Sora (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
heartstorage) wrote2014-01-13 07:33 pm
heartstorage) wrote2014-01-13 07:33 pm
Brave New World Application
PLAYER INFO
Name: Yuff
Contact Information:
DW:randomtology
Plurk:![[plurk.com profile]](https://plurk.com/favicon.ico)
randomtology
Time Zone: US Central Time
Characters Played: I am fresh meat.
CHARACTER INFO
Character Name: Sora (he has no canonical last name, so for AU let's go with Sora Niniji if for some reason the issue of last names comes up. I'll try to avoid it though!)
Character Canon: Kingdom Hearts
History: It can be found here. I apologize so much for the length the series is crazy long.
AU History:
His early history will parallel his canon one a lot. Sora grew up in an isolated fishing community called Destiny, located on an island somewhere in the ocean. Whether they came from Union or another place entirely isn't known by Sora since he much preferred playing than actually learning the town lore. For the most part, his childhood was a peaceful one- full of playing with the other children of the village and learning the ways of his quiet village's life. While he had a desire of one day exploring and seeing other places, to him it was more an idle daydream than an actual driving aspiration.
Things started to change when he was fourteen. He began to experience strange dreams that would leave him feeling uneasy and afraid, but he would frequently try to dismiss them as nothing. But one stormy night when he snuck out of his home- catastrophe struck. Something had caused the local wild Pokémon to go out of control and attack the village. Zubats flew out of nearby caves in swarms so thick they blotted out the sky, to give you an idea. Sora was nearly killed, but his fear caused his Enlightened abilities to finally fully awaken at last and saved him - but it was not enough to save the village. He was forced onto a boat with a few other survivors to escape. But the boat was much small too handle the waves of the ocean during a storm- and the last thing Sora remembered was being thrown off a capsizing boat before blacking out.
He awoke sometime later in a cart with a tamed Shinx licking his injuries. He had been found washed up on shore of the mainland by two rangers (Donald and Goofy) from Union, barely alive. Out of concern for the boy's condition, they were taking him back there to be treated. When Sora asked them about his village, they didn't seem to know anything about it or that the village even existed. They assumed Sora was delirious from his condition and told him to stop talking nonsense.
Because Donald must be a serious jerk in all incarnations.
Eventually he was brought to Union and after several days of searching for anyone who might know the boy, nothing came up. The two had to get back to their jobs, and since ranger work was far too dangerous to bring along a young boy, they had no choice but to leave him behind at an orphanage. They left him with what money they could spare and their Shinx. Before departing, they gave him words of caution about saying that he came from somewhere outside of Union. It wasn't that they believed him, but they knew that spreading information like that could get him into loads of trouble one way or another.
So Sora began his life inside Union City. He heeded the words of his rescuers and kept as quiet as he could about his life. The matrons at the orphanage certainly found it odd that he seemed to know so little about Union City- as well that he didn't seem to have any school or medical records. But the idea that he was an outsider was so farfetched that it was never even brought to the table of theories. Instead it was soon assumed that the boy just was dealing with severe trauma from his parents' death at the hand of rampaging Pokemon - to the point that maybe he was forgetting his actual identity. And since the orphanage hardly had the resources to do an in-depth investigation of who this boy was really was - they pulled some illegal strings to have falsified records created. They figured it was a temporary fix, at least until the kid could sort his head out and tell them who he was. And Sora, feeling he didn't have any other option, went along with it.
Whether or not this is believed by government officials or anyone else in the city, well, that remains to be seen.
Over time, Sora grew to be well liked by people in the orphanage. He maintained a cheerful personality despite everything, and was always willing to help people out. But even so, he didn't make too many actual friends. Lying about his origin made it hard for him to get that close to people, and most people found him a bit too odd to really connect to (NPCs at least, I wouldn't oppose to in game CR that did better!).
The desire to find out what happened to his village and if any of his friends or family were still alive was too great, and he has set sights on being a ranger. He hasn't obtained ranger status yet, but he's working on it. He claims openly it's so he can learn what's out there, but in truth it's for the chance to find his home again. He's been in Union about a year now, marking him at 15 years old so I have a chance to have pre-game CR with him.
His history may change slightly depending on if any CR alteration- especially regarding Riku, Kairi or Roxas. Until then he won't talk much about it because hey if he can go 5 games without mentioning his parents at all, I'm sure he can not mention specifics about people from his village.
Canon Personality:
When a person first meets Sora, it's not uncommon for someone to completely overlook him. He's young, short, skinny and all in all pretty average in terms of looks. Being rather average in intelligence and not particularly driven unless pushed, it's rather no surprise many people seem dismiss him right out of hand. This is only furthered by the fact that it turned out the only reason the keyblade choose him was because its first choice screwed up and no longer qualified.
But what Sora lacks in sheer awe factor, he seems to make up for in friendliness and an outgoing nature. Unlike many of the keyblade wielders, Sora has an easy time interacting with new people and making friends wherever he goes. Unless there's something about a person that puts him ill at ease, he seems to approach most new encounters as a chance to make another friend.
While this may sound like Sora is a gullible idiot that'll get himself killed one day, he's actually surprisingly perceptive about people's motives- even more so than many of his fellow comrades. A novel once described that when he meets a new person he spends some time mentally judging them into three different categories: good, bad and suspicious for those rare people like Joshua that he has trouble pinpointing their true alignment. But aside from those rare cases, all in all his perception and intuition works extremely well and it's hard for someone with malicious intent to pull the wool over his eyes.
