¶ Whitney Antares
Whitney Antares
¶ Overview
- Full Name: Whitney Antares
- Species: Human
- Born: April 2nd, 2670
- Place of Birth: CNK Station
- Gender: Female
- Sex: Female
- Sexual Identity: Questioning (likely demisexual)
- Faction: Freelance
Whitney Antares is an engineering prodigy who grew up at CNK Station, the daughter of Dr. Rhaenvaeh Canel. By the age of ten, she had designed improvements to grav technology that became bestsellers. At eighteen, she was recruited by Walker d'Ardenne to serve as the ship's engineer aboard the Chilkoot, a vessel she had helped design and build. She is currently in a relationship with Glyse McKenzie.
¶ Physical Description
Whitney is a slender young woman with blonde hair and piercing green eyes—the same striking green as her mother's. While she was once a lanky, awkward child who spent her days crawling through engineering hatches, she's grown into an attractive young woman, though she remains largely oblivious to this fact. She tends toward practical clothing—jeans and simple blouses when off-duty, her engineering jumpsuit when working. Her crewmates have tried (with limited success) to get her into more fashionable attire; the best they've managed is "jeans that are way too tight and a blouse that barely has buttons."
¶ Personality
Whitney is intensely curious and driven, with an almost instinctive understanding of how systems work together. She approaches problems with a childlike enthusiasm that belies her technical genius, often diving into projects with both hands before fully understanding the risks—a tendency that earned her a few broken bones in her youth.
She has a "titanium core" beneath her awkward exterior—growing up with Rhaenvaeh as a mother wasn't easy, and Whitney learned early to rely on herself. She processes information and emotions faster than most can follow, though she often struggles to articulate what she's feeling. She has little experience with social norms and romance, having spent her formative years surrounded by scientists rather than peers her own age. Her crewmates have been working on building her confidence and assertiveness, with notable success.
Despite her sometimes awkward exterior, Whitney forms deep attachments to the people she considers family, whether by blood or by choice. The loss of loved ones hits her particularly hard, and she has a tendency to throw herself into her work when processing grief. She's been left behind by people she cared about more than once, and while she's learned to accept it, that history has left its mark.
She has a deep respect for pilots and has learned to think about engineering from a user's perspective, not just a technical one—a skill that makes her designs practical as well as innovative. Under pressure, her anxiety falls away and she becomes calm and focused—when cultists planted a bomb on Corona Astra Station, her response was a smirk and "just another day on the Chilkoot."
¶ History
¶ Early Life
Whitney was raised at CNK Station, the only home she ever knew. Her mother, Dr. Rhaenvaeh Canel, encouraged Whitney's natural curiosity and experimental nature, even when those experiments resulted in trips to the medical bay. From her earliest years, Whitney showed an aptitude for understanding and improving mechanical systems.
She was close with the McKenzie family, particularly Glyse and David, who she considered like older siblings. Nyana McKenzie, whom Whitney called "Aunt Nyana," was a warm presence in her childhood, and her death in 2680 was one of the defining losses of Whitney's young life.
¶ Prodigy at CNK
Whitney's talents manifested early. By age five, she was keeping detailed notes on her experiments. By ten, she had designed improvements to grav coil technology that were incorporated into the CNK Glider Pack—one of the Institute's bestselling products and their number one seller for non-spacecraft applications. The royalties from this invention alone made her independently wealthy.
As she grew older, she worked alongside researchers like Dr. Pendleton and Dr. Wakeridge on increasingly advanced projects, including experimental wireless system connectivity technology. Her intuitive grasp of physics sometimes outpaced even the senior scientists' ability to explain why her designs worked—they just did.
¶ The Chilkoot Project
In 2686, when Whitney was sixteen, her mother introduced her to Walker d'Ardenne, a wealthy client commissioning a custom ship from CNK. Despite d'Ardenne's initial surprise at her age, Whitney was put in charge of the engine installation and quickly impressed him with her suggestions for improving the stock Brachio-class freighter he had selected as the base for his ship.
Over the next two years, Whitney worked closely with the future Chilkoot crew as they came to CNK for various stages of the build:
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She met Emmy Sinclair in 2687 and initially dismissed her as someone who couldn't possibly know more about shuttles than CNK's engineers. After Emmy took her flying and explained the ship's handling from a pilot's perspective, Whitney gained a new appreciation for user-focused design. The two became friends, and Whitney redesigned the Chilkoot's custom shuttle to be more responsive.
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She met Anya Tyr in 2688—a fighter pilot only two years her senior who reminded Whitney of Glyse.
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She befriended Riley Aimes after finding them upside down in the helm seat, tinkering with control panels. Riley's request for finer manual controls led to a collaboration that made the two fast friends.
Her most significant contribution was a revolutionary improvement to the subspace drive design. By looping the ion drive with a secondary cyclotron, she reduced power-to-mass requirements enough to allow the ship to dive deeper into subspace than comparable vessels. Dr. Pendleton admitted he couldn't fully explain why her design worked—only that it did, as if she had "tapped into some new branch of physics."
¶ Joining West Isles
By 2688, Whitney had learned everything CNK could teach her—or so her mother believed. When the Chilkoot was nearing completion, Rhaenvaeh negotiated with d'Ardenne to offer Whitney a position as the ship's engineer.
d'Ardenne made it clear that this wasn't a pleasure cruise. "We're thieves at heart," he told her, "even if we're a bit choosy about the jobs we take and who we take them for." Emmy had apparently threatened to shoot him if he didn't make the offer.
