Background

Originally hailing from Cayey de Muesas, Puerto Rico, Camila moved to Raleigh, North Carolina with her family in the late 80s, settling in a neighborhood on the east side of the city. Her life on the island hadn’t been exactly idyllic, but her family lived comfortably enough and had relocated with the intention of giving Camila (and her four siblings) access to the opportunities available in the continental U.S. A middle child, not overlooked or underloved by any means, but consistently dancing a half-step out of tune with the rest of the family, especially when it came to her hobbies and those she chose to associate with. One person in particular was regularly a source of bristly responses from her parents - Elijah Schaffer. She’d met him in Spanish classes, something she had chosen to get an easy A, considering she already spoke it fluently at home, and the two hit it off famously; so much so that he was frequently the reason she’d get home late from school, as they’d spend a couple hours after class at the public library so she could tutor him in Spanish. She was an average student in school, but not for lack of intellect - she was merely more interested in pursuing the arts, and solving complex algebraic equations or knowing what part of the cell was the powerhouse wasn’t nearly as important as memorizing the lines for the upcoming school play or making sure her costuming was impeccable. It was her deep love of theatre that ultimately led to her being introduced to renaissance faires in high school, and the instant Camila stepped through that wooden archway and into a world from ages past? She was hooked. The drama, the food, the people, the armor, the clothes. Everything about it felt like that half-step she had always been missing before, and everyone around her was dancing to the same beat for the first time in her life. The average student became a thing of the past almost overnight, as Camila realized that college was going to be a much easier goal to achieve with a higher GPA, and so she resolved to put forth the effort needed to pull those C grades up to A’s and B’s, keeping her eyes set on the final goal - attending the School of Fashion at Kent State University, and working wardrobe for Hollywood historical films after graduation. Everything was falling into place. At the start of her senior year in high school, she received a letter of acceptance from Kent State for the fall semester of 1999. Sure, there was that weird daisy thing that had started the year before, but it wasn’t something that registered on the scale of things that’d prevent her from pursuing her dream. She couldn’t have been more wrong. Camila’s high school diploma never even made it to print, much less into her hands, and that acceptance letter became a long-lost memory as the world deteriorated rapidly around her in the Summer of ‘99. Watching her mother, father, and younger siblings fall ill, it was with a heavy heart that Camila was left to head out on her own, heading west towards Chicago, where her oldest brother had settled a few years prior. She didn’t get far before the heavy overgrowth that would one day become known as the Appalachian Deadzone forced her back eastward, funnelling her towards Virginia - Charlottesville, to be exact. It was there that she’d meet Francis Benford, a kind-hearted aspiring nurse who was helping out in one of the relief camps in the city. It wasn’t love at first sight, not by a long shot, but Francis’ consistent compassion for complete strangers, his tireless work ethic and commitment to looking at the bright side inevitably drew Camila in. When the colder weather rolled around, she had originally intended to set out for Illinois again, while the daisies were more dormant, but Francis convinced her to accompany him to Pennsylvania, to check on his father and little brother, Greyson. Much to their relief, both were safe and doing as well as can be expected, given the situation. After a few years, the lingering tensions between Francis and his father reached a boiling point, culminating in a heated argument between the two, which ended with both Francis and Camila bidding Greyson farewell, and striking out once more. After some time persisting in Pennsylvania, and many debates back and forth between settling in the northeast and trying to find the rest of Camila’s family, the two turned their heading southwest. Journeying into the newly-carved Alabama Gap, their intention was to venture into the Eastern Deadzone in the winter to see if her older siblings had perhaps made it back to Raleigh and left some inkling of their whereabouts at the old family home. A Hail Mary in every sense of the word, but between Camila’s enduring optimism and Francis’ soft spot for the woman, they agreed it was worth a shot. It ended up being the biggest mistake of Camila’s life, and the last one of Francis’. She doesn’t talk about the winter of 2004 anymore. The next few years were a blur. Camila traveled south along the Alabama Gap, using her seamstress skills to trade with other survivors, ducking and dodging bandits to the best of her ability, hunkering down in settlements during the spring and summer months and eventually catching wind of a QZ that was enduring on the western side of the Appalachian Deadzone, in a place known as Knox. The nomadic lifestyle had begun to wear on her, and though she had spent her share of time in small settlements, she wanted to find somewhere she could get truly established. She eventually arrived at the KQZ in the winter of 2007, having given the rapidly expanding deadzones a wide berth. She quietly settled into life in the KQZ, offering her services as a tailor and armorer, flying under the radar and earning her daily rations alongside everyone else. Despite the hardships she had faced in the years leading up to her arrival at the KQZ, Camila maintains her friendly nature, striving to help as many as possible avoid the same struggles she had endured.