Fiona

OUT of CHARACTER
Name: Alex
Other characters: N/A

IN CHARACTER
Name: Fiona
Fandom: Dragon Age
Canon point/AU: Post-Epilogue of The Calling. Approximately 9:10~11 Dragon
Journal: uncalled_for
PB: Jessica Stroup will be her PB.
Age: About mid-twenties, physically and mentally.
History: Wikia page on Fiona
Mild content warnings for mentioning of variations of abuse.

Presentation: Her physical appearance is described as petite, even for a Thedosian elf, but her stature is the only thing that’s really petite about her. Fiona carries herself with a seemingly easy confidence. She is well aware of her capabilities and that boldness exudes through her common demeanor without extending over toward arrogance. Her time in the Circle has cultivated this for her and she is not shy of displaying her Maker given talents; often carrying her staff with her everywhere and proudly in the open. It is not an act to ensure fear of passersby, but instead something of a safety blanket for her own well-being. Fiona, quite frankly, hardly cares about the opinions others may hold for her, but one would be damned to think she doesn’t hold opinions of them.

Entitled noble types and authority figures are on the bottom of the list of people Fiona might respect. That is a trust that must be earned and she has no intention of making it easy. Along the way she will be heavily vocal about all and every dislike she may hold, whether it be for a situation or the particular person. Fiona is consistently blunt, honest, and has a potentially boiling temper. She’s not lady-like in the least despite her previous mentor’s grievances (if anything these grievances only encouraged her rude behavior). She snorts, slouches, rolls her eyes, mocks others, scowls, practices deflective humor, and soaks her words in sarcasm at the best of times. If her outspoken opinions aren’t enough to deter, then her over-expressiveness may be. She is practically incapable of faking a smile let alone an emotion. So even if she somehow manages to keep her opinions to herself, her face will be a certain giveaway.

She can be polite, it’s not outside her capabilities, and she is a very kind and compassionate person by default. It simply depends on who as well as some first impressions. She is far more likely to get along with those who have suffered equally as she has or have been stepped on by authority in the past. Basically rebels so long as they don’t outstep the boundaries of barking toward biting. Despite her temper and all the bitterness she may project, she’s more of a pacifist. She would rather help than hurt people and would prefer pain to never be an option. Sadly though, the world just doesn’t work like that and her kindness and compassion are sometimes hard things to see.


Motivations: Beneath the confidence and fiery behavior Fiona is drained. Life has exhausted her from day one and she is sick and tired of cruelties suffered. She has been jumping cages her whole life, squirming and writhing just to get a breath of fresh air. From the Alienage she was born in, to the slavery she endured, to the Circle she considered to foolishly be her freedom, and finally to the Grey Wardens of whom she begged to join to escape the Circle’s confinement. The naiveté of her youth has slapped her in the face every single time and she has finally hit a wall of places to turn to.

She is by and large a survivor though, and no matter how many times she’s been knocked down or kicked or tossed into a cage with the key thrown into an ocean she is still ready to stand and roar right back. She wants change and wants at least one nasty cycle she’s experienced to collapse, but she is an elf. She knows her place and it is not in leadership (…yet). Fiona is grandly envious of those in power, and in part, hates them for all that they can do and choose not to (which in a way makes her a little power hungry herself). The reality is that she doesn’t understand that it can be just as burdening to lead as the boulder she’s had on her shoulder against such people. From her experience; power is something others misuse to break the small and drive them back into corners without defenses. They do this because it’s fun, because they don’t care for those they hurt, or they just want more of the power they already hold. Her opinions of them have only been proven wrong once, by Maric, every other person she has seen with authority or power has misused it. From Comte Dorian, to Commander Genevieve, to First Enchanter Remille; these people have manipulated, abused, and harmed others who trusted them simply by having the power to do so while using it to further personal and selfish goals. Their actions have solidified her distrust of authority and her conviction to be better than they were.

