app ] paradisa
NAME: Christina
JOURNAL: lollobrigida
EMAIL: lollobrigida@gmail.com
AIM: onlysayinghello
WIKI NAME: Lollobrigida
CHARACTERS:
Oliver Queen - Smallville
Mindy Macready - Kick-Ass
Harmony Kendall - BtVS/Ats
Jo Harvelle - Supernatural
Eliot Spencer - Leverage
Callisto - Xena/Hercules
CHARACTER NAME: Faith Lehane
FANDOM: Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Angel the series
CANON: Angel S1 E118 “Five by Five” - After Faith gets hired by Lilah and Lindsey, she’s in the lobby and she fires a crossbow at Angel. He turns and catches it, she replies with, “That was so cool.” and then she takes off. I’ll be taking her from when she aims at Angels’ back. I’ve already spoken with Brian and if she does get approved, she’ll arrive and shoot at him in the lobby of the castle.
WHAT THEY LOST: Her ability to hold a knife. Any knife that she picks up will vanish from her hand and return to the drawer/sheath/shelf where she’d picked it up from. Faith is extremely fond of bladed weapons. The Mayor gives her one as a gift and she looks like a kid in a candy store that was given the giant Hershey bar all to herself. By removing this not only does it mean she’ll have to use her fighting skills more to defend/fight during battles, but it’ll prove for funny instances when she can’t butter toast. She can hold other weapons but she’ll have to learn how to use them. (save for crossbows - she already knows how to use those)
ABOUT THE CHARACTER:
(Note: I am including parts of Faith's history that happen after her canon point. I know that with canon updates being a possibility that these things could eventually come into play and I wanted to make sure to at least touch on those parts of her arc.
Also, background info for Faith growing-up is pretty non-existent. There is a non-canon fiction piece that is a diary of her childhood that references dark themes to a more specific outcome, but there are in-canon references such as “My dead mother hits harder than that.” or her discussion where she wanted a puppy where she states her mother was always too drunk or passed out to notice her. These instances give enough detail into how much she actually cares about her family. It’s probable she had a single parent home, with her mother partaking in more than just drinking and passing out around the house. Even with the path being Chosen took Faith on not being the smoothest, it’s still a better life than what she might have ended up with if she stayed in Boston.
There are a lot of things that contribute to why Faith is the way she is, but with that non-canon fiction book (Malice) out there, I wanted to make sure that I addressed the fact that I don’t consider that to be part of her canon. There are enough in-canon references to conclude out that Faith had a bad mom and a non-existent, possibly “mystery” donor of a dad.)
****
Faith Lehane is attitude... and then some more attitude. She’s attractive and she knows it, flaunts it, and uses it to her advantage whenever she can. In unfamiliar settings, if she can’t use her body to get her way she’ll attempt to use her strength. She’s bold and doesn’t care who’s watching. Faith can gain the attention of a room or she can slip out the back without so much as a sound. She’s not just a complex anti-hero that’s been shoved into the middle of a successful dynamic, she’s a unique character that goes through her own series of events and trials. Faith, as a character, grows and evolves over the duration of her arc and becomes as strong on her own as she stubbornly thought she had been in her beginning.
When Kendra died at the hands of Drusilla, Faith was next in line to be Chosen as a Slayer. Faith took the role on easily, but didn’t exactly follow the book. Her strength, speed and anything else that she could associate with being a Slayer was her key into anything she wanted. It put her above the rest. In a way she saw it as placing her into a higher level of society that she wasn’t part of before. People would push her and she would push back harder.
When her watcher was killed, Faith bailed completely on the mess left at home and headed toward Sunnydale. You can’t even sum it up as a typical rebellious streak, because hers involved ditching her entire life, crossing an entire country (by who knows what means) only a few days ahead of a pissed off Vampire. This was a vampire that previously had made lunch of her Watcher. Then add in subjecting an actual ‘Good Girl’ to her antics all in less than a week and you have a girl who was going for the crown jewel of “What not to do when you get Chosen”.
Through her beginnings as a Slayer, she had a definite lack of an authority figure. Her first Watcher was killed at the hands of Kakistos. The second one to accept Faith as their charge was Gwendolyn Post. She earned Faith’s trust and had an actual chance of getting through to the girl. The relationship between Faith and Gwen showed that Faith is capable of learning and following orders under the guidance of someone that knows better. The problem was that Gwen wasn’t currently employed with the Watcher’s Council and used Faith’s gifts as a Slayer to further her own agenda. When Gwendolyn died, Wesley Wydham-Pryce showed up and Faith dismissed him easily, thinking he was a joke and after the last incident with a Watcher doesn’t trust anyone but herself.
