Note: All things marked with * refer to items that are strictly MUX-related, and have no basis in the Marvel Canon.
Alias(es): Nita, Hard, 'Fish-Lips'
Parents: Namora & Talan (sorta on him)
Known Relatives:
Kymaera is the daughter of Atlantean hybrid Namora, first cousin of Namor, the Sub-Mariner (making Nita a first cousin once removed). She was initially assumed to be the daughter of Namora and her mate, Talan, but it was later revealed that she was a clone of Namora, created at the hands of Vyrra, the so-called 'banished one'. Due to some nasty Atlantean clones involved in a bloody attempt at revolt, clones were banned from Atlantis. However, that's neither here nor there at this point.
Kymaera grew up as Namorita with the pink skin of her mother (the mark of a hybrid with surface-dweller genes). She lived with her parents in the Atlantean city of Maritanis until her father was killed in a nuclear test. Nita was three at this time. She and her mother were two of the very few survivors. They fled to the Pacific Ocean and settled in Lemuria, where Namora took a human husband. After he was presumed dead, she was involved with a Prince of Lemuria, Merro, slightly annoying Merro's betrothed, Princess Llyra. Nita's mother died by poisoning shortly thereafter, and Merro died mysteriously around the same time. When Llyra took over Lemuria as Empress, she plotted with exiled Atlantean Prince Byrrah (another cousin of Nita and Namor) against Namor. Byrrah captured Nita and blackmailed her into helping the plot against her cousin. Through her own physical limitations, she failed. When Namor foiled the plot, he took Nita and gave her into the custody of a human woman by the name of Betty Dean Prentiss. Prentiss put Nita through high school and helped her learn the ways of the surface dwellers. Nita eventually graduated and went to college. Unfortunately, Prentiss was murdered by a renegade scientist. In her honor, Nita assumed her last name. Nita originally majored in theatre when she was in college, but eventually switched to an environmental studies major. While at first, she hid her Atlantean heritage, her friends and classmates now know who she is.
While on a field trip for one of her classes, Nita was present when Genetech's latest toy was trying to scoop up some irradiated soil. The soil was combined, and Terrax was reborn. Some other teenaged superheroes showed up (Nova, Night Thrasher, Speedball, Marvel Boy, and Firestar), and together they defeated Terrax. Then the Avengers snubbed them by showing up and taking all the credit and 'taking over from here'. Nita joined these 'New Warriors' to fill a niche in heroing society... young people who want to help out but keep getting no respect from their elders.
Nita's powers matched her well with Nova, then going by the sobriquet of 'Kid Nova'. Together, they spent a lot of time insulting one another, masking for quite some time their mutual attraction. During this initial time with the New Warriors, Nita was not the team leader yet. She fought with the team against Psionex, Terrax (again), the Sphinx, Gideon, the Force of Nature, Night Thrasher's 80-year-old maid Tai (that was a hoot) and just about anyone that stood in their way of helping people. However, all was not fun and games for this young woman. She, Speedball, and Darkhawk discovered a 'salvage' operation that was scavenging Atlantean artifacts to be sold to the highest bidder. She took off after the bloke in charge (Swimming Bear/Sea Urchin) and fought him. She lost, and he beat the tar out of her and scalped her. In revenge, Nita donned the Blood Code Carapace and took off after him, straining her relationship with her cousin. The armor has a special significance. The wearer is someone who is going out to kill or be killed. Needless to say, Nita didn't kill Swimming Bear, even tho she came really close to doing so. This crisis didn't help her internal angst regarding how she wasn't keeping true to her Atlantean heritage.
After recovering from this episode, and after Night Thrasher quit the team, Nita assumed team leadership as Marvel Boy was in the clink. She did her best, but her best wasn't good enough. She always tried to do what was right, but the lines of right and wrong were always fuzzy, and more often than not, the team would cause more trouble than they were trying to dispel. In one particular incident, the team was involved with their former enemies, the Force of Nature, in a fight in Trans-Sabal. The good-guy/bad-guy line was so fuzzy that in the end, Nita just pulled out the Warriors, as their interference had only escalated the situation. She was called before a Washington subcommittee after civil war broke out. While she was not deported or otherwise chastized for the Warriors' role in the Trans-Sabal debacle, the team learned that it seems that no one is really interested in peace.
Nita's troubles weren't over. She started feeling a little bit off, and the pressure from leading the team was getting to her. She decided to go partying one night, and foolishly got drunk and was taken advantage of by an Asian gent by the name of Ashu, who ran a gang called the Poison Memories. Ashu stole Nita's private book on her company, Oracle Inc. The book included inside info on the families of the New Warriors. As a way to get back at Night Thrasher, the Poison Memories maimed or killed the family members of most of the Warriors. Nita wallowed in guilt over her lack of control leading to the death of Rage's grandmother, the near-death of Angelica's father, the maiming of Richie's brother, etc. She was about ready to blow a fuse at this point.
So, she decided to take some time off. However, she had one piece of unfinished business to take care of. She went to the team's Crash Pad to talk to Nova. There, she told him she was leaving for awhile to get her head put on straight and finally admitted her feelings for him through a tender kiss. Still, she couldn't stay, so she left for Atlantis.
There, she found out from the Grand Vizier that clones weren't permitted in the city, and she flipped out. Before a great deal of damage could be perpetrated on the Atlantean guards (and scenery), she collapsed in much the same way she did when she first met the Mad Thinker (waaaaay back in NW #2 or 3). The Atlanteans took her to a laboratory, where her condition was diagnosed as similar to the one her cousin had gone through when he had had too much oxygen in his lungs. However, Nita was not to be cooped up in a lab, so she broke free and went into hiding.
It took Namor and Vashti to find her, after ransacking the lab and notes of Vyrra, the 'banished one'. They discovered proof that Nita was a clone of Namora, and that her genetics were very unstable because Vyrra had spliced in the genetic material of Atlantean warriors dead for centuries in an attempt to offset some of the problems that Namora had had upon reaching puberty. They didn't know what the result could be. Nita herself knew. She went searching for a new costume, a new identity. She allied herself with the sea, setting herself up as a protector of the weak, one with nature. When Namor found her, he discovered that Nita's skin had turned blue, and she had grown fins on her arms and legs. She also had gotten rather upset about many things. He talked her down, saying that her friends love her, and they'll accept her no matter what. So she departed and returned to the Crash Pad. There, she talked to Nova again, and asked if he could accept her as she was now. He said yes, and they kissed again (awwww :).
Nita rejoined the team as Kymaera. With the team, she helped fight the Gamesmaster with X-Force. She also took part in the fight against the Sphinx after being lost in an alternate world for a little bit. Nita remained with the team, cultivating her relationship with Nova, until the team took on a group called the Undertow. The Warriors had gone to the Rwandan refugee site to help with supplying the refugees with food and medicine. There, the Undertow attacked. The Warriors took a beating, and several members of the team were kidnapped, including Nita, Speedball, and Firestar. The rest of the team tracked them down, but Nita could not be rescued. Protocol, the leader of the Undertow, had had her implanted with a bit of hardware that stole voluntary control of her body from her, leaving her aware of what his people were making her body do. The hardware also allowed for limited teleport capabilities.
As a member of the Undertow, Nita's only name was 'Hard'. She wasn't allowed to speak or otherwise do anything to escape. Her body wasn't under her control. On her fifth mission with the Undertow, along with her fellow captive/operatives, they ran across the Warriors again. Rich, having lost his powers, was flying Power Pack's smartship Friday toward her location and got it stuck. She overrode her programming to save the ship, but she was teleported away by the Undertow before Richie could rescue her.
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