Personality:

Once upon a time, River was a brilliant, sensitive, caring girl, whimsical and charming by turns, and terribly spoiled by her family because of this. In Simon’s words, “she was a gift,” even if she could be sometimes very bratty about it.

Then, she underwent innumerable experiments and operations at a government lab fronting as a school for gifted youths. Simon eventually rescued her, but she emerged much different for it. Traces of her original temperament remain; however, she is much more withdrawn than she used to be, and tends to be quiet and reserved, prone to speaking things that make sense only to her, if at all.

Dreamy and thoughtful, she loves watching the world, observing all its quirks; she doesn’t quite seem to /get/ most of what she sees, though, at least not as most people do. Her responses to a situation can be rather inappropriate, from the view of most individuals; she might evince terror at a particularly strange-looking but otherwise harmless object, or completely ignore danger that would have others shaking at the knees. She can have quite the mischievous streak sometimes, but it doesn’t surface except when she’s comfortable with the person.

Occasionally she fluctuates into states of wild terror or uncontrollable anger, the former more often than the latter; even then, her terror tends to be of the subdued sort, rather than involving shrieking and crying, though she feels it no less intensely. Even more rarely, she might emerge from her shell, especially at the coaxing of a warm, friendly person like Kaylee, to laugh and play normally.