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Josua is a lean, wiry, hard-bitten young man with an implacable face that gives nothing to no one, short hair, and piercing eyes. He dresses in "urban" clothing carefully selected to not interfere with his ability to move.
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Joshua is the son of a teen runaway turned prostitute and any of a few dozen johns. His mother tried to keep him initially, though in squallor, but her descent into drug addiction and self-destruction completed itself when she OD'd when Joshua was 9. Despite his young age Joshua was already a canny survivor, a street urchin worthy of a Dickens novel, and if anything not having to steal enough to feed both himself and his useless mother was a net improvement for his state of existence.
Joshua dropped out of school and lived on the streets full time thereafter, finding shelter on rooftops, in abandoned buildings, and as he got older and more sophisticated in vacant apartments. A burglar named Casey Jenks noticed Joshua when he was 13 and befriended him, taking Joshua on as an apprentice. Casey taught Joshua how to pick locks, disarm burglar alarms, pick pockets, and size up a score; Joshua proved to be a quick study and a worthy apprentice. Joshua and Casey worked together for almost three years. Casey wasn't a father figure, more like a big brother, but for the first and so far only time in his life Joshua had something like a normal human relationship.
An electronic parts factory in the city's industrial district announced that it was closing, rendered obsolete by cheaper parts imported from Singapore and China. Casey and Joshua broke into it the next night, planning to score whatever they could carry out before the factory was stripped...just a little crime of opportunity. It should have been cake, but unfortunately a gremlin had long made the factory its home, and in the process of looting copper wiring from several of the assembly line machines Casey and Joshua enraged it. Only the gremlin was allowed to sabotage the machinery!
The gremlin turned on the assembly line, ambushed Casey and pushed him up onto it making sure to snag his hoodie into the belt, and activated a circuit board stamper. Casey called for help and thanks to his amazing agility Joshua got there in time and almost freed his friend, but not to be thwarted the gremlin appeared again and tried to push Joshua up on top of Casey to send both of them through the stamper. Joshua's fast reflexes saved him, and he catapulted the gremlin up and over instead; a second later both Casey and the gremlin were crushed.
Devastated, and also in shock at having been exposed to the reality of the existence of supernatural things, Joshua fled the scene.
Fortunately Casey had taught Joshua well, and using his burglaring skills Joshua has managed to keep surviving for several years since then. Joshua steals enough to get by; he could go for bigger scores but he doesn't want to end up dead like Casey, or to draw too much attention from either the authorities or bigger criminals. Safe, petty, under the radar crime is his goal. His favorite MO is to break into affluent apartments and condominiums while people are away on vacation, live in them secretly while he can, and when leaving take whatever small valuables are available and pawn them.
However Joshua's eyes are now wide open. He knows there is more to reality than the mundane, and he has factored that into his world view. He has noticed several supicious things around the city's heart, and has seen signs of things that previously would have just been inexplicable but now seem perhaps supernatural. People dissappearing, abandoned buildings that aren't as vacant as they might appear, and things other than himself prowling the urban jungle. He's also noticed a couple of groups of tough looking people who seem to be seeking things out in strange places. He thinks they may be hunting the inexplicable.
It is not his nature to get involved in complexities unnecessarily, but sometimes when he thinks of Casey and the thing that killed him Joshua feels a deep sense of loss and anger. And also a deep loneliness. If there really are people who hunt the strange lurking things, maybe he could find a new friend among them who could teach him about the hidden truths the existence of such things suggest. Maybe he could again feel the kind of connection and sense of purpose in life that he had felt when Casey was alive. The possibility of it hovers in the back of Joshua's mind accompanied by a strange feeling that he doesn't know the word for...hope.
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Though he doesn't consciously think of it, Joshua longs for a change for the better in his life. He knows he is capable of more but doesn't know how to go about acheiving it.
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"You'll have to catch me first..."
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Unknown to himself or as yet anyone else, Joshua is a psychic with powerful subconscious vitruvian and savant gifts, able to boost his own performance with the power of his mind. Jashua can handle a knife well enough and his boosted strength and dexterity allow him to scrap effectively if he's cornered or feels he has too, but he greatly prefers to avoid confrontations and escape when he can. Joshua is an amazingly agile free runner, and can get himself in and out of places in all sorts of interesting ways.
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Joshua has no luxuries in his life, including the luxury of options. He has no home, no steady income, no support network, and no friends. He gets by as best he can, day by day. He's got a chip on his shoulder and an independent streak, but he doesn't look for unnecessary trouble or do "dumb" things that are counter to survival or make his life even more difficult. He is first and foremost a survivor, chiseling out a living in a cruel and uncaring world. However his untapped potential for greatness is vast; he is smart and savvy, and has a natural aptitude to excel at virtually anything he puts his mind to. If he were to be taken in hand by a mentor, there is no predicting how high he might climb, or how low he might descend.
Despite the really raw deal of a life he was dealt, Joshua is a basically decent person; he is somewhat amoral but not immoral, and he is not cruel or prone to violence. He is extremely pragmatic and has little to no "spiritual" or emotional side to appeal to. He feels no pity or sympathy for others but also no spite. He prefers to say nothing than to lie, to side step rather than to collide, to evade rather than assert, to fly rather than to fight.
Joshua has been exposed to a monster and killed it, but he is not yet truly a Hunter. He doesn't know about the accords, the government's involvement in maintaining them, bounties, or really anything at all. If he does become more involved in the world of the supernatural, it will be a journey of discovery for him.
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