temptestament

Player Information

Name: Jess
Personal LJ: draconic_scribe
Age: 21
Contact Info: AIM/Plurk: Firebenderjess
Other Characters Played: N/A

Character Information

Character Name: Allen Ridgeley
Character Series: Xenosaga
Character Age: 25 (Died at 22)
Character Gender: Male
Alternate Universe
Canon Point: Before Shion summons Abel's Ark
Background Link: General canon and Allen specifically
AU Background: This Allen's early life went more or less exactly as canon: he was the son of a wealthy CEO, decided to follow his own path instead of the family business to go to technical school, graduated from Bormeo with top grades, was hired by Vector Industries straight out of college and quickly fell in love with the Jr. Chief of his Division, only to find out she was engaged to the Chief. It wasn't until a year after he joined Vector that his history deviated in any tangible way from canon.

On that day, a large group of U-TIC soldiers invaded the lab where Allen was working and activated the KOS-MOS Archetype, which went berserk. In most versions of this event, Allen was not present, instead attending a business meeting, and Kevin Winnicot was murdered by the Archetype. This time, however, the meeting was delayed and Allen, seeing the Archetype targeting his beloved's fiance, grabbed a fallen soldier's gun and started firing on the berserk android. He was successful in drawing her attention away from Kevin, but was no more a match himself than Kevin would have been. The Archetype killed him, ramming her hand straight through his chest, but was destroyed before she could return to finish Kevin.

In most cases, death would be the end of the story. However, Allen in all incarnations has a rare potential that, in most versions of events, goes unrealized. This time, it did not. Upon Allen's death, the CEO of Vector and Guardian of the Lower Domain, Wilhelm, approached his not yet dissipated consciousness and made him an offer: a return to some semblance of life, unimaginable power and, most importantly to Allen, the opportunity to keep Shion safe in exchange for his aid in bringing about the Eternal Recurrence, rescuing the universe from the looming threat of dissipation by reversing time and bringing the universe back to a point as close to its very beginning as was possible, and a promise that he would only reveal his identity to those who knew him to be dead until the appropriate time. Allen agreed and was thus reborn as a Testament, a being of pure consciousness that could still interact with the living and, in fact, wielded a great amount of power over physical space and the perceptions of mortals. Along with this pact came knowledge that the offer had been meant for Kevin, who had arranged the incident to bring about his own death.

Skip three years later, time mostly spent overseeing the movement of Wilhelm's pawns, and Allen is given a new project: T-Elos. Created from the body of Mary Magdeline, she was to replace KOS-MOS as the vessel of Mary's consciousness. As the director of the T-Elos project, Allen assumed the alias of Justin Partridge, a secretive engineer working for Vector. T-Elos outperformed KOS-MOS in every way, as in canon, and this time “Justin” brought the news of KOS-MOS being scrapped to Kevin. The next day, he would be on a re-creation of Old Miltia, waiting for Shion to discover what she needed to, when everything went down the drain.
Personality: Very little has actually changed about Allen due to becoming a Testament, so let's start with his base personality. Allen is, at his core, a kind man, if somewhat withdrawn, occasionally offensive and unusually secretive about his background. In his element, he's calm, collected and in charge, capable of taking even complete disasters mostly in stride and quickly deciding on what needs to be done. He seems confident in his abilities, but not arrogant. If anything, he tends to understate the significance of what he does despite being capable of extraordinary displays of observation, intelligence and quick thinking, in addition to being able to make difficult decisions or handle tragedies that would stop many civilians cold.

Out of his element, Allen seems to become an entirely different person. He becomes easily agitated, nervous, and overly cautious to the point of borderline paranoia. When things go wrong in a situation he doesn't understand or feels helpless in, his first instinct becomes panicking rather than working out a solution, leading to an impression of cowardice. Even when things are relatively safe, he will frequently complain and object to the insane situation or stupid risks people around him are taking.

