Nova Terra


 * This article is about the Ghost agent. For the former Confederate organization, see Nova Squadron.

"The enemies of the Terran Dominion were everywhere and the Ghosts were the best line of defense against them. It was all Nova ever thought about."

November Annabella "Nova" Terra, aka Agent 12-862, is a female terran ghost. She is the protagonist of the game StarCraft: Ghost, the prequel novel StarCraft: Ghost: Nova, the upcoming graphic novel series StarCraft: Ghost Academy and the upcoming novel StarCraft: Ghost: Spectres.

Nova has blond hair, green eyes that she inherited from her father and at age fifteen, was exceptionally tall for a girl of her age. She has, or at least had, a strong liking for framberries.

Early Life
"Honestly Tino, what are you teaching this girl?"

- Andrea Tygore to Constantino Terra, after hearing Nova's praise for servants.

Nova was born into the Terra family, one of the Terran Confederacy's rich and powerful "Old Families". The family lived in the Terra Skyscraper in Tarsonis City, Tarsonis. She possessed a degree of empathy that was generally lacking in the Old Families, a trait that did not go unnoticed. She also believed strongly in the concept of fair play.

Unknown to Nova, a great deal of her empathy was due to her telepathic abilities. Her father, Constantino, was aware of her talents, if not the full extent of them. Without training she could only sense emotions and at seven years of age was told that she was "empathetic". Normally, psychic children were conscripted into the Ghost Program by wranglers. However her family hid her abilities from the Program, and her father attempted to prevent Nova from realizing she was psychic.

At her fifteenth birthday party, Nova learned that she was psychic by reading the mind of Morgan Calabas, a "suitor".

Betrayal and Flight
The Old Families began planning to send some of their children away from Tarsonis to the relative safety of a resort on Tyrador IX, due to the rising number of attacks against the Old Families and the escalating war the Confederacy found itself in against alien invaders and numerous rebel groups such as the Sons of Korhal. Nova's parents agreed to send her away. Despite her protests, and Edward Peters' support, three days after her fifteenth birthday party she boarded a vessel for Tyrador IX. However, Nova felt her parents' minds as they were killed by anti-Confederate rebels and she quickly disembarked.

Nova returned to find that Edward Peters, Gustavo McBain, and other rebels were murdering her family and their employees. Peters ordered McBain to shoot Nova but now, with her psychic powers elevated by the mental stress caused by the carnage she had just witnessed, she unleashed powerful telepathic and telekinetic abilities without any control. A large section of the Terra Skyscraper was destroyed, and all of her would-be murderers, as well as many hundreds of nearby people, were killed. Nova then fled to "the Gutter", as far away from her former life as possible. The trauma of recent events led her close to suicide.

The destructive spectacle was proof enough that Nova would be a valuable addition to the Ghost Program. Ilsa Killiany ordered wrangler Malcolm "Mal" Kelerchian to bring Nova in, assigning her the code X41822N even though the wayward psychic was not yet formally part of the Program.

The Gutter
"In your world, people didn't die. Or if they did, it was neat-tidy. We don't do tidy here in the Gutter. We do ugly, we do nasty, we do mean..."

- Fagin 'introduces' Nova to the Gutter

Shortly after Nova arrived in the Gutter, two men attempted to rape her. They were unsuccessful and severely injured by Nova's telekinesis. The goons worked for the crime lord of the Gutter, Julius Antoine "Fagin" Dale. Monitoring Nova through traffic monitors, Fagin resolved to "acquire" her for her psychic abilities and, deducing from her expensive clothing, a ransom.

Nova was brought before Fagin but, despite being in a fragile state of mind, refused to serve him. Reading minds she realized that Fagin's chief lieutenant, Markus Ralian, wanted him dead. However, Nova was unable to intimidate Fagin nor provoke him to kill her. Instead, Fagin let Nova go and ordered the shopkeepers not to feed her. Fagin was confident that starvation would force Nova to serve him.

