Nadia Rizavi Headcanons
Her name is actually spelled “Nadya,” but whenever she told people her name, they assumed it was spelled “Nadia,” and she never saw the point in correcting them (“Eh. It’s just one letter, anyway.”) The other MFEs don’t find out until years into their friendship when they spot her Garrison ID
Her parents immigrated from Pakistan to Washington DC before she was born. She’s the middle child of five because she gives such middle child energy. That is a girl who has spent hours tussling with her siblings
Her parents were never sure what to do with all her energy and her thrill-seeking nature because they could sign her up for every extracurricular available (ice skating, hockey, robotics, basketball, etc.) and she would still seek out trouble. Fifth grade Nadia adopted a feral weasel (read: found him digging through their trash and decided he was hers now) and hid him in her room so her parents didn’t find out. She then cried when her dad called animal control and her mom dragged her to the clinic for a rabies shot. Sixth grade Nadia came home covered in muck and grime and having lost a tooth because she started her own wrestling club during recess that day and then immediately had to defend her title as leader. She threw a fit in the waiting room of the dentist’s office because it was taking too long and the TV wasn’t playing anything she liked and she was bored
They have tried taking her to yoga and meditation classes but she got kicked out of both within the first week
When Nadia called home to her parents from the Garrison, she would sometimes ask if they missed her, or if they were worried about her getting into trouble without them there to stop her
Nadia, on the phone with her mom: You and Abbu must be worried sick about me. Or afraid that I’m gonna cause some kind of national scandal and embarrass you.
Mrs. Rizavi, sarcastically: Hmm? Oh no, jaan. Your father and I are very happy. You’re finally someone else’s problem.
Nadia: *Gasps* D:<
Mrs. Rizavi: And here I thought I would have to wait until your wedding day.
Nadia: *Gasps even louder* D:<
Mrs. Rizavi, whose smirk is somehow audible on the other end of the line:
She and her family played a lot of cricket growing up. They’d show up to to the baseball diamond after school or on the weekends to play ball. Nadia became an excellent player but she wasn’t the best out of all of her siblings. She was, however, the most competitive and the best at rage-baiting her siblings into losing the match.
She also grew up with cricket matches playing on the living room TV and when I tell you this girl is loyal to her home team. She defends them with her life, and her eyes are glued to the screen every season. She has broken friendships over the results of cricket matches. She has begrudgingly rekindled those friendships when everyone told her it was stupid to lose a friend over a potentially rigged competition played by people who don’t even know she exists
She does that two-fingered whistle that people do when their team wins a cricket match. You know the one
She’s not just like this over cricket but most sports she watches (huge fan of the Washington Capitals, Washington Commanders, Washington Wizards), plus everything she has ever competed in. Her high school robotics team, her little league baseball team, elementary soccer team, etc.
She loves Kpop bands like BTS, Black Pink, Stray Kids, etc. I firmly believe she would be in the trenches of Kpop stan Twitter as an older teen/young adult had she not gotten wrapped up in the war
She also really likes artists like Rihanna, Tyler, the Creator and Megan Thee Stallion
She lights up every family function. She loves fun and she brightens every room she walks into. She’s the cool aunt who plays with the kids, she pranks other people then runs away laughing, she gorges on food, she talks and talks and talks and talks. She definitely complains when her mom forces her into a lehenga choli because she finds the blouse tight and the fabric itchy. She’s also out here complaining that her henna is taking too long, because she gets so bored so fast. As a kid, she’s definitely ignored instructions to wait till it dried first to get into trouble and accidentally smudged it. Or forgot about it and then absentmindedly scratched at her hand before looking down and thinking, Oops.