Allen's most admirable traits are his loyalty and willingness to go through anything for his friends. Unfortunately, this is also something of a weakness, as he is almost literally unable to say no to helping them, even when it puts him in direct danger. He has been described as willing to go to hell and back for his friends, and indeed he would, complaining all the way but not turning back until everyone he knew was safe.

However, while Allen is mostly the same as his canon counterpart, spending three years as a Testament has changed him somewhat. The most noticeable difference is that he's braver and less prone to spazzing out. Where it used to be easy to pull him out of his element with some unusual circumstances, he's now used to the downright impossible seeming and working with the other Testaments has required him to develop the ability to talk to some of the most terrifying people in the universe without faltering. Aside from that, he is, simply put, more willing to make sacrifices for the greater good. While he would still prefer to keep damage to others to a minimum, given a choice between helping someone who might kill hundreds and standing by while thousands died instead, he would steel himself and risk the hundreds. He doesn't consider it an easy choice, but does understand that the alternative to doing harm in one situation is sometimes downright disastrous.
Abilities: All Testaments have a standard set of powers, regardless of who or what they were in life. These powers can be broken down into two distinct sets: spacial and mental.

Testaments have, quite simply, the ability to warp space on a whim. This translates as powerful telekinesis, teleportation and the creation of wormholes and force fields. This is usually how they interact with the physical world, as they lack bodies-an aspect that essentially translates to the ability to turn intangible at will, much like traditional ghosts, and to survive in a vacuum.

They have less power over people's minds, but are capable of controlling all of a human's senses and communicating telepathically. As with their spatial warping powers, they use control of a person's senses to be visible and audible despite lacking physical bodies.

Testaments can manifest physically to be able to interact more directly with the physical world, but are in complete control of their form and can shapeshift at will.

The shapeshifting allows Testaments to have special forms for combat, usually strongly resembling Gnosis. Allen has two, depending on the situation: Testudo Ammon and Fenrisulfr.

Testudo Ammon sacrifices the bulk of his attack power for incredible defense. When attacked, its free-floating shell automatically moves to defend and soaks up the damage. If it takes too much damage in a short period, the shell will be temporarily disabled, leaving him open to attack. In this form, he is still capable of beam attacks but they're noticeably weaker.

Fenrisulfr is his attack form. Fast, agile and powerful but lacking in ways to reduce damage, Fenrisulfr resembles a hairless werewolf with glowing hedgehog spines and a bladed, prehensile tail. In this form, he is capable of firing poison spines with the force of a thrown javelin and the blade on his tail weakens the defensive abilities of those it hits.

In addition to the spacial and mental powers, Testaments display powers that ordinary living people can learn in their world, called Ethers and ranging from elemental attacks to status afflictions to healing. Allen himself is capable of healing Ethers, inflicting and curing various status effects ranging from debuffs to damage reflection, and using powerful beam attacks.

For ease of interaction in the tower, his default states will be changed to visible and tangible.

Beyond the supernatural abilities, Allen is an extremely talented engineer and programmer and a capable shot with ranged weapons.
Sample Entry: His universe was dead. How had it come to this? Wilhelm had told him that they still had time, that they could prevent this-or at least buy humanity another chance. But as Allen pressed a gloved hand to the glass separating him from the barren landscape of what was unmistakably Fifth Jerusalem, he could feel with a cold certainty that there wasn't a single living consciousness on the other side. His heart didn't beat, but that didn't stop the tight feeling in his chest as he leaned his forehead against the glass and whispered,

“I'm sorry, Ms. Uzuki. I promise I'll find out how this happened.”

He knew it wouldn't bring her back, but he couldn't do nothing. He couldn't accept that there was nothing he could do for any universe that might remain. If he couldn't have a peaceful life, it would at least be a useful one. He only hoped that it wouldn't turn out that the death of his universe had been his own fault-he wasn't intended to become a Testament, and the thought that this could have happened because of him taking Kevin's place weighed heavily on his mind.

