Aputi Kirima Theroux, 25, is a confident young inuit and french woman who boasts a bloodline full of self sufficient and adaptable ancestors with incredibly strong familial ties. She was raised in a close knit community with not only her parents, but her maternal grandparents as well who offered both knowledge and advice to the rambunctious girl. Her mother was the primary provider, taking after her own mother and instilling the same values into her daughter, while her father, a retired university professor from Paris, assisted with household upkeep and standard education.

As soon as she was considered old enough to hold a beginners bow she was allowed to join her mother on hunting expeditions where she saw tokotas for the first time. By joining her mother on these trips she was able to learn first hand just how important it was to respect the land and the creatures inhabiting it.

At only thirteen tragedy steamrolled through her family in the form of her father’s death. He was found by Aputi and her mother after being attacked by what was assumed to be a wolf or bear and passed in their arms before paramedics could reach them. At the insistence of his family he was laid to rest under the tree where he met his wife. With the loss of her husband and because of her parent’s old age Aputi filled the empty position left as her mother’s craft and hunting partner. She was taught how to skin, dry, and sew pelts into various objects like blankets and jackets, create simple jewelry with stones, and wield an ax better than a lumberjack. During the hunts she would assist her mother with a wild tokota and decided to follow them home and never leave, becoming a new family member.

After an awful hunting accident, Aputi lost her mother to an infection brought upon by her broken bone at fifteen. Her grandparents followed soon after due to grief and left their granddaughter on her own with her mother’s tokota. She moved away from the village she grew up in and tried to establish herself near the next town over, but as one last jab at the now eighteen year old the spirits called her mother’s tokota home. She was alone for only a few months before deciding life without these massive canines was not nearly as fulfilling and took a chance at a local adoption fair. Now with her trusted partner, she is trying to rebuild the family that she misses dearly.