Sora Myoudouin (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sunshine_maiden) wrote2013-06-06 08:23 pm
sunshine_maiden) wrote2013-06-06 08:23 pm
Entry tags:
Application v2: Rekindle
OOC Information
Player Name: MaxSalsa
Player Age: 24
Player Contact:![[plurk.com profile]](https://plurk.com/favicon.ico)
MaxSalsa, AIM ultimatesalsa
Player/Character HMD: Right here.
Other characters in game: None.
IC Information
Character Name: Sora Myoudouin | AU of Itsuki Myoudouin
Character Canon: Heartcatch Precure [AU]
Character Age/Gender: 20
Canon Point: Post-AU; May of 17 AI.
Notes: Parts of this are coming from applications for Itsuki to another game and Sora's old static application.
Character Canon History: Itsuki is a young woman with a totally unreasonable set of expectations. Her family runs an aikido dojo, and her older brother Satsuki is in line to succeed it. However, Satsuki is chronically ill, and is too weak to actually train. So Itsuki offered, at a young age, to take his place as the heir to the family style. Of course, as a girl she can't do that, so she decided to cast away her femininity for her brother's sake, and since she was little she's been living as a boy, training to succeed the dojo. Years have passed with this arrangement, and she's now in the spring of her second year of middle school, where she's the charismatic student council president everyone adores. Through her position atop the student council, she met Erika Kurumi, would-be president of the Fashion Club, and her would-be lieutenant Tsubomi Hanasaki. She liked their energy, and approved the paperwork they brought her, but she didn't really pay a whole lot of attention to them.
It was around this time that weird things started to happen in Kibougahana: things get damaged and subsequently repaired as if by magic; massive monsters appear, complain about issues in their lives, and then disappear; and two girls known as the Precure, Cure Blossom and Cure Marine, have become the hottest thing. While she monitored the situation as best she could, she was a little busy trying to keep the school from falling apart without her (and under the weight of the Precure rumors), so she didn't have the time to investigate herself. She did, at around the time the girls brought their paperwork by, have an odd dream that she turned into a monster, screaming about her insecurities regarding having to succeed the dojo and live as someone she wasn't; it ended just as suddenly when she was saved by the Precure, and Itsuki found herself starting to wish, just a little, that she could be someone like that.
As spring turns to summer, Itsuki finds herself considering her feminine side again, and ends up consulting the Fashion Club for advice; she ends up working out a clothing design and chooses the colors and fabric that will go into it, which she takes home to look over, though she of course can't show it to her grandfather. The next day, Tsubomi and Erika come to visit to actually complete the design, and they're able to finish the top she'd designed that day, instructing Itsuki on how to help with the process, teaching her how to cut and sew. The end result is a yellow top with a sunflower motif, one she ends up loving to wear whenever she gets a chance. Her brother sees her in it, and comments it's a good fit, and is happy she's getting back in touch with the real Itsuki, but her grandfather seems to disapprove, and she reminds herself she can't like both cute things and martial arts; she'll have to choose one or the other.
Shortly thereafter, a challenger, Hiroto, comes to the dojo seeking to take on its master; Itsuki steps up to fight in her grandfather's place, and while she wins the match by the standard rules, Hiroto cheats, and soon has turned the tables, pulling a severely damaging blow and causing Itsuki's grandfather to declare him the winner lest he hurt Itsuki. As Hiroto walks away with the dojo's signboard as proof of his victory, he's attacked by Kumojacky, a soldier of the evil Desert Apostles, and his Heart Flower is stolen, turning him into a monster that proceeds to attack! Itsuki quickly finds herself on the outside of a Precure battle looking in, as Blossom and Marine appear on the scene and try to fight back, but they're overwhelmed when Kumojacky joins the fray himself; it falls to Itsuki to assist, and even without the super strength that being a Cure provides, she's able to cover Blossom and Marine long enough for them to get things back under control. That evening, Hiroto returns the sign, and Itsuki makes her decision: she'll work hard and change herself, to become someone that can like both martial arts and cute things.
Late that summer, Itsuki's brother Satsuki is informed that there's a procedure with good odds of curing his condition, but he's wavering on whether or not to do it. Itsuki isn't really able to help him, and she can't figure out what to do with herself to keep from worrying; her mother ends up sharing her story with Tsubomi and Erika, who become worried for Itsuki in turn. While this is happening, a fairy named Potpourri visits Itsuki, and tells her she is destined to become the third Precure, but Itsuki tells him she won't really be able to help with her feelings the way they are, and Tsubomi and Erika find Itsuki to take Potpourri back home. The day of the procedure, Itsuki goes to visit her brother and finds he's missing, having been turned into a monster and made to destroy his surroundings. The Precure appear to fight the Desertrian, but they're pushed back. When everything seems grim, Itsuki's resolve to protect her brother strengthens enough that the Heart Perfume that Potpourri is carrying resonates with her heart, and Itsuki is able to become Cure Sunshine, the third Precure!
From this day, Itsuki uses her considerable power to help Tsubomi and Erika, and later Yuri, protect the people of Kibougahana from the attacks of the Desert Apostles in their quest to turn Earth into a desert. As the team continues to fight, they reach a plateau of power, and must eventually face shadows of themselves to gain new power to fight the forces of darkness. Sunshine Mirage confronts Itsuki about her having abandoned her dedication to her family's martial arts, or to the brother she so adores. While she's off-balance at first, Itsuki comes to realize that even if what the shadow of herself is saying sounds right on paper, it's not true - she's never stopped caring about those things, she just applies herself to them differently. After defeating her Mirage, she and the others gain the power of the Heartcatch Mirage, a magical item that grants them massive power so long as they're all together.
Itsuki quickly begins to realize that, while she likes being the leader of her fellow students, it's taking up time she could be using to save the world, and she announces she won't run for student council again next year so she can focus on her duties as Cure Sunshine. As winter approaches, the attacks of the Desert Apostles reach a pinnacle, and on Chrismas Eve, their leader makes an appearance on Earth: Dune. With amazing speed and power, Dune makes short work of the Precure and, while they're unconscious, succeeds in turning almost the entire world into a desert, the only safe place being the botanical garden Tsubomi's grandmother runs. From here, they launch their counterattack, heading into space to attack the enemy at the heart of their operations, in their base, the Castle Planet. After several hard fights, the team reaches Professor Sabaaku, the second-in-command of the operation, and Dark Precure, an amazingly powerful opponent. The two nearly manage to take the girls down, but Tsubomi and Yuri are able to rally and take care of things. It then falls to the girls to defeat Dune; they almost succeed, but he breaks away and takes on a final form the size of the Earth. The four girls combine their powers through the Heartcatch Mirage and take on a final form of their own, a girl with a flowing dress and galaxies reflected in her eyes, who delivers the final blow to Dune, restoring the world.
Character Canon Personality: Itsuki is a natural leader, and it colors everything she does. She's very charismatic, and she loves contact with people; being the student council president was a way to use her talents that she'd enjoy, and for a while she was happy with that. Living the way she did, dressing and acting like a boy, was hard, but the knowledge that she was helping people saw her through. She lived her days as a lie, but what else could she do? Her self-assigned duty to her brother came first, even if it hurt.
That all changed when she met Tsubomi and Erika. Suddenly she wasn't just the leader of the dojo, or first among a council of equals. She was someone people wanted to be with and learn about, for herself. To Itsuki, that was huge, and she had no problem letting herself get caught up in their flow... perhaps too much so. It was a harsh wake-up call to realize that she couldn't let her mask fall away while still doing her duty to the dojo, or to the council. When her grandfather forced the issue and told her to seek herself before returning to serious training, she was lost for a while, trying to figure out what to do with herself. The combination of Potpourri's offer to become Cure Sunshine and seeing her brother being used for evil drove her to put herself to work as a protector, and that paradigm shift has driven her ever since. She believes wholeheartedly that everyone can be saved if you have the power, and her abilities as Cure Sunshine definitely fit the bill.
Itsuki is a girl of action. Once a course is decided, she's leading the charge, and knows exactly what the next steps are. She knows how to work with people to get things done, and she's willing to compromise to make people work together. She can keep her head in a crisis and is great at rallying groups. Should something go wrong, she's willing to stay behind and keep everyone safe until the crisis has passed or everyone's out, even at expense to herself. If she doesn't know how to solve a problem, either she'll find someone who does, or she'll do whatever seems right if she can't get help. When faced with something she knows she has no hope against, though, she'll be running too; she's more than capable of picking her battles.
