Namorita

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Background

Powers & Abilities

Good seed makes a good crop

Namorita was of Atlantean-Human mixed blood, like her cousin Namor or her mother Namora.

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As an Atlantean, her natural element was water. She was able to:

• Breathe underwater.
• Swim at great speed.
• Sustain the harsh conditions at the bottom of the oceans (cold, darkness and pressure).

Her Human ancestry enabled her to breathe outside water. The pure blooded Atlantean are lacking this feature as they suffocate when in the open air. Her primary element remained water. If she didn’t immerse for a long period, she suffered some serious weaknesses. She could die of dehydration in a few days.

Like Namor, she had a superhuman strength enabling her to lift and throw a small bus. She was very resistant and very difficult to harm. She was nearly impossible to kill when underwater. She had two pairs of small wings on her ankles enabling her to fly, though at low speed.

Higher education

She lived on the surface and was a student at the Empire State University. She had a major in environmental studies, which involved a lot of sciences and a good deal of law.

Her Atlantean royal ancestry granted her important privileges in Atlantis and on the surface as well, like the direct family of any foreign country’s leader. Eventually, she ruled Atlantis.

She also was an executive for Oracle Inc, her cousin’s company. It granted her comfortable income. Eventually, she became CEO.

Atlantean Ritual Shell Armor

To settle a very personal feud with Sea Urchin, Namorita put on an Atlantean ritual armor.

It was made of sea shells and covered most of the body and head. It was not very protective. Its value was foremost symbolic for the Atlanteans. While wearing it, no Atlantean can back up from battle. The fight must be to victory or to the death of the bearer.

History

Namorita was born in Maritanis, an Atlantean colony near Antarctica, over 30 years ago. Her mother was Namora, half-Human cousin of Prince Namor.

Because of her hybrid nature, Namora was sterile. She asked the Atlantean scientist Vyrra to impregnate her with her own clone. She never told her husband, Talan, as cloning was against Atlantean law.

Talan died when Namorita was three, during the destruction of Maritanis by the nuclear testings of a surface nation. The survivors, including Namora and her daughter, relocated in Lemuria.

Eventually, Namora was poisoned by Llyra, her rival for the love of Merro, Lemuria’s ruler. Llyra assumed the throne of Lemuria soon after. Namorita remained in her care (and her hostage), suspecting her of Namora’s death but unable to prove it.

Fostered on the surface

When Namorita reunited with the cousin she had not seen since her infancy, she had an adolescent crush on him. He was quite fond of her courage and determination, but she was still very young, as they both aged slowly. He entrusted her welfare to his longtime surface friend, Betty Dean Prentiss.

Under Prentiss’s guidance, Namorita attended high school and college. She showed strong political commitment, soon demonstrating against the Vietnam War. It wasn’t to Betty’s taste, but she loved the girl as her own. Namorita eventually considered Betty to be her second mother and took her last name when she died.

Nita went back to Atlantis on a regular basis, like a boarding school’s pupil coming home for holidays. She also got close to Ann Christopher, their neighbor. Together, they nursed Wundarr, the man-child from the stars, who later became Aquarian.

Collecting many treasures from undersea wrecks, Namor built a 10 billion dollars fortune. He used it to create Oracle Inc. He expected it to provide the power to right the wrongs men were doing to the planet. He gave Namorita an executive position.

New Warriors

During a students’ visit, Nita found herself coincidentally at the site of Terrax’s rebirth. It forced her into action. A group of teen heroes soon joined her.

This group became the New Warriors. She was a prominent member. She even took leadership of the team.

For further details of her adventures with The New Warriors, please refer to their team profiles.

Namorita had a very personal grudge against Sea Urchin, who was looting Atlantean property from the seabed. Donning the ritual Atlantean shell armor, she came very close to killing him, after an initial fight during which he scalped her.

She kept close to Namor, taking an active part in his adventures. When clones of Dorma, Namor’s first love, appeared, Namorita accompanied Namor to Vyrra. She discovered that she, herself, was a clone of Namora. Though upset at Namor for hiding this truth, she recognized his wisdom of keeping it secret.

Trouble with the team

Namorita had strong political aspirations, particularly toward environmentalism. She often opposed some of her teammates with a more laissez-faire stance, mostly Dwayne Taylor and Vance Astrovik.

In the Trans-Sabal fictional nation, The New Warriors got caught in a civil war, forced to choose sides. During a Mexican stand-off between General Halladah, Araq Mezdbadah and Aqueduct, Namorita wasn’t sure what to do. Her hesitation let Aqueduct kill Halladah.

