Miriam Flippo (Cataclysmic Gerosha)

Miriam Ann "Sniperbadger" McLaine (née Flippo) is a major character in the Gerosha universe of Dozerfleet Comics. She features in the first two parts of both the webcomic trilogy and novel trilogy. She is also a main character in the show Cataclysmic Horizons, which partially reinterprets both her personal character and her history. Miriam is a fraternal triplet of Candi Levens and an identical triplet of Marina Baret. She is the daughter of Stan and Shalia Flippo, and becomes the mother of Marie, Trina, and Larry McLaine. She also becomes the wife of adventurer/scientist Steve McLaine.

Character bio
Note: ''The following narrative is specific to Cataclysmic Gerosha. See below for explanations of how previous narratives differ.''

The early life and times of Miriam are fairly consistent throughout all of her five main interpretations. The greatest deviation in her narrative comes in Cataclysmic Horizons, where the terms of how and where she flees from Gerosha are changed. Also changed is the nature of how her boyfriend, Phil Couric, meets his untimely end. She is something of a foil to her sister Candi. This is especially true of the Earth-G7 version of Candi; but is true of earlier versions as well.

While Candi is at times religious and is usually somewhat modest, Miriam was treated worse than Candi by their older sister Erin. This led to a desire to rebel, making Miriam more susceptible to worldly temptations. As a result, she became something of a "bad girl" when compared to Candi's fairly conservative demeanor. In spite this, she harbored no resentment toward Candi. In fact, Candi often came to Miriam's aid when Erin would go too far. Miriam has described Candi at times as being "like a second conscience," keeping both Erin and Miriam from going over the edge with their character flaws. Candi and Miriam remained closest of friends, even after Marina left and after separated from each other for several months with no contact.

In earlier versions, she was, like Candi, under the Curse of Honeybee Samuel. Said curse made self-control near-impossible. This is not a major plot point in Cataclysmic Gerosha, since her ancestor Sam Wrikon never became Honeybee Samuel in the Cataclysmic universe. By extension, the Meshalutian Trilogy and its continuity are no longer canon in Cataclysmic Horizons.

Ancestry
See also: Ancestry of Candi Levens (Cataclysmic Gerosha)

Miriam is a fraternal triplet with Candi and Marina. She did not acquire the Centhuen Prototype genes that her father Stan Flippo received from Grandma Centipede after being experimented on by Phaelite scientists. However, she did acquire a lot of intelligence from her mother Shalia.

Early life
Miriam grew up in her earliest years as being like Candi in almost every way. Along with Marina, the triplets were sweet and innocent. The family situation seemed almost perfect. However, Stan and Shalia grew too comfortable in their assumption that the Hebbleskins were truly gone. In 2006, a young Gunner Soorfelt changed all that by going along with his mentor on a mission to assassinate Stan and Shalia. Their initial plan botched, they settled for running the couple off the road. This secondary plan proved successful, and the founders of Gerosha were reported dead. They wanted to cut up Stan and collect Shalia's head; but police were closing in too quickly.

Reily refused to assume custody of his young sisters, since they were even younger than his own son Kirby. Therefore, custody fell on a reluctant Erin Flippo. The wealth-yet-eccentric Japanese inventor Imaki Izuki became Candi's godfather after befriending Stan and Shalia in the earliest months of Candi's life. He decided to set up base in Gerosha so as to become a sort of "uncle" figure to Candi. In this way, he helped ease a fraction of Erin's burden of promotion to parental figure.

All the girls were psychologically damaged by the senseless murder of their parents. However, Miriam took it the hardest. She was always the one who knew how to get her mother's attention the most efficiently. But she couldn't manipulate death to get what she wanted. Life with Erin brought a lot of changes in the girls' lives, and Miriam was the slowest to adjust. Imaki tried to reach out to her too; but they never bonded the way Candi bonded with Imaki. Miriam gained a love of machines early on, leading to her eventually becoming the hacker Sniperbadger. She found that at least the machines could be bent to her will. She grew confident that even if she was not to be allowed to have her way with anything else, at least she could get the machines to do her bidding.

High school
Miriam attended the same schools as did Candi and Marina, and had the same catechism instruction at church. The three girls were confirmed at the same time. Unlike Marina, Candi and Miriam pressed for harder examination questions before being confirmed. They wanted to give better-thought-out answers than what was deemed standard fare for confirmands. Nobody of the three girls took it to heart more than Candi. The girls soon left eighth grade, leaving their horrible nightmares of Gerosha Middle School behind. However, they found Gerosha High to be much worse. What they had learned would be put to the test on a regular basis.

Of the three triplets, Miriam was the least happy about moving in with Erin. Erin responded by being the harshest on Miriam, even when advised by Candi and Imaki not to. Erin slowly developed a chemical imbalance in her brain, leading to mental and emotional instability as well as violent mood swings. The stress at school was made worse when the new politically-correct faculty began aggressively persecuting the girls for not playing along with the state-sponsored ideology. They didn't do much to fight back, since they feared it'd draw the Hebbleskins in. However, the girls' torment was made worse when the teachers started encouraging students who didn't share the girls' views to retaliate with sexual harassment.

After Candi and Marina were raped, they both developed a strong desire to replace their negative experiences with positive ones. Marina took matters into her own hands, and numerous boys at school began taking advantage of her. This came back to haunt Miriam, as the boys had trouble telling the sisters apart. As the growing persecution of Marina unfolded, Candi and Miriam started taking the fall for some of her transgressions. The three girls did what they could to shelter Erin from the fact that her younger sisters' reputations were soiled.

Erin's deteriorating mental health led to strained relations with all three of her sisters, in spite not knowing the truth about how many rumors spread about the girls. However, Marina eventually entered a committed relationship with Matt Baret - the one boy was wasn't simply taking advantage of her. He saw writing on the wall with Obama's re-election, and wanted to help his family liquidate assets in their car dealership and flee the country. Marina got pregnant via Matt, and quickly experienced Erin's wrath. The result was Candi and Miriam not being trusted with whom they dated.

While Candi aimed to negotiate peace, Miriam quickly got fed up with how Erin was treating her. She began dating Phil Couric, the only boy at school that repeatedly stood up for her - even at his own expense. As the nation was split in four following the fiscal cliff dive, Phil and Miriam readily saw writing on the wall as well. Miriam got a scholarship to study advanced programming in Hong Kong - and gladly pursued it. She moved in with Phil's family, even though Candi and Imaki advised against it. Phil's family, to put Candi and Imaki's minds partially at ease, made sure that Miriam and Phil had separate bedrooms.

Escape from Ameristan and Phil's death
The arrangement was short-lived. Phil's family, being black and conservative, was readily targeted by the new regime for extermination. It was deemed a "political anomaly" that had "no right to exist." Phil and Miriam soon found themselves as

Development
(Unfinished)