EDIT: DONE!
I don't really like it, but I had to finish it. I'd rather have spend more time on it, but i guess this is good enough. As in, its horrible, and probably has tons of errors in it. Oh well. Managed to make twenty pages on word though.
Earth
Name: Nathaniel Jacobson, goes by Nate
Gender: Male
Age: 20
Team: Solo
Description: Nathaniel looks rather normal, if you look at him casually. He stands at a comfortable six feet tall, taller than most people but not by much, with normal brown hair. His blue eyes stand out as rather intriguing, as they express most of the emotion in his face, which is normally stoic. If he’s happy, he’ll smile slightly, if he’s angry, he’ll frown slightly, but for all his emotions, his eyes will betray the true story. Beyond that, he has little else of note, a few spots on his face from acne, but little else.
For his body, he’s well muscled, strong, but wiry strong, not extremely buff as you would expect. He has muscle of course, just, he’s not what you would call extremely strong looking. However, looks can be deceiving, he’s very strong, just not ripped. On his arms however, are scars, faint, except for one prominent one across both his wrists, which when asked about, will make him cover them quickly, and refuse to talk anymore. To round him off, his legs are normal, no odd scars lining them. He’s a good shade of tan, as he tries to get out as much as he can.
Of course, he wears clothing too, which is described now. His shirt is normally two kinds, either a polo, or a long sleeved shirt, which he wears depends on if he is getting a tan at the time or not. He tends to wear shorts, though he can be found in a pair of jeans, depending on the task. His shoes tend to either be regular tennis shoes, or heavy boots if he’s going to any sort of adventuring.
He has a couple other accessories he keeps on his person at all times. One is a hat kept on his person at all times, a brown fedora to be exact. The second important thing on his person is a necklace, given to him by one of his passed away friends, on a silver chain, the end holding a charm shaped like a Gardevior.
Personality: Stoic. That’s the first thing you’ll notice about Nate, and the strongest characteristic about him. He’s not one to mince words, he says as many words as he needs to in public, and leaves it at that. He conveys little feeling with his body language, simply stiff and tough, and that’s normally the only side of him they see, the stiff, uncaring, heartless side of him. He’s efficient when he’s around strangers, and doesn’t take to fraternizing.
When at work, he’s much the same. He’s more willing to talk, as he need to communicate well with is party, but little else than that will get out. However, with him here, he can seem to be more caring, and seems to genuinely want the group as a whole to be safe. He may not say it, but he’ll be willing to go out of his way to help others in his group, even going so far as to take the heat, though he maintains that simply his job, as a frontline fighter.
He’s smart too, that a fact you’ll definitely notice while in battle, and sometimes even before. Since when he’s not talking, he’s thinking, he has a lot of time to think, and every word he says normally is well thought out. A quick head on his shoulders, coupled with a long life of learning battle tactics and strategy, has helped to hone his abilities to a sharp edge.
However, he’s not just a cool calculating man who lives for the job. Far from it in fact, thought you’d be hard pressed to find it out nowadays. If you manage to become his friend, normally made by adventuring with him, as he normally gets rather friendly with them, you’ll find he’s much more talkative, though that doesn’t mean much. In that he will talk to you, though don’t expect him to just open up and spill out his feelings for you.
However he does like to have his friends, even if they are few and far between. To earn his trust takes a long while, but once earned, it’s there for life. He’s a very loyal person, and wouldn’t hesitate to help a friend. He also is quite witty, if you’re around to hear him, and may even make a few quips at your expense, in a good natured way, even if that is a rare occurrence.
Rarely if ever will he act emotional, at least around people. You might see any severe emotions he might be feeling, but he normally strangles them down, ignoring all other feeling except the few he simply can’t control. This is why he comes off as cold and stiff, as he doesn’t let himself feel. Keep it all down, don’t show weakness, you can’t be hurt.
However, that doesn’t mean he doesn’t feel. He feels acutely, and notices everything. However, he merely shoves it down. Unfortunately, one can’t do this forever, and this is normally released in a unhealthy burst of rage. If he seems to start seething, its best to back up, as he will lash out at whatever is around him, verbally. Expect him to hold nothing back, when he explodes, it is a sight to see.
As well, don’t hurt people weaker than you, around him, and don’t tease people. Doing so around him will bring swift and disproportionate justice on you, as he doesn’t take that very well. At all.
History: Nate’s history is a interesting one, though not for reason’s he’d like. However, his history has shaped who he is, and his own personality, so it is of utmost importance to tell. However, for the first three or four years of his life, it was normal. Not much happened to him to make him into who he is, he has nice parents, who took care of him, and it was just, in general, nondescript.
