Application to savrou

Jul 13, 2016 00:39

OUT OF CHARACTER

Player Name: Dawn
Are you 16 or older: Yes.
Contact:
yorisearching on Plurk or PM me at this account.
Current Characters: No one
Tag: yori (crau)

IN CHARACTER
Name: Yori
Canon: Tron (1982)
Canon Point: After the end of the movie, but I'd also like Yori to keep her experiences from her earlier game.
Age: Permanent appearance of mid-to-late twenties. That reflects how old her User, Lora Baines, was at the time of Yori's creation. Time inside the computer seems to run at a significant difference from time outside, so Yori has probably experienced something like 50 subjective years (programs tend to call them cycles) in the year or two since her date of compile. Canon gives no exact detail.

History:

Wiki link, somewhat minimal.

Yori, a computer program, was written by Lora Baines sometime before the movie opens in 1982.

The movie never gives a word for quite what Yori's exact purpose is. She appears as part of the digitizing process in the test run with an orange, and later seems to be supervising a team in the simulation (which seems to be equivalent to construction, inside the computer) of a new vehicle called a Solar Sailer. From these two points, I speculate that she was written as part of Lora's life work, the digitizing project, to check the incoming code for errors.

Many cycles after she was first compiled, as the digitizing process was either working better or becoming ever more inexplicable depending who you ask, Yori met and fell in love with a determined young program named Tron. By this time the Master Control Program had become a major power in the Encom network, preventing many programs from even speaking to their Users. Setting up as supreme ruler of the network (and then the world~!!) required shifting all loyalties to the MCP rather than the Users.

Tron was certain his User wanted him to take on the MCP. Unfortunately, before Tron received the right tools to complete the task, the MCP captured both Yori's whole digitization team, and Tron himself. Troublesome conscripts like Tron were sent to fight and be derezzed (deleted, killed) in the Games. Yori apparently set herself to not being troublesome, but quietly collected information in the hope that Tron would be looking for a way to contact his User again. Analysis is useful in other projects as well, and the MCP found plenty of productive work for her.

In an effort to challenge the Users themselves, the MCP absorbed most of Yori's team into its own processes and used the digitization laser to bring an unsuspecting User, Kevin Flynn, into the Games. Where, as you'd expect, he made allies and broke out. Tron was separated from his friends during the escape, and went at once to find Yori.

Though it took her a few moments to pull out of her long minimum-energy daze and recognize Tron, Yori at once provided Tron with the location of a working sympathetic I/O Tower and Guardian, and a method of transportation to the Central Computer itself. She left her post without permission to give Tron all the help she could.

Flynn only rejoined Yori and Tron as they hijacked the Solar Sailer. Yori was skeptical of his claims to be a User, in spite of Tron's acceptance. However, Flynn shortly had need to pull off tricks with energy absorption and redirection that would have derezzed any program who tried them. Yori didn't waste time arguing his usefulness.

Before they actually reached the MCP, unfriendly forces intercepted them. Tron fell off the edge and barely managed to hang on to the outside of the command ship. Believing Tron was dead and their task had failed, Yori retreated into her grief as the ship began to come apart and them with it.

Flynn made use of his User status again by forcing enough energy back into the ship, and Yori, to keep both intact. Yori brought the ship closer to the MCP, and to her joy saw Tron still alive and fighting on the mesa. Then Flynn unexpectedly pushed his lips against Yori's and jumped into the MCP's energy column. Yori was very puzzled by this behavior.

The crazy tactic worked; distracted, the MCP lowered its guard enough that Tron managed to deliver his User's code to its base, destroying its ability to control the system's energy and programs.

Flynn himself survived, perhaps because his presence within the MCP inspired the programs it had already absorbed to reverse the digitizing process, and eject the copyright data Flynn had originally sought. Flynn used that to gain himself a job at the head of Encom.

However, from inside the computer Yori did not know that yet--or anything else that happened to the people she cares about in the long years that led up to the sequel, Legacy.

CRAU:
inugamirpg

Turning up in a human high school full of strange and frightening events was quite a shock to a program who'd never expected to see the User world herself. Worse, she'd somehow become exactly like the Users, with no way to gain energy except to eat. Link to intro, for the curious.

At least she found a familiar face. But to her dismay, the program she greeted as Tron claimed to be called Rinzler, not Tron, and appeared unable to speak except by terse text messages. Yori might have accepted that he was a wholly different program...but he flinched at all the names he claimed not to know.

Even with no explanation, she was certain that in all the time between her last memory of home and his, someone had recoded him and hurt him badly in the process.

To make matters much worse, his Admin, Clu, showed up not long after Yori herself did. Yori promised to do her best to avoid him (as threaded here), but Rinzler was not capable of staying away from his reprogrammer.

Determined not to let this new version of the MCP use her against Rinzler, Yori spent a month ducking in crowds and her paranoia levels went pretty high. However, Clu vanished without any more explanation than his arrival.

Some students had organized clubs to teach combat and self-defense, and Yori attended all she could fit into her schedule, not that she made much progress in so few weeks. At least there were people who encouraged her efforts. Yori was pleased to make friends of several Users and also did her best to ally with strange, futuristic reploids named Axl, Pandora, and Prometheus.

