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Player Information
Name: Siberia
Age: 19
AIM SN: zombiesicles
email: electric_batarang@yahoo.com
Have you played in an LJ based game before? Yes.
Currrently Played Characters: Neuro Nougami | omnisciens
Conditional: Activity Check Link: n/a
Conditional: Official Reserve Link: not the first day but still
Character Information
General
Canon Source: Baccano!
Canon Format: Light novels (anime adaptation, as well, but she does not feature in it)
Character's Name: Maria Barcelito
Character's Age: Unknown. I'd place her in the 18-19-20 range, though.
Conditional: If your character is 13 years of age or under, please clarify how they will be played. n/a
What form will your character's NV take? Trying to think of something Maria would actually understand how to use... I think I'll go with something like a small journal or scheduler, but it only really has two pages - one half of the book has the screen built into it, and the other is for writing. This will limit how much text she can send, but she's not big into writing or reading anyway, so it won't be a big deal for her. There are a number of buttons under the screen to adjust volume, input phone numbers, etc.
Abilities
Character's Canon Abilities: Nothing superhuman; however, she is extremely talented in dual-wielding her katanas, Murasamia and Kochite, and is definitely a force to be reckoned with in battle. Gang members have described her swords as "scarier than machine guns."
Conditional: If your character has no superhuman canon abilities, what dormant ability will you give them? Over and over, Maria repeats the idea that she can cut through anything if she believes she can. I'd like to make this idea a reality for her! If Maria believes in herself hard enough, she really can cut through anything with her two swords - wood, bone, stone, steel, and maybe even incorporeal things like happiness or fear eventually. This ability is directly tied to her confidence level - she'll only be able to actually pull this off if she really thinks she's capable of it.
Weapons: Two traditional Japanese swords named Murasamia and Kochite; she received them from her late grandfather.
History/Personality/Plans/etc.
Character History:
As a young girl, Maria lived happily with her grandfather, who wasn't quite right in the head. One day, playing with one of his katanas, Murasamia, she accidentally cut him, and burst out into tears, apologizing for the accident. However, his reponse?
"That won't do at all. Listen up, Maria! When using this sword, you must never say something like ‘I didn’t mean to hurt you’! When you wield, no, when you draw out this fellow, you must always think,‘I’m going to chop you up’!"
Even though he'd intended to stop her blow, the sword had managed to slip past his defenses and slice him. Delighted with this display of potential, he says that Maria is talented, and tells her that it can cut anything. Not only that, he says that she has the right to that sword - after all, her parents had been great assassins, but instead turned to guns... so Maria's grandfather had killed them with the swords himself. And she isn't fazed by that at all.
"If you’ve drawn this blade once, you don’t have to think about anything else afterwards. Believe that the sword will cut. Then, all you have to do is just delight and rejoice in cutting.”
Maria makes her first appearance in Baccano! in the year 1931. The Runorata family and the Gandor family are butting heads - the Runoratas have been selling illegal drugs secretly, and some of their goods were stolen on Gandor property. And the Gandors hate drugs. Gustavo, a dim-witted but high-ranking Runorata mafioso in charge of the Manhattan area, decides to wipe out small organizations like the Gandors in order to show off their power and crush the robber. In retaliation, the Gandors call up their most fearsome wild card - the assassin Vino, otherwise known as Claire Stanfield.
How does Gustavo decide to try and beat the infamous Vino? All of his men are under direct control by the Runorata boss, Bartolo - who has no idea of what Gustavo's trying to do. So instead, he decides to get a bunch of guns-for-hire - people crazy enough that they wouldn't run from the name "Vino." And what hitman is crazier than Maria? She, along with another assassin named Felix Walken, are to go seize some people from the Gandors in order to draw Vino out.
