Application
Player Information:
Player name: Orenda
Personal Lj: orenda33
AIM and/or E-Mail: AIM: Draotia Email: ladyorenda@gmail.com
Timezone: EST
Character Information:
Full Name: Elena
Series Taken From: Final Fantasy VII
Power Retained: Um, no powers. But can she keep a gun, or at least get one on the list of stuff to find?
Background:
History:
Elena’s official story as a member of Shin-Ra’s Department of Administrative Research, more commonly known as the Turks, began when the plate over the top of Sector 7 in the city of Midgar fell down, crushing anyone that remained in the slums below. This was done by her soon-to-be-colleague Reno, who was badly injured in the incident, leaving him unable to temporarily perform his duties as a Turk. Thus they were short-handed, and Elena was called in and promoted to cover for his absence, eventually ending up working with both him and his partner Rude.
Being a Turk takes a lot of skills, because they do all sorts of tasks including “recruiting” for the SOLDIER program (which could easily be called kidnapping), espionage, assassinations, bodyguards for the company president and vice president, and everything else in-between. They must be able to fight, and they can’t be afraid to get their hands dirty, following company orders no matter what the deed. In general the Turks are proud of what they do, and are very loyal, not questioning their assignments for the most part.
At the time of her promotion, the company was going through a rather stressful time. A small terrorist group known as AVALANCHE was trying to destroy mako reactors left and right. The former warrior Sephiroth was running amok causing much mayhem, including murdering President Shinra himself. His son Rufus took over the company, and Cloud (the main character) and his companions had escaped from the building. So there was much for them to keep up with.
The main job assigned to the Turks was tracking down Sephiroth and finding out where he was headed, as well as stopping Cloud and his friends from getting in the way. (Elena had no problems explaining this to Cloud himself, much to the chagrin of the other Turks.) She leaves after being reminded to fill out her proper forms, ordered not to let Sephiroth get away from them. They track him to the port city of Junon, where they make use of the bar there, and aren’t seen again until Cloud’s group makes their way into Gongaga. This was where Rude reveals that Elena has a one-sided crush on their leader, Tseng. After she warns Reno and Rude of Cloud’s arrival to the village, she runs off to inform Tseng and leaves the boys to handle the anti-Shin-Ra group.
At one point, there is an optional side quest in the game that takes place in Wutai. Elena is in a bar with Reno and Rude drinking, and it is their vacation time. As soon as Cloud and the others enter, she has no problems with standing up and getting ready to attack. However, her partners had a different outlook on the matter, and told her to back down; It wasn’t worth fighting and ruining their vacation. Elena of course was outraged. Why didn’t they care about being dedicated to their job more than this, considering they were Turks?
The final straw is pulled when Reno refuses to help out the regular soldiers and give them back-up. Elena says, "Reno, do you think that was really such a good idea!? I mean is that the way a professional, a Turk would act!?" To which he replies, "Elena. Don't misunderstand. A pro isn't someone who sacrifices himself for his job. That's just a fool." Rude doesn’t say anything, and Elena storms out of the bar in her frustration, determined to prove that she was right in her line of thinking.
Next thing we know, she’s kidnapped and dragged away along with Cloud’s friend Yuffie, thanks to a disgusting man named Don Corneo. Earlier in the game he had been beaten by Cloud and warned them of the plate’s collapse; now he wants revenge, and he has a very strong desire for taking women, even against their will. Elena and Yuffie are strapped to a stone cliff, where Corneo tries to decide which girl he wants. Before he can do anything to either, Cloud’s group arrives. A fight breaks out, and once Corneo realizes he’s losing, he flips the girls upside down, threatening to drop them. Elena is embarrassed and for the most part quite angry for the situation in general.
This is when Reno showed up, knocked Corneo to the edge of the cliff, sending him to his death for messing with a fellow Turk. He says it’s for his job, but it’s obviously closer than that. Elena thanks him for coming to the rescue, but she’s scolded and told not to act weak. They decide not to pursue Cloud at the moment, claiming they were still off duty.
More things happen in the main story; eventually Cloud and his companions make their way to this ancient temple, where Tseng is found to be badly injured. Apparently right before they had shown up, Elena had had a moment alone with him, and he had asked her out to dinner when all of the trouble with Sephiroth and the Promised Land was over with. She leaves to report the temple and their findings to Rufus and never sees Sephiroth attack Tseng and leave him to die.
Meanwhile, the planet is forming weapons to protect itself from destruction of something called Meteor, which is what Sephiroth is trying to bring down on them. Rufus tries to stop one of the weapons with a mako canon called the Sister Ray; only it doesn’t work, and the new president is in his office when a massive explosion hits. Disaster and chaos all over the place, and the Shin-Ra company is disorganized.
