Personality
After becoming a Type-V mutant and relocating to Hong Kong, Vilma maintained a highly independent, proud, and cold demeanor, not forming any attachments with anyone and regarding men as prey and playthings. She maintained this independence by refusing to permit The Society to extend its influence into Asia by killing their envoys and assassins. Her attitude changed after she met Victor in ES 32 in Hong Kong and was unable to defeat him as a result of his acquired ability to increase the durability of his skin to withstand damage. Tasting defeat for the first time, Victor was the only person that Vilma fell in love with, eventually becoming his wife. Prior this she had neither been in love with nor loved anyone else. Following his death and her existence as the sole Cognate left, she was able to continue on and did not return to her former personality. Aga Mbadi appears to be the only other person with whom Vilma developed a friendship with after Victor's death, and she once saved his life years ago. However the relationship between the two later changed to the point that they are now enemies who wish to kill each other.
Vilma's attitude towards humans evolved over time. As a result of the impact winter, she came to share Victor's philosophy that humans were meant to be preyed on by the Cognate. However because her experiences differed from his, her distrust and resentment towards humans were not as ingrained. She came to believe from her rescue and treatment by Keiran and John Farrell that barring coexistence between humans and the Cognate, both species would eventually die out, with the Cognate continuing Victor's plan of moving from place to place and wiping out the human populations they came across, depopulating the Earth until only the Cognate would be left, leaving them to starve to death. Despite Keiran's betrayal of her and attempt to kill Victor and the other members of the Cognate in ES 69, Victor's own betrayal of her by appearing to go along with her proposal in order to show her human treachery hurt her more. This resolve to attempt to coexist was rekindled after meeting John Farrell again and his grandson Arthur years later in ES 126. Vilma became a believer after seeing Merlin, a device based on research by Keiran Farrell prior to the Catastrophe in ES 55 that could predict the future that had been revived, and Arthur's conviction to raise humanity from its current state and rediscover outer space. However, she realized that Victor stood in the way of this becoming a reality, and so decided to side with the humans and fight him to the death. Her belief in Arthur led her to protect him for more than ten years by battling his enemies, regardless of the morality of either side. At one point she assumed the leadership of the Stellar Nursery Society and is committed to the organization's goal of saving children unwanted and made superfluous by Methuselization.
Read more about this topic: Caerula Sanguis
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“Her personality had an architectonic quality; I think of her when I see some of the great London railway termini, especially St. Pancras, with its soot and turrets, and she overshadowed her own daughters, whom she did not understand—my mother, who liked things to be nice; my dotty aunt. But my mother had not the strength to put even some physical distance between them, let alone keep the old monster at emotional arm’s length.”
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