One night, Nita drank too much and wound up sleeping with a member of the Poison Memories gang. He took advantage of his visit to her apartment to steal the personal data she had on the Warriors. Then he arranged the kidnappings of their family: Rage’s Granny Staples was murdered, Firestar’s father was shot, and Nova’s younger brother had a finger cut off.

Kymaera

It was the peak of her emotional turmoil: feeling guilty about the Poison Memories fallouts, feeling in love with Nova (more below).

Seeking solace in Atlantis, she was repelled by the city guards. The news had spread that Namorita has been a clone of her mother. And as such, according to the ancient Atlantean laws, Lord Vashti banned her.

This accrued emotional stress provoked an extreme physical transformation. Her skin turned blue and her body turned more animalistic. Her water based abilities got better in this physical form, but she was also more vulnerable to the Atlantean limitations.

Banned from Atlantis, too ashamed of her appearance to get back to the surface, she fled to the bottom of the Atlantic. She changed her name to Kymaera, which is the Atlantean name of the ghost-shark, a legendary aquatic animal.

Namor, who had been through some extreme transformations himself, was here to comfort her. He convinced her of his love, and of the love of her friends The New Warriors. Very uncertain, she came back to the Crash-Pad. She first met Nova, and they resumed where they had left: a passionate kiss.

Then, the rest of the team welcomed her. Afterwards, her part in The New Warriors became much less prominent.

Abduction by Undertow

During a relief mission in Rwanda, Undertow kidnapped members of the two super-teams: The New Warriors and Air Force. Nova and Cardinal’s rescue mission failed to free Kymaera and Sparrow. Undertow implanted them with a chip to control their body and part of their mind. They became their new fighting pair of Soldiers of Misfortune: Hard and Fast.

Kymaera retained her self awareness and a part of control. When she fought The New Warriors, she avoided to seriously injure them… and even helped them escape.

Under The Mad Thinker’s impulsion, Night Thrasher and Rage freed her. They arrived just in time for the final battle against Volx.

New Atlantis

The New Warriors had never officially disbanded, but they had drifted apart. Kymaera went back to Atlantis.

Morgan LeFay had raised Atlantis to the surface. The Atlantean survivors found refuge in Maritanis. As Namor was part of the throng of heroes who disappeared to defeat Onslaught, Kymaera assumed the regency. She helped transform Maritanis into New Atlantis, a new capital city for the realm of Atlantis. She did so using her personal wealth, which nearly bankrupted her.

She had to face some kind of civil unrest. Atlanteans were defecting to the Lemurian realm of Prince Llyron (the son of Llyra, who poisoned Namora). An ambitious Atlantean politician named Keerg took advantage of the economic weakness of Atlantis and usurped Kymaera’s position. He immediately made business deals with surface companies. Their unscrupulous policies threatened the ocean’s depths.

Namor eventually came back. It bolstered loyalist Atlanteans to overthrow the usurper and free Kymaera. Keerg’s business partner panicked. He made a sour deal with The Wrecking Crew, who had unfinished business with Namor. They took control of his operation. He called for Tony Stark’s help.

That’s how Iron Man got involved in these Atlantean power plays. The Wrecking Crew assaulted New Atlantis. Iron Man teamed with Kymaera and Namor to defend it.

In the aftermath, Namor reclaimed his Atlantean throne. Kymaera was free of her royal responsibilities and went back to the surface.

Further mutations

Her physical condition evolved again. First her blue skin began to crack and ooze and turn gray. Then, it peeled off like a snake’s skin, and she emerged with a new pink skin and the gorgeous body she had before. She changed her name back to Namorita. This further mutation granted her new abilities, related to underwater creatures: camouflage, acid and paralyzing poison secretion.

She had been doing some police duties for Atlantis when Speedball contacted her to reform The New Warriors. Though reluctantly, mainly because of Nova, she joined. Without The Taylor Foundation to support them, and with Namorita broke after rebuilding New Atlantis, she turned to her cousin for financial support.

Because it was important to her, Namor consented to break his vow of isolationism toward surface ventures.

This New Warriors incarnation had two main adventures:

• They defeated Joe Silvermane’s high-tech arms smuggling operation.
• They helped Night Thrasher prevent The Hand from stealing Danny Rand’s Iron Fist power.