Without accepting a Watcher’s guidance her she took risks that were way above her training, involved Buffy in more than a few dangerous situations, and practiced a vigilante method of Slaying. She believed she was above the rules because she was above the standard ‘human’ level of life. She was reckless and impulsive - bursting into situations without any actual plan. Stronger, faster, better was who she was and, in her mind, that meant she could do what she wanted.
She didn’t know any better and she took that inexperience, that lack of wanting to actually try, and just shrugged it off. She believed that she had this Slayer-given talent for killing things and if she got dead sooner rather than later - then so be it. She even told Buffy at one point that if she didn’t enjoy what she was doing (ie: Slaying) that she should find something else to do. Faith got a rise out of Slaying and the power it gave to her. Slayers died young all the time and at least she’d have done it her way. However, her way was messy and a lot harder than she realized because she never had the support of someone else to back her up. Most of the time, her own actions isolated her from the very people that could have helped her.
Faith had a rough childhood, surrounded by parents that probably didn’t care too much about her. Comparing that to the lifestyle she saw when she showed up in the middle of Buffy’s world was a huge culture shock for her. She got to see what a caring, loving Mom would do for her daughter. She saw a Christmas that was actually a celebration for the family. As much as Faith wanted to have that life, she knew that it wasn’t meant for her. She envied Buffy and the life that she had. Not only did it appear that Buffy had the Slayer gig down pat, but she had a mom, a home, friends, and a boyfriend. Buffy represented an ideal image of what Faith could never be and she used her envy to motivate her. However, it wasn’t a “go-get’em I’ll do better” motivation, it more along the lines of: “I’ll take it, because I want it”.
Even though she was misguided in her motivations, she was able to be motivated and tended to focus on things to a near obsessive quality, even if it seemed like she didn’t care. When Faith and Buffy find Balthazar, Faith’s viewpoint on Slaying takes the front seat and she “teaches” Buffy just how powerful they can be as Slayers. They rob a store and get arrested. Even from that point, Faith still manages to pressure Buffy into breaking away from their police escort. She’s a force to be reckoned with and knows how to reason with Buffy to get her to see her side of things. She sees things only one way and that’s whatever way gets her what she actually wants.
It was that tunnel-vision that ended up creating the biggest obstacle in her life when she accidentally staked the Mayor’s aide. With Vampires flanking her and Buffy left and right, Faith doesn’t take that moment to look before she staked him. Staking the Deputy Mayor, which resulted in his death, was a breaking point for Faith. His death, was a real consequence of her way of Slaying. She goes back without Buffy to view the body, amidst the sirens from the police. By staring her actions in the face she makes a choice that ultimately puts her on the other side of the Slayer that she had been fighting along side of.
It’s clear, early on, that she doesn’t know how to properly deal with guilt. This probably came from the fact that she didn’t have anyone to talk to about much of anything growing up, so she just let things bottle up inside of her. Even easier than bottling it up was be ignoring it completely, which she did a lot of. She knew that killing the Deputy Mayor was wrong and she had a small level of remorse, but she never had to own up to it before. Faith, at that point, has never had someone show her the mistake and ask her how she felt about it. By weighting his body and dropping it into water, she pushed the entire situation away from herself, making it a lot easier for her to just ignore it. She even goes to the lengths of telling Buffy that she doesn’t care that she killed someone. From this point on she seems to consider anyone that ends up in the way as collateral to her job. “Nobody’s going to cry over some random passer-byer that got caught in the crossfire.” - Faith ‘Consequences’
When Faith realized how different Buffy’s viewpoint was on the stabbing that she was a part of, she knew that Buffy’s guilt would eventually push her to do something. In a moment of trying to get the upper hand in her situation, she played the weaker Slayer, going to Giles and trying to shift the blame onto Buffy. Faith took a risk by hoping Giles would trust her over Buffy and told him that it was Buffy who had killed the Deputy Mayor. She tried to tarnish the image of Buffy, which she probably knew would fail. In a way, this was just one more thing that Faith did to push her own image further down that dark road that she already believed she was stuck on.