She isn't particularly experienced in relationships of really any kind; she hasn't really had friends before she met Tsubomi and Erika, just colleagues, and as the heir to the Myoudouin style she couldn't really make friends with any of the disciples there. In more private settings she's still getting used to being around people, and at expressing herself candidly. Erika's Fashion Club is helping with that, too; Itsuki can stop being "the student council president" and just be herself around those girls, and she's thankful for that. She's been getting used to taking care of others via Potpourri, but he's a little too hyper to be much help.
Itsuki is intimately aware that she's in a weird place in her life; she's a middle school student, but the world is on her shoulders. The moment she took her Heart Perfume in hand she knew she wouldn't be able to just stop, and she lives every day since that moment ready for anything to happen. She knows she needs to take breaks, but even while she's laughing and enjoying time with her newfound friends, she's always ready for crisis, attacks, or disaster. It's a hard life, and she knows she's a little paranoid about it, but she's in it to save people, and that's the thought first and foremost on her mind. But if there weren't imminent destruction in her future... maybe, just maybe, she could relax and take a break. Until then, she continues to protect her city. There are too many things to lose to relax any time soon.
AU Information:
History: Sora is not, in fact, originally a Terran citizen - she hails from the Irgelion Empire originally, and went by the name Lira Roliaron. In 4 AI, a conflict started as a result of an Irgelion bid to seize power and star systems by force. Unfortunately for them, the Earth Sphere still had plenty of weaponry to bring to bear against the Empire's attack force, and the war devolved into a battle of attrition - one the Irgelions were doomed to lose. And so a short time later, a bridge officer aboard the Irgelion flagship elected to let the conflict end with as much grace as he could find left in the situation, and offered a surrender to the forces of the Earth Sphere. That ended in the withdrawal of Irgelion forces, except a number who elected to settle with their families, not wanting to return in shame, and ultimately finding the Earth Sphere not to be such a bad place.
Lira's father, Astor, was a combat instructor for the Irgelion military; he taught basic hand-to-hand combat to all the soldiers under his supervision, and for those with a knack for it, offered more detailed styles, including the style his family taught back home, which is not unlike aikido. When the surrender was signed, Astor elected to stay on Earth, and opened a dojo to teach the Roliaron style, though it also taught Irgelion martial arts, Astor wanting to remain true to his roots. The family adopted Terran names; they became the Myoudouin family, and Lira became Sora. She was taught that she could use whichever name she wanted, but she quickly grew attached to her new name. Her family was... less adaptive, as a whole.
Complicating matters, however, was the dojo. Sora's older brother Divin was to succeed the family style; unfortunately, he was also sickly from a young age and couldn't walk on his own, let alone practice martial arts. Sora couldn't bear to watch as her father had to shoulder the burden of not having an inheritor, and made the decision to live as a boy. After all, wasn't that enough to satisfy tradition? If Sora were male, "he" could inherit the dojo, right? And so Astor let her change herself, her entire way of thinking and acting, and allowed her to train in the Myoudouin style, as the next heir in line.
Time passed. Sora quickly discovered that, as much as she was doing this for Divin, she couldn't make any progress unless she believed she was doing this for herself, too. But as the years went on and she found herself stagnating, she wondered what the issue could be. Why couldn't she be strong, like her father? Like the other students, even? She was rapidly finding herself outclassed by pupils that had picked up the style more recently, and was despairing over what to do.
She tried to apply herself at school to make up for things. Sora was a quick study and relatively smart; she also had the charisma, even while playing at being male, to attract followers to her reliably, and she spent several years atop the student council at middle and then high school. During that time, she dressed in male uniforms and hid her gender, though if confronted she'd reveal her true self. As she grew she just... stopped caring to correct people, and let the myth that she was an oddly-curved young man perpetuate, if only because it would take too much work to correct, and it wouldn't last long anyway. She threw herself into her work with a dedication not often seen, hoping it would make her feel whole, make her stronger. But nothing she did made things work out, and while it made her feel good to help others, she couldn't help but wonder how to make the singing emptiness in her heart go away.
The final straw came when her father, realizing that Sora was losing herself over all this, told her to take a break; that she couldn't just train her body. She had to train her mind, and her soul. That broke her, and she spent months wondering what to do with herself. She put even more of herself into school, becoming the top of the class, and spending her days in the lofty heights of the student council room, looking down over the rest of her classmates and yearning to feel whole, as they did.
Then, March of 15 AI, salvation, from an unlikely source: two fairies, Apple and Pine, claiming to be from a place called Fairy Park. Sora had heard of Project PreDestiny, and she'd seen the Desu units before; she'd wished with all her heart to become someone that could fly such a unit, and bring happiness to people across the world, and maybe to herself in the process. The fairies wove a tale of magic and of technology born from it, and then told her that she had a place in the Project! That she, who was rapidly losing her self-confidence and her sense of self beyond, could fly a Desu unit! The decision and convincing took only a night, and Sora departed for Fairy Park the next day.
Imagine her surprise, then, at meeting the other pilots, and at being introduced to her unit: Desu Itsuki, a Claimer-class unit. Specialized in barriers and hand-to-hand combat, which made little sense to her for a mecha design, but she didn't argue. The personalities were almost as strange: Eri Kurumu, lazy and laid-back except when it counted; Seiren Kurokawa, distant, strict, and absurdly powerful; Ciel Auno, the ice queen model with strength to rival Seiren; Professor Himesaki, the girls' surrogate grandmother. And perhaps most important, POTPOURRI, Desu Itsuki's AI. Sora was overjoyed to finally have a companion like she'd heard the other Desu pilots had... but that joy turned into horror when POTPOURRI refused to recognize her, the unit deeming her mental state too close to "male" for the female-only systems to work with. She fell into despair for a short time, until Professor Himesaki offered a way out: training herself to get back in touch with her feminine side. Looking back on her life before, Sora decided that if she couldn't succeed the dojo as a woman, she'd just fight her father to make it work when all this was over, and she agreed to the Professor's training.
15 AI, August. The journey of the White Chalice begins. Fairy Park's status as a traveling amusement park means that a variety of people visit on a daily basis, bringing news and gossip. Sora wonders what life on the Chalice is like, and in her heart wishes to travel on it someday, as someone who protects the innocent and defeats threats to society. But first she has to continue to train herself; she can feel she's on the edge of a breakthrough, but POTPOURRI still won't acknowledge her. The Professor tries to keep her motivated to keep trying; she insists that Apple and Pine wouldn't have appeared before her if she didn't have what it took.
The second week of November. The Professor's granddaughter, Nanohana, joins Fairy Park's troop of performers. All the Desu pilots are part of the shows, too, but the girl isn't part of that. Sora has seen Nanohana before, but the two haven't met. The evening of her first performance alongside Eri, the park is attacked by three people claiming to be soldiers of the Desert Apostles, a group that seeks to turn Earth into a desert, and along the way steal the Rainbow Jewel, a powerful artifact kept in Fairy Park. Eri sorties to stop them in Desu Erika, and Nanohana wonders what to do until she literally falls into the cockpit of Desu Tsubomi, which has refused to move for dozens of other potential pilots... and it moves. The two, along with a task force from the visiting White Chalice, engaged the three intruders and defeated them, along with the more dangerous Fusion that appeared after, though it was a hard fight.
During all of the chaos, Sora has been watching, and trying frantically to make Desu Itsuki move. Unfortunately, POTPOURRI is not interested; he's acknowledged Sora as a pilot, but she still hasn't changed enough to gain true control over the unit. And so, Sora can only look on as the two girls solve the problem on their own, and she sits there, unable to help, though the two are thankfully able to take care of things on their own.
Following this incident, Eri and Nanohana depart on the Chalice when it leaves the park, and Sora redoubles her efforts to become a pilot worthy of the Desu title. Finally, in March of 16 AI, Sora has gained enough mastery of Desu Itsuki, and her hardlight suit that grants the unit's powers to her outside it, that she's ready to join her comrades on the White Chalice. For Infinity predicts a hard road ahead, for all three girls, and only by working together can they stave off tragedy.
Sora's role as she first arrived on the ship was to try and understand what the hell was going on - at no time was White Chalice a peaceful place, and with all the factions aboard it was no easy task. That started with reaching out to as many people as she could, and over the next few months she started to get a hang for world politics and how the Chalice affected them - and, by extension, the team. The large obstacle to any progress she might want to make was Nanohana, who was completely hopeless in a mech's pilot seat, let alone in social situations. It became a problem when their units depended on the pilot's emotional state, and so Sora put her efforts into trying to get the team into some kind of balance. That largely didn't happen, and too much was going on at the same time to try and keep working on things; though she did her best to help Hana work through a fair amount of hazing from the other pilots, it just didn't go as well as she'd planned.