His first and second years of school followed the patter
It was his third grade year that things turned sour for him. It wouldn’t be the last time either. You see, he was unlucky enough to not really know the latest fad. Of course, he was one of the few who didn’t, so that set him off on a bad foot. Still, that wouldn’t have been too bad, if he’d not insisted on showing off his recently acquired toy during recess. Turns out, that was totally last year, and they laughingly called him a baby.
This would have blown over soon, however some bullies jumped on it, as they are want to do, and quickly made his life hell. At first, they only teased him during recess, and left him mainly alone in class, as the teacher was watching, but as the year wore on, they keep it up, constantly making his life miserable. No matter what he did, they would trash it, and the other kids would laugh. It got to the point where he would fake sickness, just to avoid others.
However, not all his life was bad. When he was home, things went well, and he always did enjoy drawing. He was a good artist, and it was how he dealt with things. Eventually, by the middle of the year, he couldn’t take it anymore, and told the teacher. This brought about a big reduction in bullying, as she believed and then witnessed it, but it got him branded as a tattle tale. So, he was subject to the venomous glares of his classmates, who wouldn’t trust him.
This time, he experienced a different kind of bullying. Instead of physically hurting him, they refused to talk to him, pretending he wasn’t there. However, this didn’t quite work out for them. Nate wasn’t naturally a guy who liked to talk to people, so this just made him more reclusive. Besides, he had made a friend near his home, so it wasn’t like he had no companionship.
However, it did have an effect on him. He wanted to show them he didn’t care, that it didn’t matter what they thought, so he bottled up his feelings. He felt hurt, and sad, and he hated that no one would talk to him, but he didn’t show it. He acted cool, and never rose to the bait. He would show them.
Eventually, this became second nature, even if it wasn’t healthy. He didn’t show any emotions as school, kept himself cool and calculated. He relaxed around his house, which was the only reason he could keep it up, but it wasn’t healthy for him to keep his emotions bottled up.
However, it worked. He managed to get though the year without blowing up, and the summer let him blow off some steam. He even managed to make another friend, bringing his total count up to two. His parents were a bit concerned with how dispassionate he seemed for his age, but they figured it was just a stage.
It wasn’t. By next year he’d once more managed to grip the cool emotionless exterior he wanted to project, and by this time, a new kid had emerged as a target. He was just like Nate had been last year, but this time, the bullies were worse. Nate ignored this. It wasn’t his job, he wasn’t about to let it happen again.
However, he couldn’t stick to his plan, because after four weeks of seeing it, and doing nothing, he couldn’t take it anymore. He felt slimy, not doing anything, and he couldn’t stand it. So the next time he saw it, he stood up to them, calling them out on how horrible they were, and how to just leave him alone. They decided to try and bully Nate instead.
But that was okay, because Nate was stronger than last year. Mentally and Physically. For about a month, he simply ignored the bullying, taking it and not reacting, but by the end of the month, he was fed up. When they started bullying him the next time, he couldn’t stop himself from turning around and ramming his fist into the guys face. Of course, it ended badly for him, as there were more of them, but he still got a few good hits in.
By now his parents were fed up with his attitude. They knew something was wrong, but not what. Worse yet, they didn’t want him fighting, he needed discipline. So, he was sent off to receive martial arts training after school. This, had two significant effects on him.
One, he gained more self discipline. He had a firm grasp on his feelings, and pushed them down further, and he grew stronger. This was very rigorous, mainly because quite a few people needed to be able to defend themselves, and he took to it well. He never stopped training, though he did after a time switch up to a more rigorous dojo.
This also had an effect on him at school. The kid he’d defended, and then subsequently bullied for, was grateful for the help. He waved it off, but she said it was very brave of him. This of course, made him even more ashamed of his inaction earlier. For once he had a friend at school, even if the pair were rather odd. She was a tomboy, to be sure, rash in decisions, while he was just about as far from rash as you could be.
Still, he liked her. She was a good friend, and the bullies were busy nursing their wounds. They had a pretty good rest of the year, the pair, and when the year ended, they managed to keep in touch. She couldn’t believe how much less serious he was now, she jokingly commented that she was sure he was a robot for a while, which he just rolled his eyes at, and laughed. She was named Natalie.
They had quite a few discussions, ranging from plans for their future, to their dream partners. They both had interesting stories about those. He liked to hear about it. His own dream partner was interesting. She then showed him a necklace, that she bought, with a graceful looking animal on it, saying proudly that’s what her dream partner supposedly turned into. Nate laughed, saying that sounded ridiculous.
The next two years of his life went well. He continued class, and martial arts, and even managed to gain another friend, bringing their group up to five strong. He still kept his cool demeanor, but he seemed to be warming up. He wasn’t as cold, and he even managed to act friendly, though that rarely happened in school. It was a good two years, fifth and sixth grade passing by.
