Gabriela Grajek

Gabriela was born in Poland but moved as a young child to New York City, accompanying her mother after her father died in an industrial accident. She was raised by her uncle, a housing contractor, in a working class Catholic family in Queens. She attended Columbia University on a scholarship paid by expat Polish organisations, majoring in Linguistics and Slavonic studies. She graduated in the mid 70s, when the CIA was actively looking to recruit young Americans with skills in Eastern European languages, and she was recruited immediately after graduation. She worked in the New York field office for a couple of years before being posted to Prague, where she picked up fluent Czech. After another stateside posting, she returned to her alma mater to finish her postgraduate degree, intending to become a college professor.

Like many other people, Gabriela found her plans thrown into chaos by the outbreak of the world war. She had always been active in Polish expat circles and had retained strong government contacts from her time in the CIA. As the CIA stepped up its collaboration with expat Eastern European groups, Gabriela was informally recommended for a job with the Polish government-in-exile in London, where she became a liason with western intelligence services.

Gabriela was sent to West Germany in 1985 to assist with forming Polish expat units to fight alongside NATO forces, and she entered Poland for the first time since she was a little girl alongside the US 5th division. Although never formally attached to a combat unit she was exposed to enemy fire at several points. In late 1985 she and a group of Polish soldiers who had defected to NATO departed on a long term mission to reach the town of Rzeszow, which was at the time still behind Soviet lines, after NATO intelligence suggested local partisans were plaining an uprising within the town.

The intelligence turned out to be correct and Gabriela was instrumental in the uprising that took control of the city. She eventually transitioned from being an advisor to becoming a member of the city's governing council. When the surviving Free Polish leadership decided to base itself in Rzeszow, Gabriela was given a seat in the central military council, and soon rose to become its Chairman, despite her young age. She is now the effective ruler of the area surrounding Rzeszow and is recognised, at least in principle, as the leader of Poland by various anti-communist camps and communities throughout Poland.

Gabriela is motivated first and foremost by a strong hatred for the Soviet Union, communism, and all it stands for. She is opposed to any form of compromise with the USSR or the local communist authorities. Despite her American upbringing and government service, she feels a much stronger revulsion towards the USSR than attraction to the USA - if Americans are seen cooperating or even compromising with the Soviets, she will view them as an enemy. Having said this she still intends to carry out her original mission when sent to London, which is to establish a Polish government that will cooperate with NATO military strategy, although given the breakdown of coherent NATO strategy in Poland, she mostly carries this out by encouraging Free Polish forces and communities to materially assist NATO units. Her past as a CIA officer is widely known, but not the fact that she was still working for the CIA until she lost contact. So far these two motivations have not come into conflict, but if she were to receive orders from the CIA, particularly if they involve compromising her persecution of war against the Soviets and their allies, they might.

A short and slim woman, Gabriela has long, straight black hair and intense eyes. She usually wears formal suits when performing her official duties. She carries a PM pistol and is proficient in its use. She speaks Polish with only a slight American accent.