Daphne Rudko
From Survival Of The Fittest
Name: Daphne Rudko
Gender: Female
Age: 16
Grade: 9th
Extra Curricular Activity: N/A
School: Barry Coleson High
Appearance: Daphne stands at a height of about 5'2", and possesses a thin, almost sickly looking frame, which is probably due to her past illness which she has long since recovered from. Her form is rather plain, as are the clothes she usually wears. Often she is seen wearing rather casual attire that hangs someone loosely around her stick-like form. Her pale complexion, in combination with her scrawny appearance, tends to give others the impression that she is physically weak and fragile. Her dark blonde hair is cropped short, close to her chin, with a fringe framing her pale face. As for her facial features, Daphne possesses a small, round face with large grey eyes, thin eyebrows, a small button nose, and small lips. It is her face that gives her the appearance of a child. However, her eyes, though large and rounded, are slightly downcast and framed by unarched eyebrows, making her appear sullen and closed. She has a rather androgynous looking appearance, due to her slight frame and plain-looking facial features.
Various bruises and scars linger as a result of a history of endless abuse, though her face appears unscathed save for the faint remnants of a bruise under her right eye. They are quite visible, for Daphne had never seen any point in concealing them.
Biography: Ever since a very early age, Daphne has lived her childhood life close to death. Being born premature, the adults who cared for her were convinced that she would never live past her first year, yet her parents struggled as hard as they could and spent as much as was possible to support their sickly child. Thankfully, she managed to survive, perhaps by a miracle, as was remarked by one of the doctors who surveyed her health. However, as a growing child, Daphne had always sensed resentment from her parents, who had gotten themselves in and out of debt in an endless cycle simply so that their daughter could at least survive infancy.
This feeling seemed to intensify when Daphne was diagnosed with active tuberculosis. Due to the fact that her parents were already in debt after spending so much trying to keep their prematurely-born daughter alive, they were reluctant to treat Daphne immediately. Eventually, they did bring Daphne to the hospital to be treated. By then, Daphne, already suffering from poor health, was once again on the verge of death. It took Daphne nearly a year to completely recover, and as a result, she was forced to miss a year of her grade school education. Though Daphne eventually recovered, she remained plagued by her poor health and weakness. As the family struggled to bring themselves out of financial debt, constantly cutting corners and barely earning enough to make the most essential of ends meet, the resentment from her parents continued to grow into hatred. Eventually, it came to the point where they began to physically abuse Daphne, blaming them for all of their financial problems. While Daphne was fully aware of this hatred, she kept quiet, silently accepting this as something all parents did.
Throughout her grade school life, everyone seemed to ignore and avoid her, seeing her as plain and dull. She responded in turn by keeping to herself, always sitting in her own corner, engaging in solitary activities such as reading books on history. Once 4th grade started, she suddenly found quickly herself becoming targetted by a clique of girls, who simply saw her as a means of a power trip. Daphne took everything that was being thrown at her in a passive silence, complying to their whims, always being treated though she were a means of stress relief. After all, she never retaliated. She never told on them. She remained as passive as ever. Thus, the bullying continued until she entered 7th grade, and it was around that time when things began to cross the line. The bullying girls became increasingly violent, approaching the point where they were verbally threatening the life of the fragile Daphne. As a result, Daphne finally panicked in fear, for it was only now that she truly felt that her life was in danger. The following occasion the girls began their attack, Daphne lashed out out of fear for her life.
In the end, the leader of the girls had fallen dead, her throat cut by a knife and her forehead smashed in with a heavy rock. Daphne was immediately arrested and taken by police for questioning. However, it was quickly concluded that Daphne was only acting out of self defense, and also, due to her age, she was acquitted. In any case, Daphne now had a reputation among her fellow students as a murderer. As a result, students came to fear her, and avoided her even more out of fear. On the bright side, no one ever bulled Daphne again. Then again, she would always be treated like an alien or a monster. But as always, Daphne accepted this. After all, it wasn't as though anyone wanted to talk to her in the first place. Even as a junior highschooler, she was nortorious for the incident, for there are some who had heard faint rumors of a well planned and conspired murder.