Seventh grade wasn’t quite so cheery. The school wasn’t the most happy place then. Things were going crazy in his life. This was because his dad died. He was only fifty years old when he died, but a heart attack managed to claim him. It struck Nate hard. He wasn’t used to having to deal with grief, and dealt with it the same way he did all others. He stuffed it down into him, and ignored it.
That didn’t quite work as well as he had hoped. It worked for several months, but he found himself getting angry, for no reason, and lashing out. He felt that he was cracking, that his façade was going to break. It just so happened to, when he was at Natalie’s house. They got into a heated discussion about one of his lashing out comments.
When things got far too heated, he stood up, and nearly hit her. As he readied to hit her, he just couldn’t. Everything just crashed down on him. Sixth months worth of grief, and pain, and everything else, was too much for him. He fell down, crying. What else could he do? He was loosing it, lashing out at friends. He was mortified still, that he was crying. In front of Natalie.
She was surprised. However, to her credit, she took it with grace. He soon got up, still crying, though trying his hardest, and saying he had no idea what was happening. Natalie called him out on that, to which he smiled, still crying. She was right, but that didn’t help him any. He felt so horrible though, lashing out, that he had to apologize. She accepted it.
It was a rough next month for him, dealing with it. It wasn’t easy, like his other feelings, to just push down. It wouldn’t go away. Yet, time helped heal the wounds, time and company of friends. Eventually, he was forced to move on, and he did. It still hurt, but he came out stronger. The year passed uneventfully for that, as well as his next year. Then they entered school proper.
In this school, you started to specialize. If you wanted to become an explorer, you started to take classes related to that, while if you didn’t, you took other classes. Nate however, decided to take as many as he could of both. It was a grueling schedule, not the least of which because the adventuring side of school didn’t want anyone unfit to fight it out.
Still, this was normal. He slogged though classes, be they history, or battle strategy. It wasn’t too bad, he was disciplined enough to honestly work on his stuff, and not procrastinate. As well, he was fit enough to stand the grueling physical schedule in many of his classes. His martial arts instructor also was very good, and was the first one to give him the idea for his gauntlets. He also told him to wear them at all times he could.
That was tiring. Still, by the end of the year he was far more able than he had been at the beginning. Natalie and him had both managed to make it though, she did a wonderful job swinging it, and the next year went much the same as this one.
Junior year however, brought more conflict into his life. By now he’d had to specialize more, he couldn’t quite work such a generalized schedule. Still, he was top of his class in everything, striving to be excellent. Natalie had gotten a new boyfriend, something he abstained from, if only because he found it foolish, and didn’t notice the changed.
She started to wear longer clothing, and heavier makeup. He wasn’t sure why, it seemed foolish, but when she started to hang out with him less, and less, he noticed it. Wondering what was up, he went over to her house one day, knocking on the door and asking to see her.
She seemed short with him, for having come, but entered, as she asked him tensely what he wanted. He merely asked what the reason for all the changes was, she seemed stressed, and hadn’t been around him much anymore. She replied it was none of his business, and proceeded to put make up on. He noticed something there, something suspicious.
He walked over, and asked her what was wrong again, to which she replied there was nothing wrong. All he had to do was roll up her sleeve to prove that point wrong, as she had bruises on her upper arm. She merely said she fell down stairs. He laughed. Hard. When she yelled at him what was so funny, he merely pointed out that she knew how to fall, unless she had an aneurism, she wouldn’t have taken any bruises.
She refused to talk to him about it, and showed him the door. Instead of leaving, here merely sat there, waiting until she’d open it. When she did, he smiled, and said “Hey, don’t worry about it. I’m here for you, you know that? We’ve been though a lot, you know?” With that, she burst into tears.
And the story came out. Apparently her boyfriend had started to beat her. He was stronger than her, just barely, and hated the fact that she was around him so much. He was jealous, and said she couldn’t. To say he was angry would be an understatement. He’d never been so mad in his life. She didn’t want him to do anything, and he didn’t, for then.
But the next time he saw him, after school, he wasn’t so kind. Picking him up quite easily, he pushed him into a wall, and said, quite calmly, that if he ever touched her again, if he had any reason to believe she was hurt, he’d snap one of his arms. And if she was hurt again, his other, until he couldn’t move. It got the point across.
Senior year ended on a high note. He graduated high honors, and soon was with his friends in an explorer team. Of course, upon entering the real world, they found it far less exciting than they thought. Running a team was tough. Still, they managed to not only do well, but to exceed.