Fairly early in her travels with the Chalice, she also found herself in the middle of a budding romance that would turn very, very interesting, and that brought her more than a few revelations about herself. As she found herself going deeper and deeper with Kamille, she found her personality changing bit by bit, as well; as time passed, she overlooked things that she wouldn't have let go, and opened herself up to quite a bit. Her team, meanwhile, wasn't doing as well, and the friction between the four girls - or more accurately, between the three girls and Seiren - was getting unbearable, leading to a therapy session in which nothing much happened, but marked a further downtrend in the girls' relations.
Over a few months' time, Sora learned the true cost of war; fighting and killing single pilots that threatened her and her team's safety was one thing, but when she was on hand for the destruction of a space colony and its millions of residents with a nuclear weapon, she snapped just a little, placing a little more focus on making sure everyone made it out all right in any encounter she found herself in. That was made more difficult a week or two later, when the girls unexpectedly ran into DUNE, enemy of the PreDesu, spooking around a space colony. The team fought hard, though Sora was heavily injured, and seemingly defeated him. Sora and her team finally relaxed a little, knowing their ultimate goal was finally done, and that they were mostly here as liasons at that point.
And then her life took a severe downturn. Over several weeks, Eri and Hana's personalities shifted somewhat; the cause was linked to their machines, the Endless units, and just after Hana and Sora patched things up once and for all and Hana promised she'd be there for Sora when things got rough, she announced that she and Eri would be staying behind at Fairy Park for a little while. That left Sora vulnerable and off-balance, and when Kamille proceeded to beat up a vendor to take a plushie for her when he couldn't win it fairly in her line of sight, she lost it and ran back to the Chalice to get away from things. That put her on a perch atop the ship just in time for an attack run by an enemy, and she very nearly was melted by an incoming magical blast. She was scorched mentally and physically for days after, and never really was the same even after that. In the aftermath of all that, she shut Kamille out and broke things off with him, and was out of her mind for a day or three.
But slowly - very slowly - she started to get better. She directed her desire to help inward, to help herself work out her issues. She focused on patching things up, on not snapping at people. And, inadvertently, while she was still vulnerable Hana presented herself as an anchor, and Sora latched on hard, her aborted feelings for Kamille coming back several times as strong for Hana, whom she'd helped grow from a fledgling pilot and a foolish girl into a strong young woman. Those feelings drove her to protect the girl from anything she could feasibly get in front of, and went to the point that Sora was willing to do almost anything for her, because she needed Hana more than she could really express.
And, of course, she would do the same - on at least some level - for most of her friends. So just a day or two after she promised Hana she would be careful and always be there, Sora proceeded to very nearly kill herself in a massive attack against an Armored Core NEXT. She spent weeks recovering from the attack and a following operation, and still has burns that are healing very slowly, and some nerve damage that will likely never heal. Still, she put what she could into training and working on her magic, and spent her remaining time with Hana and Eri.
The final battle, early in 17 AI, was nothing short of a catastrophe - DUNE had survived everything, and came back with his lieutenant to take care of business. The girls rallied and defeated the lieutenant and forced DUNE to flee into space, where he assumed a super mode making him nearly the size of the Earth. The four sortied themselves and leveraged the power of infinite love to take on a combined form, Infinity Cosmos, and defeated DUNE once and for all. The fight was hard - Desu Tsubomi was severely damaged, Desu Erika was so much scrap, and Desu Itsuki didn't look so hot either - but the power of love prevailed against DUNE's hate for the world. And with their duty done, the girls made their way back to Fairy Park, where they returned to their roles of entertainment within the Park, while still training for the next inevitable battle. Sora, for her part, remained close with Hana and Eri - though as hard as she tried, she was never quite as close to the latter as she was to the former - and the girls lived in relative harmony.
Personality: Sora is a highly conflicted young woman. At her old school, before she joined the Project, she was the student council president, with all the personality traits to match. She's kind, and will happily talk to anyone about anything, with a seemingly permanent smile on her face. She knows about a wide variety of topics, both academic and otherwise; she had scarily-accurate knowledge about what the various organizations were doing at any given time, and she made it a point to know everyone in the building by name. But she'd been living an odd life until a year prior to her joining the Chalice: she'd been posing as a boy at school, pushing away her feminine side. She didn't have time for cute things, or dresses, or her appearance; she was too busy practicing martial arts, or studying for classes, or running the student council, or doing one thing or another. It hurt to know she was distancing herself from who she was inside, but she just kept telling herself it was for her older brother Divin's sake. Some days she actually believed it, if she closed her eyes and stuck her head under her pillow far enough.
When she had time to talk to people, she was always formal about her interactions, being extra careful to pick just the right words, and to find the solution to make everyone as happy as possible. She only had an opinion when the council had one; aside from that, she tended to leave people to sort things out themselves. Personal relationships were right out, as she just didn't have time for someone else, and she didn't want to hurt someone else with her backwards personality and general social ignorance. As an Irgelion in the Earth Sphere, she didn't really advertise her heritage either, for her own safety; she didn't want to risk that getting out and causing a problem for her student council duties, or the dojo. She resented that a little, but she understood that no matter what happened, she was still herself - even as Sora, she was still Lira inside. Even if everything else had changed, she knew her past.
Her only exception to her policies was to protect those important to her. Sora is a protector by nature, stepping into help those unable to help themselves, and while she's normally calm and coolheaded, she can display impressive anger on behalf of other people, though rarely (if ever) for herself. It was that will to protect that got her into martial arts in the first place, to take Divin's place since he couldn't take over in his condition; all by her own decision, through her own admiration of him and stubborn desire to keep him safe. And it was that will to protect that drove her to leave everything behind, to go somewhere she'd never really heard of, to pilot a mecha she'd never seen.
Sora's training at Fairy Park over the one year span before she joined the Chalice helped her quite a bit; she started to grow as a person, and even a little bit as the girl she was meant to be all these years. She was still working on her martial arts skills, but she also started to open up just a little more, and some of her feminie traits started to surface. Not much, but it was a good start, even the Professor could see that. Her old smile grew just a bit more, though no less permanent. And she started to make friends of others, beginning with the other girls at Fairy Park, though it was a slow process.
She took to flying her unit well; it took time to learn how to fly Desu Itsuki, but she got the hang of it over time, and she made good friends with POTPOURRI, its AI. Her expressiveness work also helped with the unit's power, oddly. And she thought that would be enough as she flew to the Chalice, in March of 16 AI. Since her arrival on the Chalice, though, Sora's had a number of roadblocks that have severely affected her growth and personality. She's had to work hard to triumph over severe self-image issues, constant failure, and heartbreak. She's changed quite a bit in the process.
Sora has become someone that needs people and attention to keep herself sane. If left alone too long, she starts to fall apart, and if she believes she's driven someone important to her away, she'll be depressed for days. In exchange, if her friends can honestly say they need her, or that they appreciate her, she'll be on cloud nine. She's open and loves to talk to people, but she can't keep her problems internal, and she has no capacity to shut up once she starts talking. She tries not to burden people with her problems too much, but it's hard for her. That said, contact is life for her, so she tries to meet new people when she can. She thrives around groups of people she can talk to.
More worryingly, she's starting to shift in personality to a point where her friends, and moreso her teammates, are everything for her; if they're threatened, she comes unhinged pretty quickly, and she'll put herself at risk every time if she can protect them. The list of people she'll protect isn't particularly short, and is easy to get on, but it matters to her all the same. She will do anything in her power to protect "her girls" from any threat, any time; and maybe even some things beyond her power, if that's what it takes. She does care for her other friends, too, but though she's a little slow and cautious to give it, when she finds someone she can share her heart with, she gives all of it, with no regrets. Her heart is on her sleeve for all to see, and she wouldn't have it any other way.
Last but not least, she's starting to come into her own as the girl she's meant to be all this time. Her feelings are in line with what an nineteen year old girl should be feeling, her dress choices are starting to make sense, and she's becoming self-conscious about her appearance again. In short, she's turning back into the girl she's always wanted to be, even if it nearly killed her to get there.
Character Abilities: Magic: Sora's a member of Project PreDestiny, a group that produces unique mobile suits that are powered by magic. Sora herself has magical talent that she can use through her Soul Perfume, the device that serves as the "key" for Desu Itsuki, and that grants her hardlight suit in a pinch. She can use the abilities of Desu Itsuki while on foot, with a few exceptions, but the power is lower, and it's lower still if she's not transformed; without her Soul Perfume, she's almost entirely mundane. In exchange, there are places Sora can go on foot that Desu Itsuki can't, plus she doesn't have to waste a lot of time to get set up - she just has to call out the activation phrase, and she has access to her abilities. One notable downside to her magic is that if a shield ability is broken (or another continuous skill is interrupted), she suffers backlash from the spell and can't act for a moment. For shield skills, the backlash is proportional to the incoming effect that broke the spell.