But the abuse did not end there. Though Daphne's health gradually improved as she grew into her pre-teen years, her relations with her parents only worsened. Her father, an alcoholic, began to sexually abuse her as she entered junior high school while her mother simply turned a blind eye. By this time, humanity in Daphne's eyes became an ugly parasite on the world that was cruel and abusive by nature. After all, the history of humanity as she had spent reading of on her own was for the most part accounts of massacre after massacre: humans killing and hurting humans for their own pride and beliefs. Daphne's view on humans had transformed into something that was warped and cruel. After all, the countless occassions of abuse she had been forced to put up with was proof enough: humans were cruel by nature. As far as Daphne was concerned, the desire to abuse and feed off of the misery of others was a very human, voluntary feeling.
That said, Daphne was convinced that she had absolutely no need to feel remorse, after she had stabbed both of her parents with a paring knife as they slept. Although she was not in touch with society, she read the news. Murders and casess of violence in all forms imagineable happened everyday, committed by humans, inflicted upon humans. What was so shocking about that?
Daphne was let off yet again, due to her age, and due to the fact that she had supplied sufficient evidence that she was simply 'defending herself'. It fascinated her, to jump through loopholes in the law and get away with killing someone. It was further proof after all, that human morality was irrelevant.
None of Daphne's relatives were willing to adopt her after the incident, and it probably did not help that it was hardly the first time she had killed someone. She was sent to the community orphanage, where she continued to be alienated, as she always had.
"But what's the point in complaining? After all, that was life. Ladies and gentlemen, children of the world, this is humanity at its finest."
Other: Due to her extremely passive nature, Daphne had never experienced any cases of extreme emotion, other than fear. Once she feels afraid, she will not hesitate to lash out, believing that she can only escape by killing the second-party. She is a solitary character, quiet and closed-hearted, unwilling to trust others. Given that she has a weak and childlike, innocent appearance, others may be inclined to believe that she is helpless. Though she tends to exhaust easily due to her weak health, all of this seems to be irrelevant once adrenaline kicks in. She will lash out at anyone and everyone should she become afraid, but that would only occur should she feel her life is in danger. (Then again, it is SOTF, after all. Her life will constantly be in danger.)
Though she has become jaded with the world since an early age, she is actually honest at heart. Having not known any sort of love at all, she knows not how to hate. However, after all she has been through, she has developed a strong, resilient will to live, though she has lost all hope and faith in humanity. Trust is now an alien concept to her. To her, mankind is more than capable of willingly killing others out of their own greed and selfishness(SOTF itself is simply further proof of the fact). All they are to her are parasites, more than ready to take all they can from her, an easy target. However, if there was anything Daphne had a strong hold on, it would definately be her own life. After all...Daphne realizes that even she, herself, is only human.
Number: Girls 15
The above biography is as written by LadyMakaze. No edits or alterations to the author's original work have been made.
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Designated Weapon: Paring Knife
Conclusions: What a complete and utter drama story...(heh). Daphne'll probably get a kick out of her weapon, seeing how it was the same type of knife that she used to kill her parents. I don't really see anyone really teaming up with her...as I see it, she's just a lifeless doll, really, and the fact she won't really trust might be her downfall. Rather wildcard, really. Might be a contender, depending on how she deals with having that weapon, of all things.
Contents |
Game Evaluations
Kills: 3; Marie Zaid, Eddie Serjeantson, Miranda Grey
Killed by: Jason Andrews
Collected Weapons: Paring Knife (issued weapon)
Allies: None
Enemies: Marie Zaid, Eddie Serjeantson, Miranda Grey, Jason Andrews
Mid-Game Evaluation: For a good portion of her time on the island, Daphne had drifted along by herself, avoiding all contact with others. It was at the waterfall that she first ran into Callum Hadley. Daphne attempted to hide in the nearby bushes, but Callum had heard her and called her out, assuring her that he wouldn't hurt her unless she attacked him. Callum explained to Daphne that he was looking for a girl named Beth. Daphne's only response to this was that Callum shouldn't bother, she was probably already dead anyway. At this, Callum left in a huff, once again leaving Daphne alone.
Soon enough, her inner sanctum was once again desicrated, this time by Glenn Hughes, followed closely by Jeremy Torres, Marie Zaid, Heather Pendergast, and Fred Hughes. The group seemed to think that perhaps she had murdered the corpse of Gabrielle Minase that lay in the immediate area. Daphne set them straight on who she had and hadn't killed as if it were nothing at all. At this revelation, the others seemed ready to leave, but it was Marie who approached the girl, thinking that perhaps an injury or fever had caused her delerium. At this, Daphne lashed out, slitting the girl's throat and sending her life to a crashing hault in front of the group. A few tense moments followed after the death of Marie, and the group that had come to the waterfall parted ways with Daphne. After a while, she too left the waterfall in search of a new destination.
