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Out of Character Information
player name: RS
player livejournal: rainbowserenity
playing here: None
where did you find us? From your Tseng player.
are you 16 years of age or older?: Yes, if the amount of candles on my last birthday cake were any indication.
In Character Information
character name: Aerith Gainsborough
Fandom: Final Fantasy VII (specifically, Advent Children Complete)
Timeline: At the end of the movie when she walks away into the light.
character's age: 22
powers, skills, pets and equipment: Aerith was the last of the Cetra, an Ancient race on her planet who could communicate with spirits and had an intense connection to nature. Since Aerith is only half-Cetra, these abilities aren’t quite as apparent as they would be in a full-blooded one. When she was alive, she could hear the whispers of the dead and could make flowers grow in a seemingly desolate area of the slums. After she died, instead of simply becoming absorbed into the Lifestream like most people would be, she still remained somewhat aware and was able to get the Lifestream to help Holy fight off Meteor at the end of the original game, and somehow able to use Great Gospel to cure Geostigma in Advent Children Complete.
She is quite skilled with magic, but can’t seem to use any naturally unless it’s a part of her limit breaks. For that reason, she’ll arrive with the ability heal, but only if she’s hurt herself. Since there’s no Lifestream in Anatole, she won’t be able to hear dead people, but she’ll still have a connection to nature and be skilled with growing flowers. She was also the only person who was able to cast Holy, so she can do that as well.
She did use a staff as a weapon, but since she’s coming in from floating around the Lifestream, there’s no reason that she’d have it with her. ;)
canon history: Aerith was born on February 7 to Ifalna, one of the last of a race called the Cetra, and Professor Gast Faremis, a genius scientist. Soon after her birth, thugs from the greedy corporation Shinra attacked their home in Icicle Inn, murdered her father, and kidnapped Ifalna and her infant daughter. The two were experimented on by Shin-Ra’s scientists, but finally Ifalna and Aerith escaped. Ifalna was gravely wounded but managed to make it to the town of Midgar, where she put her young daughter in the hands of Elmyra Gainsborough, a young woman recently widowed.
Elmyra raised Aerith like her own child and kept her safe from the Shinra Corporation. It was around this time that Aerith met Tseng, a Turk whose mission was twofold: to protect her, and to convince her to help Shinra find the Promised Land. Aerith violently rejected her Ancient heritage, but Tseng stuck around to keep an eye on her and the two became close friends. Drawn to beauty, she discovered the two places flowers would grow in Midgar: Elmyra’s house, and a small church in the Sector 5 slums. When she was about sixteen, a young man with black hair and blue eyes fell through the roof of her church and into her life. His name was Zack Fair, and he was her first love. He built her her first flower cart and encouraged her to begin selling flowers - "Midgar full of flowers, wallet full of money!" They dated for a while until an important mission took Zack away from Midgar for four years. Aerith wrote him eighty-nine letters, but she never heard back and he never came home.
When Aerith was twenty-two, she met another young man with the same blue eyes as Zack who also fell through the roof of her church. Following him was the trouble in the form of Turks, Shinra’s elite fighting team who were trying to get her back to the science labs where, as far as they were concerned, she belonged. Thinking quickly, she offered to date him if he’d be her bodyguard. He agreed and helped her escape.
She found out later that his name was Cloud Strife and he was a mercenary currently in the employ of a rebel organization called AVALANCHE. She loved the idea of fighting against the people who had made her life miserable for so long and joined the team. They began tracking Sephiroth, a former SOLDIER gone mad, and slowly but surely, the pieces of Aerith’s destiny fell into place and she realized what she had to do.
After Sephiroth stole the Black Materia from Cloud, Aerith went to the Forgotten Capital and began to pray for the release of Holy, powerful white magic she could cast thanks to the materia her mother had left her, presumably as an heirloom. Unfortunately, Sephiroth figured out her plans as well and brought it upon himself to stop her. Permanently.
Following her death, Aerith traveled through the Lifestream to find where she could release Holy, and she called upon the souls of the others in the Lifestream to join her in her attempt to defeat Sephiroth. Holy was successfully summoned, Sephiroth was defeated, and Aerith, thinking that her destiny was fulfilled, let go of her core and memories to rejoin the Planet.
