Solomani, female, 46

Michelle is a passionate and outspoken woman, utterly convinced of the obviousness of her cause, and certain that those who argue against her are all part of the conspiracy. She never lets truth or logic get in the way of her beliefs.

Michelle was working in a fast food restaurant on Amondiage when the truth suddenly dawned on her - the entire Imperium was a lie. That humans had populated the galaxy hundreds of thousands of years ago was such an obvious falsehood she couldn't believe that others hadn't seen it. If some so called alien species had taken humans from Earth, then why were there still people on Earth thousands of years later?

She argued with her family, her friends and her co-workers. She was laughed at, but she started to gain a following. Going out into the Islands she hitch-hiked to other worlds to spread the truth. The entire Imperium was a lie put about by the governments to keep people in line. Aliens were also probably just people dressed up in suits. Mostly they just looked like people in cat or dog suits.

She took the opportunity to visit all the worlds of the Islands, refusing to try and leave for Imperium space because she believed doing so would result in her being brainwashed. At some point she realised that there were some minor flaws in her arguments, but by this time she was beginning to get a following so decided to carry on, actually getting support from the government of Topas which found her views useful. This gave her some much needed credibility, but also made her an enemy within the Topas terrorist groups.

Over the last few years, she has made a number of rivals amongst both the scientific and business establishments, a fact she uses as proof that she's on to something. Though she has pretty much alienated her family and original circle of friends, she can except to get an audience of hundreds, if not thousands, when she does fund raising events on worlds in the Islands. She is beginning to tire of the circuit, but has a number of donors who pay her a considerable salary to keep going. If she's privately questioning her public beliefs, she's definitely not showing public signs of it.