Intelligence wise, Sora is probably best described as simple. Complicated concepts tend to go over his head, and he's nowhere near as philosophical as his friend Riku. A few characters remark that he can be slow on the uptake, and it's not without merit. However he isn't without his clever moments. In battle he's shown to be very cunning in terms of resourcefulness and strategy, frequently turning the odds in his favor by using an object at hand or even using his opponent's abilities against them. His simple way of thinking frequently benefits him too, allowing him to cut through to the heart of the matter of an issue instead of getting stuck on the smaller details.
Sora has an overwhelmingly strong sense of justice. Many times on his adventures he would get involved in affairs not his own simply because of his strong sense made him feel it was wrong to leave unjust things lie. Originally, his perspective of justice was very two dimensional: light is good, darkness is bad. Later on when he encountered Nobodies who were never meant to exist, he did his best to apply the same duality as he did with darkness. This belief system wasn't irrational, since the forces of darkness had destroyed his home and light was the only chance to stop destruction. Not only that, but most Nobodies, even if they were sympathetic in their search to become whole beings, did so with methods that hurt and killed many innocent people.
However as he's gotten older and more experienced, Sora's has begun to expand his schema of justice to include shades of gray. Starting with his best friend whose learned to use darkness for good instead of evil (albeit, it took him a couple games and screw ups to figure out), he's coming to realize that darkness doesn't necessarily mean evil and that it is just as necessary as light. Nobodies such as Roxas, Namine and Axel also made him begin to question the things he had been taught about Nobodies. He's at the point that he seems to now privately believe that they have every right to exist as their Somebody counterparts. He still has a way to go to completely shake off the duality of his views on justice, but he's making progress.
All in all, when things are peaceful Sora is a boy at peace. While he enjoys adventure as much as any teenage boy, he seems most content just spending a quiet fun day with his friends. While Riku originally wanted to leave the islands with zero intent or desire to return one day, Sora seems to hang onto the dream that one day he'll get to return home with his friends. Having that dream threatened or seemingly taken away often results in Sora getting depressed or more easily agitated.
While the past couple years of Sora's life have made him grow and mature a lot, he's still very much a kid. He gets easily excited about new things and just as quickly angry over little things that more mature members of the group overlook. He can be competitive and do bratty things like stick out his tongue at villains or be a complete smart mouth. When something bothers him enough, he'll become extremely stubborn and not let it go. He also has a tendency to get stuck in the moment and forget the bigger picture- which sometimes lands him into serious trouble.
It's shown that Sora's got a bit of an ego as well. He gets miffed when people insult his capabilities or dismiss him. He'll do ridiculous things to prove himself, such as challenge the demi-god Hercules to a one-on-one battle to show that he's true hero material. He likes glory and isn't above seeking it out in absurd ways. When faced with the aspect of taking the Mark of Mastery Exam, an idea as nerve wracking to keyblade wielder as the SATs or GRE are to us, Sora showed total overconfidence in that he'd be able to pass it with flying colors (hilariously, he failed while his less confident friend passed).
Luckily, his ego and pride isn't strong enough to get the better of him when things get really serious. Truth be told, Sora knows deep down he's no one special. He knows that he only got the keyblade because the true chosen were unavailable and that his friends are so much more skilled and special than he is. And yet while one would think that would bother him - he doesn't care. He cares so little that villains who tried their hardest to psych him out with that card ended up having it backfire on them. While Sora certainly appreciates the occasional ego stroking, as long as he can help his friends he's okay whether he's the chosen one or the almighty janitor.
Partly thanks to the encouragement of his travel companions Donald and Goofy, Sora does his best to keep up a cheery temperament. Not all this is false, Sora is someone that tries to look on the bright side of things and is able to live in the joy of the moment. However it's indicated that when things are truly bad, this becomes less sincere cheer and more a mask to get by. This mask is pretty easy to see and sometimes break- but he'll do his best to keep it up so his friends don't get sad too.
Because of this coping mechanism and his old duality in how he viewed the world, Sora hasn't learned how to cope with his own darkness too well. He isn't without darkness as all people have darkness in them (aside from some princesses who- aw forget it), and due to the events of the past years its been growing in his heart unchecked. Best case scenario this causes him to become snappish at the people around him during stressful times. Worse case scenario? Well, he was once almost destroyed by Xehanort using that darkness against him. And it was such a close call that even after Ventus used his armor to shield the light in Sora's heart from being destroyed? The darkness was still strong enough to possess the armor and make Sora the unintentional final boss of a game. And that armor's resilient enough to darkness to fly through space.
Seriously. If that's not a cry for therapy I don't know what is.
Fortunately, despite the fact he's got a lot of issues, Sora's managed to avoid a tragic fate that often befalls Keyblade wielders in this series thanks to his friends. Sure, some of them make crappy therapists, but having them around has saved him on many occasions whether it be from enemies or his own failings. Sora works best in a team, and is the only keyblade wielder that'll regularly work in one. While some scoff that it's possible he has no real power on his own and the team itself is a bit of a ragtag crew (such as among its ranks is a drunken pirate, a skeleton with ADD and a talking duck) - it's hard to deny that his team has been the most successful thus far in the war. He even admits this, stating that on his own he's weak, but his friends are his power.
All in all, Sora is a simple kid that simply wants to be with his friends. He's got issues what with his view on justice as well as dealing with negative emotions, but he has a good heart. He likes to do the right thing, and so long as he has friends who will keep him in check- it's likely he'll end up alright. He may not be the brightest or the most skilled of the keyblade wielders, but there's still a lot more than the underwhelmed first impression people get to him.