The assassins, headed by Gustavo and his underlings, herd two people - Roy, the robber responsible for the whole mess, and Eve Genoard, who he was trying to get some money out of - into a news agency. However, the entirety of the people in the agency had already disappeared, and Gustavo's plan to catch some Gandors is a failure... or so it seems. They've walked into an ambush, as the three heads of the family - the brothers Luck, Keith and Berga Gandor - appear. Cockily, Luck offers everyone on Gustavo's side the option to join his side. But he's not just bluffing - Luck talked to Bartolo about what's happening, and Bartolo isn't happy about everything going on behind his back. Enraged, Gustavo presses the attack anyway. It doesn't work so well, considering the three brothers are immortals - when Gustavo blows off Luck's head, it reforms within seconds.
Maria is excited by this, and leaps to attack Luck right away, declaring that she'll get to fight Vino if she keeps killing Luck. However, Felix Walken reappears with their two hostages, interrupting her massacre and demanding 3 trillion dollars as payment from Gustavo if he's to kill the three brothers. Why? As it turns out, Felix is actually Vino in disguise, playing on the other side. And, naturally... this just makes Maria even more excited. Claire tells the Gandor brothers to take care of Eve and Roy, seeing as they're friends of Keith's wife, and Maria immediately leaps to attack him.
Vino doesn't bother using his multitude of guns. Instead, he's able to parry each and every one of Maria's katana strikes with nothing more than scissors. He isn't an infamous assassin for no reason, it seems. Her life is spared just barely by another of Gustavo's assassins trying to get a cheap shot on Vino. As the famous assassin begins a rant on the nature of killers, he's only stopped from declaring Maria and the other assassin as his enemies - and not true assassins - by Keith Gandor.
"Don't mock the living. We're all villains here."
And Maria's response to this? It's not to take the opportunity to get a jump on Vino, or to escape.
"Sooo cool! Hey, does what fox-eyes said earlier still count?"
And so, just like that, Maria decided to join up with the Gandors. In the end, the Gandors came out on top of the rogue Runorata mafioso, Gustavo being killed for his insolence, and all was well. Relatively.
In the year 1933, Maria, integrated relatively smoothly into the Gandors' organization over the past year and a half (she's the only woman and the only non-white member, which might have caused friction in this time period if not for the fact that she also scared the hell out of all the other gang members), working as security here and there on the brothers' whims. She was extremely competent at taking care of trouble, but also had an unfortunate knack for ruining everything in the surrounding area in the process, which gets her in trouble with Luck when she slashes up half of the casino she's supposed to be guarding. Mostly because she's bored. In an effort to stave off any impending disasters with Maria's boredom and her blades, Luck gives her another mission - to go talk to some ruffians who have been cashing in on the Gandors' turf. Or, rather, to guard someone else while he does the talking, because there's no way Maria could pull off something like gang diplomacy.
Instead, Luck places the negotiations in the hands of the Gandors' top "negotiator" - Mister Tick Jefferson, torture technician, creepy manchild, and (naturally) a fast friend of Maria's. She is to be his bodyguard while he speaks to the delinquents, who are apparently holed up in Millionaire Row, one of the wealthiest districts in New York City. The two unsettling gangsters head off on their job. En route, the two of them end up discussing why they do the things they do - why Maria loves to cut, and why Tick, who's very fond of cutting with his scissors, does, as well. It turns out that Maria is driven by the belief that she can break anything in the world, and Tick by the belief that there is some bond out there that can't be broken. The twosome, childish as ever, decide to have a "contest" to see whose belief is stronger, since they directly oppose each other. In spite of Tick's somewhat pessimistic view that all things will break in the end, he says he'll believe in Maria and her ability to defend him, too.
They arrive where the delinquents are supposedly staying, Genoard Mansion... at the back door rather than the front, due to Tick getting lost. When Maria attempts to rush in, an armed woman, Chane Laforet, is there to confront her, under the impression she's there to hurt Chane's friends. The two of them get into a heated battle, much to Tick's dismay, as Mr. Luck said no fights, but he can't really do much to stop them. They're only interrupted by a scream from within the house that distracts Chane and sends her running off to investigate, Maria hot on her heels.