Four days later Fagin learned Nova's true identity. Realizing that he would be unable to ransom her, as he would be destroyed by the retaliation of the Old Families, he ordered a reliable enforcer, "the Pitcher", to kill Nova. Despite four days of starvation and partial dehydration Nova easily killed the Pitcher by destroying his brain with her mental powers. She carried on by stealing food and resolved to go after Fagin for ordering her death.

Fagin responded by acquiring a psi-screen from Confederate Army Supply Sergeant Morwood (the device rendered him immune to telepathy), then surrounded himself with insane heavily armed guards, drug addicts who desperately needed a fix, and children. Although distracted by the thoughts of the drug addicts Nova defeated the ambushing gunmen and confronted Fagin again. Fagin ordered his men to kill the children one by one until she surrendered while he used his psi-screen to torture Nova at range. Unable to bear more, Nova surrendered.

Escape from Madness
Six months later Fagin was using Nova as a "loyalty detector" and assassin. Those who failed to pass Nova's test were murdered. She was prevented from going outside which made it difficult for Kelerchian and his allies to locate her. Over that same time Fagin had become progressively more unpredictable, killing people, even his own children, almost on a whim, due to overuse of the psi-screen. Markus Ralian's desire for Fagin's death only grew, but he could not bring himself to do it. Nova had no trouble reading this from his mind. Nova knew the psi-screen couldn't protect Fagin from her telekinesis, but she never had the opportunity to use it on him.

Meanwhile Agent Kelerchian discovered her location from contacts in the police force. To help him secure Nova, he was ordered by Killiany to take with him Major Esmerelda Ndoci and her "Annihilators", a marine unit ill-suited for such a delicate mission but they were all that was available. The Sons of Korhal offensive on Tarsonis' space platforms were not an ideal theater for a ground-based unit like the Annihilators. With ghosts in short supply acquiring a powerful psychic was an "alpha priority" and they were ordered to bring Nova in unharmed.

Kelerchian resolved to bargain with Fagin first, and if that failed then he would "summon the marines". As the wrangler discovered, Fagin's mental faculties made bargaining difficult if not impossible. As the crime lord ranted Nova used her powers, forcing Ralian to shoot and kill Fagin. Kelerchian let Nova scan his mind and she learned that if she went with Kelerchian she would become a ghost. She also learned that a memory wipe was a standard part of the training regimen. This Nova saw as an incentive, as she did not want to remember the deaths and murders.

A satisfactory end to the operation was interrupted by the penetration of the orbital defenses by the Sons of Korhal. Killiany transferred oversight of the operation from Kelerchian to Ndoci, who directed her troops to kill everybody except for Nova (no exception was made for Kelerchian). In the ensuing firefight Fagin's compound collapsed. Ralian was killed, while Nova and Kelerchian were trapped together, and Ndoci was trapped elsewhere in the building.

Nova used her powers to rescue herself and Kelerchian, but the latter was severely wounded. Nova then forced Ndoci to summon medical aid for Kelerchian. Then the zerg attacked, but Nova, Kelerchian, and Ndoci survived.

Ghost Training
Nova was taken the world of Ursa, headquarters of the Ghost Program. Despite her considerable psychic power she started at a disadvantage due to the ill-effects of six months of abuse and malnutrition and she barely handled Sergeant Hartley's physical training regime. However she pulled through and completed the training in a record two and a half years, whereas it normally took four years.

Six months into training Nova met Kelerchian again, and discovered (through mind reading) that the wrangler was being sent on a one way mission to Sakrysta Mining Base by Emperor Arcturus Mengsk.

Nearing the end of her training Nova was met by Arcturus Mengsk himself, who gave her a final training assignment: kill Cliff Nadaner, a former anti-Confederate terrorist turned anti-Dominion terrorist. Nadaner had led the group that sent Edward Peters, Gustavo McBain and others to kill her family. Nova was to go to Tyrador VIII alone and kill Nadaner with only her mental powers. She was inserted via drop pod with only some of a ghost's standard equipment. Nova successfully located her target, eliminating the defending troops. She verbally confronted Nadaner for ruining her life and killed him last.

A New Life
"Cliff Nadaner is dead. And soon, for all intents and purposes, I will be too."

- Nova upon terminating Nadaner.