An important thing to keep in mind for Sora's magic is that, like her teammates, her emotions drive spell power. If she's confident and in control of herself and the battle, her abilities are even stronger; if she's depressed and doesn't think she can do much, even a strong shield will fold like a house of cards. The effect is even more apparent for Sora than the other girls, likely a side effect of her open personality.
Her primary ability either on-foot or in the Itsuki is the Itsuki Aegis, a shield skill that looks like a sunflower. The shield's biggest claim to fame is that it's reflective to projectiles - assuming they don't overload the shield, they'll bounce back from whence they came. She's also taught herself how to use the inside of an Aegis as a movement mode; she can ride a shield by hopping into the middle and zipping away. Such a shield is still reflective, and can fit more than just her, though not much more. If it's broken by loss of concentration or a powerful attack, though, she falls. The weight of Desu Itsuki is too extreme to ride a shield. She can also push an Aegis as a ranged attack in any direction, including as a stomp attack from a shield she's riding; it can't differentiate between friend and foe, though, and it loses strength as it travels further from her. Using an Aegis in this way is technically a separate skill: the Itsuki Aegis Impact.
Itsuki Protection is an energy-efficient alternate shield. This one is flat and non-reflective, and can be used to cover a large area quickly. Its major drawback is that while it can protect a huge space, if any area of the barrier is breached, the whole thing falls. The shield itself is a dull yellow, and somewhat thicker than an Aegis, though this makes it harder to see through. She's learned to manipulate very small doses of Itsuki Protection as a transportation aid she calls Air Step, which creates very small barriers with grooves for easier holding and landing. They're not resillient to damage, but they're so small she can make them with a thought. They're handy for anything from ascending (or descending) distances unassisted, to making long jumps in spaces where an Aegis is impractical (or too flashy), and into any number of edge cases.
Itsuki Flash is a light-based projectile attack that fires a bright, damaging ball in a direction, ideally at an enemy. Her skill isn't great enough to direct the projectile after it's thrown more than a degree or two, and the shot destabilizes at long range. One of her goals once she's got the power of a stronger unit behind her is a guided Flash, as well as multiple Flashes.
The area-of-effect Itsuki Dynamite is a localised explosion designed to clear the air around Sora, throwing anything not bolted down at least some distance away. Of course, an explosion can't exactly differentiate between friend and foe, nor is it in any way subtle. The tradeoff for all these problems, though, is good power and effectiveness.
Last up are a few erratta that are part of Sora's magic. Sora is learning to manipulate her shields into more tangible forms; she's working out how to make constructs from shields, but progress is slow. She's hoping for a breakthrough soon, though. She's also trying to put some more work into a healing spell she developed a little while ago, which she's really only used once. Even trying gives her a headache and makes her extremely tired, and for the life of her she can't figure out why. The one time it did work, it had a notable effect on the target she used it on, but... why isn't it working now? It's a question to be pondered.
Aside from her spells, Sora can also summon the Itsuki Tambourine, a unique weapon that serves as both a beam chakram and a simple cannon, though it's not particularly effective at either. It's also a focus that improves the power of her shield skills. It can be called or dispelled with a thought, though if it's damaged, it needs to be repaired just like anything else.
After DUNE's revival, Sora (along with her partners) gained acess to a new power: the Silouhette system. It serves as a limiter release, but it's so powerful that it allows the units to gain new forms entirely. Sora's is an overhaul to everything that makes Desu Itsuki what it is, along with a few new tricks. After some thought, she decided on a name: Desu Shining.
Shining is a direct upgrade to Desu Itsuki, keeping all its old skills but giving them more power and new names, swapping out "Itsuki" for "Shining" in their names: the Shining Aegis, the Shining Flash, and so on. The power bump is significant, so it'll take a little getting used to. Aside from the old abilities, there are a few new things. One is a new weapon that she's been wanting for a while: a souped-up version of the fleurets that Tsubomi designed, that she can use as a focus for her shield abilities, much like she can with the Shining Tambourine. The Shining Saber is a long, slightly flexible beam saber; it's patterened after a rapier. Of course, being a beam saber, even if it's designed as a piercing weapon it'll still cut fairly well. All Sora's usual shield abilities are still available while using it. The tradeoff is that "magic" (shields, ranged attacks) is weaker while her sword is equipped.
A new addition to her arsenal is the Shining Cluster, which fires a number of Itsuki Flash projectiles; they're formed with initial instructions, usually to either travel in a pack and spread out to trap an enemy, or to start out in a wide spread and converge on a point. If she has time to focus on them, she can control the group after it's fired for versatility. Alternately, single Shining Flashes can home in on targets even without her conscious direction.
She's also mastered the Shining Meteor, a shielded charge that uses a modified Aegis to destabilize the target and allow her to pass through; the impact is powerful, plus the magic radiating off the shield rips the inside of the enemy apart as she goes through. Unfortunately, after nearly killing herself with it, she's very wary about using it again. Sora also has significant issues with her mobility after the incident; occasionally something will get lost in her damaged nervous system, and she won't move right, causing her abilities to come out wrong or not at all. In short, Sora's a little broken but works through it as best she can.
On-foot Combat: On foot, Sora's options are a mix of magic and melee. She's trained in martial arts, specifically an offshoot of aikido with some Irgelion moves mixed in, but she's learned some new things, both from the Project and from her time on the Chalice. Her bread and butter is the Itsuki Aegis, which she can use in an offensive or defensive capability; one good option for approach is to ride in on a shield and stomp it down to the ground as she gets close, dealing an opening blow that has to be evaded and putting her in position for her next attack right away. It's also great for covering squishier allies that find themselves in the way of attacks. Itsuki Dynamite is useful in a pinch if she's surrounded, though she doesn't use it much. She prefers midrange combat; close enough to run in for an attack pass, far enough away to be able to use shields at leisure. Her weaknesses are bombardment attacks and stealth, not to mention attacks from much larger units (read: mecha).
Mecha: Sora is a mecha pilot by trade. Of course, that requires her to actually have her mecha. That said, her skills in Itsuki (or Shining) translate to skills on-foot, so she functions as a human-sized magical warrior that's resillient but not tankish. Sora can still switch her hardlight suit and abilities between Itsuki and Shining as needed, but rather than draining a robot's power faster, it drains her own energy; if she pushes herself too hard while in Shining's hardlight suit, she risks passing out.
Character Inventory: Soul Perfume (Sora): Transformation device. Grants Sora her hardlight suit, and access to her powers as the pilot of Desu Itsuki. She's able to manipluate magic even without her Soul Perfume, but it's significantly less powerful. Donning her hardlight suit is a swift action. POTPOURRI, Sora's AI companion, is aboard this device. Normally in Sora's pocket. Other characters can't use this for its intended purpose; other Desus will find that their own powers are much more usable than trying to access Sora's.
Ring: The scraps of the girls' units from the last battle were plentiful, and Sora kept a few for herself, weaving a strand of metal from each of the three Claimer units into a ring, to give her a memento of her girls even when she couldn't be with them. The ring itself is a strand each of sunshine yellow, sakura pink, and ocean blue, all twisted together.
Samples:
Thread: Here with Roxas
Third-person:
Sora wasn't sure what to feel at this point, as she sat on a bench outside the welcome center she'd found herself in. She'd fought so long and so hard, and now... here she was in some other world. She was pretty certain she wasn't going to be seeing Hana or Eri here, let alone any of the other Desu pilots. So it was just her, in a foreign world that needed some kind of saving.
As much as she didn't want to do something like that, she couldn't deny that the idea sounded workable. She could take care of whatever these people needed, and get home to her girls with a successful mission under her belt and a few days' worth of missing them to relieve.
...The nagging voice in the back of her head, though, insisted she was going to be here a while, and she didn't like that prospect. She distinctly remembered the feeling of being separated from Hana and Eri, and didn't much like it. Who knew how long this was really going to take? The redhead had a sinking feeling that she was going to need to make a few good friends here, or she was going to drive herself spare, and that was without considering the strange ailment the welcome desk had mentioned from lack of contact with other people.
Which was another problem. Contact to survive? If her girls were here, sure, that wouldn't ever be a problem. She could fill in whatever the quota happened to be without really thinking about it. But alone, in a new world with new people? This was going to be a little weird.
After a moment's thought, though, Sora shook her head and smiled. 'Not that I haven't dealt with weird before. I'm an expert on weird by now, I think.'