At least until disaster struck. It was their first World Thread mission, a year into this. Someone important had gotten lost during an accident, and they needed a team to go find them. Most teams wrote him off as dead, which was common, but they didn’t want to take that for an answer. They would go look. Having recently gotten clearance, they went in, high hopes.
It ended with death. A slow death, but a death none the less. Natalie got hurt on the mission, and while they managed to retrieve and save their objective, she had a badly torn arm. She went to the hospital. And things went downhill from there. The wound healed, but infection set in. They tried to cure that, but the medication they used proved to be ineffective. They amputated her arm, but it didn’t do any good. They stopped trying to help her, and just put her on medication, about a week before she died.
She accepted her demise, with good faith, but he didn’t. He hated it. Even worse, she died a slow death. From something that shouldn’t killed her. Still, she told him, he needed to move on when she died. She even gave him a charm from her family, that she’d shown him all those years ago. She smiled faintly, and said she’d been right. She’d died the next day.
He took it hard. The whole team took it hard. Worse yet, he had a fate just like her’s dangled over his head. He became a dreamless.
It’d been a week after she’d died. He’d been sleeping, too tired to stay up, when he saw the vivid last flashes of his dream partners last life. It ended violently.
Something was coming. A sense of fear overwhelming washed over him, as something was chasing him. He was worried, sad, overwhelmed, distraught, a rush of emotions, as he ran. Then he tripped, then amazing pain, then nothing.
He woke screaming. A horrible, distraught feeling was over him, which only grew worse. It was a feeling no words can convey. The closest he ever came to it was describing the feeling of a friend dying, a million times more intense. Rage sorrow anger fear panic, all mixed in, and amplified, until there was little else. Even he couldn’t even consider controlling the rage of emotions.
It was about two days in that the apathy set in. until then, he’d been overwhelmed with emotion, but it suddenly faded away. He was left in a void, emotionless, and unfeeling. This however, was not indescribable. It was all too human. For about three days he stayed in this state, lethargic, and unable to move.
It was then that his iron will came into play. He forced himself up one day, forced himself to the bathroom, forced himself to clean up. It was when he cut himself with a razor that things went downhill. He felt the pain. In a world almost void of feeling, pain, something he’d fought to avoid, was one of the only things he could feel.
This started him on his downward spiral. He started to cut himself. Lightly, then harder, as he needed more to truly feel. He hated the pain, but it was something, anything, to grab onto, in a world sucked dry of all feeling, all meaning. It took him a week to finally reach the decision to end it all.
He was dead. He was truly dead, as it was an uncommon occurrence to rebond. Besides, without Natalie, what point was there? It wasn’t grief, as he didn’t feel, but uncaring. There was nothing left, why wait for death?
He’d planned it all out. He’d written the note, cut both his wrists, and bleed out. At least he’d feel before he died. However, it didn’t work out. After he cut his first wrist, he couldn’t bring himself to cut the other. That, and a friend, worried about him, had come. Rushing him to the hospital, they treated him. It wasn’t unusual.
It was at this low, after his attempted suicide, that he was reunited with a dream partner. It happened, one night, when in the ward. He expected nothing, almost dreaded sleeping, as the blackness engulfed him. But, then, he felt.
It was only slightly, at first, but he felt happy. Then the feeling exploded. It may be that after not feeling for so long any happiness was like a drug, and this was a very intense happiness. T o say that he woke up delirious with joy was not an overstatement. He woke up laughing, tears of joy streaming down his face. Some of the staff though he’d gone insane.
With that, came a flush of feeling. He was hungry, ravenously, he was tired, he wanted to go out and jump around, but most importantly, he felt. It was like giving a starving man food, a dehydrated man water, a sick man health.
It took him about a month to get back into things. His partner this time was very different. He felt a lot more emotions from her than he had before. He’d wake up crying, or laughing, or fuming with anger, over things he didn’t know about. Still, it was interesting, and after the hell he went though, he savored emotion more than ever.
Still, he didn’t stop his cool demeanor. By this time, it was second nature. Still, around friends, he was noticeably looser. The team had disbanded, mainly after losing two of its more zealous members, but that didn’t bother Nate. He was just happy to be alive. After nearly dying, he knew how precious it was. Not much else happened, bringing him up to present day.
IQ Skills: Nontraitor, quick healer, counter hitter, Quick Striker, Quick Dodger
Key Items: Detect Band
Weapon: He has four weapons, two very distinct. His ranged weapons are two pistols, high caliber. The other two are very distinct. His hands are his weapons, and since they are, they only need some good additions. These come in the form of gauntlets. Both pair are titanium and steel up to his elbows, protecting his arms from attack. The only difference is that one pair, his attacking pair, has a set of quarter inch spikes protruding from it, around his knuckles, which he uses. As expected, he’s extremely good with his hands, a very talented martial artist.