The last encounter with the Turks is in the subways underneath Midgar. Their orders are to seek out Cloud and the others and kill them all. After all, even with the company falling apart, they must still perform their job, and they always get things done. In the end, they choose not to, and Reno tells Elena she was actually a great Turk, perhaps his way of finally admitting she had his respect. They wander off in the opposite direction, to do what they need to while Cloud goes to face Sephiroth and save the world. Midgar is basically destroyed in the process, but many people were placed in shelters and rescued from the Planet’s wrath against Meteor.
She’ll appear in the house after everything has settled down a little, say… maybe a month later, exploring for survivors and other various tasks after Meteor.
Personality:
One of the very first things people will say to Elena is that she talks too much. She’s not very good at keeping secrets, and on numerous occasions has told her opponents about their current mission plans. She is a bit naïve and oblivious to some of the general “common sense” skills at times, but her time spent with Reno and Rude is helping her get over that little by little, and she’s getting better at making practical choices.
When it comes to work, she’s very serious and sometimes overeager to please and get things done. In that sense she is very reliable, and will get something done when asked to, even if she dislikes it, but might become distracted easily and have to really focus to keep that from happening. Sometimes she’ll even take on extra work than what’s really necessary in hopes of impressing, especially for Tseng, whom she has a one-sided crush on. She is very good in terms of detail, but often times may struggle to see the big picture side of things. For example, in Wutai she doesn’t immediately understand why the other Turks would not do the “right thing” and capture Cloud simply because they are off duty. But by the end of the mission, and also later on when they have the option of fighting again, she starts to understand that some things about working just aren’t worth dying for. She also has a tendency to get bored when stuck doing a task for too long. She likes changes in routine and the variety that usually comes with being a Turk.
Sample Third-Person Post:
Paperwork. Plain, old, ordinary, pointless, redundant, waste of time paperwork. For the last two days, all that Elena had been given to do was a giant mountain of the stuff, much to her distaste. She could have been out spying for information or actually being useful… but no. Here she was, sitting at the cramped and cluttered desk, her legs starting to fall asleep from being stuck in the uncomfortable chair. Heck, right now she wouldn’t even mind babysitting Rufus on bodyguard duty, boring as that could be, just for the change in routine.
Not that she didn’t understand why she was stuck with such a menial task while the other Turks were actually out with exciting assignments. Despite the facts that she was no longer a rookie and had survived through Meteor and Sephiroth’s attempts at destroying the world, she was still the newest member of their group, and therefore was stuck with a lot of the duties that no one else wanted. Besides, the others told her, she was lucky, since procedures for keeping track of records in the past used to take twice as long. It didn’t exactly make her grateful, but she would take what comfort she could get out of the thought.
The worst part was that she was certain that the stupid pile kept multiplying. She had no idea if papers could breed or not, or maybe they underwent mitosis instead? Or maybe it was a form of clerical fission… Maybe she would have to ask Rude and see if he had ever experienced this strange phenomenon. For whatever reason it was, it was a frustrating never-ending pile, and she was starting to wonder if she could somehow convince Reno to “accidentally” set them on fire for her. That probably wouldn’t work; he’d say that the work was “good experience” for her, and would more than likely just leave with a few teasing taunts on how he was having all the fun with Rude.
Her feet kicked restlessly underneath her chair, and with a frustrated sigh she stood up, stretching her arms up in the air with a yawn. She would not complain, determined to do a good job so that maybe Tseng would let her move on to something new soon. But that didn’t mean that she had to torture herself in the meantime. The new coffee maker was calling her name, dang it. Of course Rufus didn’t get the really nice kind anymore, since profits in rebuilding were much less than when they were in charge of controlling all the mako energy, and she would have to doctor it up with large amounts of sugar to counteract the bitter flavor. Maybe that wasn’t a bad thing, since the energy might make her more motivated to finish, and she truly hoped to impress the others with how much work she got done today.
Once she returned with her not quite forbidden treat, she glared at the pile, wishing that they had filled out themselves in her absence. She could do this! And once she had… perhaps after clocking out, she would reward her good behavior with some time at the shooting range. She couldn’t let herself get rusty and let the boys get ahead of her, after all.
Sample First-Person Post:
Okay, so… This thing is working, right? Good, because I’m sure it’d be rather dumb if I was just spending time typing and then it just deletes itself or something like that. Not to mention if anyone else actually sees it. Wow, how embarrassing that would be.
So I’m still not entirely sure what’s going on, but I’m sure I’ll figure it out. Apparently I’m locked inside of a building, and my gun kind of weirdly disappeared. At least I think so, since I know I wouldn’t lose that. And my phone’s gone too. Which… okay, that I could see possibly losing if Reno was involved, but not at the same time as my gun. I’d give out coordinates to anyone that might be tracking this to help look, but I can’t seem to figure that out either.
So, um… A little help, possibly? Reno? Rude? Anyone?