Chane arrives just in time to see a beheading - or rather, someone recovering from one. Jacuzzi and his gang, the delinquents Maria and Tick had been looking for, just bore witness to an amazing event shown to them by a suspicious group of people, headed by a man named Tim and a spear-wielding woman called Adelle. Offering Jacuzzi and his cohorts the gift of immortality, they prove their point by bringing an immortal man - one Dallas Genoard - and murdering him right on the spot. Of course, since he is immortal, his body starts reforming as soon as he's offed, much to the shock of the delinquents. Maria shows up after the fact to find Chane and Adelle locked together in a counter, but is interrupted before she can gleefully join in - first by Tick, who'd decided to come in through the front door after all - and then by two people from the Martillo family. Ennis the homunculus is a perfectly normal person, but Ronnie Suchiatto, chiamatore of the Martillo family, instantly freezes the mood in the entire room with his mere presence.
This riles Maria up - so many strong people to slash! The tension in the room is palpable as the numerous groups in the room try to feel out what's going next. Dallas, who has recovered from his demise a few seconds ago, is the one to break the silence, suddenly rushing at Tick with the intention of stealing his scissors in order to exact vengeance on Ennis (whom he has a beef with from a few years prior.) However, Maria rushes in and slices him up before he can do any harm to the man she's been assigned to protect, gleeful at the possibility of being able to chop up a man who will never die forever. She probably could have gone on murdering poor Dallas for a long time if Tim didn't sic Adelle on her to stop her.
And here's where things start looking down for our chosen heroine.
Despite Maria and Adelle being about matched in skill, the simple truth is that Adelle's spear has longer reach than both of Maria's katanas - she can't even land a hit on Adelle, who begins wiping the floor with her. At the same time, the spearwoman is extremely perceptive, and notices right away that Maria is not only having trouble with the physical aspect of the battle, but the mental, as well - she's doubting that can beat the spear. Adelle rubs it in Maria's face, who heatedly denies it. But that doesn't keep her from losing. She's only saved from a fatal strike by Ronnie suddenly taking everyone's weapons - somehow. Soon after, one of Jacuzzi's gang members throws a smoke bomb, and everyone in the mansion disperses.
Tick and Maria end up wandering through the rain and taking shelter in an abandoned concrete building near Grand Central Station. The poor girl is utterly crushed by her defeat, although Tick tries to console her, saying neither of them won or lost. She tells Tick a little bit about herself in her depression - saying that she'd thought she could cut anything, but since her grandpa had died, she had no way of proving she was any better than she was when she was young. That she's scared.
"I'm scared. When I think of what might happen if I lose to her again, that I might lose faith in Murasamia... I imagine blaming the loss on my swords and I get so scared I can't do anything... My swords are all I have. They're everything to me... It feels like if I doubt them, I'll end up losing my past and my pride and my faith and my soul, and it scares me, amigo..."
Tick tells her that he doesn't believe that. After all, he only believes in things that can break - and he'd never seen any of Maria's swords or spirit break. Giving him a tiny thanks, Maria falls asleep for a while as they wait for the rain to pass.
After a bit, the two decide to head back to the Genoard mansion, Tick raising Maria's spirits a little bit with his encouraging words and feelings. However, when they get there, Jacuzzi and company are gone - instead, they're greated by the actual Miss Genoard. Blustering to try and get past her current state of insecurity, Maria abruptly takes Eve hostage as a feint, even after she remembers her from the previous encounter with the Gandors, and demands to be led to Jacuzzi. Helplessly, Eve agrees. However, Tick sees through what she's doing - that her heart's not really in it, ands he's just trying to make up for lost confidence. Even so, they carry on.
And the translation currently has not carried on past there, so... the conclusion remains to be seen!
Point in Canon: 1933, right before her fight with Adelle.
Character Personality:
If it weren't for certain aspects of her personality, Maria would really be a sweet and adorable young lady. She's almost always smiling, full of energy and excitement, and is cheerfully gregarious. Upon meeting her, one definitely wouldn't think she was cut out to work with the mafia... until she starts talking about how much she really wants to turn that guy in the corner into a human stack of pepperoni slices.
