Nian was born as a tiger, in Asia. The tiger awakened to her true nature while she was still young (Nian vaguely remembers her mother, who never returned from a hunt one day), and was befriended by a local village boy. He discovered her naked human form sunbathing on a rock near a waterfall. She spent a lot of time with the boy, in both human and tigress form, learning a little bit about human behaviour, such as clothes are important for some reason, and basic communication. She found out his name was Jin. He was the one who named her Nian, which means the beast. In Chinese mythology the beast Nian comes at springtime each year and will sometimes kill and eat villagers. There is a special ‘lion dance’ that is performed at each Chinese New Year to keep the beast away. For a while they played almost every day. Sometime she spent time in or near the village dressed in clothes that Jin had stolen for her, but she stays away from the other villagers, who seemed uncomfortable around her. Time passed. One day there were some new people in the village who were dressed in strange dark clothes that looked hot and impractical, but she didn't pay them much attention as she then had new cubs to care for. It was a sign of her trust and loyalty towards Jin that she showed her cubs to him, and even let him come play with them. One day he did not come to visit her family. After a week concern overwhelmed her maternal instinct and she wnt to the village to find him. The trap was sprung. Her last image of Asia was a hysterical young boy being restrained, sobbing and screaming, while the village elder shook hands with one of the strangely clad strangers. Memory then becomes blurry. There was pain……. there was a cramped dark box that moves .…….then grogginess……… then a cell. Wherever she had been taken she was aware of the other animals, she can smell their fear. Sometimes she spent days or weeks in the bare cramped cell. Other times she was moved to a brightly lit, white sterile room. The smell of other animals is stronger there. There are human faces, but she doesn’t remember what happened. Her whole body feels slow, alien and disconnected ……..it was impossible to think…….. One day the routine changed. She was stuffed in a box and let loose in what she came to learn was the barrens. By this stage she had developed a strong resentment of humans and as her head finally cleared, she bristled at the memory of her lost cubs. She survived by eating gangers, and learned to use her naked female form as bait. Her resentment of all humans is abated somewhat by kind acts here and there. A middle-aged man started leaving small amounts of syntha-meat out for the local big cat. An old lady showed concern for the naked, pretty Asian girl (totally ruining a hunt in the process), and insisted on taking her into her home and feeding her. This became regular visits for the tiger, where she could get food, albeit strange tasting, and the old lady started teaching her some English (as well as knitting-which the tiger humoured her with). She gradually became aware of a large, weird smelling, pointy eared human who shared her territory. One time, she stalked and killed ganger that he was tracking. Another time she was attracted to an alley by the strong scent of blood, only to find the man already crouching over the body. She was warned off by a snarl. The next week she was ambushed by a large group of gangers who wanted revenge on the man-eating tiger. It didn’t go so well for her, but out of nowhere the strange man was there……. killing. She regenerated back to full health soon after, and a type of respect and understanding was born. They were both hunters. They shared their territory. Occasionally they shared a meal. She tolerated his dog.
To learn more about people and how to fit in better Nian will sometimes venture in to the city to go sit in parks or malls and observe people. She is especially interested in how they interact with one another. A curious thing happened the first time she went into a park…the latin names of the plant species around her popped into her head, and she knew what features made each plant identifiable. From this she developed an interest in hanging around gardening stores and has spent a bit of money on exotic plants as she is trying to develop her own little slice of jungle in the burnt out barrens’ apartment that she occupies (she has wasted a lot of money on plants that have died, but is getting the hang of keeping them alive now). She also found an old fountain/water feature that still works (which she likes to play in), and has it in the middle of her green“flat”. Nian doesn’t know low long ago it was since she was taken from her home. She does not know how long she spent at the place with the white room. She still thinks about the young village boy from time to time but thoughts of him and her lost cubs make her sad and inclined to take pleasure from eating people. Since she has found her freedom in the barrens almost a full cycle of seasons has passed.