PLAYER INFO
Name: Jess
Main Journal: N/A
Contact Info: AIM: firebenderjess | MSN: firebenderjess@aol.com | Plurk: firebenderjess
Played Characters: None
AC Reminders: N/A

CHARACTER INFO
Name: Allen Ridgeley
Age: 25
Species: Testament, formerly human (possibly genetically engineered, though it's never confirmed or Jossed.)

Series: Xenosaga
OU/AU: AU
Canon Point: Post-Recurrence (and thus 'death')
History: Allen was born to a wealthy family, with several older brothers. The son of a successful businessman, he was expected to be prepared to possibly take over the family company. Instead, he decided that business wasn't his calling and went to college for engineering instead, cutting off all ties with his family. Immediately on graduating, he got a job at the interplantary company Vector and met Shion Uzuki, who he instantly fell in love with, only to find out that she was engaged to Kevin Winnicot.

A year later, he was part of the KOS-MOS project, working on creating an android that would protect humans from the threat of indestructible monsters called Gnosis. The project went smoothly, until a militant group seized control of the lab and activated the KOS-MOS Archetype, causing her to go berserk. Allen was supposed to be off planet for a meeting, but had been unable to make it and had come into work as usual. When the Archetype targeted Shion, Allen intercepted the attack without hesitating, ending up fatally impaled on the android's hand.

In most cases, death would be the end of the story. However, Allen in all incarnations has a rare potential that, in most versions of events, goes unrealized. This time, it did not. Upon Allen's death, the CEO of Vector and Guardian of the Lower Domain, Wilhelm, approached his not yet dissipated consciousness and made him an offer: a return to some semblance of life, unimaginable power and, most importantly to Allen, the opportunity to keep Shion safe in exchange for his aid in bringing about the Eternal Recurrence, rescuing the universe from the looming threat of dissipation by reversing time and bringing the universe back to a point as close to its very beginning as was possible and a promise that he would only reveal his identity to those who knew him to be dead until the appropriate time. Allen agreed and was thus reborn as a Testament, a being of pure consciousness that could still interact with the living and, in fact, wielded a great amount of power over physical space and the perceptions of mortals. Along with this pact came knowledge that the offer had been meant for Kevin, who had arranged the incident to bring about his own death.

Skip three years later, time mostly spent overseeing the movement of Wilhelm's pawns, and Allen is given a new project: T-Elos. Created from the body of Mary Magdeline, she was to replace KOS-MOS as the vessel of Mary's consciousness. As the director of the T-Elos project, Allen assumed the alias of Justin Partridge, a secretive engineer working for Vector. T-Elos out perforrmed KOS-MOS in every way, and an outwardly apologetic “Justin” brought the news of KOS-MOS being scrapped to Kevin.

The next day, Allen met Shion again as Justin inside of a spacetime anomaly, while T-Elos fought a rescued KOS-MOS and revealed himself as the Brown Testament, although not her former coworker. He gave her just enough information to know that she had an important role to play before vanishing to let T-Elos and KOS-MOS finish fighting it out. T-Elos won, but Shion's fear for KOS-MOS caused a shift in the anomaly that transported everyone present, Allen included, into Shion's subconscious.

Inside Shion's subconscious, which presented itself as her suppressed memories of a horrific conflict she'd been caught in fifteen years ago, Allen watched her and her friends-including Kevin, who was continuing to act as if he didn't know anything more than her-live through the events she'd forgotten, not letting on that he was there even when his fellow Testament, Louis Virgil, came to terms with his own reasons for lingering and decided to move on. With difficulty, he watched as Shion was captured and questioned, reminding himself that she would be fine as long as things went according to plan. And they did, leading Shion to remember how her mother died and the fact that she had summoned the nearly invincible monsters plaguing humanity.