She, too, has power of her own, her magic, and from the mistreatments suffered and trusts broken she has learned to wield hers for what she believes is right. It is a moral she has learned on her own and one she’ll stand by to her dying breath. She does not threaten others with violence, she does not strike from mere assumptions, and she does not draw lines in battle against those of a different mind. If someone is hurt or in trouble then she will help, her personal opinions against them can sit and wriggle on a bench in the meantime. But Fiona does not allow people to fall if she can do anything about it. If she turns her magic against anyone it is not without thought and reason. She’s not afraid to take a life, she’s committed murder before, but it will be an act of self-defense.

Most of her behavior, in fact, is a method of self-defense. Her sarcastic and deflective sense of humor along with her bitterness and anger toward a great many things (all the inequalities of Thedas, nobles, etc.) are all defense mechanisms. They fuel her survival and keep her safe from any further harm that may come to her. She has built a wall around herself brick by brick to keep others away. She does not trust easily and when she does she’s risking that brick wall being shattered like glass. And when her wall shatters, be it by anyone or anything, it hurts like hell. She can crumble under pessimism when she’s overwhelmed or feels helpless and it is harder to stand back up each time, yet somehow she does it.

Fiona does not have many dreams or aspirations of her own because she’s never had the capacity to. She knows how to breathe, she knows how to keep her heart beating, and she knows how to plow through each day when it’s easier to lay down and die. Sleep is usually not much of a rest either. Nightmares can plague her (and not just Grey Warden ones) giving her little room to step beyond her past when it can be so easily dredged up onto her present. Somehow though, she does it. She keeps going because maybe the next move will make life easier and maybe suffering will eventually end, if not for her then maybe those after her. Her giving up her son is a leading example of how she views her life and the world around her. He will have better chances ignorant and blind of her, detached from her life to maybe find happiness on his own and without her weighing him down. It is a decision that arguably takes the life out of her, but the fact still stands that she will continue to live and survive and she will still not let herself be brought down so easily.


Setting: Fiona will be reacting horribly. She is one to hold grudges and it’s likely to cause bitterness and hatred to brew over time. Despite that, she is unlikely to actively rebel on her own. She might disagree and argue against everything going on, but she is mostly bark and no bite. There is a mindset holding her back that she is still just an elf and she knows her place. It will take a long while for her to realize there are possibilities for anything otherwise.


SAMPLES

First Person Thread:

[Fiona’s eyes glance only a moment at the device in question. It’s foreign, like everything here. How it is supposed to record anything she says? She isn’t certain. But why does she have to say anything at all?]

Is this some kind of sick joke?

[It’s more a yell at the ceiling’s speakers than the device. They aren’t listening, she knows they can’t be or the device probably wouldn’t be necessary. They don’t even really care. The more she thinks on it the more she becomes determined not to say a word.

She gets out of the bed, angry and still exhausted. She tries the walls, any sort of door or seeming exit with obviously no luck. It’s nearly half an hour before she turns back to the object next to the bed, a glum defeat on her face. The anger, however, has yet to die down. When she finally addresses the device she snatches it up and glares at it before the words come. She still doesn’t have to give them anything. She can wait, she’s fine with waiting. But what good will that do?]

You bloody bastards. What happened to the others? Where are they? [There’s a huff of breath as she shakes her head, changing her tactic.] You must think highly of yourselves for breaching life and death and then having the gall to ask someone how they feel thereafter. Please, it’s embarrassing you’d think anyone would give you an honest answer. Don’t flatter yourselves. But if you must have one from me, then I feel just fine.

[She would prefer to scream or cry, but she doesn’t. With a forceful calm she sets the device back down and quietly returns to sitting on the bed, seething and glaring as she waits.]



Prose:

Fiona considered kicking, punching, screaming, but instead there was only a subtle curse that escaped her while they led her down the halls. They gave her explanations that naturally explained nothing she needed to know and only what they wanted her to hear. But she listened, because not doing so would be stupid. In her mind she was telling herself to be calm, take deep breaths, and try to think through this. Yet the longer she listened to these strangers and the more she absorbed what was said, the more panic crept in and made itself comfortable.

When the doors closed behind her, her eyes immediately went for the onlookers, twisting to a glare. If their position in the room didn’t say enough, then their ridiculous and excessive clothing certainly did. These were people with money and power, chatting aimlessly about nothing important while she was being told to appease them or die. This sounded horrifically familiar and that tiny panic persisted to spread.