Terra
Name: Serra
Gender: Female
Species: Gardevoir
Team: Solo
Description: She’s very well cared for, and it shows. She’s rarely dirty outside of a dungeon, and even then, she only gets dirty when necessary. She prides herself on her looks, and her grace, and she wouldn’t ever let those up. Her green hair is actually a shade or two darker than most others of her kind, and her white is a bit brighter. But that’s not too noticeable. She also likes to wear a blue ribbon in her hair, which she finds as kind of her trademark, an idea she got from her dream partner.
Personality: She’s emotional. That’s the only way to put it. Being an empathetic psychic tends to do that to people. She feels very acutely, and isn’t afraid to show her feelings. When she’s happy, she’s estatic, when she’s sad, she dismal, when she’s mad, she enraged. There is rarely any mild feeling in her, if she’s feeling, it’s a strong one, and she rarely if ever abstains from feeling.
At times, she seems to act like she has it all together. Normally when around strangers, she acts upbeat, graceful, and poised, as if everything that’s happened she has a plan for, and that there’s nothing she couldn’t handle. This is only sometimes, as it’s more of a remnant of her past personality, which has died out after the incident.
She often feels the need to act perfectly. She has to be excellent, she has to be happy, cheery, she has to have everything under control, she has to do everything exactly like she’s supposed too. Even her anger needs to be perfect, she can’t be too soft, or too mean. It just has to be perfect. This part of her was dominate, but after the incident, its become far less evident.
When not obsessing with perfection, she’s actually cool. She’s definitely smart, even for her own kind, and has a rather biting wit at times. This only really comes out around her friends, and fellow explorers, but she’s most definitely able to turn a phrase, and isn’t afraid to point out just how idiotic or silly that ideas sounds, just the level of sarcasm depending on how much she knows you.
She is compassionate however, which is why she doesn’t use her wit on people she doesn’t know. She genuinely cares for others, and wants to help. Whether or not you really deserve it doesn’t matter, she believes that everyone deserves a second chance to prove themselves, even if that’s not really the best idea. She believes in the inherent goodness of people
She tends to have a temper at times though. She keeps it under check, but don’t antagonize her, as its only going to end badly for you. She’s not really the kind to forget offenses, and while she isn’t that hard to appease, in fact, rather easy, you do have to at least try. And while she’ll give anyone a second chance, don’t burn her on that. She’s not stupid, and not about to forgive you for doing it. She also determined to get what she wants, and isn’t afraid to push you into making the right choice.
She dislikes injustice, as well, and loathes liars. Its one the few things that really gets her going, is when a pokemon is a liar, or cheats and steals. Injustice is something she just can’t stand for, and won’t allow, if she can do anything about it.
She’s also very loyal, loathe to abandon anyone she trusts or likes, though it has happened once, and as such, she’s choosy about her loyalty. If your on an adventure with her, you have her loyalty temporarily, but to permanently gain it, she has to trust you implicitly. When you’ve gained her trust, it is a hard thing to lose, and she’ll do just about anything to help, barring mental breakdowns.
While rare, these mental breakdowns are a sight to see. She panics, and heavily. She basically just runs, going as far away as she can, then curling up into a ball and shivering for a while. This has only happened once, but it nearly got her killed, as well as a few of her teammates.
History: Her history has been one of perfection, or the vain attempt to chase such a goal.
Her family was a well to do and had a fair bit of renown to its name, which meant that when she was born, the bar was already set high for her. She was lucky enough to get the first year of her life to herself, playing around as a ralts, and learning subtly manners, and talking to anyone she wanted to. She was a kid, and that was expected, in fact, in their view, healthy of her to get a taste for new things. As an explorer, you had to have them.
However, once that year passed, fun time was over. Almost immediately, her family was busy training her, teaching her the ropes of how to fight, how to lead, how to think. Most importantly, however, was how to act. It didn’t matter if she could actually do all those things, as long as she could appear to do so, she wouldn’t be questioned on it.
That’s not to say they didn’t expect perfection out of her. She was taught never to get angry without reason, never to overreact, or under react. This went on for two years, of intense training. She was given some free time, as much as necessary, to meet people, normally other well to do families, and started to make a few friends.
By the third year of her life, this image of perfection had been ground into her. It no longer was a conscious act, but merely a fact of her life. She had to be perfect, and that meant watching everything she said, watching her friends, making sure she was always perfectly cared for, perfectly groomed, and perfectly in control. To those who only had a passing friendship with her, which was most people, she seemed to be the pinnacle of grace, seemingly keeping her entire schedule up and still having time to relax.