The girl stood, taking a deep breath and stretching. "Somewhere in this world, someone needs me. I've just got to keep telling myself that." There was a small wry quirk to her grin as she started walking to find her apartment. "If I believe in it hard enough, maybe it'll even be true."
Player Name: MaxSalsa
Player Age: 24
Player Contact:
Player/Character HMD: Right here.
Other characters in game: None.
IC Information
Character Name: Sora Myoudouin | AU of Itsuki Myoudouin
Character Canon: Heartcatch Precure [AU]
Character Age/Gender: 20
Canon Point: Post-AU; May of 17 AI.
Notes: Parts of this are coming from applications for Itsuki to another game and Sora's old static application.
Character Canon History: Itsuki is a young woman with a totally unreasonable set of expectations. Her family runs an aikido dojo, and her older brother Satsuki is in line to succeed it. However, Satsuki is chronically ill, and is too weak to actually train. So Itsuki offered, at a young age, to take his place as the heir to the family style. Of course, as a girl she can't do that, so she decided to cast away her femininity for her brother's sake, and since she was little she's been living as a boy, training to succeed the dojo. Years have passed with this arrangement, and she's now in the spring of her second year of middle school, where she's the charismatic student council president everyone adores. Through her position atop the student council, she met Erika Kurumi, would-be president of the Fashion Club, and her would-be lieutenant Tsubomi Hanasaki. She liked their energy, and approved the paperwork they brought her, but she didn't really pay a whole lot of attention to them.
It was around this time that weird things started to happen in Kibougahana: things get damaged and subsequently repaired as if by magic; massive monsters appear, complain about issues in their lives, and then disappear; and two girls known as the Precure, Cure Blossom and Cure Marine, have become the hottest thing. While she monitored the situation as best she could, she was a little busy trying to keep the school from falling apart without her (and under the weight of the Precure rumors), so she didn't have the time to investigate herself. She did, at around the time the girls brought their paperwork by, have an odd dream that she turned into a monster, screaming about her insecurities regarding having to succeed the dojo and live as someone she wasn't; it ended just as suddenly when she was saved by the Precure, and Itsuki found herself starting to wish, just a little, that she could be someone like that.
As spring turns to summer, Itsuki finds herself considering her feminine side again, and ends up consulting the Fashion Club for advice; she ends up working out a clothing design and chooses the colors and fabric that will go into it, which she takes home to look over, though she of course can't show it to her grandfather. The next day, Tsubomi and Erika come to visit to actually complete the design, and they're able to finish the top she'd designed that day, instructing Itsuki on how to help with the process, teaching her how to cut and sew. The end result is a yellow top with a sunflower motif, one she ends up loving to wear whenever she gets a chance. Her brother sees her in it, and comments it's a good fit, and is happy she's getting back in touch with the real Itsuki, but her grandfather seems to disapprove, and she reminds herself she can't like both cute things and martial arts; she'll have to choose one or the other.
Shortly thereafter, a challenger, Hiroto, comes to the dojo seeking to take on its master; Itsuki steps up to fight in her grandfather's place, and while she wins the match by the standard rules, Hiroto cheats, and soon has turned the tables, pulling a severely damaging blow and causing Itsuki's grandfather to declare him the winner lest he hurt Itsuki. As Hiroto walks away with the dojo's signboard as proof of his victory, he's attacked by Kumojacky, a soldier of the evil Desert Apostles, and his Heart Flower is stolen, turning him into a monster that proceeds to attack! Itsuki quickly finds herself on the outside of a Precure battle looking in, as Blossom and Marine appear on the scene and try to fight back, but they're overwhelmed when Kumojacky joins the fray himself; it falls to Itsuki to assist, and even without the super strength that being a Cure provides, she's able to cover Blossom and Marine long enough for them to get things back under control. That evening, Hiroto returns the sign, and Itsuki makes her decision: she'll work hard and change herself, to become someone that can like both martial arts and cute things.
Late that summer, Itsuki's brother Satsuki is informed that there's a procedure with good odds of curing his condition, but he's wavering on whether or not to do it. Itsuki isn't really able to help him, and she can't figure out what to do with herself to keep from worrying; her mother ends up sharing her story with Tsubomi and Erika, who become worried for Itsuki in turn. While this is happening, a fairy named Potpourri visits Itsuki, and tells her she is destined to become the third Precure, but Itsuki tells him she won't really be able to help with her feelings the way they are, and Tsubomi and Erika find Itsuki to take Potpourri back home. The day of the procedure, Itsuki goes to visit her brother and finds he's missing, having been turned into a monster and made to destroy his surroundings. The Precure appear to fight the Desertrian, but they're pushed back. When everything seems grim, Itsuki's resolve to protect her brother strengthens enough that the Heart Perfume that Potpourri is carrying resonates with her heart, and Itsuki is able to become Cure Sunshine, the third Precure!
From this day, Itsuki uses her considerable power to help Tsubomi and Erika, and later Yuri, protect the people of Kibougahana from the attacks of the Desert Apostles in their quest to turn Earth into a desert. As the team continues to fight, they reach a plateau of power, and must eventually face shadows of themselves to gain new power to fight the forces of darkness. Sunshine Mirage confronts Itsuki about her having abandoned her dedication to her family's martial arts, or to the brother she so adores. While she's off-balance at first, Itsuki comes to realize that even if what the shadow of herself is saying sounds right on paper, it's not true - she's never stopped caring about those things, she just applies herself to them differently. After defeating her Mirage, she and the others gain the power of the Heartcatch Mirage, a magical item that grants them massive power so long as they're all together.
Itsuki quickly begins to realize that, while she likes being the leader of her fellow students, it's taking up time she could be using to save the world, and she announces she won't run for student council again next year so she can focus on her duties as Cure Sunshine. As winter approaches, the attacks of the Desert Apostles reach a pinnacle, and on Chrismas Eve, their leader makes an appearance on Earth: Dune. With amazing speed and power, Dune makes short work of the Precure and, while they're unconscious, succeeds in turning almost the entire world into a desert, the only safe place being the botanical garden Tsubomi's grandmother runs. From here, they launch their counterattack, heading into space to attack the enemy at the heart of their operations, in their base, the Castle Planet. After several hard fights, the team reaches Professor Sabaaku, the second-in-command of the operation, and Dark Precure, an amazingly powerful opponent. The two nearly manage to take the girls down, but Tsubomi and Yuri are able to rally and take care of things. It then falls to the girls to defeat Dune; they almost succeed, but he breaks away and takes on a final form the size of the Earth. The four girls combine their powers through the Heartcatch Mirage and take on a final form of their own, a girl with a flowing dress and galaxies reflected in her eyes, who delivers the final blow to Dune, restoring the world.
Character Canon Personality: Itsuki is a natural leader, and it colors everything she does. She's very charismatic, and she loves contact with people; being the student council president was a way to use her talents that she'd enjoy, and for a while she was happy with that. Living the way she did, dressing and acting like a boy, was hard, but the knowledge that she was helping people saw her through. She lived her days as a lie, but what else could she do? Her self-assigned duty to her brother came first, even if it hurt.
That all changed when she met Tsubomi and Erika. Suddenly she wasn't just the leader of the dojo, or first among a council of equals. She was someone people wanted to be with and learn about, for herself. To Itsuki, that was huge, and she had no problem letting herself get caught up in their flow... perhaps too much so. It was a harsh wake-up call to realize that she couldn't let her mask fall away while still doing her duty to the dojo, or to the council. When her grandfather forced the issue and told her to seek herself before returning to serious training, she was lost for a while, trying to figure out what to do with herself. The combination of Potpourri's offer to become Cure Sunshine and seeing her brother being used for evil drove her to put herself to work as a protector, and that paradigm shift has driven her ever since. She believes wholeheartedly that everyone can be saved if you have the power, and her abilities as Cure Sunshine definitely fit the bill.
Itsuki is a girl of action. Once a course is decided, she's leading the charge, and knows exactly what the next steps are. She knows how to work with people to get things done, and she's willing to compromise to make people work together. She can keep her head in a crisis and is great at rallying groups. Should something go wrong, she's willing to stay behind and keep everyone safe until the crisis has passed or everyone's out, even at expense to herself. If she doesn't know how to solve a problem, either she'll find someone who does, or she'll do whatever seems right if she can't get help. When faced with something she knows she has no hope against, though, she'll be running too; she's more than capable of picking her battles.
She isn't particularly experienced in relationships of really any kind; she hasn't really had friends before she met Tsubomi and Erika, just colleagues, and as the heir to the Myoudouin style she couldn't really make friends with any of the disciples there. In more private settings she's still getting used to being around people, and at expressing herself candidly. Erika's Fashion Club is helping with that, too; Itsuki can stop being "the student council president" and just be herself around those girls, and she's thankful for that. She's been getting used to taking care of others via Potpourri, but he's a little too hyper to be much help.