Upon completion she was designated Agent 12-862 and received a memory wipe, becoming yet another ghost single-mindedly focused on serving the Dominion and destroying the Dominion's enemies. She would serve in Nova Squadron under Colonel Jackson Hauler. During a mission against the Koprulu Liberation Front on New Sydney Nova would again meet the Annihilators. Ndoci recognized Nova but due to the memory wipe Nova no longer recognized Ndoci, nor did she particularly care.

In StarCraft: Ghost, Nova would be expected to choose between loyalties to Arcturus Mengsk and Colonel Hauler.

Appearance
Nova has blond hair, green eyes that she inherited from her father and at age fifteen, was exceptionally tall for a girl of her age.

Personality-Pre Ghost
Even through her ghost training (before the memory wipe) Nova's personality generally remained the same throughout her late teen years. She possessed a degree of empathy that was generally lacking in the Old Families (a trait that did not go unnoticed) and believed in the concept of fair-play, or at least had an aversion to "cheating" (eg. considered attaching gliders to her shoes at her birthday to walk elegantly to be "cheating").

Although willing to deal death to those she believed to deserve it (eg. Fagin and Cliff Nadaner), she wanted to avoid harming those who fell outside this definition (did not want to harm Fagin's associates and regretted having to dispatch the rest of Nadaner's group).

Personality-Ghost
As of becoming a full fledged ghost, Nova's personality has, perhaps not that surprisingly, changed radically. From her interactions in the New Sydney incident, elements of snideness and arrogance can be seen. As per the aims of the Ghost Program, virtually no traces of her previous moral code remain.

StarCraft: Ghost
Nova is the player character in StarCraft: Ghost. Her appearance shifted from "realistic" to a more "anime-ish" look when Swingin' Ape Studios was purchased by Blizzard and their console design teams were merged.

Psionic Abilities
Nova is an incredibly powerful telepath and telekinetic, ranked PI 10. In addition to her natural psychic abilities, she has completed her ghost training.

These psionic abilities include cloaking, psionic sight (which enables her to see heat signatures) and psionic speed (which quadruples her speed).

Weapons
Nova typically carries an AGR-14 assault rifle and a sniper rifle, however, she can use nearly any terran weapon that she can pick up.

Nova can use a variety of grenades, like other ghosts.

Nova can also use the psyblade as a melee weapon. It is designed from a combination of terran and protoss technology.

General Combat Abilities
Nova is capable of a wide variety of combat moves, including climbing and sliding down ziplines. Nova can also kill silently by sneaking up on an opponent, and can use techniques such as "dangle snipe" (in which she hangs from a pipe with her legs and snipes an opponent).

Calldowns
Nova has the ability to "call for help"; she has at least six calldowns; Identify, Irradiate, EMP Burst, Arclite (which directs attacks from a powerful siege tank), Yamato Cannon, and the ever-popular nuke.

Other Appearances
Blizzard Entertainment employees have stated that they definitely want to continue Nova's story, either in novel or comic format.

StarCraft: Ghost: Academy and Spectres
Nova is set to appear in the StarCraft: Ghost Academy graphic novel series alongside a key StarCraft II character before her first mission. She will also appear in StarCraft: Ghost: Spectres, a novel which covers part of the plot of StarCraft: Ghost.

StarCraft II
Nova could appear in a StarCraft II mission. She has been seen on a flatscreen in the Hyperion, the images being of gameplay from StarCraft: Ghost.

World of Warcraft Easter Eggs
Exploring World of Warcraft - RIP Starcraft Ghost (Double-click for larger video) KBw7lhZuEj0 Nova's tomb has been spotted in a World of Warcraft location (a strange stone in the Netherstorm). Drysc, a Blizzard World of Warcraft Community Manager later stated that "Some say that under certain conditions you can see her ghost... Pun not intended." A cloaked figure resembling Nova can also be found near the tomb.

Drysc used the lyrics of Kansas song Dust in the Wind to describe her:

Rest in peace Nova... I close my eyes Only for a moment, then the moment's gone All my dreams Pass before my eyes, a curiosity Dust in the wind All they are is dust in the wind... /tear