She didn’t. It was grating on her, to do this. Every moment was tension, as she had to wonder, was that good enough, was that perfect? Did that meet the standards of her parents, was that going to work? Every action was fraught with tension, and it grated on her nerves. She had to do it right, she just had to. Luckily, she was given enough room to relax during this period, so she didn’t freak out.
It was her fourth year when she started training at the guild. Normally, one like her would likely not have to join until their seventh year, and join as a full member, but her family didn’t believe in that. No, they believed in going the whole way, and that would be what she would do. She’d not be accused of being favored, no; the family knew she’d show her perfection this way and stop any doubt.
It was both more and less grueling than her work before. She was in training, and they made her work, but not as long as she had when she was with her family. She had more time to prepare, more time to work on keeping her semblance of perfection. She even managed to make a friend in her roommate, someone who was not so obsessed with perfection, but did admire her.
A year passed like this, then another, before she managed to move up into a full fledged member of the guild. She was a junior member, and would be for a few more years, as she was still not yet strong enough to go out on her own to even the most benign dungeon, but she was officially on the list, and ahead of schedule, according to the Guild books. Her parents expected nothing less.
Now that she was a full member, work got even tougher, and longer. She kept up the seemingly effortless grace, with even more effort. It was during this time that she first violated her own standards, in lying. She rationalized it, saying she wasn’t really asked, but it was a lie, and she let an injust action stand.
She was up late at night, having been unable to sleep, and deciding to get more training in, as was proper, when she saw something moving around shifty. Curious, she followed, and saw to her shock, a well respected guild representative raiding the food stores, gorging himself. She fled back to her room, not wanting to get caught seeing that, and went back to sleep soon after.
It was that morning that she did it. The guild master lined up all the people, and asked them, who had done this. No one was exactly keen to say, especially considering none of them did it, but the guild representative, walking in, pointed to a certain Pokémon, and said he’d seen him around in the night, he likely did it.
The Pokémon was chosen mainly because he was a glutton, and often gorged on food. She found the act distasteful, but she couldn’t believe her ears. The guild representative was lying, and going to get someone in trouble. She nearly spoke up, before a troubling thought came to mind. She had no proof. It would be her word against his own, and they wouldn’t listen to a junior member.
So she said nothing. The poor member was forced to work twice as hard, and repay for all the food lost. She consoled herself by saying he probably deserved it, it would serve him right, but it didn’t help her sleep any better at night. She didn’t get a good night’s sleep for another month. Still, it subsided, in the rush to stay perfect.
By the sixth year of her life, she had it down. She was regularly contributing to the group, and often was asked to help due to the fact that she was by far the easiest to deal with, and the least hindrance. It was this year that she purposefully lied to keep up the façade. It was during inventory, a long dull task that involved tallying up the monthly stock, to make sure it matched what they were supposed to have.
She’d been up late, and the late nights had been getting to her. About a fourth of the way though, she’d decided to take a break, as she had about three hours to do it. She then ended up taking an hour and a half long nap, before waking up to her own shock. She’d only managed to get though half of the stock, by the time it was up.
However, when submitting her form, she gave that inventory was right on target. Considering no one really cared to check if she was correct, she got away with it. No one but her knew she’d lied, but it ate at her. She hated to lie, but she had to. She had to appear perfect, even if she wasn’t. That was all that mattered.
A year passed during this, grating her nerves raw. She had at several times been forced to lie about what she’d done to keep up her image of perfection, and it was keeping her up at night. However, no one else saw this; she was at all times around people perfect. Even her roommate didn’t see this from her, though she couldn’t help getting the uneasy feeling something was wrong.]
Still, she managed to graduate to full guild member. That year was rather relaxed for her, however, due to the fact that she wasn’t really yet strong enough to go on any serious journeys. By then she’d grown strong enough to deal with everything, and this year was almost a recuperation year, allowing her to wind down from the extreme stress of the last year.
Year nine brought with it her first evolution, and with that, challenges. She was stronger, and fitter, so that meant she was now often on harder missions. This meant she had to train harder, to keep up her peak performance. As well, she was often given jobs around the guild, which had to be done perfectly as well.
This strained her time, yet she bore it with the same tense grace she’d done all the other times. That year had been difficult, but not as difficult as year ten proved to be. That year she was put in charge of her first team, for a rather easy mission, which nearly degraded into disaster. Things were going well, it wasn’t too difficult, until a horrible mishap took place.
A lucky hit had landed on one of her teammates, and had confused him, soon triggering him nearly fainting his teammate. This might not have turned out so badly, but they were soon after ambushed, and cornered, before they could heal. Two strong enemies, a dark type and a psychic, were closing in on her, her two squad mates behind her.