Itsuki is intimately aware that she's in a weird place in her life; she's a middle school student, but the world is on her shoulders. The moment she took her Heart Perfume in hand she knew she wouldn't be able to just stop, and she lives every day since that moment ready for anything to happen. She knows she needs to take breaks, but even while she's laughing and enjoying time with her newfound friends, she's always ready for crisis, attacks, or disaster. It's a hard life, and she knows she's a little paranoid about it, but she's in it to save people, and that's the thought first and foremost on her mind. But if there weren't imminent destruction in her future... maybe, just maybe, she could relax and take a break. Until then, she continues to protect her city. There are too many things to lose to relax any time soon.
AU Information:
History: Sora is not, in fact, originally a Terran citizen - she hails from the Irgelion Empire originally, and went by the name Lira Roliaron. In 4 AI, a conflict started as a result of an Irgelion bid to seize power and star systems by force. Unfortunately for them, the Earth Sphere still had plenty of weaponry to bring to bear against the Empire's attack force, and the war devolved into a battle of attrition - one the Irgelions were doomed to lose. And so a short time later, a bridge officer aboard the Irgelion flagship elected to let the conflict end with as much grace as he could find left in the situation, and offered a surrender to the forces of the Earth Sphere. That ended in the withdrawal of Irgelion forces, except a number who elected to settle with their families, not wanting to return in shame, and ultimately finding the Earth Sphere not to be such a bad place.
Lira's father, Astor, was a combat instructor for the Irgelion military; he taught basic hand-to-hand combat to all the soldiers under his supervision, and for those with a knack for it, offered more detailed styles, including the style his family taught back home, which is not unlike aikido. When the surrender was signed, Astor elected to stay on Earth, and opened a dojo to teach the Roliaron style, though it also taught Irgelion martial arts, Astor wanting to remain true to his roots. The family adopted Terran names; they became the Myoudouin family, and Lira became Sora. She was taught that she could use whichever name she wanted, but she quickly grew attached to her new name. Her family was... less adaptive, as a whole.
Complicating matters, however, was the dojo. Sora's older brother Divin was to succeed the family style; unfortunately, he was also sickly from a young age and couldn't walk on his own, let alone practice martial arts. Sora couldn't bear to watch as her father had to shoulder the burden of not having an inheritor, and made the decision to live as a boy. After all, wasn't that enough to satisfy tradition? If Sora were male, "he" could inherit the dojo, right? And so Astor let her change herself, her entire way of thinking and acting, and allowed her to train in the Myoudouin style, as the next heir in line.
Time passed. Sora quickly discovered that, as much as she was doing this for Divin, she couldn't make any progress unless she believed she was doing this for herself, too. But as the years went on and she found herself stagnating, she wondered what the issue could be. Why couldn't she be strong, like her father? Like the other students, even? She was rapidly finding herself outclassed by pupils that had picked up the style more recently, and was despairing over what to do.
She tried to apply herself at school to make up for things. Sora was a quick study and relatively smart; she also had the charisma, even while playing at being male, to attract followers to her reliably, and she spent several years atop the student council at middle and then high school. During that time, she dressed in male uniforms and hid her gender, though if confronted she'd reveal her true self. As she grew she just... stopped caring to correct people, and let the myth that she was an oddly-curved young man perpetuate, if only because it would take too much work to correct, and it wouldn't last long anyway. She threw herself into her work with a dedication not often seen, hoping it would make her feel whole, make her stronger. But nothing she did made things work out, and while it made her feel good to help others, she couldn't help but wonder how to make the singing emptiness in her heart go away.
The final straw came when her father, realizing that Sora was losing herself over all this, told her to take a break; that she couldn't just train her body. She had to train her mind, and her soul. That broke her, and she spent months wondering what to do with herself. She put even more of herself into school, becoming the top of the class, and spending her days in the lofty heights of the student council room, looking down over the rest of her classmates and yearning to feel whole, as they did.
Then, March of 15 AI, salvation, from an unlikely source: two fairies, Apple and Pine, claiming to be from a place called Fairy Park. Sora had heard of Project PreDestiny, and she'd seen the Desu units before; she'd wished with all her heart to become someone that could fly such a unit, and bring happiness to people across the world, and maybe to herself in the process. The fairies wove a tale of magic and of technology born from it, and then told her that she had a place in the Project! That she, who was rapidly losing her self-confidence and her sense of self beyond, could fly a Desu unit! The decision and convincing took only a night, and Sora departed for Fairy Park the next day.
Imagine her surprise, then, at meeting the other pilots, and at being introduced to her unit: Desu Itsuki, a Claimer-class unit. Specialized in barriers and hand-to-hand combat, which made little sense to her for a mecha design, but she didn't argue. The personalities were almost as strange: Eri Kurumu, lazy and laid-back except when it counted; Seiren Kurokawa, distant, strict, and absurdly powerful; Ciel Auno, the ice queen model with strength to rival Seiren; Professor Himesaki, the girls' surrogate grandmother. And perhaps most important, POTPOURRI, Desu Itsuki's AI. Sora was overjoyed to finally have a companion like she'd heard the other Desu pilots had... but that joy turned into horror when POTPOURRI refused to recognize her, the unit deeming her mental state too close to "male" for the female-only systems to work with. She fell into despair for a short time, until Professor Himesaki offered a way out: training herself to get back in touch with her feminine side. Looking back on her life before, Sora decided that if she couldn't succeed the dojo as a woman, she'd just fight her father to make it work when all this was over, and she agreed to the Professor's training.
15 AI, August. The journey of the White Chalice begins. Fairy Park's status as a traveling amusement park means that a variety of people visit on a daily basis, bringing news and gossip. Sora wonders what life on the Chalice is like, and in her heart wishes to travel on it someday, as someone who protects the innocent and defeats threats to society. But first she has to continue to train herself; she can feel she's on the edge of a breakthrough, but POTPOURRI still won't acknowledge her. The Professor tries to keep her motivated to keep trying; she insists that Apple and Pine wouldn't have appeared before her if she didn't have what it took.
The second week of November. The Professor's granddaughter, Nanohana, joins Fairy Park's troop of performers. All the Desu pilots are part of the shows, too, but the girl isn't part of that. Sora has seen Nanohana before, but the two haven't met. The evening of her first performance alongside Eri, the park is attacked by three people claiming to be soldiers of the Desert Apostles, a group that seeks to turn Earth into a desert, and along the way steal the Rainbow Jewel, a powerful artifact kept in Fairy Park. Eri sorties to stop them in Desu Erika, and Nanohana wonders what to do until she literally falls into the cockpit of Desu Tsubomi, which has refused to move for dozens of other potential pilots... and it moves. The two, along with a task force from the visiting White Chalice, engaged the three intruders and defeated them, along with the more dangerous Fusion that appeared after, though it was a hard fight.
During all of the chaos, Sora has been watching, and trying frantically to make Desu Itsuki move. Unfortunately, POTPOURRI is not interested; he's acknowledged Sora as a pilot, but she still hasn't changed enough to gain true control over the unit. And so, Sora can only look on as the two girls solve the problem on their own, and she sits there, unable to help, though the two are thankfully able to take care of things on their own.
Following this incident, Eri and Nanohana depart on the Chalice when it leaves the park, and Sora redoubles her efforts to become a pilot worthy of the Desu title. Finally, in March of 16 AI, Sora has gained enough mastery of Desu Itsuki, and her hardlight suit that grants the unit's powers to her outside it, that she's ready to join her comrades on the White Chalice. For Infinity predicts a hard road ahead, for all three girls, and only by working together can they stave off tragedy.
Sora's role as she first arrived on the ship was to try and understand what the hell was going on - at no time was White Chalice a peaceful place, and with all the factions aboard it was no easy task. That started with reaching out to as many people as she could, and over the next few months she started to get a hang for world politics and how the Chalice affected them - and, by extension, the team. The large obstacle to any progress she might want to make was Nanohana, who was completely hopeless in a mech's pilot seat, let alone in social situations. It became a problem when their units depended on the pilot's emotional state, and so Sora put her efforts into trying to get the team into some kind of balance. That largely didn't happen, and too much was going on at the same time to try and keep working on things; though she did her best to help Hana work through a fair amount of hazing from the other pilots, it just didn't go as well as she'd planned.