AU Deviation:
A difference in Sora's personality comes from the fact he's been forced to lie for the past year of his life about where he came from. Not being a liar by nature, he doesn't enjoy doing it and feels a measure of guilt from it. It's made it harder for him to make connections to people or establish true bonds of friendships. He likes to have a cheery disposition still, but it seems rather odd or detached at times. Possibly like he's not quite all there all the time.
From all this, he's incredibly lonely. Sure, he has his Shinx. But a Pokemon can't really fulfilled the sort of human interaction he needs. He badly wants friends, but it's hard to get friends when you're lying all the time. Unfortunately, at this point he's too scared to stop lying out of fear of how people would react to the fact that he had been lying to them for so long- especially over such an important subject as people outside of Union. And so, the vicious cycle continues.
He didn't grow up in Union, but has spent the past year here- so the amount of knowledge he knows about the city is touch and go- mostly it's prioritized by his own survival. By now he's figured out where the places to go for food and maybe quick odd jobs, but couldn't tell you a single thing about the Council Hall.
Since he hasn't gone through all the things he has in canon, he's still rather naive or immature about a lot of things. I'll probably be referencing his behaviors in earlier canon more than later canon, since that would probably reflect better his mindset and personality. At the same time, his sense of morality and justice has been challenged a lot sooner than it was in canon. Unlike in canon, he's very conflicted on the matter of Pokemon. Some are his friends, yet others are the ones who caused his problems in the first place. He's still trying to work things out in his moral schema when it comes to how to handle the creatures.
It's safe to say that Sora, while a bit of a strange goof, will be very devoted to his dream of becoming a ranger. What he lacks in skill and experience, he makes up for in determination and hard-work. He wants very badly to go home, or at the very least find out what happened to his home. Since the rangers feel like his only chance to achieve that dream, he will go above and beyond to join their ranks.
Possibly even to a worrying degree. Who knows, maybe the Rangers just gets a lot of crazy determined shonens.
Canon Abilities:
In canon Sora is a keyblade wielder. This means he can summon a key like weapon that is pretty haxx. The keyblade can open any lock, always returns to the wielder, be sharp enough to cut through buildings, shape shift into other weapons (or ships), travel worlds and all sorts of godhaxxy things. But on the downside, keyblades also mark its wielder as a giant target to monsters like Heartless and there's no giving up the keyblade once it's chosen you - so you spend your entire life constantly being hunted by any heartless that happen to be nearby.
Like most of the keyblade wielders, he seems to possess a low level of empathic abilities. Though while the ones with formal training seem to sense more the levels of light and darkness in their heart, Sora is less refined and seems to sense more along the lines of how malicious a person is- which is a major reason he's not often tricked. If he's dealing with someone that has malicious intent, he starts to get edgy, untrusting and even frequently hostile.
Sora also had an ace up his sleeve called drive form that for a short amount of time, would allow him to wield two keyblades or have his magical power be greatly enhanced. These forms were incredibly strong, however extremely taxing. So much that if he used this power too frequently, he stood the risk of reverting into anti-form- which was a heartless like form with claws that would attack anything in sight. Whoops.
In addition to his keyblade, he's capable of using magic. Most of it is elemental magic such as ice, fire, thunder, air and light. He's also got some healing skills and can mess with gravity and time. Or make shields. In overall power he's about average in comparison to other characters in the games.
His name does mean Sky, so I should probably talk about his movement skills as well. He can jump really high and even learn to glide or fly. He also seems to take no damage from falling, no matter the height. He also is able to move incredibly fast in short bursts of speed, fast enough that that he becomes a blur or mirages of his movement.
However Sora's most unique power to himself is the power of his heart. He seems to possess a special ability that allows his heart to connect with other people much more than others. This allows him to do stuff like store other people's heart/souls into his body for safe keeping or trigger actual emotions out of people who are, quite literally, incapable of emotions. It's even theorized by one person in canon that this power of his, if used right, could even bring back the dead. However how these powers work is still vague/mysterious, and also at this point it seems to come at serious costs. For example, triggering actual emotion out of normally emotionless sociopaths for some reason is possibly not the best idea. Another problem is that if someone else's heart/soul is in him for an extended point of time- it starts to influence his own personality and appearance. Also the only known way to get those hearts/souls out of him right now is to kill him.
Seriously. Heart is actually a terrible power.
Enlightened Abilities: Okay, as you can probably tell from that crazy list above- there's no way in hell I can mimic all of his abilities so I'll just pick and choose here.
Sora will be a Psychic/Flying type. Psychic to help mimic a little his crazy heart power since that is his unique power in game. Flying because well, his name is literally the word for sky.
His psychic abilities will be largely based on his emotions and empathic abilities (much like in canon). Powers and evolutions will break down like this:
1st Evolution (now):
- Low Empath: Sora will be able to pick on on whether or not someone has malicious intent or feelings, just like canon.
- Agility: For short periods of time, Sora can make himself move very quickly. Periods of time are about 5-10 seconds.
- Offense Emotions: He can do offensive attacks that are lashing out of his own emotions. It's powered based on how strongly he feels the emotion, but is in the low-to-mid power range. No surprise, his most common attack from this will be Confusion.
2nd Evolution:
- Empath: Sora will be able to pick up on a wider range of emotions from other people.
- Agility: He becomes even faster, to the point he looks like a blur. Period of times last from 10-15 seconds.