Even when Angel had her and was trying to side with her, trying to explain that he understood what she was going through, she deflected. She made jokes and tried to hit on him. She got angry and upset, but it was easy to see just how broken she was on the inside. Instead of trying to accept the help that was there for her, though, she pushed it away. She showed just how determined she is to keep herself out of trouble when the Council takes her out of Angel’s custody. She threatened to kill another man and then jumped from the back of a van. She bailed once more tried to get one last poke at Buffy when she was confronted at the docks. Faith wanted to prove a point, to show that she’s just the same as Buffy. That she represented the other side of things and how being a Slayer could be. The final confrontation between the two Slayers ended with a battle, but Faith ultimately saved Buffy from Mr. Trick. While Buffy saw it as a sign that she was worth saving, Faith already had her mind made up.
Faith approached the Mayor and put herself into a position that she thought was above Buffy’s current situation. A bulk of her involvement with the Mayor’s plan had one key ingredient to it: taking Angel away from Buffy. She played the role of the “recovering” Slayer, trying to make amends all while working for the Mayor and helping him push his final goal forward. Part of the plan that Faith took a hand in didn’t just involve taking Angel away from Buffy, but turning him into Angelus. Faith believed that Angelus would want to take the side of the Mayor and herself, seeing that they were the “Big Guns” in the situation. It would serve a dual purpose of giving the Mayor what he wanted and taking something away from Buffy in order to give it to Faith.
The Mayor, Richard Wilkins III, provided her with a residence, clothing, weapons, and his positive reinforcement. The Mayor, in his own unique way, was probably one of the best people to Faith. His endgame wasn’t a positive one, but the way he treated Faith and respected her and who she was as a Slayer was, at that point in her life, the best familial relationship she had. He became someone Faith relied and depended on.
It’s easy to see just how much Faith relied on her relationship with the Mayor. She trusted him, looked up to him in a way. She completed the tasks he proved her with and came back to tell him just how well she handled it. She sought out his praise and was ready and willing to take on the next assignment. She took an interest in what he was planning and it wasn’t all for the position at his right hand, but it was because she never had someone that actually made her feel useful or good at what she was doing. When she was Slaying with Buffy there was a comparison to be made, but working for the Mayor, she was on her own - making her own mark as her own “type” of Slayer. She wanted to earn her position, which was a slight contrast to how she felt earlier with her mentality of “Want, Take, Have”. She even has a moment of worry, that once her job was done that the Mayor won’t need her anymore. It’s a very obvious side to her that she does prefer to be important, needed - rather than someone that is just easily used for their strengths.
One of Faith’s tasks had been to poison Angel, to take him out of the game for the Ascension. This act puts Buffy in a weakened emotional state and puts Faith once more on top, in her mind. It was keeping her occupied and away from the plans. Eventually, the two Slayers came to blows and that time, instead of Faith being the one to save Buffy - Buffy was the one to finally try to end Faith. Faith is stabbed with her own knife in the gut and eventually landed in a comatose state.
When she awakened from the coma, rather than run from the city and seek refuge far away from anyone that knew about her past, she stayed in Sunnydale. Faith’s envy for Buffy’s life had been so obvious that even the Mayor could see how much Faith could have done if she had been given a better situation. She confronted Buffy on her campus and actually tells Buffy that she “stole her life” and that payback was a bitch. It was this obsessed way of thinking that always guided her actions.
She swapped places with Buffy, but not before making sure to explain to Joyce just how much Buffy had forgotten them. Faith thought that both of them being Slayers had given them a bond to share and that Buffy’s actions had forced Faith to take these extreme stances. They both shared the blame for the way Faith had turned out and Faith was determined to even the score. Even when she had what she thought she wanted, Buffy’s life, she couldn’t cut it being Buffy and wanted to leave Sunnydale as quickly as possible.
The way Faith handled all of her relationships had always been that nothing really meant anything in the long run. People left, no one really cared, and it was all meaningless. She treated her sexual partners with hardly a second glance and when she was in Buffy’s body she had to face that people actually cared about Buffy and the situations she was in. It wasn’t what Faith was used to and ultimately led her to attempt and leave again. To bail, but this time in Buffy’s body - since that one was free of any criminal acts.
Faith stopped herself from bailing completely, because she knew that as Buffy she had a chance to do something right. When the news comes on about a church being taken hostage, she took the initiative, understanding that she had a shot at actually doing the right thing. When Buffy confronted her in the church and the two came to blows once more, this was the first time that Faith’s self-hatred was fully-exposed. She hated herself and what she had become and lashed out at her own body, trying to destroy who she was.