Fairly early in her travels with the Chalice, she also found herself in the middle of a budding romance that would turn very, very interesting, and that brought her more than a few revelations about herself. As she found herself going deeper and deeper with Kamille, she found her personality changing bit by bit, as well; as time passed, she overlooked things that she wouldn't have let go, and opened herself up to quite a bit. Her team, meanwhile, wasn't doing as well, and the friction between the four girls - or more accurately, between the three girls and Seiren - was getting unbearable, leading to a therapy session in which nothing much happened, but marked a further downtrend in the girls' relations.
Over a few months' time, Sora learned the true cost of war; fighting and killing single pilots that threatened her and her team's safety was one thing, but when she was on hand for the destruction of a space colony and its millions of residents with a nuclear weapon, she snapped just a little, placing a little more focus on making sure everyone made it out all right in any encounter she found herself in. That was made more difficult a week or two later, when the girls unexpectedly ran into DUNE, enemy of the PreDesu, spooking around a space colony. The team fought hard, though Sora was heavily injured, and seemingly defeated him. Sora and her team finally relaxed a little, knowing their ultimate goal was finally done, and that they were mostly here as liasons at that point.
And then her life took a severe downturn. Over several weeks, Eri and Hana's personalities shifted somewhat; the cause was linked to their machines, the Endless units, and just after Hana and Sora patched things up once and for all and Hana promised she'd be there for Sora when things got rough, she announced that she and Eri would be staying behind at Fairy Park for a little while. That left Sora vulnerable and off-balance, and when Kamille proceeded to beat up a vendor to take a plushie for her when he couldn't win it fairly in her line of sight, she lost it and ran back to the Chalice to get away from things. That put her on a perch atop the ship just in time for an attack run by an enemy, and she very nearly was melted by an incoming magical blast. She was scorched mentally and physically for days after, and never really was the same even after that. In the aftermath of all that, she shut Kamille out and broke things off with him, and was out of her mind for a day or three.
But slowly - very slowly - she started to get better. She directed her desire to help inward, to help herself work out her issues. She focused on patching things up, on not snapping at people. And, inadvertently, while she was still vulnerable Hana presented herself as an anchor, and Sora latched on hard, her aborted feelings for Kamille coming back several times as strong for Hana, whom she'd helped grow from a fledgling pilot and a foolish girl into a strong young woman. Those feelings drove her to protect the girl from anything she could feasibly get in front of, and went to the point that Sora was willing to do almost anything for her, because she needed Hana more than she could really express.
And, of course, she would do the same - on at least some level - for most of her friends. So just a day or two after she promised Hana she would be careful and always be there, Sora proceeded to very nearly kill herself in a massive attack against an Armored Core NEXT. She spent weeks recovering from the attack and a following operation, and still has burns that are healing very slowly, and some nerve damage that will likely never heal. Still, she put what she could into training and working on her magic, and spent her remaining time with Hana and Eri.
The final battle, early in 17 AI, was nothing short of a catastrophe - DUNE had survived everything, and came back with his lieutenant to take care of business. The girls rallied and defeated the lieutenant and forced DUNE to flee into space, where he assumed a super mode making him nearly the size of the Earth. The four sortied themselves and leveraged the power of infinite love to take on a combined form, Infinity Cosmos, and defeated DUNE once and for all. The fight was hard - Desu Tsubomi was severely damaged, Desu Erika was so much scrap, and Desu Itsuki didn't look so hot either - but the power of love prevailed against DUNE's hate for the world. And with their duty done, the girls made their way back to Fairy Park, where they returned to their roles of entertainment within the Park, while still training for the next inevitable battle. Sora, for her part, remained close with Hana and Eri - though as hard as she tried, she was never quite as close to the latter as she was to the former - and the girls lived in relative harmony.
Personality: Sora is a highly conflicted young woman. At her old school, before she joined the Project, she was the student council president, with all the personality traits to match. She's kind, and will happily talk to anyone about anything, with a seemingly permanent smile on her face. She knows about a wide variety of topics, both academic and otherwise; she had scarily-accurate knowledge about what the various organizations were doing at any given time, and she made it a point to know everyone in the building by name. But she'd been living an odd life until a year prior to her joining the Chalice: she'd been posing as a boy at school, pushing away her feminine side. She didn't have time for cute things, or dresses, or her appearance; she was too busy practicing martial arts, or studying for classes, or running the student council, or doing one thing or another. It hurt to know she was distancing herself from who she was inside, but she just kept telling herself it was for her older brother Divin's sake. Some days she actually believed it, if she closed her eyes and stuck her head under her pillow far enough.
When she had time to talk to people, she was always formal about her interactions, being extra careful to pick just the right words, and to find the solution to make everyone as happy as possible. She only had an opinion when the council had one; aside from that, she tended to leave people to sort things out themselves. Personal relationships were right out, as she just didn't have time for someone else, and she didn't want to hurt someone else with her backwards personality and general social ignorance. As an Irgelion in the Earth Sphere, she didn't really advertise her heritage either, for her own safety; she didn't want to risk that getting out and causing a problem for her student council duties, or the dojo. She resented that a little, but she understood that no matter what happened, she was still herself - even as Sora, she was still Lira inside. Even if everything else had changed, she knew her past.
Her only exception to her policies was to protect those important to her. Sora is a protector by nature, stepping into help those unable to help themselves, and while she's normally calm and coolheaded, she can display impressive anger on behalf of other people, though rarely (if ever) for herself. It was that will to protect that got her into martial arts in the first place, to take Divin's place since he couldn't take over in his condition; all by her own decision, through her own admiration of him and stubborn desire to keep him safe. And it was that will to protect that drove her to leave everything behind, to go somewhere she'd never really heard of, to pilot a mecha she'd never seen.
Sora's training at Fairy Park over the one year span before she joined the Chalice helped her quite a bit; she started to grow as a person, and even a little bit as the girl she was meant to be all these years. She was still working on her martial arts skills, but she also started to open up just a little more, and some of her feminie traits started to surface. Not much, but it was a good start, even the Professor could see that. Her old smile grew just a bit more, though no less permanent. And she started to make friends of others, beginning with the other girls at Fairy Park, though it was a slow process.
She took to flying her unit well; it took time to learn how to fly Desu Itsuki, but she got the hang of it over time, and she made good friends with POTPOURRI, its AI. Her expressiveness work also helped with the unit's power, oddly. And she thought that would be enough as she flew to the Chalice, in March of 16 AI. Since her arrival on the Chalice, though, Sora's had a number of roadblocks that have severely affected her growth and personality. She's had to work hard to triumph over severe self-image issues, constant failure, and heartbreak. She's changed quite a bit in the process.
Sora has become someone that needs people and attention to keep herself sane. If left alone too long, she starts to fall apart, and if she believes she's driven someone important to her away, she'll be depressed for days. In exchange, if her friends can honestly say they need her, or that they appreciate her, she'll be on cloud nine. She's open and loves to talk to people, but she can't keep her problems internal, and she has no capacity to shut up once she starts talking. She tries not to burden people with her problems too much, but it's hard for her. That said, contact is life for her, so she tries to meet new people when she can. She thrives around groups of people she can talk to.
More worryingly, she's starting to shift in personality to a point where her friends, and moreso her teammates, are everything for her; if they're threatened, she comes unhinged pretty quickly, and she'll put herself at risk every time if she can protect them. The list of people she'll protect isn't particularly short, and is easy to get on, but it matters to her all the same. She will do anything in her power to protect "her girls" from any threat, any time; and maybe even some things beyond her power, if that's what it takes. She does care for her other friends, too, but though she's a little slow and cautious to give it, when she finds someone she can share her heart with, she gives all of it, with no regrets. Her heart is on her sleeve for all to see, and she wouldn't have it any other way.
Last but not least, she's starting to come into her own as the girl she's meant to be all this time. Her feelings are in line with what an nineteen year old girl should be feeling, her dress choices are starting to make sense, and she's becoming self-conscious about her appearance again. In short, she's turning back into the girl she's always wanted to be, even if it nearly killed her to get there.
Character Abilities: Magic: Sora's a member of Project PreDestiny, a group that produces unique mobile suits that are powered by magic. Sora herself has magical talent that she can use through her Soul Perfume, the device that serves as the "key" for Desu Itsuki, and that grants her hardlight suit in a pinch. She can use the abilities of Desu Itsuki while on foot, with a few exceptions, but the power is lower, and it's lower still if she's not transformed; without her Soul Perfume, she's almost entirely mundane. In exchange, there are places Sora can go on foot that Desu Itsuki can't, plus she doesn't have to waste a lot of time to get set up - she just has to call out the activation phrase, and she has access to her abilities. One notable downside to her magic is that if a shield ability is broken (or another continuous skill is interrupted), she suffers backlash from the spell and can't act for a moment. For shield skills, the backlash is proportional to the incoming effect that broke the spell.
