual completely melting them into a primordial goo. However, it is unknown whether she can conceptualize constructive biopathy (performed by the Ethereal Sana'Ligna), though she has her eyes set on it, as well as other possible uses of it post-war, like its utilization in chemistry, farming, and medicine, to name a few scenarios.

Her skills with weapons are on par with the standard XCOM soldier. Dawn prefers to use symbiote and plasma grenades in combat. She currently uses the XCOM plasma rifle for an offensive weapon, though she aims to upgrade to the Psi Rifle as soon as she gains a better foothold over her telepathy. Physically, she is on par with many XCOM soldiers, however, due to her age and development, she is substantially physically weaker than her adult comrades.

## Notable Relationships

* Aegis- Teacher and mentor in the field of telepathy; Ethereal
* Caelior- Close friend
* Runi'Carreria'Borelia- Teacher and mentor in the field of weapons usage- mother-like figure; Borelian
* Charlotte Conley- Biological Mother
* Geist (Lukas Von Theil)- Primary psionic teacher and mentor
* Gerald Conley- Biological Father
* Grace Conley- Twin Sister (identical, save for a birthmark on the neck)
* Lian Zhao- Close friend- XCOM infantry soldier
* Mary Stevens- Close friend from the PRIESTS- Magus-class aegii psion
* Kunio Azuma- Close XCOM friend and mentor-like figure- Leviathan-class teleporter psion
* Vihelmina Forslund- Close friend- Magus-class telekine templar