Background
Julie 'Dizzy' Bottero is from a fairly large extended Italian family, and grew up in New York City's Bensonhurst and Little Italy areas: many of her uncles having served in the Second World War, where her father was killed in the European theatre when she was a year old: her father's and particularly Uncle Angelo's wartime experiences being something of a mystery to her, given the frequent reticence to talk about such things, and also perhaps related to her uncle's occasional references to 'Your father and I saw some pretty odd stuff in the wars.' (Her Uncle having gone on to serve in Korea as a Marine aviation mechanic, at least ostensibly.) Something of a misfit among her traditional family, she's nonetheless spent her childhood in and around her family's largely-automotive related businesses, and given her mother's and aunts' times working in the war effort, wasn't too strongly-discouraged from helping out around the shops, even if often relegated to counter and parts-run duty, at least as far as customers might see: a fascination with machines and things that turn in general seemed to come hand in hand with a tendency to be a tomboyish tagalong with her brother and cousins, gaining the moniker 'Dizzy' from schoolyard days spinning around on merry-go-rounds, donut shop and soda fountain stools, or just spinning herself around in the middle of playgrounds, something that would prefigure the onset of her mutation later.
Dizzy attended Catholic elementary school and public high school, where she proved to be bright if a bit of a joker, despite hanging out largely with a rocker/teeny-bopper crowd, also of course tagging along for the drag racing scene, including the usual impromptu street races, causing concern about the usual near-misses-with the law and the usual uptightness of adults. As she grew into her later teens, though, her mutant senses began to start showing themselves, she beginning to become distracted by spinning objects in almost hallucinatory-seeming ways, one teacher, old Sister Claire, had never particularly approved of the poodle-skirts-and-saddle-shoes set, and less so Dizzy's tomboyish tendencies and ways: and at first rather subtly, ordinary objects would prove to have been turned around when no one, Dizzy included, was even looking, and this only played on the old teacher's wits, (The public high school faculty believed she must be slipping with age, or being pranked by students,) Sister Claire, for her part, was convinced witchcraft must be involved, though during one particularly stern detention lecture, a pencil sharpener was set whirling violently for a few moments, at which point she expected Dizzy or at least her crowd's 'devil music' must be involved. Fortunately, no one really believed her, even as Dizzy began learning something of how to *use* her rotational abilities, from stuck bolts to emergency braking, to, occasional michief and play she did her best to conceal. nonetheless, near the end of her junior year, her family felt it best to pack her off to stay with Uncle Angelo in California, given Sister Claire's increasing paranoia, and Dizzy's seemingly-increasing gravitation toward the Village and various occasionally-trouble-marred race scenes.
There, she'd spend a couple of years between school, (She'd had to wait a year or so to get in synch and catch up) …finding herself immersed in the *California* custom car scene at Angelo's Speed and Aviation, where Uncle Angelo's war-surplus airstrip and hangars, increasingly passed by by bigger more modern airports, also became home to his own custom and speed shop, as well as hosting drag races. which scenes were of course, the place for someone like Dizzy to be, even if what she did there *did* cut into her schoolwork a fair bit as she got older.
Julie's skillset did improve, automotively and otherwise, her ex-Marine uncle somehow managing to keep her out of too much trouble, partly by keeping her rather busy, including with work on her own prized '56 Nomad, customized and very-respectably-hopped-up for the parts-running representation of the business, at least, as well as CB-equipped, which gave some freedom to spend more time hanging about the surfer scene as well as perhaps something of a leash as well. Uncle Angelo, for his part, perhaps quietly ignored some of what seemed perhaps a bit uncanny about Dizzy's abilities, pretending not to notice things like an old autogyro that Dizzy occasionally took up when no one was looking, (despite the lack of an engine on it.) And seeing to it, for some reason, she knew a bit about self-defense, as well as how to use a few firearms, largely a carbine kept around to 'scare off coyotes,' ….So things progressed, until the day of President Kennedy's assassination, when a distraught Dizzy found a number of shop tools and the like spinning and flipping about one of the shops in what may have looked like a fit of hysteria in the aftermath. Uncle Angelo soon decided it would be best for Dizzy to make the road trip back home, to clear her head, and try and attend Kennedy's funeral, ostensibly, but perhaps in part because of certain tensions surrounding the Sacramento riots. She returns to a New York in somewhat more crisis, with a Chevy full of tools and, possibly a few arrangements made via some of Uncle Angelo's mysterious contacts. (opening for possible SHIELD motor pool recruitment.)
IC Events
Traits
- Rotational Motion: Dizzy has a specialized, but very strong telekinetic type of ability: she can impart and manipulate rotational motion, particularly strongly when an object is shaped or designed to turn or spin, or is for whatever reason already doing so regardless. She's particularly adept in using this regarding her automotive obsessions, (and by extension other mechanical devices, )everywhere from removing stubborn bolts to adding or removing rotational force to driveshafts or wheels to make cars do things most from the period cannot. She can spin-stabilize thrown items quite strongly, or alternately, send things which are rotating or spinning awry by throwing that off-balance. Unsecured items of other types, she can cause to flip over somewhat randomly, which in a panic can "really mess up a room." and in a physical fight, she can cause *people* to over-rotate when throwing haymakers or other moves that involve rotating. (This can upset people's sense of equilibrium and relates to her nickname. )
- Gyroscopic Senses: Dizzy vividly perceives rotational motion all around her, including, as a 'rest state,' that of the planet. Consequently, she herself has a highly acute sense of balance and orientation, in herself and other things which is difficult to disrupt. She can inertially-navigate with her eyes closed, and can perceive objects which are rotating all around: the faster or bigger, (or the more out-of-place for the setting,) the more-vividly. It's this sense which started her fascination with mechanics and engineering, and is what enables her to latch onto items with her kinetic control without seeing them or otherwise knowing where they may be. (ie, if, say, a vehicle's driveshaft isn't turning, she has to 'feel around for it," and can only directly perceive it once it starts turning. Her reflexes are distinctly sharpened where this sense is involved, (Handy when a loss of control may send things flying,) and she can react subconsciously to such threats before her visual cortex could catch up, (Something like a spinning weapon or the path of a rifled bullet is *very* vivid to her.)