Namor had created a triumvirate to rule Atlantis in his absence, as he joined The Defenders again. Namorita was the royal family part, and thus stayed in Atlantis. She commissioned a joint venture with the surface, to study teleportation technology. She took part in the experimentation, which blew up in her face, and turned her skin blue again (but just the skin this time).

Finale: going with a bang

Night Thrasher reassembled The New Warriors: he, Speedball, Nova, Namorita, and a newbie called Microbe. Namorita agreed to joined because she was getting bored by her Atlantean princess’s life. Her skin was still blue and she had Atlantean tribal tattoos.

Dwayne came with a business plan: he had sold The New Warriors broadcast rights to a television company. Namorita was really not fond of that idea. It turned The New Warriors’ actions into a reality show circus. They had to bow to the production’s demands and legal entanglements… all things that Namorita despised at the peak of her political activism. Speedball was delighted to be on television.

Until they did one show too many.

Under Speedball’s (mis)guidance, they had cornered four highly wanted super-villains, among them the explosive Nitro. Speedball launched a very ill-prepared assault, but a very TV-bankable one. Namorita singled out Nitro, expecting to impress him into submission. She didn’t… He exploded with the full might of his power…

Namorita, standing one foot from his face, got vaporized. And in a sense, she was better dead because…

This explosion took place in Stamford, Connecticut, and left over 600 dead… and started the first Marvel Civil War .

Romantic life

From her teenage years, she had a crush on Namor. She sometimes reminded him of it as a form of teasing. He considered her more like his dear little sister.

From their first encounter, it was clear that Nita and Nova would end up together. Yet, their first kiss happened rather lately, when she was the most vulnerable, just before she left the team after the “Poisoned Memories” arc. When she came back from her voluntary exile in the oceans, they resumed this passionate relationship. Undertow’s abduction interrupted it for quite a long time.

When she underwent her most terrible physical transformations, she went to Richard for comfort. He rejected her, claiming he had enough trouble on his own. After she got back to her pink skinned condition, she was really angry at him. She immediately sought payback: she went to the place Rider was sharing with Bernie Dillon and Caps Cooper, and had wild sex with Bernie in the next room.

This anger at Nova nearly cost Speedball her presence in the second New Warriors.

After a chance encounter with Johnny Storm, they started to date. She wanted to further get back at Nova, and he liked the provocative publicity stunt. They became the tabloids’ favorite targets and played that game well. They grew quite fond of each other. Namorita even joined him for an alternate Fantastic Four team, while the other three FF were trapped in the Negative Zone .

But they were both assuming roles that kept them apart: he as The Human Torch of the FF, she as a ruling member of Atlantis. They were still very attracted to each other. Yet, every time they tried to get back together, they ended up arguing about who should leave his responsibilities to join the other.

Description

Namorita was a tall, gorgeous, muscular young woman. She appeared in her late teens due to her Atlantean slowed aging. Like all Atlanteans, she had pointed ears and thin, high-arched eyebrows over her big eyes. Hers were blue. Until Sea Urchin scalped her, she wore her long blond hair in a pony tail. Then she kept her hair short for a while, but eventually let it grow back.

Becoming Kymaera, her skin turned blue, her eyes grew rounder and were all black, she had 4-fingered webbed hands and shark-like dorsal fins at the back of her calves. Then her blue skin peeled off and she reverted back to a human appearance. In the end, her skin turned blue again, and she had carved white Atlantean tribal tattoos over her face and body.

While in action, with The New Warriors or Namor, she always dressed in green swimsuits. Otherwise, she either dressed like any female student or with female corporate executive clothes. She had quite a sense of fashion. During her Kymaera period, she wore a combat suit made of rag-tag sea shells and fishing nets she had gathered during her voluntary exile.

Afterward, she dressed in more usual sportswear: a white sports bra with fishnets and a white sports legging. In the end, she wore a red and white one-piece swimsuit.

She was barefoot most of the time, to let her ankle wings free. On the rare formal occasions she had to wear shoes, she often ended taking them off to fly.

Personality

She bore her cousin’s deep sense of honor. She was very loyal to her cause, her friends and her teammates. But unlike Namor, she had a sense of humor. She enjoyed spending good times with her coeds or Firestar, to whom she was the closest in The New Warriors.

Despite a bit of bravado, she felt insecure. Though she was a member of the ruling family of Atlantis, her mixed-blood made her question her place both beneath the seas and on the surface world. Learning she was a clone only made it worse.

