Name: Grace; Gracie— no last name :P

Age: A year younger than Omorfiá so normally around 15-16 in oneshots, ages up from 15 in-fic.

Height: 5'4", 6 inches shorter than Donnie for that height difference 🥰 (IT IS MY CANON THAT HE IS TALL)

Species: Human

Appearance:

Important Features: Brown hair normally in long dreadlocks (didn't have the option in this Picrew). Large and soft brown eyes, wide nose with subtle nose bridge. Full lips, has dimples when she smiles 🥹

Personality: Compassionate, caring, smart, fatally trusting, naive, stubborn, curious, a smidge insecure.

Relationships:
Omorfiá - Sister, would do anything for
Donnie - best friend with a huge crush on
Leo - Respects like an older brother
Raph - At first nervous around, eventually another brother figure
Mikey - immediate little brother
Splinter - first and only father figure
Casey - annoying
April - she's okay with
Shredder - terrified of
Karai - also scared of
Nylla - becomes a mother/older sister figure
Bláthanna - oh God another Omorfiá (quickly protective of her)

Abilities: Though Grace is a human she has a natural interest and talent in anything computer related. She teaches herself how to assemble computers, code, and eventually hack. She also is the most emotionally stable and normal teenager of my characters.

Creation Backstory:
Alright, go back to picturing me, 13, an angsty teen. I created Omorfiá (currently wasn't her name), and decided this angsty character needed a friend. So I found another picture that fit well with Omorfiá's vibe and from there created Mávros, a ghostly sentient shadow that served as Omorfiá's "Jimny Cricket" and friend.

I needed to justify why this little ghost was tethered to and following Omorfiá around while being her own person and not just Omor talking to herself, so I decided this was the first person Omorfiá was forced to kill and the soul of this girl latched on to Omorfiá. (I'm really sorry it sounds so batshit crazy now I know.)

Very quickly this became unsatisfying because Mávros' story was leading to her wanting to become A Real Girl again ala Pinocchio or The Little Mermaid and I just wasn't vibing. While I was exploring this idea I came across a picture of a girl that immediately gave me the inspiration for Grace... you'll find that this is how most of my characters come to me.

I used Omorfiá and Grace as a duo in online roleplays. Because their backstories were integrated together (though changed from before, I promise, there is no murder anymore), I couldn't separate one from the other and have their backstories function. I actually tried that with Omorfiá and among other reasons it... didn't go well.

In the beginning Grace was a pretty one-note character, Omorfiá's side-kick and the cute smart girl that everyone loves. I started to combat her being only an extension of Omor by giving her a rebellious spirit. She's curious and more willing to explore and try new things than Omorfiá is. Eventually I built the dynamic that Omorfiá is very protective of Grace, to the point of not wanting her to go anywhere, whereas Grace is wanting to branch out and live unafraid and trying to encourage Omor to do the same. She's the character that pushes for more, and ends up widening their world when Omorfiá would rather hide and remain with what they've made.

Grace went through several shifts in her appearance, but with several core traits staying the same. She remained dark skinned (she's more mixed, so maybe a light-dark-skin) through the years, and I always kept her big brown eyes. She was supposed to be Omorfiá's balance, her foil in a way with her softer femininity while Omorfiá remained more rougher and masculine-leaning.

Her hair changed exactly once. Her first reference photo had short straight hair, and so I added that to her character just because that was my initial image of her. But I wanted to be more practical, and with the way they lived I wondered if she would be able to actually properly care for her hair, or if she even knew how to care for her hair in that style. So eventually I switched her hair to natural dreadlocks, and her hair has remained unchanged since then.

The main idea I had with Grace was for her to be "cute", and so with her body type I went for the more short and curvy look, which again was almost an intentional opposite from Omorfiá. Again, considering their lifestyle and what she does in her free time, I designed Grace to be fit and have some muscle, but also natural fat and curves.

Clothing-wise, I think Grace was the one with the most clothing changes out of the four characters. I don't really remember what she first wore, but I went through several different outfits and styles of clothing. At one point she wore a crop top inspired by another picture, later she wore a tank top with some sort of graphic on it? Eventually I settled with clothing similar to Omorfiá's, considering how cool or hot it becomes underground, and that Omor would shop for the both of them and Grace would want to emulate Omorfiá's style.

Because she wasn't a mutant I tried to compensate for her normal-ness by giving her a lot of skills. For a while she knew gymnastics, ballet, first aid, computer hardware and coding/hacking. Eventually I dropped the ballet, and then later on I dropped the gymnastics aside from being a little spry and flexible. I kept her first aid skills, but toned it down a bit and also gave Omorfiá some know-how.

Grace's ability to code and work with computers was a trait I fell in love with and have kept, even though it's a pain to actually write. But I wanted something she could connect to Donnie with, and something that she would do when Omorfiá wasn't around. I used to play around with the idea that she was Omorfiá's "guy in the chair", but eventually dropped it because it just didn't work for me.

I also gave Grace a collapsible bō staff as a weapon, among other gadgets of her own creation. I mostly wanted her to be matchy matchy with Donnie, but I also had some personal knowledge of the Bō staff that I could write in, and just enjoyed the graceful nature of the staff. I haven't really implemented this with her in a while, and I think I'm leaning towards dropping the staff and just letting her have some fun gadgets.

As I said in Omorfiá's part, at first these two lived in an abandoned apartment. Admittedly I don't remember a lot of details about this, but eventually I moved them to a subway car in an abandoned tunnel around a mile away from the Turtle's Lair. Omorfiá and Grace completely tore out the inside like one of those bus homes and turned it into a one-room home.

For electricity, Grace ran extension cords to a/multiple unspecified power sources and gave them lights, power to her computers, and their mini-fridge and microwave. They keep bottled water in the car and food in the mini fridge.

Grace and Donnie's relationship has always been based around Best Friends to Lovers but with a little forbidden twist. One thing I've never been able to settle on is how they meet and how she's introduced to everyone else. I believe I've settled on an accidental meeting in the sewers/tunnels and then secret meetings that are eventually discovered, but even that can play out in different ways and details can change. But yeah the reason Omorfiá hates Donnie is because he begins to "take away" Grace and Omor has lingering resentment for the turtles.

For her backstory, of course it changed very drastically once Mávros became Grace. Mávros' backstory was always ambiguous and vague, and that carried over to Grace's backstory as well, but I did give her a past before Omorfiá.

Spin offs:
SEVEN YEARS — Grace's story is a bittersweet one in Seven Years, and also only a slight tweak in her backstory to fit better into the altered world. I really enjoy her journey of self-discovery, and the budding romance that remains alive when she returns from her travels. Her curiosity remains a driving force within her that compels her actions and progress in the plot.

OFFICE ROMANCE — This is the story where Grace is the main character, and I really love it. I love dressing her up in pretty and probably unrealistic outfits for a secretary job. Her relationship with Donnie is always so fun to write and it remains fun even in this more modern setting of office work, that I have zero experience with. I also love writing her interacting with the other characters that she won't meet for a long time in the main fic.

If I had to describe Grace in one word: Sweetheart

If I had to describe Grace in two words: Cinnamon Roll.