Daphne found herself outside of the makeshift hospital, where a large group consisting of Aiden Ambrose, Daisuke Andou, Eddie Serjeantson, Miranda Grey, Mallory DeLuca, and the group from the waterfall had congregated to form an escap plan. Daphne remained passive to the events around her, that is, until Eddie made the mistake of getting too close to the bushes. Daphne lashed out at him, ending his life. Right afterward, Miranda ran out, horrified by Eddie's demise, and she too met her fate at the end of Daphne's blade. The rest of the group barricaded themselves into the hospital, and it was then that Daphne contemplated running away. Before she could, however, Fred threw a flashbang in her direction, effectively blinding her.
Heather took the opportunity to fire at her repeatedly, and several of the shots actually connected with Daphne, one taking out her eye. When her vision returned, she saw Glenn standing above her, telling her that he wouldn't allow her to leave so she could kill anyone else. Daphne lashed out at the boy, deciding that if her life was to end, she'd drag him into the abyss along with her. However, Daphne was no match for Glenn, and quickly found herself mere moments away from her deathbed. Much to her surprise and disbelief, Glenn didn't kill her. In fact, he spared her life. Never before had Daphne been treated with such compassion, and she had no idea how to react. Upon this startling turn of events where Daphne was allowed to leave with her life, she turned around to thank the Hughes boy... for everything.
It was then that the rattling sound of a gun echoed throughout the area surrounding the makeshift hospital, and the hot lead that had been emitted from its barrel pierced Daphne's chest. Jason Andrews had taken the opportunity to fire upon her when her back was turned. The Rudko girl didn't go down so easily, however, and it was only when Jason fired another burst of gunshots at her that her life was finally taken from her. The one thing that Daphne Rudko had struggled for so long to hold on to, her life itself, had been mercilessly ripped away from her only moments after Glenn had showed her compassion and quite possibly sent her life on a U-turn.
Post-Game Evaluation: Quite the little survivor, this one. She was a little crazy before she ever started in the SOTF ACT, what with the murdering of her parents and that school girl and all. Daphne was a scraper thoughout the game, and she fought viciously for her life. Had Glenn not spared her, she wouldn't have had her stunning "revelation", and truth be told, she probably wouldn't have been shot in the back moments later. Pity.
Memorable Quotes: "I've killed before. There was this girl at my old school who first made fun of me, and then hit me a lot. She also stapled my earlobes, saying that friends help eachother pierce their ears. When she threatened to stuff my hand into the incinerator, I slit her throat and crushed her forehead with a rock. And then there was my Dad. He hit me a lot, cursed me, did things to me...so I killed him. I also killed Mom too, because she woke up and screamed a lot....but then she hit me a lot too. But...I didn't kill that guy over there." - Daphne sets Glenn and company straight on her history of murder
"After going through so much, you've decided to put an end to all of this, by killing someone. Even if you don't like it, there's just no other solution for you, is there? Everything's a living nightmare and you want it all to end, yet you want to survive. You're driven to the point where all you can do is take someone else's life to save yourself." - Daphne gets into the head of Glenn Hughes
Other/Trivia
- When creating the design of Daphne Rudko, LadyMakaze had two characters in mind: Lain Iwakura from Serial Experiments Lain, and Tokiko Mima from Key the Metal Idol. Rudko comes from the name of a classmate, Jake Rudko.
- Daphne was in the same History class as Glenn Hughes.
Threads
Below is a list of threads that contain Daphne, in chronological order.
Your Thoughts
Whether you were a fellow handler in SOTF or just an avid reader of the site, we'd like to know what you thought about Daphne Rudko. What did you like, or dislike, about the character? Let us know here!
An interesting character, funny how her views on life mirror those of myself and a friend of mine *laughs*. Ironic death too, as soon as she finds people that'll let her live, she gets blasted by Jason Andrews.- Slayer
Daphne was actually one of my favorite villain characters, even though she was somewhat short-lived. She was one of the more... evolved, I guess... "evil" characters. She had reasons for what she did. I think that's why Glenn sparing her life was quite the momentous occassion... he was probably the first person to ever show the girl compassion. Then, her life ending seconds later added icing to the cake. It's like... she realized the error of her ways only to be gunned down by someone just like her. Bravo, Maka. - Megami