She’d not been put in such a situation before. She’d always been able to outthink her opponents, outguess them, and outplay them. But here, she was trapped. Her teammates were wounded, she was incapable of handling them, and was about to be defeated herself. It was t hen that she considered leaving her squad mates. She considered teleporting, and leaving them, so she’d complete the mission.
Unknown to any but her, she’d also nearly done it. As the foes closed in, she prepared to teleport out, before an object caught her attention. It was a sleep orb. Lunging for it, she grabbed and used it, knocking both of the two out. Her allies, now not in danger, whacked them both out of the park, and they managed to win.
No one else might have thought much of this, in fact she was lauded by her squad mates as having a great head in that situation, but she was deeply scared. She’d considered abandoning her teammates, all for her own gain. They could have been seriously hurt, and all she cared about was that she look perfect.
Another sleepless month for her, and worse yet, it left her with a thorny, as of then unanswerable question. Was that truly right? Was her own perfection that important, as to warrant that? She knew the answer her parents would say, but was that the true one?
A question left unanswered, even though her next two years, in which she grew stronger, landed a spot on a regular team, still affiliated with her guild though, and worked through it. Her teammates found her to be a nearly infallible ally, though were wondering why every time they saw her, she seemed to be more and more tired.
By now, she was cutting back on sleep to work, and keep her perfection. It wasn’t healthy, she knew, but she had to do it. By now, it was no longer just important, it was all consuming. Training had to be done perfectly; she had to think of everything. She had to, or she’d shame her family, and everyone would see her for the shallow being she was. She couldn’t allow that.
Year thirteen was the one she nearly snapped in, but didn’t. It wasn’t any one event, moreover it was more of a combination of several events, starting with the dissolution of the team she was in. A tragedy had struck, in that the leader was stricken dreamless, and did not rebond. No one could dare step up to take his lead, even though a few suggested Serra do it. She was too young however, and needed another two years before she could become a senior guild member, and field her own team, if she wanted too.
So her rather nice team was dissolved, and forced her to find another one. Meanwhile, she returned to guild work, and got more piled on her than before. As well, her parents were visiting, and expected to see how she was doing. Her father made disapproving comments of her line of work, though accepted the quality, while her mother was more concerned with the fact she seemed to be slipping slightly in her appearance.
It was stressful for her, to say the least. Several times she just wanted to scream and run, never to come back, but she didn’t, she merely smiled, and nodded. To say she was on edge would be an understatement; she was walking an unimaginably thin line. If she’d been provoked just right, she probably would have snapped, and it might have been good for her to have done so.
However, she managed to get back onto a regular team, her parents left, and the guild work lowered. The frayed ends of her nerves once again reunited, and she managed to get some spare time even for herself, which allowed her to relax enough.
Fourteen was an uneventful year, just regular guild work, and routine teamwork, working, training, and working more, as she attempted to keep the emotions down. By now, it was starting to get harder, as she had to once more resort to lying, but that started to bother her less. The obsession for perfection made up for whatever qualms she had.
Fifteen once more was an uneventful year, as she was by now used to the schedule, used to the work, and strong enough to handle most of what came at her. She’d not been able to really make friends during the past few years, but it was okay with her, she’d managed to keep the façade going, still keeping that image of perfection unspotted.
Sixteen was a once more stressful, but manageable year for her. She’d managed to once more climb up to a senior member, and started the long and stressful job of managing a team. She had to run it out of the guild, as most others did, but she was able to attract a rather experienced squadmember, who helped her during the first year of this. As well, she was known for excellence, so she had quite a few people to add to her team in that way, so while the new responsibility, and the new work was hard, it was manageable.
Seventeen was the same, a year of stress, but manageably so. She’d started to go for harder stuff, and working with more people, trying to get the best stuff for her team, the greatest efficiency. Her squadmates were surprised with how long she’d work, but she managed to get it all worked though, and continued to keep up this image of effortless ease, when at all possible.
Year eighteen was when it all fell apart. It started well enough, she evolved, pushing her to achieve her highest limits, the squad was flourishing, and everyone seemed to consider their team one of the premiere up and coming ones. However, one simple incident, let to a downward spiral that ended the team, nearly broke her, and ended any illusion of perfection she once held, though in the end may have saved her.
That incident, was one of her squad mates dying. It wasn’t because of anything she’d done, no, in fact she’d not even been on the mission, busy running the team, when her right hand Pokémon died in the world thread. The people with him managed to escape, though his sacrifice, but he didn’t. It hit her very hard.
He was about the only person she could really trust with the team. While adept, most of them weren’t exactly experienced, and she wasn’t used to dealing with all the team stuff alone. Couple that with the fact he was the only person she’d really halfway opened up too, and it hit her hard. Which she failed to show, of course, beyond what was expected.