Obviously, the most prominent part of her personality is her downright bloodthirstiness. It's bluntly revealed that she spends almost all of her time thinking about hurting and killing others with her deadly katanas, regardless of whether it's an appropriate situation for that or not. Even when she's just walking down the street, she's probably imagining all the different ways she could slice up other passerby. And the cars, and the stores, and the buildings... As it turns out, there is no deep psychological reason for this behavior of hers. She's just insane. When asked why she loves cutting, she responds simply and honestly "Because it's fun!" It's something of a miracle that she has enough restraint not to act on her desire to mutilate all the time. This is mostly due to the fact that she enjoys cutting up things that are hard to slash more than anything; strong fighters who will challenge her are those who she wants to cut with her swords the most.
Nonetheless, she does take her job - and cutting things up - quite seriously. She sees her two swords, Murasamia and Kochite, not as tools which she must take care of, but as separate entities which she has befriended, and often apologizes for them when she starts cutting people up, saying that they move on their own. Her swords and the act of slashing things are sort of the center of her being on which she places her self-confidence and happiness - her reason for living, if you will. Because she is talented and can defeat many people with her swords, she believes that she is strong and can accomplish anything she wants if she tries hard enough. More than anything, she wants to prove that she is strong - likely as a way to live up to her grandfather's expectations of her, which became her own expectations of herself.
"She had to be faster than anyone, stronger than anyone.
Sharper than anyone."
Maria's determination and self-confidence are great, and her pride is undoubtedly her greatest asset. This gives her a tendency to be reckless and rush into things, however, which has ended poorly for her a number of times (although she manages to survive somehow.) When she and her swords are actually defeated in battle, it tends to hit her pretty hard, since she concentrates on that facet of herself so much. And while she can usually bounce back from these instances with a new wave of confidence ("I lost, but if we had a rematch, I'd definitely win!"), in some cases, such as her battle with Adele, with whom she should have been evenly matched, her self-confidence will take a massive blow which is much more difficult to recover from. Being strong - being able to cut anything - is her raison d'être. Having the idea that she is not strong or that she can't cut everything damages her at the very core. Losing battles, or rather being unable to cut is very hard on her, and though it's only happened three times, all of those times had a big effect on her. She becomes even more reckless and unpredictable than usual in an attempt to smother her self-doubt.
Outside of her psychotic need for slicing and dicing, Maria's actually a very amicable person. Her most noticable personality characteristic outside of her bloodthirstiness is certainly her perkiness; she's always very bright, loud and excitable, eagerly awaiting the next mission or adventure. Perhaps due to her slight case of The Crazy, she has a very innocent and childish mindset, and thus, her behavior can sometimes start irritating people without her even noticing. Almost everyone in the Gandor family avoids her for this reason, though she doesn't seem to have noticed or care. But she always means well!
Additionally, Maria has a very cheerful disposition, and aside from losing in a battle, it's basically impossible to bring her spirits down. She's even friendly to the people she's hired to assassinate! She's not totally oblivious to people being displeased with her, but she usually doesn't let it get to her, trying to wiggle out of such situations by playing dumb. While she's certainly not the brightest crayon in the box in the first place, she manages to keep a slight grip on common sense. And while she does typically have a one-track mind for cutting things up, she does do other things. She just gets bored if she doesn't slice anything in a long time - which is why hitman-for-hire was the perfect job for her.
Character Plans: I've been waiting for an opportunity to play this character for a few years now, and since translations are finally available, now's the time! I think Siren's Port is a great setting for Baccano! characters, who are already subject to lots of urban warfare, and I'm also quite fond of the cast here. I'd like Maria to be able to settle in here, make a few more friends, and possibly get tangled up in things by accident only to make things worse. She'd be my first really sociable character at the game thus far, and I think it'll be a good change of pace for me.