- Offense and Defense Emotions: He can still do offensive attacks, but positive emotions will become healing or defensive spells. For example, the will to help someone hurt could translate into a healing spell- while wanting to protect someone/something might raise his defense.
3rd Evolution:
- Empath Influence: He can attempt to influence other people's emotions with his own. The stronger personal connection he has with a person, the more likely it'll succeed.
- Agility: He can now move so fast that it leaves behind mirages of him as he goes. Periods of time now last 15-20 seconds.
- Dream Eater: Sora can eat/absorb the nightmares and dreams of targets, causing them pain and healing him. Has a higher chance of success if target is asleep. This is based off abilities in Drop Dream Distance.
- Emotions take Life: Strong emotions can take their own temporary physical form that while weaker than strong pokemon, can still aid him in battle. Positive emotions take forms that are either cute or pretty in appearance, while negative emotions take more monstrous forms. However, destroying any of forms will cause him physical pain. While this is technically Vanitas's power in canon, uh, well...just google that guy's face sometime.
As for flying, right now in his first evolution he's able to jump much higher than a normal person and doesn't take much fall damage. Second evolution he'll be able to glide and third evolution he'll be able to fly. He may grow wings or he may not I haven't decided yet. However because he's gotta be lightweight, he'll never grow above 5'2" and remain on the small side in build.
His trainer ability will be Kindred Soul because his friends are his power.
Also while it's not powered, it should be noted that he'll be wielding an axe as a replacement to his keyblade. Other than it's a good quality battleaxe, there's nothing special about it. Like his original keyblade's name, its name is Kingdom. In addition, he's grown to be extremely skilled at picking locks - a callback to his canon power to open any lock.
Starter Pokémon:
He will start with a Shinx named Simba.
Notes/Special Considerations:
As we discussed before, Sora comes from outside of Union, on an island village called Destiny that got attacked by Zubats. The origins of Destiny is nothing more than former Union citizens going out into the wilderness and starting a new life. The details about all that I'm just going to leave vague and up to you guys, since I doubt a 15 year old boy with no aptitude for studying would've cared enough to know himself.
Regarding the village of Destiny and its fate, I am very open to it's level of impact of the actual plot. If you guys want to make it part of the lore, that's cool. If you want to make it completely inconsequential beyond Sora's backstory, that's cool too.
SAMPLES
(NOTE: You may link a previous entry or thread, including testrun or musebox threads (but NOT Dear Mun), for one or both samples. However, we want to see the character in the setting of Brave New World and specifically in their AU for at least one sample.)
First-Person:
What would you say the role of Pokémon is in your life?
Pokémon? [he crosses his arms, looking a bit conflicted] I'm not sure. I know Simba's my friend! And I guess I wouldn't mind having more Pokémon friends. But...there's a lot of bad ones too. So I'm not sure what to think about them.
What do you feel your role in Union is?
[he glances around to make sure no one is listening before he answers quietly] I...don't really think I belong here. I wanna help people out if I can! But...[he shakes his head] there's somewhere else I need to be. I can't forget about it.
To what lengths would you go to rescue your allies if they were lost in the wilderness?
[his hand curls up into a fist and he gives a little fist pump in front of his chest] I'd do whatever I can! My allies are my friends, and friends help each other! That's all there is to it!
What area do you seek to explore? The peaceful forest, in search of new, previously overlooked discoveries; the uncharted caves, in search of the unknown; or the wildest of mountain terrain, in search of danger, adventure, and thrills?
[he holds his arms out, in some sort of bravado] I'd like to see all kinds of things! And learn what's out there! Can you imagine what sort of wonders are out there? It'd be such a great adventure!
[But then, he looks around again- to make sure he's alone. The bravado stops, and his arms fall to his side and he looks much more worried. A scared lonely kid, that's all he really is]
But...most of all, I just wanna see home again. I...I don't know what's there anymore, but...I wanna find out- no. I need to find out.
Third-Person:
The uniform was too big.
Sora scrunched his nose in front of the mirror as he tried to straighten it. He had gotten the smallest size available, and it was still two sizes too big for him. He looked closer to a kid playing dress up than a member of the Rangers. He was sure a lot of them felt that way about him too.
He makes a "hmph" sound to no one in particular. He'd show them.
With a strange sense of determination, he got to work rolling up the sleeves. Simba nearby sat on the edge of the bed, a mattress on the floor, watching his companion. Last week marked a year he had been in this city, a year since he had received Simba from those two who had found him. He still looked much like a child, but there were changes. His face had lost a lot of its youthful baby fat, his voice had deepen and he had grown several inches - even if he was still small for boys his age. He looked a lot older than he used to be.
And yet, the impish grin that broke out on his face when he finally got the sleeves adjusted right brought him to looking like a young kid all over again.
"Aha! Perfect!" He stretched his arms out before placing his hands behind his messy head. The uniform still looked big on him, but at least it looked presentable. Maybe there was a chance tomorrow he wouldn't be laugh out of training.
"This is it, Simba." As usual, he spoke to his Pokemon out of having no one else to talk to. He kept the smile on, even if bits of sadness shone through on it. "Starting tomorrow, everything's gonna change."
No more staying at an orphanage, no more fretting if the future would ever change, no more feeling powerless. Tomorrow was a new beginning. The start to fulfilling his dream from the entire past year. He would finally start to get to search for what he really wanted. And maybe, if he was lucky, he could make some friends along the way!
Simba gave a simple little mew in reply, one that seemed skeptical - at least to Sora. He glanced over at his furry friend and spoke encouragingly. "No really, things are gonna get better from here on out! You'll see!"
