Inky the Cockatoo

*"You call it vandalism, I call it art."* - Inky

Inky is a cockatoo living in an urban city, who is always rebelling and protesting whatever she sees as wrong. She considers herself a domestic freedom fighter. However, recently she has been arrested by the Chaotix for vandalism, and was trying to avoid her sentence. But she ended up assisting them in an important case, and befriended the team of detectives. In turn, they helped pay her legal fees, and currently she continues to help them in investigations as an unofficial member of the Chaotix.

## Concept and Creation

I always kind of wanted to have a bird character since I love looking at birds for some reason, but nothing ever really stuck unfortunately. But around the time of the SFCW's July art challenge to make a character out of 3 pre-selected colors, I ended up making a fox with a similar outfit to Inky's. Eventually I decided to evolve this design and color choice into a bird character, with heavy inspirations from Graffiti and street art, as well as inspiration from works that share the same aesthetic.

## Personality

Inky is a headstrong, cocky, and rash girl with a constant desire for freedom. She will always fight anyone who asserts themselves as a figure of authority, and it takes a lot of convincing and trust for her to show any sort of respect. On her own, she follows herself and her own rules. She has a strong sense of what she believes to be right and wrong, her morality is almost black and white. She is also much more akin to speaking through actions rather than words. If you upset her, she won't yell at you, but rather she'll try to trip you up or mess with your stuff.

But if someone were to gain her trust, she is extremely loyal to the ends of the earth. She'll give said person nicknames, gifts, and spend a lot of her time with them. She'd do anything to protect them, and will always have their backs when she's called.

## Abilities

**Spray Gun**

Inky possesses a golden, single-hand gun that doesn't fire bullets. Instead, it is hooked up to a spray paint can and "fires" the paint. It is more precise than the can alone, and is very easy to handle. She always carries extra cans as ammo, and most of the time uses her weapon for graffiti and tagging purposes. She can also use the spray on other people, which at first may seem to be ineffective and merely miscoloring her opponent. But if not washed off after a few hours it may cause infections or allergic reactions. Even worse if she sprays it in someone's face, as the chemicals are toxic to injest, and can cause loss of eyesight if sprayed in the eyes and left untreated. This is precisely why she wears her goggles and uses her scarf to cover her mouth when using her weapon.

**Trick Blades**

Inky is also an avid rollerblader. She prefers it to walking, and sometimes has disorientation when switching to walking as she is so used to rollerblades. But when on her wheels, she is pretty shockingly fast. Not enough to surpass some particular hedgehogs, but fast enough to make the average person gawk. Not to mention on her rollerblades, she is almost constantly moving, making her very evasive and agile. She is also a lover of rollerblade tricks, and will jump, twirl, and flip as much as she can just to show off.

**Speedpaint**

When taking the time to actually make real graffiti art (instead of merely tagging), Inky is surprisingly quick. While variables such as size and materials used can affect how long she takes, she still is faster than most other graffiti arists, about ten minutes faster than average. Now the quality of her work is debatable, but it certainly has effort put into it to try and look as beautiful (or as cool) as possible.

## History

### Rebel Without a Cause

Avi has always been a city bird. Born in the concrete jungle, she has seen all sorts things growing up. But as a fledgeling, she had always a fascination with the rebellious counter-culture she had witnessed on a day to day basis. So, at about the age of 10 she began trying to associate herself with these people, hanging out in places where they would go. This led her to frequent her neighborhood's skatepark, which is where she first learned how to get a handle on her rollerblades.

But as cool as it was being part of the "rebel" crowd, Avi wasn't sure just who or what she was supposed to be fighting against. Politicians? Police? "The Man"? But, regardless of what it was, she was still enjoying her life, albeit a rebel without a cause. Around this age, Avi also got into the practice of graffiti art. Although she well knew that it was illegal, something about putting crazy colors and beauty onto the boring gray city walls had an appeal to her. She sucked at first, of course, but she was always trying to get better, and do more and more every day. Eventually it began to seem so obsessive that her friends gave her the nickname Inky for all the paint she left around the city.

