Java is Martin MystÈre's inseparable assistant and friend, and shares pretty much every one of his discoveries and adventures with him. He certainly doesn't belong to our civilization. Although clad in modern clothes, his distinctive features are those of a Neanderthal man just as it is depicted in the traditional iconography: A stocky and muscular build, a posture that is slightly bent forward, and a low, receding forehead.
Java cannot talk, he expresses himself through gestures and grunts which turn into real roars when he is in a rage. A flash of intelligence, acute but completely different from what a citizen of a twentieth century society might possess, shines in his eyes.
In some mysterious way, Java forever experiences a profoundly deep communion with the powers of nature; he can perceive a very fine track in a thick forest or in the city traffic; he can 'enter' the body of a wild animal and 'see' what its eyes see.
Java chose to leave his native town, The City of Ethereal Shadows hidden in the inaccessible mountains of Mongolia, in order to reach and neutralize a diabolical enemy. With the help of Martin, he became an American citizen. He is economically independent and his sentimental life is as mysterious as it is intense. Although they possess opposite and complementary characters, Martin and Java manage to live together and understand one another without the need for words.
Diana Lombard is Martin MystËre's fiancËe. The couple shares a deep emotional bond, which began many years ago during a dangerous and highly memorable anthropology expedition.
Diana is a fundamental reference point for Martin, and manages to moderate his faults with a healthy dose of patience, understanding and feminine wisdom as well as occasional biting sarcasm. Although she is frustrated and sometimes enraged by Martin's open-minded attitude concerning romantic relationships, she knows full well that Martin is in deep love with her since they share their intellectual and emotional selves so intimately only with one another.
That said, however, it's difficult to differentiate Diana from any of Martin's diabolical enemies when she's having one of her jealousy fits.