She was short tempered. As a strong-headed woman, she despised sexist comments. As a strong-bodied woman, she made her point to any male making such comments. The changes she endured as Kymaera made her quicker to anger. Her love life was one of violent passions… and one night stands. She was completely uninhibited with her body.

She was very sensitive, and active, toward environmental issues. As Namor, she tended to take personally any environmental offense to the seas. But her involvement was not limited to that. Other subjects also concerned her, like the rain forest or industrial pollutions. But after the Trans-Sabal debacle, she dampened it.

She might have still deeply felt the concerns, but she wasn’t expressing them anymore

As regent of Atlantis, she tried to be an enlightened ruler.

Namor and Namorita had always been close, even sharing a kind of bond. Even after she proved herself with The New Warriors, he was still overprotective of her. Despite pretending it was a past adolescent crush, she has always found him attractive.

Quotes

“You’re not gonna rescue my cousin while little Nita sits at home darning socks, little lady ! I’m a real live sub-mariner, too, you know !”

“Besides, if I don’t hit the pool twice a day I’ll shrivel up and die and the room will smell like old sushi !”

Nova: “Look out, babe !”
Namorita: “Why did Terrax scream like that? And why did that punk risk suicide by calling me babe ?”

(During an investigation committee after Trans-Sabal’s interference)
General Standish: “You don’t respect us very much, do you, Miss Prentiss ?”
Namorita: “No, do you respect me very much General Standish ?”
General Standish: “You have done very little to earn it, young lady.”
Namorita: “And you… and all your kind… have done very little to earn mine… old man.”

Nita: “So get your butt in here, and maybe we can do something to heat up the water.”
Richard: “I didn’t bring a bathing suit.”
Nita: “Well, since Vance is moving in next week, we won’t get much chance to do this again… So. Fair’s fair… You come in without a bathing suit… And maybe we’ll see about taking mine off as well…”

Namorita: “I thought you loved me, but you weren’t there for me when I needed you. If I want empty love, I can get it from anybody…” (Grabs Bernie Dillon by his neck tie and drags him to the bedroom)
Namorita: “You’ll do. Come with me.”
Bernie: “Yes ma’am! Be gentle”.

Nova: “So, like, what’s with you guys having new costumes.”
Namorita: “I just got tired of looking like a walking Sports illustrated  cover.”

Aegis: “What ? Those clones aren’t people, Nita. If we let Genocide get away, she could hurt someone that really matters !”
Namorita: “I’M A CLONE ! And I matter ! We’re here to protect people… All people.”

Namorita: “We should give the press something to really talk about. I have to attend a benefit dinner tonight, for an environmental charity I support. I could use a date.”
Johnny Storm (attracting the attention of the tabloids’ photographers): “Yo, bud. Feast your eyes on this.”
Johnny (hand-kissing her): “Miss Prentiss, I’d be delighted to be your escort.”
Namorita: “Excellent. Pick me up at six o’clock.”

“This is a joint venture between Dr Carter and Atlantis, Johnny… A chance to show that our kingdom is not some backwater, but as technologically advanced as Wakanda, the United States or anyplace else.”

“I don’t want to be the Fantastic Four’s fifth wheel again. The one everyone only knows as The Human Torch’s girlfriend. […] Well, I’m not going to give up my life to be swallowed by yours ! I’m not the little mermaid, growing legs so she can be with her prince !”

Nita: “Are we too much alike Johnny… or too different ?”
Johnny Storm: Both, maybe. Like… matter and anti-matter. I see you. I want you. We get close.”
Nita: “Boom”
Johnny: “Every time.”

Namorita: “On your feet, Nitro, and don’t try any of your stupid explosions because that’s only going to make me hit you harder.”
Nitro: “Namorita, right ? Aren’t you The Sub-Mariner’s cousin or something ? Well, I’m afraid we’re not bargain basement losers you guys are used to, baby… You’re playing with the big boys now.” (BOOOOM !)

DC Universe History

In the DC Universe, she would replace Aquagirl (Tula), the daughter of Aquaman’s step-sister, Deborah Perkins (Deep Blue). She’s the foster granddaughter of Neptune Perkins.

See, it goes like this :

She’d be the leader of an unit in the Atlantean army called the Drift.

By Nicolas Lemaçon.

Source of Character: Marvel Comics (New Warriors v1-3, Namor The Sub-Mariner #1-50, Civil War 1).

Helper(s): Darci, Sébastien Andrivet.

Writeup completed on the 31^th of May, 2017.