An important thing to keep in mind for Sora's magic is that, like her teammates, her emotions drive spell power. If she's confident and in control of herself and the battle, her abilities are even stronger; if she's depressed and doesn't think she can do much, even a strong shield will fold like a house of cards. The effect is even more apparent for Sora than the other girls, likely a side effect of her open personality.
Her primary ability either on-foot or in the Itsuki is the Itsuki Aegis, a shield skill that looks like a sunflower. The shield's biggest claim to fame is that it's reflective to projectiles - assuming they don't overload the shield, they'll bounce back from whence they came. She's also taught herself how to use the inside of an Aegis as a movement mode; she can ride a shield by hopping into the middle and zipping away. Such a shield is still reflective, and can fit more than just her, though not much more. If it's broken by loss of concentration or a powerful attack, though, she falls. The weight of Desu Itsuki is too extreme to ride a shield. She can also push an Aegis as a ranged attack in any direction, including as a stomp attack from a shield she's riding; it can't differentiate between friend and foe, though, and it loses strength as it travels further from her. Using an Aegis in this way is technically a separate skill: the Itsuki Aegis Impact.
Itsuki Protection is an energy-efficient alternate shield. This one is flat and non-reflective, and can be used to cover a large area quickly. Its major drawback is that while it can protect a huge space, if any area of the barrier is breached, the whole thing falls. The shield itself is a dull yellow, and somewhat thicker than an Aegis, though this makes it harder to see through. She's learned to manipulate very small doses of Itsuki Protection as a transportation aid she calls Air Step, which creates very small barriers with grooves for easier holding and landing. They're not resillient to damage, but they're so small she can make them with a thought. They're handy for anything from ascending (or descending) distances unassisted, to making long jumps in spaces where an Aegis is impractical (or too flashy), and into any number of edge cases.
Itsuki Flash is a light-based projectile attack that fires a bright, damaging ball in a direction, ideally at an enemy. Her skill isn't great enough to direct the projectile after it's thrown more than a degree or two, and the shot destabilizes at long range. One of her goals once she's got the power of a stronger unit behind her is a guided Flash, as well as multiple Flashes.
The area-of-effect Itsuki Dynamite is a localised explosion designed to clear the air around Sora, throwing anything not bolted down at least some distance away. Of course, an explosion can't exactly differentiate between friend and foe, nor is it in any way subtle. The tradeoff for all these problems, though, is good power and effectiveness.
Last up are a few erratta that are part of Sora's magic. Sora is learning to manipulate her shields into more tangible forms; she's working out how to make constructs from shields, but progress is slow. She's hoping for a breakthrough soon, though. She's also trying to put some more work into a healing spell she developed a little while ago, which she's really only used once. Even trying gives her a headache and makes her extremely tired, and for the life of her she can't figure out why. The one time it did work, it had a notable effect on the target she used it on, but... why isn't it working now? It's a question to be pondered.
Aside from her spells, Sora can also summon the Itsuki Tambourine, a unique weapon that serves as both a beam chakram and a simple cannon, though it's not particularly effective at either. It's also a focus that improves the power of her shield skills. It can be called or dispelled with a thought, though if it's damaged, it needs to be repaired just like anything else.
After DUNE's revival, Sora (along with her partners) gained acess to a new power: the Silouhette system. It serves as a limiter release, but it's so powerful that it allows the units to gain new forms entirely. Sora's is an overhaul to everything that makes Desu Itsuki what it is, along with a few new tricks. After some thought, she decided on a name: Desu Shining.
Shining is a direct upgrade to Desu Itsuki, keeping all its old skills but giving them more power and new names, swapping out "Itsuki" for "Shining" in their names: the Shining Aegis, the Shining Flash, and so on. The power bump is significant, so it'll take a little getting used to. Aside from the old abilities, there are a few new things. One is a new weapon that she's been wanting for a while: a souped-up version of the fleurets that Tsubomi designed, that she can use as a focus for her shield abilities, much like she can with the Shining Tambourine. The Shining Saber is a long, slightly flexible beam saber; it's patterened after a rapier. Of course, being a beam saber, even if it's designed as a piercing weapon it'll still cut fairly well. All Sora's usual shield abilities are still available while using it. The tradeoff is that "magic" (shields, ranged attacks) is weaker while her sword is equipped.
A new addition to her arsenal is the Shining Cluster, which fires a number of Itsuki Flash projectiles; they're formed with initial instructions, usually to either travel in a pack and spread out to trap an enemy, or to start out in a wide spread and converge on a point. If she has time to focus on them, she can control the group after it's fired for versatility. Alternately, single Shining Flashes can home in on targets even without her conscious direction.
She's also mastered the Shining Meteor, a shielded charge that uses a modified Aegis to destabilize the target and allow her to pass through; the impact is powerful, plus the magic radiating off the shield rips the inside of the enemy apart as she goes through. Unfortunately, after nearly killing herself with it, she's very wary about using it again. Sora also has significant issues with her mobility after the incident; occasionally something will get lost in her damaged nervous system, and she won't move right, causing her abilities to come out wrong or not at all. In short, Sora's a little broken but works through it as best she can.
On-foot Combat: On foot, Sora's options are a mix of magic and melee. She's trained in martial arts, specifically an offshoot of aikido with some Irgelion moves mixed in, but she's learned some new things, both from the Project and from her time on the Chalice. Her bread and butter is the Itsuki Aegis, which she can use in an offensive or defensive capability; one good option for approach is to ride in on a shield and stomp it down to the ground as she gets close, dealing an opening blow that has to be evaded and putting her in position for her next attack right away. It's also great for covering squishier allies that find themselves in the way of attacks. Itsuki Dynamite is useful in a pinch if she's surrounded, though she doesn't use it much. She prefers midrange combat; close enough to run in for an attack pass, far enough away to be able to use shields at leisure. Her weaknesses are bombardment attacks and stealth, not to mention attacks from much larger units (read: mecha).
Mecha: Sora is a mecha pilot by trade. Of course, that requires her to actually have her mecha. That said, her skills in Itsuki (or Shining) translate to skills on-foot, so she functions as a human-sized magical warrior that's resillient but not tankish. Sora can still switch her hardlight suit and abilities between Itsuki and Shining as needed, but rather than draining a robot's power faster, it drains her own energy; if she pushes herself too hard while in Shining's hardlight suit, she risks passing out.
Character Inventory: Soul Perfume (Sora): Transformation device. Grants Sora her hardlight suit, and access to her powers as the pilot of Desu Itsuki. She's able to manipluate magic even without her Soul Perfume, but it's significantly less powerful. Donning her hardlight suit is a swift action. POTPOURRI, Sora's AI companion, is aboard this device. Normally in Sora's pocket. Other characters can't use this for its intended purpose; other Desus will find that their own powers are much more usable than trying to access Sora's.
Ring: The scraps of the girls' units from the last battle were plentiful, and Sora kept a few for herself, weaving a strand of metal from each of the three Claimer units into a ring, to give her a memento of her girls even when she couldn't be with them. The ring itself is a strand each of sunshine yellow, sakura pink, and ocean blue, all twisted together.
Samples:
Thread: Here with Roxas
Third-person:
Sora wasn't sure what to feel at this point, as she sat on a bench outside the welcome center she'd found herself in. She'd fought so long and so hard, and now... here she was in some other world. She was pretty certain she wasn't going to be seeing Hana or Eri here, let alone any of the other Desu pilots. So it was just her, in a foreign world that needed some kind of saving.
As much as she didn't want to do something like that, she couldn't deny that the idea sounded workable. She could take care of whatever these people needed, and get home to her girls with a successful mission under her belt and a few days' worth of missing them to relieve.
...The nagging voice in the back of her head, though, insisted she was going to be here a while, and she didn't like that prospect. She distinctly remembered the feeling of being separated from Hana and Eri, and didn't much like it. Who knew how long this was really going to take? The redhead had a sinking feeling that she was going to need to make a few good friends here, or she was going to drive herself spare, and that was without considering the strange ailment the welcome desk had mentioned from lack of contact with other people.
Which was another problem. Contact to survive? If her girls were here, sure, that wouldn't ever be a problem. She could fill in whatever the quota happened to be without really thinking about it. But alone, in a new world with new people? This was going to be a little weird.
After a moment's thought, though, Sora shook her head and smiled. 'Not that I haven't dealt with weird before. I'm an expert on weird by now, I think.'
The girl stood, taking a deep breath and stretching. "Somewhere in this world, someone needs me. I've just got to keep telling myself that." There was a small wry quirk to her grin as she started walking to find her apartment. "If I believe in it hard enough, maybe it'll even be true."