However, this rebel found her purpose on a fateful day. A human man by the name of Dr. Ivo Robotnik, with his massive robot army, had taken siege of her city and occupied it for a good while. But Inky refused to accept this fate, and every single day during the occupation, she would do everything within her power to sabotage Robotnik's operation. While she had no special powers, she had her paint, which she would sometimes use to mess up his machinery, blind his cameras and robots, etc. And when she wasn't doing direct sabotage, she would only do her graffiti on his creations as artistic protest, covering up his logo with images of nature in response to the amount of pollution the occupation was causing. It was all significant enough for Robotnik to consider her a large nuiscance, but not a genuine threat. But to Inky, if it could keep him distracted, and could give hope to the people of her city, it all was worth it.

The occupation only lasted for about a month before world-renowned hero Sonic the Hedgehog, as well as a handful of his companions, had taken down Robotnik at the city and liberated everyone. While Inky didn't get to meet any of her city's heroes herself, she looked up to them and respected them highly for saving everyone.

### The Chaotix Detective Agency

As often as Inky could get away with her graffiti and never be caught, she would sometimes get a little too cocky. Sometimes she would be spotted in full view doing her work, or caught just as she finished up. But she would always escape in the knick of time. Unfortunately though, there had been enough sightings of her that police had a full description of what she looked like, and the task of tracking her down was sent to a private detective agency known as the Chaotix.

Inky, not even aware that the police were out for her, was very easily caught and arrested under the charges of vandalism. She either had to spend 100 hours in community service, likely being forced to erase her own work, or pay a fine which she had no conceivable way to afford. But on the drive back to the police station, Inky had overheard the trio of detectives chatting about another job they had, a missing persons' case. But the details seemed familiar to her, and so she spoke up, trying to tell them what she knew about their possible case. Luckily for her, her information seemed to give them a lead on this case, and surprisingly enough she had tagged along for the rest of the investigation, as her close connections to the city helped the Chaotix's mission run smoothly. After the case was resolved, Inky had actually formed a bond with the three, but she still expected to be taken to the station and forced to pay for her vandalism charges.

But, surprisingly, that feeling of friendship had been mutual between her and the Chaotix, and out of their own paychecks they actually paid off her legal fees. Out of gratitude for them, Inky has been assisting the three ever since, and has been cutting back on where she puts her graffiti as not to make them pay a second fine.

## Relationships

### Canon Characters

**Vector the Crocodile**

Inky looks up to Vector a lot. After all, he was the one who offered to cover her bail, and he's much sharper than meets the eye, which has gained her respect. They also have very similar music interests, and bond a little bit over that, even if Inky considers herself a more visual artist.

**Epsio the Chameleon**

Espio is somewhat of a disciplinary, older brother figure for Inky. She doesn't look up to him like Vector, and she has a distaste for his overly serious nature, and likes to pick on him about it, but she does listen to him when the situation calls for it. She trusts his judgement, but believes he could stand to lighten up a little.

**Charmy Bee**

Inky has a thing for teasing Charmy. Obviously it's because he is far younger than her, but also because he's, in a way, a younger brother figure to her. He's just an easy target for jokes, but Inky does respect him as a member of the team even if he does get on her nerves, and she believes he has a lot of potential.

## Trivia

* Her attitude and skills are heavily inspired by the games Jet Set Radio and Splatoon.
* Her spray-paint gun and outfit were also partially inspired by Tracer's "Graffiti" skin in Overwatch.
* Inky is of Indonesian descent
* When she is angry or startled, her head feathers will perk up, resembling a mohawk (akin to real-life Sulfur-Crested Cockatoos)
* Her instrument of choice is a heavy bass

## Gallery

original challenge from JulyBlasting Alexander Hamilton while making this