His grin faded after that, and he looked away from Simba and instead down at his feet, dropping his hands. He could feel the doubt that swelled up in his stomach, leaving an uncomfortable feeling. When he spoke again, it was much quieter, more unsure and to himself.
"...Yeah. You'll see."
Name: Yuff
Contact Information:
DW:
randomtologyPlurk:
Time Zone: US Central Time
Characters Played: I am fresh meat.
CHARACTER INFO
Character Name: Sora (he has no canonical last name, so for AU let's go with Sora Niniji if for some reason the issue of last names comes up. I'll try to avoid it though!)
Character Canon: Kingdom Hearts
History: It can be found here. I apologize so much for the length the series is crazy long.
AU History:
His early history will parallel his canon one a lot. Sora grew up in an isolated fishing community called Destiny, located on an island somewhere in the ocean. Whether they came from Union or another place entirely isn't known by Sora since he much preferred playing than actually learning the town lore. For the most part, his childhood was a peaceful one- full of playing with the other children of the village and learning the ways of his quiet village's life. While he had a desire of one day exploring and seeing other places, to him it was more an idle daydream than an actual driving aspiration.
Things started to change when he was fourteen. He began to experience strange dreams that would leave him feeling uneasy and afraid, but he would frequently try to dismiss them as nothing. But one stormy night when he snuck out of his home- catastrophe struck. Something had caused the local wild Pokémon to go out of control and attack the village. Zubats flew out of nearby caves in swarms so thick they blotted out the sky, to give you an idea. Sora was nearly killed, but his fear caused his Enlightened abilities to finally fully awaken at last and saved him - but it was not enough to save the village. He was forced onto a boat with a few other survivors to escape. But the boat was much small too handle the waves of the ocean during a storm- and the last thing Sora remembered was being thrown off a capsizing boat before blacking out.
He awoke sometime later in a cart with a tamed Shinx licking his injuries. He had been found washed up on shore of the mainland by two rangers (
Because Donald must be a serious jerk in all incarnations.
Eventually he was brought to Union and after several days of searching for anyone who might know the boy, nothing came up. The two had to get back to their jobs, and since ranger work was far too dangerous to bring along a young boy, they had no choice but to leave him behind at an orphanage. They left him with what money they could spare and their Shinx. Before departing, they gave him words of caution about saying that he came from somewhere outside of Union. It wasn't that they believed him, but they knew that spreading information like that could get him into loads of trouble one way or another.
So Sora began his life inside Union City. He heeded the words of his rescuers and kept as quiet as he could about his life. The matrons at the orphanage certainly found it odd that he seemed to know so little about Union City- as well that he didn't seem to have any school or medical records. But the idea that he was an outsider was so farfetched that it was never even brought to the table of theories. Instead it was soon assumed that the boy just was dealing with severe trauma from his parents' death at the hand of rampaging Pokemon - to the point that maybe he was forgetting his actual identity. And since the orphanage hardly had the resources to do an in-depth investigation of who this boy was really was - they pulled some illegal strings to have falsified records created. They figured it was a temporary fix, at least until the kid could sort his head out and tell them who he was. And Sora, feeling he didn't have any other option, went along with it.
Whether or not this is believed by government officials or anyone else in the city, well, that remains to be seen.
Over time, Sora grew to be well liked by people in the orphanage. He maintained a cheerful personality despite everything, and was always willing to help people out. But even so, he didn't make too many actual friends. Lying about his origin made it hard for him to get that close to people, and most people found him a bit too odd to really connect to (NPCs at least, I wouldn't oppose to in game CR that did better!).
The desire to find out what happened to his village and if any of his friends or family were still alive was too great, and he has set sights on being a ranger. He hasn't obtained ranger status yet, but he's working on it. He claims openly it's so he can learn what's out there, but in truth it's for the chance to find his home again. He's been in Union about a year now, marking him at 15 years old so I have a chance to have pre-game CR with him.
His history may change slightly depending on if any CR alteration- especially regarding Riku, Kairi or Roxas. Until then he won't talk much about it because hey if he can go 5 games without mentioning his parents at all, I'm sure he can not mention specifics about people from his village.
Canon Personality:
When a person first meets Sora, it's not uncommon for someone to completely overlook him. He's young, short, skinny and all in all pretty average in terms of looks. Being rather average in intelligence and not particularly driven unless pushed, it's rather no surprise many people seem dismiss him right out of hand. This is only furthered by the fact that it turned out the only reason the keyblade choose him was because its first choice screwed up and no longer qualified.
But what Sora lacks in sheer awe factor, he seems to make up for in friendliness and an outgoing nature. Unlike many of the keyblade wielders, Sora has an easy time interacting with new people and making friends wherever he goes. Unless there's something about a person that puts him ill at ease, he seems to approach most new encounters as a chance to make another friend.
While this may sound like Sora is a gullible idiot that'll get himself killed one day, he's actually surprisingly perceptive about people's motives- even more so than many of his fellow comrades. A novel once described that when he meets a new person he spends some time mentally judging them into three different categories: good, bad and suspicious for those rare people like Joshua that he has trouble pinpointing their true alignment. But aside from those rare cases, all in all his perception and intuition works extremely well and it's hard for someone with malicious intent to pull the wool over his eyes.
Intelligence wise, Sora is probably best described as simple. Complicated concepts tend to go over his head, and he's nowhere near as philosophical as his friend Riku. A few characters remark that he can be slow on the uptake, and it's not without merit. However he isn't without his clever moments. In battle he's shown to be very cunning in terms of resourcefulness and strategy, frequently turning the odds in his favor by using an object at hand or even using his opponent's abilities against them. His simple way of thinking frequently benefits him too, allowing him to cut through to the heart of the matter of an issue instead of getting stuck on the smaller details.
