...Or "I was an alien superhero"

Two sides of the same coin.

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All About Mina: As Real As It Gets

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Back Cover to the "Starleafgirl: Origins" graphic novel.

• Eyes: Blue.
• Hair: Blond, long.
• Skin: Light peach.
• Height: 5'4.5" Earth feet.
• Weight: 125 Earth pounds.
• Earth Name: Mina Sorcha Aishling

Mina was an ordinary girl... on her planet, anyhow, before that fateful day she decided to take the path less traveled. Since all of this happened on another planet and I don't really feel like elaborating at the moment, suffice it to say that she came across someone in need.

This person was badly injured and most likely wasn't going to make it to the nearest hospital. In rather unoriginal but true way, Mina found she had the ability to heal others with her touch. This wasn't something her people could normally do nor was it something easily explained by science.

It was, however, explained by the much-rumored emergence of "mutants" -- people who could do extraordinary things. Afraid of what might happen to her if someone found out what she could do, she designed an alternate persona to wear in the off chance she came across someone else who needed help and dubbed her something that more or less translates to English as Starleafgirl or, more literally, "(Female) Child of the Stars and Leaves."

Mina came to Earth because she wanted to find out what she could about the ~confirmed~ mutant phenomenon on other planets. She had jumped at the first chance she got to participate in the Intragalactic Student Exchange Program (the I.S.E.P.) sponsored by her planet's government. It's a program for elite students (her grades were very good and she had to write an essay as well as submit to an extensive psychological evaluation and health check up) to travel to other planets and learn about their cultures. The exchange program switches herself and a willing alien participant; each is required to submit weekly reports to the Ten'equai (chairpersons) of the program.

Mina happened to be chosen to study Earth. She made up an Earthling name -- which was subject to approval for quality control and realism purposes (great job they did, huh?) -- and was given a cover story for herself. She now attends school at a Catholic all-girls high school in Manhattan called St. Nicholas's.

Mina corresponds regularly with her Earthling counterpart, who attends a special school for exchange students on Mina's homeworld, partly so she can better understand Earth (specifically American) ways but also because she happens to get along well with the Earth girl called Kat. And of course she tells Kat about all the -- what's the word -- 'cool' places to go on her planet.

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Starleafgirl: Girl From Above

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Front Cover to the "Starleafgirl: Origins" graphic novel.

• Eyes: Green.
• Hair: Brunette, long (but usually tucked into hood so it looks short).
• Skin: Light peach.
• Height: 5'7" Earth feet.
• Weight: 130 Earth pounds.
• Species: Sa'equai
• Codename: Starleafgirl

As a side note, Starleafgirl is more buxom than her Real Life counterpart as well.

Having just arrived on Earth as an I.S.E.P. student, Starleafgirl hasn't had any adventures yet. "Astraleaves!" is a modification of her original idea for her Earth battlecry; her original one was in Latin and goes something along the line of "Astri frondescent," but then she realized she didn't want to be mistake for a witch, so she changed it. She meant her codename, and battlecry, to evoke both the awe of the stars and the vitality of lush green plant-life, but cultural differences get in the way of people understanding it.

Because Mina never came across anyone in dire need before she transferred to Earth (her homeworld is generally a very peaceful planet ;D), Mina had no need to modify her alternate persona. Mina did, however, have to modify the codeword she utters in order to transform -- a transformation aided by advanced technology, by the way -- because it was in her homeworld's tongue and someone showing up on Earth speaking that language possibly making the headlines at the same time that Mina'd gotten selected for the I.S.E.P. program as Earth's ONLY exchange student would look rather suspicious if anyone from her homeworld read about it later.

Her outfit is mostly red-and-white, made from a stretchy material as well as cloth, with tan boots.

When she utters her codeword "Astraleaves!" to transform, a light green luminescence emits from every inch of her body, covering her completely, and then falls off of her body like glowing leaves, which then disappear. It's a holographic projection, an animation if you will, that she designed to happen during the transformation.

Starleafgirl's staff.