Her hate of herself was put out in the open when she’s in Los Angeles, too. She goes after Angel knowing that he once claimed to understand her, to know what it was like to kill someone. She figured that if she pushed him hard enough that he would have no choice but to put her out of her misery. That she could trust him to kill her, to be the one to end it for her. She pleaded with him to kill her, to end her life because she didn’t feel like she was worth saving. Her wild throws escalate to the point of sobbing, because she truly believed she wasn’t worth her own life.
It’s a realization that is long coming from when she first came into the series and is one of the most defining moments for her character. She accepted her guilt and showed true remorse for her actions. It was this final breakthrough that Angel has with her that gave her the strength and motivation to turn herself into the police. She realized that she needed to do the right thing and face her crimes, rather than continue running from them. She was sentenced and sent to jail, which when compared to what the Watcher’s Council might have done to her was possibly the lighter sentence.
Prison is about as routine as one can get. It’s a lot of quiet time and self-reflection. Angel visited her, so there was the possible bi-weekly “Pep” talk about how she could do it. There was also the fact that prison was still the better end of how her life could’ve ended up if she had never become a Slayer at all. I like to think prison gave Faith a lot of perspective. It mellowed her out a bit, made her looser around the edges and more adaptable to the input of others. It shifted her focus from the near obsessive to a more rational and logical way of thinking. She saw the bigger picture for once, instead of how that picture should have her in the center of it. Because of that self-reflection, she stayed put. She didn’t use her strength or body to get herself out of there. She didn’t bail because it was too hard and she didn’t start trouble because she wanted to eventually get out of there, if they would let her out. Just because her sentence was Murder Two, 25 to Life - didn’t mean she had to actually serve her entire life.
When she breaks out of prison, it’s not for herself or her own reasons. In fact, Wesley tells her the situation and she bows out. She tells him that it’s something that Angel should take care of. It’s only when she hears Angel is gone and Angelus is around that everything changes for her. She puts someone else in front of her own life, her own needs, and risks everything to give back to him that second chance that he gave to her in that alley.
She proves to be a leader, able to think tactically and with a sound rational to how Connor’s influence and state of mind isn’t going to help the mission. She flat-out admits that she’s a murderer. It’s part of who she is now; just like she’s a Slayer. When she returns to Sunnydale it's because she knows that's where she's needed. Even if she knows that she'll face hardships, such as Buffy and everyone she hurt in the past, she goes. She fully understands the responsibility that she has as a Slayer and is willing to face her past to do her job.
Everything that happened to her up to her turning herself in was a huge long line of events for Faith to look back on and realize how simple it would’ve been to just do things differently. It’s not that she regrets how her life has been either, it’s that she just realizes what she could’ve had if she hadn’t tried to just take it. Because of that, all of her actions and motivations from that point forward are ones she’s trying to take to make up for her past. She’s using Angel as a role model and instead of continually looking back at the things she did that were wrong, she’s trying to make up for it by doing something right now.
She values her friends, even though there are very - very few of them at this point in her canon. She trusts Angel completely, adds Wesley to her list of people she needs to trust, but knows it will take more than just a single mission for him to trust her and knows that Buffy is next up on her list to make amends. She’s very vocal about how she feels about being judged so quickly based on her past.
Powers and Abilities: (Note: I am adding a section here about her abilities/powers as a Slayer. Just so that it’s here for reference.)
Demon spirit/blood infused girl - Faith has been given the lineage of a Slayer. Passed down from Slayer to Slayer, Old Crusty Dudes that couldn't fight for themselves, pretty much set up a girl to be possessed by the spirit of a Demon, in order for her to be strong enough to fight against them. Over the years, it's been traced to some form of demon blood within their bodies. Almost like an extra bit of genetics that gets flipped on when they're activated.
Super strength, speed, agility, balance. Advanced hearing & sight - Much like the standard super-hero type, Faith can run faster (ie: catch up to a speeding vehicle), jump further (ie: between rooftops), Punch Harder (ie: she picked up what appeared to be about 200lbs on a bench-press bar as if it was a 5lb free-weight), and stay standing longer than the average fighter. The demon blood in her system, amps up her normal abilities, but she does still need to train in order to use them effectively. She doesn't like to train, but she realizes that it sort of helps to know how to duck so that you don't have to punch so often.