In time Yori and Rinzler grew a little more comfortable with each other as allies and friends. Rinzler's code still forbade him from remembering anything about Tron. Yori remained unwilling to force the issue, given how much pain his code caused him at any slip.

Personality:

Yori's main function is analysis, and it echoes in everything she does and every choice she makes. Gathering all relevant data, making allies, and taking new situations into account all come naturally to her. However, landing in a foreign User world is much more change than she ever expected to deal with.

Despite her involvement in the digitization project, she hadn't thought of the User world as any kind of physical reality of its own; it was only a source of very strange and inexplicable code. Yori does not have quite the same reverence for Users that Tron shows, though she certainly prefers the Users to the MCP. To Yori, while their Users might have written the programs, it doesn't mean they care in any meaningful sense. The Users may deserve obedience, but no more.

Meeting Flynn didn't change that. Although she's grateful to Flynn for saving her and for distracting the MCP, it's hard to be in awe of someone who sounded so lost himself.

The down side of Yori's analysis skills is that when she cannot see any chance at all of changing things or making a difference, she tends to fall into paralyzing despair. Working for long without explicit direction is difficult for a program, and if all Yori sees are dead ends, she doesn't waste energy walking down them. However, Tron has always been her holdout of irrational, unquestioning hope. She gave up on him too soon once, and is much less likely to do so again. That might eventually help her adjust to a world so terribly unpredictable as to defy all logic.

Analysis is also a source of joy to Yori. Gathering data is something she values in itself, regardless of whether she expects the data to be of use. She takes delight in learning new skills, as well. As shown in canon, she's a good pilot of different craft despite having little opportunity to practice under the MCP. Yori tends to attack any new task with interest.

In general Yori is a cheerful program, though this can hide many layers of calculation. Yori had to spend quite some time acting as a slave to the Master Control Program and keeping her own thoughts guarded. She can be very demonstrative with her friends and those she trusts, such as, in the film, her long-time friend Dumont, as well as Tron. However, it takes a lot for her to completely trust a strange User or admin, or other potential danger.

Yori prefers not to show herself as any kind of threat, and will be friendly and noncommittal to almost anyone. Making actual alliance is quite different, and she takes commitments seriously.

CRAU:

Transit to Inugami came as a total shock. Yori understands the concept of waking up in a new system, but the school wasn't a system at all. Meeting so many Users face to face is still pretty terrifying. Adjusting to a space ship will be a small task compared to the massive culture shock of being outside a computer in the first place. She's trying to process all the changes.

Spending approximately two months in a haunted high school has taught Yori that things can always get weirder. She finds it hard to accept that so many events can't be analyzed, either because there isn't enough data or because there's no context for what she does have.

Other than teaching her a whole new range of fear for Rinzler at Clu's hands, and giving her a head start on coping with the non-digital world, two months didn't have that much impact on Yori's personality. Her life under the MCP was even more regulated and deadly than high school.

Contracts:

Under the presupposition that more data is always good for comparison and analysis, no matter how accurate it may or may not be, Yori will ask every question she thinks she can get away with.

However, the captains and crew count as Users, and Yori won't want to upset them or make them consider her code in any way faulty. She'll sign the contract once her interviewer starts to look bored or irritated. She's not sure they can get her home or if that's even where she wants to go at this point, but watching how people show up is better than being left behind. She's more interested in finding her friends than going back to the system that's probably already replaced her by now.

(And if they let her look at the crew roster, she'll be even happier to come aboard.)

Abilities/Skills:

In the computer where she lived, Yori can look at code and see what's wrong with it, though she doesn't specialize in fixing any errors. Code analysis isn't nearly as much use in the User world where the internal code is so incredibly well encrypted for whatever User-whim reasons. However, given time to study new code languages, she could probably be helpful with various computer maintenance tasks. The trouble is that she's likely to view any and all programs as living beings, and might argue their right to fair treatment.

Yori is a pilot, by choice, not code. She appreciates the freedom a vehicle can provide and would jump on any opportunity to learn a new mode of travel. She'd like to keep as many options open to herself as possible.

While Yori has learned some basics of combat and disk-combat first from Tron, then Rinzler and the Taekwondo Club, it isn't her function and she'd rather use them to make an escape if necessary. She's got pretty good aim if she has time to analyze the situation, though, and is acrobatic enough to climb around system corridors where she isn't supposed to be while avoiding detection most of the time.

Although it will take some time to learn the use of non-digital materials, Yori has a long-standing interest in design, color, and art. This is shown only in a single deleted scene, but relevant considering how little time Yori has in canon to show anything not immediately useful to saving the system.

Strengths/Weaknesses:

Strengths:

Yori demonstrates high levels of intelligence, loyalty, and patience. Without her preparations and faith in Tron, the heroes would never have made it close enough to the MCP to make a difference.

She's also better at talking people into things than Tron is, not that it would take much.

Weaknesses:

Left to herself, Yori tends not to act on any plan that has too many risks. She depends too much on others to push her into motion. Caution was a necessary survival trait under the MCP, but it's likely to hinder her now.