Starleafgirl seems to have the ability to summon a staff at will, as well, but, like her outfit transformation, it's actually advanced technology aided by nanobots. She always wears a silver (the color, not the metal, although it is metallic, but it's an alien alloy) bangle on her right wrist, which appears to be a perfectly ordinary piece of jewelry until she pushes in the two green gems and swiftly turns it in toward her body. At that point, the bangle snaps off and becomes straight, quickly growing in Starleafgirl's left hand she's gripping a silvery metallic staff, a large green gem at either end. Her staff can absorb laser energy, harmful or not, as a result of the alien metal that's used in it; it was designed this way because people have laser guns on her homeworld instead of guns like we'd use here on Earth.

Starleafgirl's trusty sidekick, K.I.T.A.R.A.

Her last piece of equipment is a small, Cetra-class computer capable of flight named K.I.T.A.R.A. (the anagram only translates into her native tongue, but for us it would be something like "{K}compact {I}supercomputer {T}companion {A}and {R}knowledge {A}base"). It's about the size of a large marble and glows the same green as her eyes (although the glow is turned off most of the time so it doesn't draw attention to itself). It's primarily solar-powered but does have an independent power source within itself as a backup. If damaged, it would use nanomachines and diagnostic subroutines to repair itself from the inside out. It's capable of speech and has the entire knowledge of Starleafgirl's people within it, but it will never tell a stranger anything. Good luck trying to interface with Starleafgirl's computer if it doesn't want to.

Starleafgirl is tight-lipped about the full scope of her powers, never revealing to anyone everything that she can do, but her powers and abilities are as follows:

Abilities:

Computer Savvy because she comes from an advanced civilization.

Staff-Fighting because she's received training for such as a means of self-defense; her staff absorbs laser energy (for why, see a previous paragraph). As far as Unarmed Combat goes, she's only trained in ways to defend herself, but that doesn't mean she can't throw a punch. ;)

Green Bioluminescene that occasionally flashes in her eyes, particularly when she's being emotional, because of her alien heritage.

Superior intellect, stamina, and speed, but only due to her Super Strength and Super Agility and alien heritage, which happens to mean she's better than the average human. She can beat most people in Track without really trying, and can figure out most things quickly but she'd always get beaten by someone who has Intellect, Stamina, or Super Speed as a Power.

She also has 20/7 vision, which is pretty average for people from her planet, but extremely impressive here on Earth (peak human is about 20/10-20/8; hawk vision is 20/2). She doesn't have any other enhanced senses other than those mentioned in Powers.

Powers:

Night Vision because of her alien heritage.

Super Strength because of her alien heritage.

Super Agility because of her alien heritage.

Flight because of her alien heritage.

Healing Touch that glows with her usual green bioluminescence for 1 second on the skin of the person who was just healed. Her touch has cured every condition she's come across; the ultimate exception would probably be death, of course.

She can heal herself as well, but this shouldn't be mistaken for a Healing Factor because she needs to put conscious effort into it; a Healing Factor is passive. Even if she doesn't have to touch the place to heal it (although that helps), she has to concentrate really hard in order to heal the wound/disease/etc. in herself.

Weaknesses:

Like all of her race, gold burns her to the touch and makes her ill (headaches, stomachaches, overall not feeling well). If she were stabbed with a gold weapon or made to be around large amounts of gold for any long period of time, it would probably have more serious effects on her. Luckily, however, gold seems to be almost as rare on Earth as on Mina's homeworld.

Because her people are natural flyers, everything on Mina's homeworld is designed with wide open spaces and high ceilings. Because of this, both Mina and Starleafgirl possess a certain degree of claustrophobia, which might get worse depending on how badly she panics during the situation.

Coming from a (mostly) peaceful planet as she does, Mina is naive when it comes to the big, bad world out there, which may mean that she'll trust people she really shouldn't and place herself in dangerous situations without being aware of it. It also makes her reticent to commit acts of violence, even when necessary.

Her last weakness is more of a personality flaw but, on the battlefield, it can lead to trouble. Starleafgirl seems to alternate a lot between being indecisive about what the best course of action to take next is and being too impulsive without really thinking things through.

Starleafgirl = a dream girl? Closer to the truth than her fans would realize, since Starleafgirl is just a holographic projection.

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