Kayla Sims

Kayla Sims In-Armour

Kayla Out-Of-Armour

## **With The Taskforce**

Kayla joined the *UNSC Acheron* upon its completion in 2554. Like the rest of its crew, Kayla joined *Taskforce Omega* upon its formation in 2557 once the *UNSC Infinity* returned after *The Second Battle of Requiem.*

## **Physical Description**

Kayla is an African-American female. She stands at the moderate height of 5’7” and weighs 134 lbs. During her downtime Kayla often wears a red hoodie given to her by her kids one mother's day, she wears it everywhere. Although not nearly as often as when she first joined up, Kayla likes to try fit in a gym session whenever possible, as her physical condition has been deteriorating as she grows older, despite her best efforts. Kayla has had the same hairstyle since she was a child; short on the sides, long on the top. Her hair is naturally styled, meaning when she wakes up, it’s left the way it is while still giving off the impression she’s spent time to get it the way that way. Having had a knack for art as a teen, Kayla likes to draw crude pictures of things she sees in her everyday life on her armour. While not necessarily regulation, Kayla chooses discreet places to put them and often disregards it when people point it out.

## **Personality**

She is very pragmatic, especially in her approach to politics or war. Despite being a Master Gunnery Sergeant, who would usually take time to make a decision, Kayla uses intuition in most cases. Rather than analyzing a situation to the fullest. As a Master Gunnery Sergeant and leader, Kayla is a brilliant tactician, however, she would always make an attempt at peace before resorting to violence. This is done out of a sense of responsibility rather than preference and she often puts very little effort into it.

Kayla always demands respect, not just towards herself but to everyone, she views disrespect as a serious insult and will not hesitate to berate team members or her men should they refuse to follow an order. Kayla is very mellow and level-headed. She is capable of remaining composed and calm in the most troubling and difficult situations. However, when Kayla reacts past her normal equable mood, there is no middle-ground. It is always either her normally reserved nature or lashing out with extreme emotion. Through the years, one thing that has always stayed in tact was Kayla’s fierce competitiveness. She sees everything to an end, and always makes every attempt to come out the winner.

While mostly cool-minded, Kayla can get emotional with personal matters, her mind can become foggy and violence would generally be her fallback in such situations. This generally only happens in times of utter desperation or emotional turmoil, which is rare for Kayla. Since achieving Master Gunnery Sergeant, when around friends she is much more outspoken and lively, while still resorting to her mellow mood for others outside her circle. When she began to have children, she was always fun loving and enthusiastic while watching them grow and teaching them.(edited)

When it comes to her men and her leadership, Kayla is always a voice of encouragement, her choice of words was always enough to encourage her men and overshadow her monotone voice. Given that it takes Kayla quite a while to trust anyone and let them in emotionally, she tends to make a big deal out of it when someone is moved from acquaintance to friend. she always considers someone's willingness to try something unusual or improbable more important than whether it succeeds or not.

All through her life Kayla has taken her role as a leader, and eventual Master Gunnery Sergeant, extremely seriously. To her, it is a responsibility, not a role or rank, there are many examples of this seen throughout her combat experience. However, Kayla’s stoic attitude and silence can - and has - interfere with expressing her thoughts or feelings to teammates. Situations where this occurs often lead to the above mentioned cloudy or foggy mind. After overcoming such situations she tends to spend some time alone to gather and compose herself, during this time she is very stubborn and obnoxiously sarcastic or cocky.

## **Bio**

Kayla was born in Detroit and was raised by her father and stepmom. Her birth-mother took residence in a hospital due to severe post-traumatic stress. As a child, Kayla bore witness to crimes and sometimes even death as she was raised in poverty within the crime filled streets of the city. Despite this, she always rose above it and took inspiration from her father and stepmom. Even amongst the crime and gangs dealt with on a daily basis, plus a very low and sometimes nonexistent income, the two of them still followed their dreams in pursuit of becoming artists. Between Kayla’s education, her mother’s hospital fees and the basic cost of living, her father and stepmother found themselves in very deep debt very early on in her life.

Kayla lived the majority of her school years squatting in apartments or abandoned houses until they were kicked out and moved on. However, throughout all this, her parents continued to show a love for art, and always had a smile on their faces. If they moved into a particularly horrid or rundown place, Kayla would help her parents liven it up by painting beautiful pictures. She was always inspired by their inability to believe life is nothing but beautiful and rare, and magnificent. And eventually, their faith paid off. Through the work of a community outreach program funded by a successful Japanese tech company, Kayla’s parents were able to host a small, but busy, art exhibition.

With the funds gathered from the exhibition, they were able to get back on their feet. Soon enough, the had a house in the suburbs, away from the majority of the city’s crime. Kayla began to excel at school, and visit her birth-mother more often. She would show her mother some drawings, and her mother would tell her stories and share some life lessons with her. When she was approaching the end of highschool and her eighteenth birthday, Kayla had a choice to make. She had become inspired by her birth-mother, and it gave her a thirst to join the UNSC and fight. However, she showed exceptional skill in art, and her father and stepmother disliked the idea of her joining the army.

After a lot of deliberation, Kayla decided she would join the Marine Corps, the Covenant threat meant not joining would be selfish. She passed basic with flying colours and was assigned to a Phoenix-Class Colony Ship as security against Insurrectionists. At this point, the Insurrection was weakening every day, but security for unarmed ships was still required. She was stationed aboard the ship for three years, during which time there were three attacks, two from the insurrection and one from a small band of Kig Yar pirates. By the end of her service aboard the vessel, Kayla had achieved the rank of Sergeant.

