Characters who appear in the webcomic Friends of a Friend.
Central Characters
Role: Field Agent
Urban Legend Inspiration: The "Friend of a Friend"
Born on the the US Fraternity Base to a pair of retired agents, Eden is a Mendax Maximus (also called a "Friend of a Friend"), someone with the ability to make rumors come true by spreading them. Eden has been trained from childhood to use her powers to help the Fraternity, a fate she wished she could escape, but reluctantly accepts nonetheless. Eden has a near encyclopedic knowledge of urban legends, and struggles against her compulsive urge to share the stories she hears with others, as she knows doing so can have catastrophic effects on reality itself.
- Alliterative Name: Made even worse by the reveal of her middle name: Elmer.
- All Jews Are Ashkenazi: Averted. While her father is German-Jewish, her mother is Ethiopian-Jewish.
- Badass Family: Both her parents are retired special agents who worked during periods of societal upheaval.
- Badasses Wear Bandanas: Subverted to an extent. Eden wheres a bandanna over her mouth in public as a reminder to not run her mouth. When her powers are needed, however, she'll pull it up onto her head, which even she admits looks pretty badass.
- Bad Powers, Good People: Her power has the ability to spread fear and panic, and can even cause tragic events to befall others. Nonetheless, Eden tries her best to act morally.
- Believing Their Own Lies: Turns out Eden's so good a lying that she ends up believing her own bullshit. Leads to lots of paranoia and neuroses on her part.
- Black and Nerdy
- Compelling Voice
- Compulsive Liar: Although she resents her lie-telling tendencies, Eden remains an impulsive liar.
- Conditional Powers: Eden's powers only work if the rumors she starts continue to spread. If only one or two people believe her, there will be no effects.
- Conspicuous Trenchcoat: Part of her regular outfit. Knowing it stands out as stereotypical spy attire, she purposefully wears it to keep people away from her in public, while also keeping her anonymity.
- Consummate Liar
- Elective Mute: Tries her best to not speak in public out of fear of accidentally starting a rumor. She is fairly comfortable speaking with her friends and family members, however.
- Friendless Background: Although she has a close relationship with her tutors while growing up, she never interacted with children her own age.
- I Just Want to Be Normal: Eden often dreams of leading a normal life outside of the Fraternity and without her FOAF powers.
- I Know What You Fear: Has a keen awareness of societal woes, and is able to manipulate these to induce mass panic.
- Jewish and Nerdy
- Nice Jewish Girl
- Not-So-Badass Longcoat: To be fair, that's not what she's going for.
- Prematurely Grey-Haired: Apparently due to reading an English translation of Cow Head (a fictional Japanese story said to be so scary that it drives the reader mad) as a child, Eden's hair is slate-grey despite her only being in her 20's.
- Self-Proclaimed Liar: Eden makes no effort to hide when she is lying (in fact, she is very open about it), but her compelling voice makes this irrelevant.
- Transgender: Was assigned male at birth, but transitioned as a preteen. It's not brought up often, and when it is, it's never played for laughs.
Role: Resident Pseudoscientist and Medical Researcher
Urban Legend Inspiration: The "10% of the Brain" Myth, Pop-Science
A resident psuedoscientist at the Fraternity Headquarters, Nadia is an eccentric Bostonian who gained access to 100% of her brainpower after overdosing on back-alley nootropics. Performing as what even she admits is just a stereotypical mad scientist, Nadia provides Eden and other agents with medical intelligence, such as information about new fad diets, dangerous definitely-real street drugs, and miraculous totally-not-snake oil cure all's.
- All Muslims Are Arab: Averted. Nadia comes from an Albanian-American family.
- All Theories Are True: Operates with this idea in mind.
- Boyish Short Hair
- Disappeared Dad: Her parents divorced when she was young, with her mother taking full custody of her and her brother. She reconnects with her father after graduating when he offers her a job at his pharmacy, but he still keeps her at arms length.
- Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: Her older brother is a medical student and a model son, while Nadia got through school on C's and barely keeps in touch with her family. In her defense, she was more or less forced by the fraternity to fake her own death.
- Large Ham: Makes up for Eden's reserved personality tenfold.
- Mad Scientist: When Nadia attempts to seem like a legitimate medical scientist, she ends up emulating this archetype.
- Omnidisciplinary Scientist: In addition to medicine, Nadia claims to have expertise in psychology, sociology, engineering, chemistry, zoology, mycology, anthropology, physics and dietetics.
- Pintsized Powerhouse: Had a reputation as a bit of a bruiser before dedicating herself to science. Her enhanced brainpower gives her extraordinary motor skills and spacial awareness, which more than make up for her small stature when she winds up in a fight.
- Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness: Combined with her pronounced Boston accent, her speech occasionally becomes unintelligible.
- Sibling Yin-Yang: While her morally upright older brother, Niko, trains to be a physician, Nadia makes a living concocting snake oils and illicit drugs.
- Southies: Though she sometimes tries to hide her Boston accent, there's no denying her neighborhood of origin.
- Techno Babble: None of which is ever used correctly.
- The Short Guy with Glasses: Has to where special sunglasses due to her enhanced ocular sensitivity.
- Weird Science: Her bread and butter.