Sora has an overwhelmingly strong sense of justice. Many times on his adventures he would get involved in affairs not his own simply because of his strong sense made him feel it was wrong to leave unjust things lie. Originally, his perspective of justice was very two dimensional: light is good, darkness is bad. Later on when he encountered Nobodies who were never meant to exist, he did his best to apply the same duality as he did with darkness. This belief system wasn't irrational, since the forces of darkness had destroyed his home and light was the only chance to stop destruction. Not only that, but most Nobodies, even if they were sympathetic in their search to become whole beings, did so with methods that hurt and killed many innocent people.
However as he's gotten older and more experienced, Sora's has begun to expand his schema of justice to include shades of gray. Starting with his best friend whose learned to use darkness for good instead of evil (albeit, it took him a couple games and screw ups to figure out), he's coming to realize that darkness doesn't necessarily mean evil and that it is just as necessary as light. Nobodies such as Roxas, Namine and Axel also made him begin to question the things he had been taught about Nobodies. He's at the point that he seems to now privately believe that they have every right to exist as their Somebody counterparts. He still has a way to go to completely shake off the duality of his views on justice, but he's making progress.
All in all, when things are peaceful Sora is a boy at peace. While he enjoys adventure as much as any teenage boy, he seems most content just spending a quiet fun day with his friends. While Riku originally wanted to leave the islands with zero intent or desire to return one day, Sora seems to hang onto the dream that one day he'll get to return home with his friends. Having that dream threatened or seemingly taken away often results in Sora getting depressed or more easily agitated.
While the past couple years of Sora's life have made him grow and mature a lot, he's still very much a kid. He gets easily excited about new things and just as quickly angry over little things that more mature members of the group overlook. He can be competitive and do bratty things like stick out his tongue at villains or be a complete smart mouth. When something bothers him enough, he'll become extremely stubborn and not let it go. He also has a tendency to get stuck in the moment and forget the bigger picture- which sometimes lands him into serious trouble.
It's shown that Sora's got a bit of an ego as well. He gets miffed when people insult his capabilities or dismiss him. He'll do ridiculous things to prove himself, such as challenge the demi-god Hercules to a one-on-one battle to show that he's true hero material. He likes glory and isn't above seeking it out in absurd ways. When faced with the aspect of taking the Mark of Mastery Exam, an idea as nerve wracking to keyblade wielder as the SATs or GRE are to us, Sora showed total overconfidence in that he'd be able to pass it with flying colors (hilariously, he failed while his less confident friend passed).
Luckily, his ego and pride isn't strong enough to get the better of him when things get really serious. Truth be told, Sora knows deep down he's no one special. He knows that he only got the keyblade because the true chosen were unavailable and that his friends are so much more skilled and special than he is. And yet while one would think that would bother him - he doesn't care. He cares so little that villains who tried their hardest to psych him out with that card ended up having it backfire on them. While Sora certainly appreciates the occasional ego stroking, as long as he can help his friends he's okay whether he's the chosen one or the almighty janitor.
Partly thanks to the encouragement of his travel companions Donald and Goofy, Sora does his best to keep up a cheery temperament. Not all this is false, Sora is someone that tries to look on the bright side of things and is able to live in the joy of the moment. However it's indicated that when things are truly bad, this becomes less sincere cheer and more a mask to get by. This mask is pretty easy to see and sometimes break- but he'll do his best to keep it up so his friends don't get sad too.
Because of this coping mechanism and his old duality in how he viewed the world, Sora hasn't learned how to cope with his own darkness too well. He isn't without darkness as all people have darkness in them (aside from some princesses who- aw forget it), and due to the events of the past years its been growing in his heart unchecked. Best case scenario this causes him to become snappish at the people around him during stressful times. Worse case scenario? Well, he was once almost destroyed by Xehanort using that darkness against him. And it was such a close call that even after Ventus used his armor to shield the light in Sora's heart from being destroyed? The darkness was still strong enough to possess the armor and make Sora the unintentional final boss of a game. And that armor's resilient enough to darkness to fly through space.
Seriously. If that's not a cry for therapy I don't know what is.
Fortunately, despite the fact he's got a lot of issues, Sora's managed to avoid a tragic fate that often befalls Keyblade wielders in this series thanks to his friends. Sure, some of them make crappy therapists, but having them around has saved him on many occasions whether it be from enemies or his own failings. Sora works best in a team, and is the only keyblade wielder that'll regularly work in one. While some scoff that it's possible he has no real power on his own and the team itself is a bit of a ragtag crew (such as among its ranks is a drunken pirate, a skeleton with ADD and a talking duck) - it's hard to deny that his team has been the most successful thus far in the war. He even admits this, stating that on his own he's weak, but his friends are his power.
All in all, Sora is a simple kid that simply wants to be with his friends. He's got issues what with his view on justice as well as dealing with negative emotions, but he has a good heart. He likes to do the right thing, and so long as he has friends who will keep him in check- it's likely he'll end up alright. He may not be the brightest or the most skilled of the keyblade wielders, but there's still a lot more than the underwhelmed first impression people get to him.
AU Deviation:
A difference in Sora's personality comes from the fact he's been forced to lie for the past year of his life about where he came from. Not being a liar by nature, he doesn't enjoy doing it and feels a measure of guilt from it. It's made it harder for him to make connections to people or establish true bonds of friendships. He likes to have a cheery disposition still, but it seems rather odd or detached at times. Possibly like he's not quite all there all the time.
