Penny is a bright-eyed, bushy-tailed new student at the Enjuhneer Institute of Technology. She is the character most like me in the strip, though she is not an exact replica. She serves as a set of insider eyes in the vast subculture known as geekdom. Penny is slowly realizing that she isn’t alone, that other people have the same interests and tendencies as she does, and that it’s totally cool to be nerdy.

Lyta, or Hippolyta, is Penny’s roommate, and is undeclared regarding major. She is Penny’s first real nerdy experience at EIT, as they chanted Maxwell’s equations in unison. Lyta is a little skittish regarding her geekdom, and she’s trying to maintain and assert her feminine presence in the male-dominated school environment. She’s a rather hardcore feminist, but according to her, she’s “not militant” about it. We’ll see how that turns out.

WiredWolf42 is a girl (yes, she’s a girl) that lives down the hall from Penny and Lyta. She’s abandoned all things girly in her quest to learn the ways of the internet. WiredWolf has become so addicted to the internet that she’s even forgotten her given name and goes solely by her screenname. She’s also repulsed by human contact and emotions, favoring blogs over hugs. WiredWolf is only slightly based on a friend of mine — most of her is a combination of character quirks I’ve seen in my travels.

Eirian is a sweet, innocent, active Environmental Engineer. She’s very tall and exotically beautiful, but doesn’t seem to quite realize it. In fact, she doesn’t notice at all that nearly every male in her presence goes ga-ga over her. She’s more concerned with sustainability, saving the whales, and helping underpriveleged children. Eirian is as altruistic as she is oblivious to male advances.

Myra is a smart, somewhat naive, and very emotionally expressive chemistry major. She really does get your jokes, I swear. It just… takes her a little bit. Once her mind is done processing her heavy workload and deciding what to stress about next, she’ll think back a few weeks and finally get that joke you told her. It doesn’t make her dumb or anything — she is quite bright — just absentminded.

Kali is invisible for many reasons. She’s an invisible roommate. ::rimshot:: She represents girls in gaming and comp-sci, as you don’t see them very often. ::another rimshot:: She represents the generally slanted ratio of women to men at tech schools, and she’s a prime example of how there are clearly no girls on the internet. Kali herself is fun, sweet, and so desperately trying to be noticed for her merit and not for her quirks.

Renold is an ARMY major (AeRo-MechY) that plays video games, watches anime, and makes snarky comments. He eventually wants to launch things into space. For now, he spends a good chunk of his life in the bowels of the internet or on XBox Live pwning n00bs in “Insert Generic FPS Here.” Despite appearing like he’s not paying attention, he tends to be full of surprising insights. He also enjoys arguing about the physics of science fiction shows and movies.

Julian is Penny’s new boyfriend and overall sweetheart. He’s a Zen comp-sci that just seems to know how to fix almost anything computer-related. Julian thoroughly enjoys puzzles and German board games, and he has the rank of 5 kyu in Go. He is a generally low-maintenance guy and goes with the flow, but he’s also not afraid to put himself on the line and make an ass of himself on occasion. The rabbit head on his shirt connects him to his first appearance in the strip, in a LARP costume as a giant black rabbit.

More to come! Pictures soon!