Some cultural foods she really likes are biryani, korma, kulfi, haleem, jalebi and kaju katli. A non-cultural food she does not like are hot dogs because she once entered a hot dog eating contest and stuffed so many down her throat she nearly choked five times before throwing up. She also did not win. If she ever sees another hot dog again,
She definitely has a close relationship with her cousins back in Pakistan. idk, she just has that vibe
She is an avid gamer and has the rage quits to prove it. She and Pidge game together on the ATLAS
Shopping is actually a relaxing activity for her (as she says in Launch Date), but only because it is mild in comparison to her usual hobbies of sky diving or provoking Iverson. She is still directing everyone on this shopping spree like a military sergeant to find the best deals possible and get to the check-out line before anybody else
Part of the reason her parents were so tired of her antics is because they knew Nadia was smart. The same girl who spent all night playing videogames still got an A on her science test the next day. On more than one occasion, they have implored her to stop being so rowdy and apply herself because she could really get somewhere in life if she just tried. They insisted on her becoming a doctor but she asked if she could do engineering instead and they relented because it was still up there in Top 10 Career Paths a Parent Wants Their Child to Follow
Having said that, she grew dissatisfied doing electrical engineering. The actual labs were fun, and so was figuring out thermodynamics and circuit analysis, but then she thought Is this what I’m gonna be doing for the rest of my life? Working behind a desk forever?
So eventually she gets it in her head that she could be a military engineer, that way she can work in engineering and finally experience the excitement she’s been craving. She drops out of uni when she’s 18 to apply to the Garrison, so she joins the MFE friend group later than James and Ina, but at the same time as Ryan, whose first choice was to become a photographer
Her parents are disappointed in her, but she got a near-perfect score on the Garrison entrance exam, so what can they do? At least she’s finally applying herself. Everyone else who knew her was thrilled because if she took engineering she would probably take cars apart for fun and if she became a doctor more people are leaving that ward dead than alive
She and Ina have this unspoken bond as some the few women in the Garrison engineering unit. She and Ryan have the bond of coming in late to the Garrison and having to catch up to their peers.
She and James didn’t get along at first. Or rather, if you asked Nadia, she would say she and James were super close on account of being in the same unit. If you asked James, he would say that she was a colleague. But honestly, James was growing sick of her tendency to be silly all the time and not take things seriously, wondering how on earth she even got in
This only grew worse during the war. The MFEs eventually got stuck in a Galran trap during a mission and James finally snapped chewed her out harshly for telling them to look on the bright side
Nadia was hurt but still comforted him and then managed to get them out. James then realized that Nadia wasn’t silly in spite of the war, but because of it, because if she couldn’t keep hope alive during the end times, what else was there?
Nadia: Basically I have to stay silly because the other option is death :3
Nadia brings a few things from home: a Rubiks cube, an old pen she’s had since the seventh grade and a henna cone. She’s never had patience but between Galran attacks and long nights fearing for her life, she’s had a lot of free time on her hands. Might as well learn a skill her mom has been begging her to her whole life. She’s not very good at first, especially because she’s trying to apply it on herself, which takes a lot of awkward maneuvering. Thankfully, James finds her applying henna one day, and after some brief confusion (“Is that a henna cone?”) he sits down and lets her apply it on him. James is half Algerian on his mom’s side and henna is pretty culturally significant there too. They take turns learning to apply henna on each other's hands and marveling at the difference in design
When Nadia finally comes home from war, she expects her parents to be angry but doesn't expect them to embrace her so tearfully ("We thought you were dead.")
They are shocked to find that she wants to continue working at the Garrison and they complain about it to anyone who will listen, but they do that thing that brown parents do when they say "My middle child, Nadya, grew up to be such an idiot. We told her to go into doctoring, she said, 'No, papa, I want to become an engineer.' We said, 'Fine, be an engineer.' And she said, 'No, papa, I want to go into the military. And we said, 'The military?' But then she went ahead and completed the exam without telling us, got full marks. What could we do? She ended up fighting on the frontlines of the war, but the phone lines were down, the radios were down, what could we do? Now she wants to go back." and it sounds like they're berating their child, but in reality, it's their way of saying, "My child Nadya got into engineering and then got full marks on an exam and became a military engineer, then saved the world. What has your Hassan been doing recently, hmm?"
Nadia: I'm like if a really smart person was also a massive fucking idiot.
James, not even looking up from his book: You don't say
Nadia: D:< *Kicks him off the bench*