From all this, he's incredibly lonely. Sure, he has his Shinx. But a Pokemon can't really fulfilled the sort of human interaction he needs. He badly wants friends, but it's hard to get friends when you're lying all the time. Unfortunately, at this point he's too scared to stop lying out of fear of how people would react to the fact that he had been lying to them for so long- especially over such an important subject as people outside of Union. And so, the vicious cycle continues.
He didn't grow up in Union, but has spent the past year here- so the amount of knowledge he knows about the city is touch and go- mostly it's prioritized by his own survival. By now he's figured out where the places to go for food and maybe quick odd jobs, but couldn't tell you a single thing about the Council Hall.
Since he hasn't gone through all the things he has in canon, he's still rather naive or immature about a lot of things. I'll probably be referencing his behaviors in earlier canon more than later canon, since that would probably reflect better his mindset and personality. At the same time, his sense of morality and justice has been challenged a lot sooner than it was in canon. Unlike in canon, he's very conflicted on the matter of Pokemon. Some are his friends, yet others are the ones who caused his problems in the first place. He's still trying to work things out in his moral schema when it comes to how to handle the creatures.
It's safe to say that Sora, while a bit of a strange goof, will be very devoted to his dream of becoming a ranger. What he lacks in skill and experience, he makes up for in determination and hard-work. He wants very badly to go home, or at the very least find out what happened to his home. Since the rangers feel like his only chance to achieve that dream, he will go above and beyond to join their ranks.
Possibly even to a worrying degree. Who knows, maybe the Rangers just gets a lot of crazy determined shonens.
Canon Abilities:
In canon Sora is a keyblade wielder. This means he can summon a key like weapon that is pretty haxx. The keyblade can open any lock, always returns to the wielder, be sharp enough to cut through buildings, shape shift into other weapons (or ships), travel worlds and all sorts of godhaxxy things. But on the downside, keyblades also mark its wielder as a giant target to monsters like Heartless and there's no giving up the keyblade once it's chosen you - so you spend your entire life constantly being hunted by any heartless that happen to be nearby.
Like most of the keyblade wielders, he seems to possess a low level of empathic abilities. Though while the ones with formal training seem to sense more the levels of light and darkness in their heart, Sora is less refined and seems to sense more along the lines of how malicious a person is- which is a major reason he's not often tricked. If he's dealing with someone that has malicious intent, he starts to get edgy, untrusting and even frequently hostile.
Sora also had an ace up his sleeve called drive form that for a short amount of time, would allow him to wield two keyblades or have his magical power be greatly enhanced. These forms were incredibly strong, however extremely taxing. So much that if he used this power too frequently, he stood the risk of reverting into anti-form- which was a heartless like form with claws that would attack anything in sight. Whoops.
In addition to his keyblade, he's capable of using magic. Most of it is elemental magic such as ice, fire, thunder, air and light. He's also got some healing skills and can mess with gravity and time. Or make shields. In overall power he's about average in comparison to other characters in the games.
His name does mean Sky, so I should probably talk about his movement skills as well. He can jump really high and even learn to glide or fly. He also seems to take no damage from falling, no matter the height. He also is able to move incredibly fast in short bursts of speed, fast enough that that he becomes a blur or mirages of his movement.
However Sora's most unique power to himself is the power of his heart. He seems to possess a special ability that allows his heart to connect with other people much more than others. This allows him to do stuff like store other people's heart/souls into his body for safe keeping or trigger actual emotions out of people who are, quite literally, incapable of emotions. It's even theorized by one person in canon that this power of his, if used right, could even bring back the dead. However how these powers work is still vague/mysterious, and also at this point it seems to come at serious costs. For example, triggering actual emotion out of normally emotionless sociopaths for some reason is possibly not the best idea. Another problem is that if someone else's heart/soul is in him for an extended point of time- it starts to influence his own personality and appearance. Also the only known way to get those hearts/souls out of him right now is to kill him.
Seriously. Heart is actually a terrible power.
Enlightened Abilities: Okay, as you can probably tell from that crazy list above- there's no way in hell I can mimic all of his abilities so I'll just pick and choose here.
Sora will be a Psychic/Flying type. Psychic to help mimic a little his crazy heart power since that is his unique power in game. Flying because well, his name is literally the word for sky.
His psychic abilities will be largely based on his emotions and empathic abilities (much like in canon). Powers and evolutions will break down like this:
1st Evolution (now):
- Low Empath: Sora will be able to pick on on whether or not someone has malicious intent or feelings, just like canon.
- Agility: For short periods of time, Sora can make himself move very quickly. Periods of time are about 5-10 seconds.
- Offense Emotions: He can do offensive attacks that are lashing out of his own emotions. It's powered based on how strongly he feels the emotion, but is in the low-to-mid power range. No surprise, his most common attack from this will be Confusion.
2nd Evolution:
- Empath: Sora will be able to pick up on a wider range of emotions from other people.
- Agility: He becomes even faster, to the point he looks like a blur. Period of times last from 10-15 seconds.
- Offense and Defense Emotions: He can still do offensive attacks, but positive emotions will become healing or defensive spells. For example, the will to help someone hurt could translate into a healing spell- while wanting to protect someone/something might raise his defense.
3rd Evolution:
- Empath Influence: He can attempt to influence other people's emotions with his own. The stronger personal connection he has with a person, the more likely it'll succeed.