Between deployments, Kayla found herself on a shore leave that spanned several weeks. During which time, she stayed with her cousins who lived very close to the hospital her mother was now staying at. Over the course of her shore leave, Kayla had several one night stands, however, when she was undergoing a routine medical exam before redeployment, it was revealed to her that she was pregnant. Kayla was given maternity leave, and upon approaching the father, he denied ever having known her. Once she decided to keep the baby, Kayla stayed in her parents house for the duration of her pregnancy, always eager to return to the corp.

Just days after Kayla’s 23rd birthday, she gave birth to her son, whom she raised for 2 months before leaving to her father and returning to the corp. While some may think this cruel, Kayla felt the same, but she was compelled to lend her gun in the fight. Kayla was redeployed to the colony of Kholo. There, she was assigned her own squad. For the early part of the war, Kholo seemed to have been ignored by the Covenant, so the biggest security risk in Kayla’s mind was some innie joyriders stealing a cargo ship, or something along those lines. However, in 2539 Covenant Scout vessels made contact with the planet and there was little to be done to stop them. Thanks to Kayla’s quick wit, she was able to organise the remains of three squads, which then assisted in the evacuation of civilians. Kayla watched as the Covenant burned a symbol into the planet and laid waste to any civilians they left behind.

Shortly after this, Kayla was approached and asked if she wanted to join the ODSTs. She spent very little time contemplating it and kindly declined. She enjoyed being a Marine, a grunt, and she could never imagine herself being able to drop from the sky in one of those death traps. Instead, she was given the rank of Gunnery Sergeant, being able to bump up the ranks due to her efforts on Kholo and the recommendation of a surviving officer who was incapacitated during the fight and saved by Kayla.

She was transferred and became a platoon sergeant of 42 Marines in a reconnaissance platoon. She assisted in planning unit training and operations for four and a half years. During which time, she assisted in preparing those who would be fighting on the front lines and was often deployed with her platoon to battles such as the Battle of Miridem. Kayla then, once again took an extended shore leave. The majority of this time, she spent with her son, who she discovered, loved to draw. He would draw pictures of Mommy shooting aliens and yelling at other soldiers. The only time she did not spend with her son, she spent with a man she met on the trip to Detroit. He was an author, and Kayla and him got along *really* well. By the end of Kayla’s shore leave he, somewhat impulsively, proposed, and she, somewhat impulsively, said yes.

Upon her return to active duty, Kayla returned to her platoon and was almost immediately deployed to Actium, where a large majority of the 42 Marines in her platoon perished. They fought for nearly the entire battle but were ultimately forced to pull out after significant losses. Meaning they weren’t present for the detonation of two nukes and the glassing of the colony. Although she was affected by the loss of over two thirds of her platoon, she was quickly reassigned to Reach. Over the next seven or so years, Kayla continued to serve the UNSC Marine Corps, and occasionally took leave to visit her family. She got married, and even fit in the time to have a second child, though a surrogate was used. Slowly, she made her way through the ranks, and by the time the Covenant invaded Reach, she had reached the rank of First Sergeant.

During the Covenant invasion of Reach, Kayla fought with her men in the UNSC counter-attack across the Viery territory. She was forced to order a retreat when the Covenant Supercarrier *Long Night of Solace* appeared and crippled any home-field advantage the UNSC had. Reassigned to New Alexandria, Kayla was tasked with coordinating and assisting in the mass evacuation of civilians in the city. Kayla, along with any forces she could get, assisted in evacuating a lot of the civilians aboard the civilian transport craft *6 Echo 2*. Unfortunately, the forces left to guard the docks were insufficient and the pilot had no choice but to attempt an escape. Kayla watched as the transport was shot down and crashed into the harbour.

Eventually, Kayla received the order for all UNSC forces to abandon Reach, and she left the planet aboard the *UNSC Dawned Horizon*. Upon the ship’s return to Earth, Kayla was promoted to Master Gunnery Sergeant, due to her heroic actions and bravery showing throughout the Fall of Reach. She was reassigned to *Cairo Orbital Defense Platform* which was home to a large garrison of Marines stationed there in an effort to repel any potential boarding parties. During the *Battle of Earth*, Kayla fought to protect Cairo station and watched in horror as the Covenant slipped past Home Fleet towards Earth. Despite wanting nothing more than to be on Earth, fighting, Kayla and her men remained on *Cairo Station* for the duration of the *Battle of Earth*, protecting Lord Hood and the station from any further boarding attempts.

After the battle, Kayla assisted as she much as she could for several months, before requesting a leave of absence. She took half a year to be with her son and newly born daughter, she told them stories and they made her a card. The end of the war with the covenant, as well as the time spent with her children, made Kayla think deeply about returning to the Corp, but in the end she caved. Kayla was redeployed on *Cairo Station* until, a year later, the *UNSC Acheron* was introduced to the world.

## Quotes

- *”Theirs not to make reply, Theirs not to reason why, Theirs but to do and die.”*

- *”Hold yourself responsible for a higher standard than anybody expects of you. Never excuse yourself.”*

## Music

- **Theme Song:** Zack Hemsey - "Don't Get In My Way"