She swallowed and pushed herself to move forward toward the weapons and the odd dummies set up before her. She ran through her options in her mind as her eyes looked over each weapon. If her magic was at her disposal there wouldn’t even be need for this. Those people who brought her here wouldn’t even have been able to move her an inch she didn’t want to move. But it was gone, and this was no Templar silencing, it was just an eerie subtle quiet. She wasn’t exhausted by it, it just wasn’t there. And they took it. What else could they do, were they planning to do? They threatened death, but there were far worse things than death and she dreaded to find out what.

For several moments she stood silently by the weapons, though she made no move to lift a single one. Those people weren’t watching, not really. So when she turned around to head back to the door she hoped it would remain that way. She kept the terror suffocated in fists at her side. She wasn’t going to play their game. She had done this before and she refused to do it now, she would never go back to that. They would just have to deal with it or deal with her. She couldn’t care less which one they chose.



What is your character scored: ~5 & 9-10.

(~5) Without her magic/powers: Fiona has little in the way of survival skills as she consistently relies on others for both decision making and general survivability (such as general outdoor know-how, hunting for food, watching for/covering tracks, etc.). While she can manage and is smart enough to figure out hiding places, food scavenging, or possibly how to build a fire on her own she has little experience in such things and has never had reason to fend for herself entirely on her own. If the building a fire idea fails though, at the very least, Thedosian elves do have a natural ability to see well in the dark and are known to reflect light similar to the eye of a cat (likely the ocular structure: tapetum lucidum). But she'd still potentially freeze.

Although her staff can indeed be used as a bludgeoning weapon, or any sort of stick for that matter, she isn’t exactly trained to use it as such (her failed attempt to hit Duncan (to be fair he is a rogue) with her staff is testimony of this).

She does, however, have a strong willpower just for sheer survival. She can take life, but is bound by strong morals to keep such kills to solely self-defense. This will be slightly hindered by her lack of magic as she has a tendency to crumble when she feels helpless or overwhelmed. Her magic is something of a safety blanket for her and without it she will struggle not to give into pessimism. This attitude may be cured with time as she grows acclimated to the Arena, but it will likely be replaced and fueled by a stronger stubborn hatred in its place.


(9-10) With her magic/powers: Although the video game medium’s spells vary from each installment, most of her spells have a video game equivalent or something close enough. Her magic can be broken down thusly from specializations and schools visible within the video game medium of the series (I’ve also jotted down page numbers, but it’s mostly just for my own reference):
Primal/Arcane Spells:
Arcane bolt (160)
Flame blast (158)
Fireball (349)
Winter’s Grasp (161)
Cone of Cold (177)
Blizzard (178)
Stone fist (162)
Earthquake (163)
Lightning bolt (181)

Force Spells:
Slow (Most similar to Gravitic Ring - 157)
Telekenetic Burst (Not demonstrated in The Calling, but practiced in her appearance in Asunder – it’s possible she learned it in the 30 year gap between the novels, but I’m listing it anyways for possibilities. – A:345)

Spirit Spells:
Forcefield (Most similar to forcefield in Origins, however, it is more comparable to a physical glass barrier than a cage which restricts mobility. - 182)
Barrier (346)

Creation Spells:
Heal (167)

Tactical spells not found in the video game mediums:
Tracking spell (Detects the location of others – p.196)
Staff light (Orb of a staff can glow like a lantern, dim as a candle to blinding bright)

Beyond her list of spells, Fiona has a scary stubbornness to her that keeps her going even when death seems imminent. She is not opposed to going down fighting (if anything she prefers it), and she is willing to exhaust herself to extreme measures; from taking arrows to the chest and continuing to lash out spells to consecutively casting several heavier spells. There is no fear the next spell cast would mean her passing out if it also meant a greater chance for survival. She does not, however, have many spells in the case of close range combat and excels more at ranged.

Her likability will consistently be her downfall. The more someone gripes about her less than polite behavior the more she will try to vex them and revel in their disappointment. That is, of course, if her uncooperative temper doesn’t dissuade others first.


Token: Her token will be a pin of her staff.