Wicked-awesome immune system and boosted healing abilities - The demon blood in her also gives her a leg up on the competition. She'll never catch a cold, never get sick and even if she gets shanked and falls off of a building she won't die - she'll just end up in a coma. Even from that she'll wake up and be ready to go rather quickly. In canon, she’s in a coma for a while and moves from the bed without any muscle fatigue or weakness. Cuts and scrapes heal in a day; more serious injuries take a few days. She'll limp, but she'll still be walking.
THIRD-PERSON WRITING SAMPLE:
The music was surrounding her. A pulse that was nearly secondary to her own. Lights flashed, strobing colors across her skin as she danced. What did she care? She didn’t even want to know her own name anymore. Things could be different. She could go back to the way it was. Go back to the power. The want, the take, and she could have it all again.
Her feet moved on the dance floor, sliding across spilled beer and who knows what else. Hands in her hair, tangled upward, lifting it off of the back of her neck. Her hips kept rhythm as her upper half stayed in counter to it.
Shutting her eyes, she blocked the face of the guy grinding up on her. The lights still flashed, illuminating the silhouette of a man as he slumped to the ground. The image of Finch, clutching his chest, startled her. Eyes blinked open suddenly. A bit confused by where she was, wondering how long she’d been standing there. The guy she’d been dancing with was long gone. Off with some red-head.
“Your loss,” she called out to him, only half-believing it. Her fingers tucked her hair back behind her ear, trying to pick up where she had left off. Her steps were uneven, because she was certain someone had seen her lapse. That small faltering movement was exposed and someone had seen it.
A hand moved to grab at her ass. Turning quickly, her fingers curled around his wrist and twisted his arm away. The guy attached to the wandering hand fell to the floor in the club immediately. A sharp cry rung in her ears and she smirked, “Did I ask you to feel me up? Do you think a girl just wants that kind of man-handling?”
Letting go, she left the man clutching his arm, staring out at the crowd. “What? Anyone else want to play grab-ass with me?”
The bouncer came up to her, tapping her on her shoulder. Faith spun wild and clocked him, her arm extended outward, before she just pushed through the crowd. Leaving them all to tell some tale of a wild brunette that was more than they could handle.
They all talk. They all say the same thing.
None of them understand, none of them know just how lucky they are that she let them live.
FIRST-PERSON WRITING SAMPLE:
[she’s been in this “room” for a while now, having bolted from her first encounter in this place. Apparently, this was “her” room and this book was hers too. Plus, there was a heap of shit in it that she’d prefer to have skipped over - but she was a sucker for seeing her name on the page]
Right. So, I’m ditching the episode of Reading Rainbow.
I get it. I was here, everyone knows my name, and we’re all best of friends. [she rattles it off without much care for whoever gets offended] I’m super excited for Pot Luck Tuesday.
In the mean time, I’m looking for a Vampire. Tall... dark... brooding, kinda big on the lurking in shadows. We’re old friends and I think he still has my blender.
I’m getting ready to make some margaritas, so, I’d kinda like it back.
Just tell him... Faith’s looking for him. I’m sure he can’t wait to catch up with me.
INTENT: Aside from Anya, Faith is a character that I’ve RPd with the longest. I started her out in small (self-admittedly) horrible PSL games where I wrote her in First Person. I put her into insane situations and alternate takes on the actual canon. I pushed her onto friends of mine, trying to get their feedback and input as to my take on the character. I wrote fiction and prompts and read other people’s versions of her. I love writing Faith. She’s the kind of character that can have her own arc eclipse the main character’s and I’ve always found something new to do with her regardless of the situations I put her in.
When I first joined Paradisa, I had Anya and Willow, then Angel and later Eve. Now I have Harmony. Buffy/Angel is one of my first RP fandoms and I’ve wanted to try my hand at Faith since I got here. However, she was such a staple character, and played so well, I never thought I’d get the chance to do that. Now that I have that chance, I don't want to pass it up. I am willing to make the time and the effort to follow through with this. If I find myself struggling to keep up, I will adjust my character load accordingly.
I have a pretty good balance of character types right now, and I’ve chosen her canon point specifically so that I can work with the current cast the best. With Buffy’s earlier canon point, and Wesley’s loss - I really want to get the most out of her arrival. By choosing a point where she’s still vulnerable and at a disadvantage because she’s ruled by those reckless urges and a healthy dose of self-loathing. By putting her in a place that is big on people not being punished for what they did back home, she’ll have a lot of choices to make. She’ll have to deal with more good-noble people than she’s ever run into and view first hand how things can be different. I think she has a lot of potential within the setting and I want to try my hand at it.