Whitney accepted without hesitation. For all her love of CNK, she had grown restless watching her friends leave while she remained behind. The Chilkoot represented everything she wanted: a chance to see the galaxy, to work on the ship she had helped create, and to be part of a crew that had become like family.
¶ Ships
- Chilkoot - Ship's Engineer
¶ West Isles Crew
The crew of the Chilkoot has become Whitney's family. They call Glyse "Whit's girlfriend" more than they use her actual name, and Emmy considers Whitney a sibling. When Whitney needed to sort through her confusing feelings about Glyse, it was Anya, Emmy, and Riley who sat her down and helped her understand what she was feeling—and then accompanied her to Calysto for moral support (and, if things went badly, to "get her absolutely piss drunk and find people to fight").
¶ Walker d'Ardenne
Whitney respects d'Ardenne as a businessman and leader, though she still sometimes struggles to call him "Walker" instead of "Mr. d'Ardenne." She appreciates that he took a chance on a teenage engineer and trusts his judgment on jobs, even if she doesn't always understand the full scope of his plans. D'Ardenne, for his part, has developed a genuine fondness for Whitney and is protective of her wellbeing—when he learned something might be happening with Whitney and Glyse, his first question was whether it was "an ending or a course correction."
¶ Emmy Sinclair
Emmy taught Whitney that engineering isn't just about making things work—it's about making them work for the people who use them. Their friendship started rocky but quickly deepened. Emmy's threat to shoot d'Ardenne if he didn't hire Whitney speaks to how much the grifter values the young engineer. Emmy considers Whitney a sibling and has taken on a protective older-sister role.
¶ Anya Tyr
Only two years older than Whitney, Anya is the closest thing she has to a peer on the crew. Whitney admires Anya's skills as a fighter pilot and sees echoes of Glyse in her. Anya has been instrumental in helping Whitney build her confidence and assertiveness, and was the first person Whitney went to when she realized she might be dating Glyse without knowing it.
¶ Riley Aimes
Whitney and Riley bonded over a shared love of tinkering. Riley's pilot instincts and hacker mindset complement Whitney's engineering genius, and the two frequently collaborate on modifications to the ship's systems. According to Anya, Riley is "the only person on this ship who has any real solid experience with any sort of normal relationship."
¶ Mikhail Janson
...
¶ Major Associations
¶ Rhaenvaeh Canel
- Relation: Mother
Whitney's relationship with her mother is complicated. Rhaenvaeh encouraged her daughter's brilliance and experimental nature, but she was never an easy woman to have as a parent. After Nyana's death, Rhaenvaeh became "a hot mess" by some accounts, her grief manifesting in ways that were difficult for Whitney to navigate. Despite this, Whitney loves her mother and inherited her piercing green eyes.
¶ Glyse McKenzie
- Relation: Girlfriend
Glyse and Whitney grew up together whenever the McKenzies visited CNK. Whitney idolized the older girl, and their bond seemed unbreakable—until Nyana's death. On that terrible night, Whitney comforted a grieving Glyse, holding her as she cried and talking through the night. It was the most vulnerable Glyse had ever been with anyone outside her mother. And then Glyse disappeared from Whitney's life for nine years.
Whitney never understood why. She assumed she'd done something wrong, despite David's assurances otherwise. When Glyse finally reached out in 2689 (with considerable prodding from David and d'Ardenne), Whitney was overwhelmed with emotions she couldn't quite name. Glyse gave her flowers the same color as her hair, called her pretty, and left Whitney blushing and confused about what any of it meant.
In the nearly two years that followed, they stayed in close contact through regular video calls. Whitney calls Glyse "Yse"—a childhood nickname that only she gets to use. It wasn't until June 2690, while watching a romantic holo, that Whitney realized everything the main couple was doing was what she and Glyse did—"except for the kissing and the other stuff." Her crewmates helped her understand what she was feeling, and in December 2690, Whitney confronted Glyse directly: "We're dating, aren't we."
When Glyse tried to deflect—claiming she was "completely undateable," that she'd die as a fighter pilot, that all her relationships ended badly—Whitney stood her ground with an assertiveness that surprised them both. "Then don't die. You're good at that." She made clear that she wanted Glyse, that she had no interest in pushing for physical intimacy Glyse wasn't comfortable with, and that they could figure out the rest together. Glyse finally relented: "Fine, girlfriend. We'll give this a shot."
They've been together ever since.
¶ David McKenzie
- Relation: "Cousin"
Whitney and David call each other "cousin"—not because they're actually related, but because it's easier than explaining the complicated web of relationships between their families. David has always been a presence in Whitney's life, even from afar. She suspects he somehow reads her diary entries, and occasionally leaves messages for him in them. Unlike Glyse, David never disappeared—he kept in touch, reassured her that Glyse's silence wasn't her fault, and generally looked out for her in his own calculating way. She appreciates his unique way of showing affection, even when it involves manipulating her into ambush reunions with his sister.
¶ Nyana McKenzie
- Relation: Surrogate Aunt (deceased)
"Aunt Nyana" was a warm, caring presence in Whitney's childhood. Her death in 2680 was devastating for the young girl, who retreated to a zero-g room with a stuffed bear Nyana had given her to grieve. The loss taught Whitney early that the people she loved wouldn't always be there—a lesson reinforced when Glyse stopped speaking to her shortly after.
¶ CNK Institute
- Relation: Former Home
CNK Station was the only home Whitney knew for the first eighteen years of her life. She was raised among its scientists and researchers, learned from its greatest minds, and contributed innovations that became bestsellers. Though she's moved on to the Chilkoot, CNK will always be part of who she is.