- Agility: He can now move so fast that it leaves behind mirages of him as he goes. Periods of time now last 15-20 seconds.
- Dream Eater: Sora can eat/absorb the nightmares and dreams of targets, causing them pain and healing him. Has a higher chance of success if target is asleep. This is based off abilities in Drop Dream Distance.
- Emotions take Life: Strong emotions can take their own temporary physical form that while weaker than strong pokemon, can still aid him in battle. Positive emotions take forms that are either cute or pretty in appearance, while negative emotions take more monstrous forms. However, destroying any of forms will cause him physical pain. While this is technically Vanitas's power in canon, uh, well...just google that guy's face sometime.
As for flying, right now in his first evolution he's able to jump much higher than a normal person and doesn't take much fall damage. Second evolution he'll be able to glide and third evolution he'll be able to fly. He may grow wings or he may not I haven't decided yet. However because he's gotta be lightweight, he'll never grow above 5'2" and remain on the small side in build.
His trainer ability will be Kindred Soul because his friends are his power.
Also while it's not powered, it should be noted that he'll be wielding an axe as a replacement to his keyblade. Other than it's a good quality battleaxe, there's nothing special about it. Like his original keyblade's name, its name is Kingdom. In addition, he's grown to be extremely skilled at picking locks - a callback to his canon power to open any lock.
Starter Pokémon:
He will start with a Shinx named Simba.
Notes/Special Considerations:
As we discussed before, Sora comes from outside of Union, on an island village called Destiny that got attacked by Zubats. The origins of Destiny is nothing more than former Union citizens going out into the wilderness and starting a new life. The details about all that I'm just going to leave vague and up to you guys, since I doubt a 15 year old boy with no aptitude for studying would've cared enough to know himself.
Regarding the village of Destiny and its fate, I am very open to it's level of impact of the actual plot. If you guys want to make it part of the lore, that's cool. If you want to make it completely inconsequential beyond Sora's backstory, that's cool too.
SAMPLES
(NOTE: You may link a previous entry or thread, including testrun or musebox threads (but NOT Dear Mun), for one or both samples. However, we want to see the character in the setting of Brave New World and specifically in their AU for at least one sample.)
First-Person:
What would you say the role of Pokémon is in your life?
Pokémon? [he crosses his arms, looking a bit conflicted] I'm not sure. I know Simba's my friend! And I guess I wouldn't mind having more Pokémon friends. But...there's a lot of bad ones too. So I'm not sure what to think about them.
What do you feel your role in Union is?
[he glances around to make sure no one is listening before he answers quietly] I...don't really think I belong here. I wanna help people out if I can! But...[he shakes his head] there's somewhere else I need to be. I can't forget about it.
To what lengths would you go to rescue your allies if they were lost in the wilderness?
[his hand curls up into a fist and he gives a little fist pump in front of his chest] I'd do whatever I can! My allies are my friends, and friends help each other! That's all there is to it!
What area do you seek to explore? The peaceful forest, in search of new, previously overlooked discoveries; the uncharted caves, in search of the unknown; or the wildest of mountain terrain, in search of danger, adventure, and thrills?
[he holds his arms out, in some sort of bravado] I'd like to see all kinds of things! And learn what's out there! Can you imagine what sort of wonders are out there? It'd be such a great adventure!
[But then, he looks around again- to make sure he's alone. The bravado stops, and his arms fall to his side and he looks much more worried. A scared lonely kid, that's all he really is]
But...most of all, I just wanna see home again. I...I don't know what's there anymore, but...I wanna find out- no. I need to find out.
Third-Person:
The uniform was too big.
Sora scrunched his nose in front of the mirror as he tried to straighten it. He had gotten the smallest size available, and it was still two sizes too big for him. He looked closer to a kid playing dress up than a member of the Rangers. He was sure a lot of them felt that way about him too.
He makes a "hmph" sound to no one in particular. He'd show them.
With a strange sense of determination, he got to work rolling up the sleeves. Simba nearby sat on the edge of the bed, a mattress on the floor, watching his companion. Last week marked a year he had been in this city, a year since he had received Simba from those two who had found him. He still looked much like a child, but there were changes. His face had lost a lot of its youthful baby fat, his voice had deepen and he had grown several inches - even if he was still small for boys his age. He looked a lot older than he used to be.
And yet, the impish grin that broke out on his face when he finally got the sleeves adjusted right brought him to looking like a young kid all over again.
"Aha! Perfect!" He stretched his arms out before placing his hands behind his messy head. The uniform still looked big on him, but at least it looked presentable. Maybe there was a chance tomorrow he wouldn't be laugh out of training.
"This is it, Simba." As usual, he spoke to his Pokemon out of having no one else to talk to. He kept the smile on, even if bits of sadness shone through on it. "Starting tomorrow, everything's gonna change."
No more staying at an orphanage, no more fretting if the future would ever change, no more feeling powerless. Tomorrow was a new beginning. The start to fulfilling his dream from the entire past year. He would finally start to get to search for what he really wanted. And maybe, if he was lucky, he could make some friends along the way!
Simba gave a simple little mew in reply, one that seemed skeptical - at least to Sora. He glanced over at his furry friend and spoke encouragingly. "No really, things are gonna get better from here on out! You'll see!"
His grin faded after that, and he looked away from Simba and instead down at his feet, dropping his hands. He could feel the doubt that swelled up in his stomach, leaving an uncomfortable feeling. When he spoke again, it was much quieter, more unsure and to himself.
"...Yeah. You'll see."