Especially since all Users are high risks, in her estimation. It's complicated trying to talk with those who she knows can both create and destroy entire systems.

Also, Yori is vulnerable to most physical damage, especially unarmored as she is. She's no more than human in speed or strength or reflexes, though she probably has a slight edge over most people in processing time and finding connections.

Damage manifests itself in pixelation and missing pieces of code, not in blood.

As a code analyst familiar with her own code, Yori has a limited ability to repair herself if her disk is present and intact and she has sufficient energy to put into the effort and also stay conscious. Getting repairs from anyone else will be very tricky. Measures would need to be taken to keep her supplied with power while medics work out the intricacies of her coding and the permissions necessary to access it.

In theory Yori is weak to someone skilled enough at reprogramming, however, she's fully capable of noticing errors and changes in her own code and certainly won't make it easy for anyone. She is proprietary code written by Lora Baines, and not easily decipherable, even if she is outdated. I'd prefer to discuss any reprogramming efforts in full before playing them out.

Items:

A watch
A flip phone, Inugami standard
A backpack, containing: 1 notebook, various random school notes and papers, 2 pencils, 6 hair ties, 4 hair barrettes, 1 frisbee for disk-fighting practice
1 Encom-style identity disk (presently blank, since Yori's been human for a while)

Clothes: 1 complete student uniform, masculine style (white shirt, black blazer, gray sweater vest, black trousers, black socks and shoes)

Since Yori is returning to digital format, she should have an Encom-style unarmored bodysuit underneath all this. Her circuits glow blue.

SAMPLES
Network Sample:

[It's hard to know whether to believe anything the official crew have said. Asking general questions is easier if she's not actually meeting anyone in person. Yori spends quite a while typing and retyping her message.]

Attention, please. Would you mind answering one or more of the following questions?

[Without the protocols of an I/O tower, Yori can only do her best at striking a balance between politeness and demands for the information she sorely lacks.]

1. How does the Ingress work, in your experience?

2. What is your opinion of computer code, or what does the world you came from teach about code, intelligent or otherwise?

3. Does this ship supply reliable power and sustenance to those aboard?

4. What clubs or teaching sessions or other informational sources exist here?

[Impossible to ask without giving some things about herself away, but Yori hopes it's no more than the ship already knows. She isn't inclined to trust this new place yet.]

If you can answer even one of these, I'd appreciate hearing from you. Thank you for your attention.

[More information is better than less. Some of the input is always faulty. Yori hopes she can understand this place enough to figure out which.]

Prose/Action Sample:

The self-proclaimed User who sat on Yori’s flight deck had spent the entire trip casting strange looks toward her, but since Flynn had offered no explanations yet that made sense, Yori ignored him. There was no time for questions, not about her own User, not what the whole lot of them had been thinking to permit the Master Control Program, no time at all. She tapped at her controls with a worried haste.

The smooth pilot’s board of the Solar Sailer gleamed with red errors. Yori slid quick fingers over it, fighting to increase speed a little more despite her total lack of authorization here. The central computer was the MCP’s own domain.

Arrival was the most vulnerable point of their transit. Until they left the beam network, Yori knew quite well even a bit could tell which direction they had to be going. Tron knew it, too, if his stiff worried pacing at the other end of the Sailer was any evidence.

Once they escaped into the barren crevices of this energy-drained wasteland, places to hide and to ambush from abounded. Sark would have no choice but to split up his guards if he wanted to search them all; Yori would bet on Tron against any ten. A little farther, and then they would be close enough to risk abandoning the Sailer.

Only a little farther…

From the front Tron shouted “Sark!” in angry warning. The massive Carrier loomed beside them, taking advantage of the terrain to hide its bulk, set for a head-on intercept at full speed. Yori curled over her board to brace for an crash she couldn’t prevent or mitigate.

Commander Sark’s ship smashed their fragile simulation into junk data along with all Yori’s speed calculations. The force flung her into the rear buffer as the Sailer broke up around her. In the calm of pure shock Yori recalculated how much power the MCP would have used to make that interception. To bring an entire Carrier across the Game Sea faster than a transport beam? How many systems had burned out from that drain?

She would have preferred to go on being underestimated and dismissed as a threat.

Impact, amid the clatter of a hundred shattered fragments of the Sailer. Just ahead, her heavy pilot’s board hit at one corner and cracked across in slow derez. The buffer under her screeched across the floor of Sark’s hangar and flared into nothingness, critical failure. Yori fell through its fading remains to land hard on her back. She blinked, unsure for a long moment whether she was going to follow its example or not, and tried to muster a response from her arms and legs.

Flynn was already scrambling up from the debris unharmed. After the trick with the energy beam she had no idea what would actually hurt him. Yori herself seemed whole, though every part of her code ached.

Tron’s furious shout still echoed in her ears, but she couldn’t see him; he’d been at watch beside the sails, where had he landed?

Anxiety winning out over the pain of the landing, Yori rolled over to complete a frantic visual search. Where was Tron? He had been at the other end of the Sailer, but the trajectories-

He was lost.

(Alternately, if this canon-setting piece is iffy, a test drive thread is available here.)

savrou

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