Appearance/PB: bust shot, full body fanart (with bonus Tick)
A woman on the shorter side, with the lithe, muscular body of a swordfighter. She's got tanned, brown skin with big dark eyes and long, wavy hair she almost always keeps up in a ponytail, decorated with a single rose. Maria is described many, many times as being extremely beautiful; however, she doesn't seem very conscious of her appearance at all, and her beauty in the eyes of others is often marred by her... special personality. Nonetheless, she remains something of a show-stopper. Usually, she's seen wearing her tradtitional military-like costume, but depending on her job, she changes her clothes (i.e. while she was working as a security guard in a casino, she was disguised as a dancer.)
Despite her carefree attitude, she's almost always poised for a fight, and someone with a good eye for such things would probably notice that upon seeing her. Maria has a thick Mexican accent and also drops Spanish words into her speech occasionally (mostly "amigo/amiga") - however, she still speaks fluent and generally understandable English.
Writing Samples
First Person Sample -- Mmm... that looked like a start! Okay, now - [ the woman's voice, heavily Mexican and sounding very eager, is interrupted by a few clicks and then successive beep beep beep, getting louder. ] No no no! Calm down, amigo, I just want to see the movies! Come on, come on, it's not asking for much, I don't think --
[ This goes on for a bit more, her thoughtful tone broken up every few seconds for a new click or mechanical beep plus the nearly-childish frustration immediately following, before there's a rustling sound, a more muffled "Hey, you! Hiding won't help you!", and a sudden shot of generic, Starter Apartment-brand bedsheets. Which quickly flips over to reveal the speaker; a rather pretty young woman, peering down with big, dark eyes at the screen curiously. ]
Huuuh... It says recording, but does that mean it's working? Can you see me? 'Cause I can't see you! I got really excited, too... Maybe I got ripped off! Do they sell lots of fake goods in Canada or something? I've never been here before. Haven't heard much about it either, amigos, but that's why I'm talking to you, right? Tell me about Canada, if the little movie screen is actually working... Something like "how much is the train to New York" would be really good, mmhm! I was on a job, you know!
[ despite her clearly having some understanding of what's happened to her, her demeanor seems fairly unfazed at the moment, and even her questions seem a little distracted - to put it mildly. Judging by the way she's leaning all around and checking out the NV (occasionally putting it in a completely useless angle that gives a great view of the cobweb in the corner of her room), this new toy is more interesting to her than her current predicament.
Either that, or reality just simply hasn't sunk in yet. ]
Third Person Sample
Mr. Luck wasn't here. Mr. Berga wasn't here. Tick wasn't here.
Most importantly, of course, Mr. Keith wasn't here.
"So what am I supposed to do?"
Maria had been pondering this for some time at this point. Well, two days - but that was a lot of time for her to be thinking about the same thing, honestly, and it certainly felt even longer when she had nothing to do in the first place. The little dingy apartment wasn't so bad (she'd seen worse), and she'd spent a decent amount of time pacing around it trying to figure out a course of action. When she wasn't doing that, she was out on the streets, instead, doing pretty much the same thing only with some added wonderment at the strange ways of the future. (Were those big hulking machines really cars? Woah.) Which was how she'd found herself sitting in a little sandwich shop, holding a mostly-finished wrap in one hand while she stared at a newspaper - partly because she was reading it, but mostly because her other hand was cutting idle shapes into it with the dinner knife.
Now, she'd been a hired blade for a good number of years. It was only recently that she'd been absorbed into any sort of organization. But now she felt like she owed the Gandors some sort of loyalty. That's what the point of being in those groups was, right? Not indiscriminately cutting up everyone she saw. It was a great sacrifice for their cause, really, coming from her. But the Gandors weren't here, other than herself. Did that promise still hold?
Because, honestly, looking at this jobs section in the paper wasn't doing much for her. Her lips curl into a pout as the dull blade slices through a fat section of letters in front of her. They were all just...
"Boring! Someone like me can't do this work! Ahh, what do I do, what do I do... Murasamia and Kochite are going to get really fed up if this keeps going on! I just--"
Cut off by the appearance of a pretty frightened-looking waiter, who timidly interjects: "Um... i-is your meal... is everything okay, ma'am...?"
Blink. Slow, sheepish blink.
"... Yeah! Of course it is, amigo! Eheheh..."