She was expected to be sad sure, but nothing more, and to continue to lead the team flawlessly. She had too. This meant that any feelings of grief, any thoughts of asking for help, were pushed aside. She just kept it going, three years of stress starting to get to her, as she lost sleep, started to become jumpy, though always passing it off as something else. Her nerves were frayed, nearly to the point of tearing, when they finally snapped. It was around the end of the year when this happened, and she just ran.
It was in a dungeon, a world mystery. They were to investigate something peculiar going on, in a world mystery, then to decide the cause, and report back. Things went well, though they were continually bemused by what was going on, until they reached the tenth floor.
Something was up, something decidedly odd, she knew as she entered the floor, but to say what, well, that was a different matter entirely. It was a grating sensation, up here, and it got on her nerves. Then all hell broke loose.
They were swarmed. They seemed to come out from everywhere, and while the squad managed to fight them back, more just kept coming. As her team, and her, got more and more grievously injured, she wondered what was going on. She couldn’t leave, they hadn’t found out what to do. The grating feeling in her head was not going away, her team was desperate to get out, but she couldn’t go. She hadn’t failed once, she wouldn’t here!
That was, until she just lost it. The pressure, the grating feeling in her head, the tension built up, the need to be herself, the years of lies, omissions, lost nights, questions with no answers, and worst of all, years of pent up emotion, broke. She yelled out to just stop, everything, to just stop, and ran. The team followed her, wondering at what she was doing, shocked. She seemed to be freaking out, ignoring anything that got in her way, even the wounds she was accumulating.
She passed out in a corner, shivering in a ball. She nearly died there, but her team managed to get her out. They couldn’t understand what had gone on with her, and her new attitude, jumpy, frayed, nearly delirious. No one understood what had happened.
It was a day after that breakdown that she became a dreamless. It seemed to validate everyone’s views on what had happened; maybe she’d gone dreamless earlier than expected? To her, it was if everything was crashing down. Her perfection, her record, everything, was falling down around her, she was even going to die, and worse yet, she was dreamless.
The emotions were almost too much for her, but they ended soon enough, and the apathy set in. People started to avoid her as she did nothing, lethargy setting in. She had no will, no drive, and it was compounded in that everything was over. Her record, her life, her perfection, all gone, vanished, in the span of a week. A month passed for her in this state, her demise drawing near. All emotion, formerly something so prominent, was gone, and worse yet, it’d been so long since she’d felt anything really, that she wasn’t really sure she could.
A new month however, brought with it new life for her. In their darkest hours, when all hope was lost for them, they connected. That night was something amazing for her. It started off, in the depths of nothing, with a spark. A spark was all that was needed.
She felt happy. She didn’t know why she felt happy, but she did. And in that split second, of confusion, she knew. She wasn’t alone anymore. A feeling of jubilation washed over her, as she felt ecstatic. Words could not describe the feeling of finally, after a month of nothing, of soulless apathy and lethargy, the feeling of happiness. It was truly the most wonderful thing in the world for her. She didn’t care right then, if she acted perfectly. She didn’t care that she looked a fool when her parents rushed in, absolutely shocked, it didn’t matter. She was happy, she was alive. She had hope.
To say this was a complete reversal of her personality wouldn’t be correct. Old habits die hard, and she still at times, feels the need to act perfectly. But it wasn’t such a problem anymore. It didn’t matter to her whether or not she was perfect, whether or not she had the best team, was the best looking, the strongest, the smartest, it didn’t matter. She was alive.
She spent the next month, doing nothing. She just relaxed, enjoying the feeling of being completely free from obligation, completely free to do whatever she wanted, which was at this point, nothing. However, by the time the month had ended, she was bored. Sure, it was fun, but she wanted excitement again. She wasn’t exactly sure how she’d do it, but she decided that she’d simply join the guild again.
To be precise, she’d never left, but she’d been taking an extended break. However, when she came back, she was shocked to see the happiness everyone had for her. She’d felt so sick, so compulsive to be needed, she hadn’t realized that she had made quite a few friends. While at first startled with her sudden change in personality, everyone soon agreed it was for the better, at least, most of the time.
It took her a while to get back into the swing of things, she’d let her training go, and to reach that top spot she wanted, out of her own want, not a need for perfection, she’d had to work hard, but not so compulsively. She still wasn’t good at asking for help, but she did it. She managed to regain her spot as one of the premiere fighters, once again, but hasn’t been doing much else.
IQ Skills: Nontraitor, Intimidator, Quick dodger, Multitalent, and quick healer.
Key Items: Psyche Orb, Special Band
