Delta Emblock

Delta Emblock, designated Agent X10128B, was a Terran Dominion ghost who later joined Nova Terra's Covert Ops Crew. Born into poverty on New Sydney, she trained at the Ghost Academy alongside Nova as a member of Team Blue and became known for her precognitive ability, before the deceptions of the Defenders of Man and a series of memory erasures reshaped the course of her service.

Early life#

Delta Emblock grew up in poverty on New Sydney. Her mother died when she was seven, having contracted a fatal lung infection from a factory with poor working conditions. Her father spent the factory's compensation on alcohol, and Emblock was forced into factory work at the age of seven. The labor prevented her from going to school, learning to read, or forming friendships. She knew she was a telepath but could do nothing about it. She was nearly killed during a zerg attack on New Sydney and afterward suffered recurring nightmares of it. A wrangler eventually rescued her, and she enrolled at the Ghost Academy, though her formal training was delayed while she learned to read.

The Ghost Academy#

Emblock underwent literacy training in the Academy library. A week before her literacy test she met Nova Terra of Team Blue, already known to her for Nova's PI 10 rating. Nova accidentally scanned Emblock and learned of her past, though Emblock was more embarrassed by her illiteracy than by the scan, and Nova helped her study. Emblock passed the test and befriended all of Team Blue except Aal Cistler, who mocked her late literacy. When Cistler was expelled for drug use, Emblock replaced him as Team Blue's fifth member.

During a training exercise against zerg-bots she unlocked pyrokinetic ability, and Nova helped take out the controlling consciousness. The team was unsettled when Lio Travski was taken away for secret rehabilitation of his drug use and returned a changed person, and when Cistler used his father's political clout to return to the Academy. Nova Terra confided in Emblock that she was in a relationship with Team Blue's leader Gabriel Tosh, against Academy regulations, and Emblock worried for her. In a later urban combat exercise Emblock was downed by Red Team's Andie Dessai, but Travski's technopathic abilities carried Team Blue to victory. Afterward Director Kevin Bick and Superintendent Angelini combined the teams for an exercise on the fifth planet of the Baker's Dozen.

The Baker's Dozen#

On the anniversary of the Fall of Tarsonis, Emblock dreamed of Teams Red and Blue trapped behind enemy lines during a clash between terran and zerg forces, ending with a nuclear device that destroyed Team Blue. She knew the nightmare meant something but could not say what. The teams were combined into Team Purple under Gabriel Tosh and sent to the Baker's Dozen aboard the battlecruiser Cyrus. The zerg were found besieging Old Family heirs sheltering on the system's fourth planet, and the team engaged the Swarm to rescue the children. The fight turned against them, leaving the trainees stranded with the Cyrus crippled. While Tosh and Nova struck at the zerg hatchery directly, Emblock helped repair the Cyrus and then defended its perimeter until the zerg withdrew to protect their hatchery, allowing the ship to depart. On returning to the Academy, the trainees had their minds wiped, the mission having supposedly been canceled.

Service and trauma#

Emblock was targeted for recruitment by Project Shadowblade, but her precognitive abilities allowed her to remain hidden and avoid abduction. In 2503 she graduated from the Ghost Academy and took part in Operation: Exodus. An event later classified severely affected her, and she suffered severe trauma during an interrogation. After a failure in Operation: Dark Fire in 2504 she was recalled to the Academy for psychiatric evaluation, where the team noted she had become cold and distant, and she was assigned to Nova Terra for the duration of her rehabilitation. She then served in Operation: Queen's Gambit, Operation: Silent Runner, and Operation: Thunder Struck.

Covert Ops#

Years after the End War, Emblock was sent with Nova Terra, Stone, and Theodore Pierce to gather intelligence on a Defenders of Man base. The squad went missing shortly afterward, and her profile appeared in a secure Defenders of Man database. After Nova broke out of a facility in Sharpsburg, she found Emblock under attack by Defenders of Man forces and saved her, but the two were separated during the escape and Nova could not contact her again.

Emblock was later discovered alongside Pierce in a holding pen when Nova infiltrated Carolina Davis's compound on Vardona, her memories replaced and no recollection of Nova remaining. After the conflict on Vardona she was taken to the Griffin, where she was shown the actions she had taken in the name of the Defenders of Man. Not wanting the memories to remain, she asked to have them removed, which Nova and Reigel granted. Emblock then chose to work with Nova, abandoning the Terran Dominion to operate independently. When Stone refused to accept that the Defenders of Man had deceived him and escaped confinement, Emblock tracked him and ultimately helped persuade him that his false memories no longer made sense, leading him to have his neural inhibitor removed and go his own way.

Personality and abilities#

As a trainee, Emblock was considered to have a "bubbly" and highly social personality, with a tendency to fraternize that her handlers were advised to watch. By 2504 her behavior had changed, having become cold and increasingly distrustful of Dominion personnel after the interrogation preceding Operation: Dark Fire.

Emblock held a psi index of 7 and was known for her powers of precognition, alongside pyrokinesis, telepathy, and telekinesis. Because of her delayed training she lagged behind other ghost operatives of similar age and was regarded as having only moderate natural proficiency with weapons and tactics. Her pyrokinetic and precognitive abilities were considered unreliable, and her psyche profile advised that only trained and psi-resistant handlers interact with her, though her precognition gave her a higher than average mission completion rating.