Two years later, Aerith found herself called upon again, to help Cloud and her friends defeat Bahamut SIN and Sephiroth's remnants. Focusing her willpower and love, Aerith was able to help Cloud perform superhuman feats and even calls out to Kadaj to distract him, ultimately leading to his and his brothers' destruction. Her core is reformed when Cloud ends up in the Lifestream following the battle, and she and Zack inform him that his work on the Planet isn't quite done yet. After they make sure Cloud makes it back to the surface okay, they bid him farewell and return to the Lifestream, where Aerith is sure her work is done now.
personality: Aerith is cheerful and good-natured with a sly, teasing sense of humor. She will try to be friends with everyone, even romantic rivals. She’s very peaceful and in touch with nature due to being half-Cetra, so if you can’t find her, check the garden - she’s probably tending to the flowers. There’s little she won’t do to protect her friends and she can kick some butt, but her talents mainly lay in healing. She was fairly isolated growing up, and as such, loving and being loved are very important to her, and loss of love is devastating to her.
It’s also easy to see that she has a stubborn streak. Once she’s made up her mind about something, nothing will stop her from seeing it through (like, say, getting her gullible boyfriend to build her three different flower carts, or going to pray for Holy without telling anyone because she didn’t want to be stopped). Living in the slums taught her strength, and while she does rely on her friends quite a bit, there’s no doubt that she can take care of herself.
Aerith also has a temper and she does try to control it, but her emotions do tend to get the better of her, especially if there’s a good reason for it. Despite this, she copes with change fairly well since as in nature, it is part of life. She may be shaky for awhile, but eventually she will get used to it and embrace whatever the change has brought to her with a smile and forgiveness.
why do you feel this character would be appropriate to the setting? Having Aerith is mandatory! Plus, she’ll make the town look fabulous. And everyone likes a healer.
Writing Samples
Network Post Sample:
Helloooo?
[Hmm. Usually when she called someone answered - but then again, she wasn’t sure if there was anyone who could answer.]
Hmm...this definitely isn’t the Lifestream, is it? [Although she’d basically figured that out from the start; after all, the Lifestream didn’t have anything remotely town-like about it. It was almost like a dream, really. Plus, she had a feeling this wasn’t a special case like it had been those few times awhile ago.
After all, the last time she was able to pick up a phone, it was to tell everyone where to go. How could she tell anyone anything if she didn’t know who was here - or where she was, for that matter? There must be a reason she’s here. Right? Whatever the case, she’s grateful to be up and about and gives the screen a little smile.]
I guess if anyone needs me, I’ll be outside exploring!
[It couldn’t be any worse than the Midgar slums, right?]
Third Person Sample:
When she first stepped onto solid ground, she actually had to scuff her boot against it a few times to assure herself it was really there, that she could feel it. Being a conscious spirit and having an actual body were two completely different things, really. When you were a spirit, you couldn’t feel things; not really. It was just your soul remembering how simple things like walking on solid ground felt.
Once the shock sunk in, Aerith looked around the room in confusion. Was she at an Inn? But why? It wasn’t as though the Lifestream had any. She let out a nervous giggle at the thought as she imagined her ancestors or someone charging spirits to circle the Lifestream.
She went to the window, still marveling at the feel of a solid floor under her feet. Maybe what was outside would look familiar, at least. When she looked, however, she couldn’t figure out where she was at all. None of the cities Cloud and the others had taken her to looked anything like this, although the more she stared, the more she realized that it almost reminded her of home - the slums of Midgar. Even though it looked familiar in that sense, the town outside was different enough for her to realize that, for some reason, the Planet had decided to send her far, far away.
Whatever fear and surprise she felt was replaced with excitement. It’d been so long since she’d been able to feel things; real things. Despite the view outside looking like something from the slums, maybe there’d be a place for her to be able to grow flowers again. The sensation of soil between her fingers and hearing the plants’ happy cries wasn’t something she hadn’t experienced since she’d left Midgar. It couldn’t hurt to look, especially since the people she could see from her window looked civil enough. They weren’t throwing each other punches, at any rate.
Aerith smiled as she stepped away from the window and turned to head out the door. Okay, of course she still had to find out just where she was and how she’d ended up here, no doubt about that. But the sensation of actually living again was exciting enough that finding out where she was or how she’d gotten here seemed more like an unimportant side quest than anything.
Anything else? Nope! ♥