Patch comes from a family that values intelligence, common sense, and a strong work ethic. Neither of her parents ever had anything handed to them, and that's how they raised their children, to earn everything in their lives. Her father is an academic, her mother worked on the night cleaning crew of his college, which is how they met. Her mother's mother lived with them growing up, her father's parents close by, and their extended family was never far away for long. They are an incredibly close knit extra large brood. Patch was given a strong sense of family, a strong sense of community, and encouragement to do anything that she was passionate about. It didn't matter what form that passion took, as long as she did something worth doing.
Her parents were both about as happy as parents can be when they hear that their daughter wants to go into a career where she puts her life on the line in the normal course of doing her job. She was excited and invested and determined to make a difference in the world on a local scale, and they supported it. Their only condition was that she get a degree first. So she raced through one, putting on blinders to most of the world around her so that she would be ready for the academy as soon as she was old enough to join.
Once she was, she did, and she killed it. That's also where she met Diego, their paths briefly crossing before he got thrown out. She thought the decision was a little harsh, but she had no way to change the outcome, and had her own course load and grades to worry about. They didn't really reconnect until after she'd graduated. It led to a romance, relatively brief, ending in disaster, the downfall being due mostly to Diego's inability to be a part of a proper adult relationship. She still cares about him, but she can't sacrifice everything she's worked for and everything important to her in order to cater to his issues. She's worked too hard, and values the life she's built too much. So things end, but she doesn't cut him out entirely. She's around, in a general sort of way, because she recognizes that she's probably his only proper adult relationship, and she doesn't want to deprive him of that entirely. She just can't invest herself in what they have the way she used to. She has to much going on, with her job, and also with the time she gives to improving her community when she's not on the clock.
Diego makes himself a thorn in her side, his vigilante crap making her job very difficult, putting criminals back out on the street when she knows she could have either gotten them the help thy needed, or gotten them out of the community. It's endlessly annoying, but she still believes that he has the potential to make a real difference in the world. She refuses to rise to his repeated insistence that she come and do things his way, just to see how good it feels to forget about the paperwork.
Sadly, it's the night that she finally takes his advice that she ends up being killed by one of the criminals who've taken Klaus hostage.