With Shion distraught, Allen finally revealed his identity and tried to assure her that it hadn't been her fault. On being pressed for details, he also informed her of Kevin's involvement in everything that was going on and the fact that she would soon have to make a choice that would have a major impact on the universe. An argument between him and Kevin ensued, ending with Allen flatly stating that Shion didn't deserve to be lied to longer than was necessary and fading out, leaving the group to easily escape the spacetime anomaly as it fell apart.

The next time he saw Shion and her friends was on the planet Meridian, where Wilhelm was waiting with the artifacts required to bring about the Recurrence. He told Shion about the threat of universal dissipation, that the Recurrence could delay it by returning the universe to its beginning and that she was the only one with the power to start it. At first, Shion had doubts about the Recurrence, until Allen told her that the new timeline wouldn't be a perfect copy and that there was a chance that the changes would reduce or even eliminate a lot of the suffering she and the people around her had had to live through. Her friends objected, but he told them it was Shion's choice to make, not theirs, and led her on to meet Wilhelm, along with Mary revived upon T-Elos' destruction and absorption of KOS-MOS prior to his appearance on Meridian.

Allen watched with some sadness and disappointment as Shion activated Zarathustra, having held a vague hope that humanity would deem the Recurrence unnecessary in spite of history's imperfections. But he didn't consider it his choice to make, having been separated from humanity when he accepted the role of Testament and contented himself with the thought that if Shion had chosen Recurrence, he'd done the right thing in helping make the option available, and never so much as considered trying to back out, even as all of history came undone, effectively cutting short the future of the entire universe.
Personality: Very little has actually changed about Allen due to becoming a Testament, so let's start with his base personality. Allen is, at his core, a kind man, if somewhat withdrawn, occasionally offensive and unusually secretive about his background. In his element, he's calm, collected and in charge, capable of taking even complete disasters mostly in stride and quickly deciding on what needs to be done. He seems confident in his abilities, but not arrogant. If anything, he tends to understate the significance of what he does despite being capable of extraordinary displays of observation, intelligence and quick thinking, in addition to being able to make difficult decisions or handle tragedies that would stop many civilians cold.

Out of his element, Allen seems to become an entirely different person. He becomes easily agitated, nervous, and overly cautious to the point of borderline paranoia. When things go wrong in a situation he doesn't understand or feels helpless in, his first instinct becomes panicking rather than working out a solution, leading to an impression of cowardice. Even when things are relatively safe, he will frequently complain and object to the insane situation or stupid risks people around him are taking.

Allen's most admirable traits are his loyalty and willingness to go through anything for his friends. Unfortunately, this is also something of a weakness, as he is almost literally unable to say no to helping them, even when it puts him in direct danger. He has been described as willing to go to hell and back for his friends, and indeed he would, complaining all the way but not turning back until everyone he knew was safe.

However, while Allen is mostly the same as his canon counterpart, spending three years as a Testament has changed him somewhat. The most noticeable difference is that he's braver and less prone to spazzing out. Where it used to be easy to pull him out of his element with some unusual circumstances, he's now used to the downright impossible seeming and working with the other Testaments has required him to develop the ability to talk to some of the most terrifying people in the universe without faltering. Along with the bravery has come more of a tendency toward making snarky comments and occasional teasing that he would have once kept to himself for fear of the response. Aside from that, he is, simply put, more willing to make sacrifices for the greater good. While he would still prefer to keep damage to others to a minimum, given a choice between helping someone who might kill hundreds and standing by while thousands died instead, he would steel himself and risk the hundreds. He doesn't consider it an easy choice, but does understand that the alternative to doing harm in one situation is sometimes downright disastrous.

Powers: All Testaments have a standard set of powers, regardless of who or what they were in life. These powers can be broken down into two distinct sets: spacial and mental.

Testaments have, quite simply, the ability to warp space on a whim. This translates as powerful telekinesis, teleportation and the creation of wormholes and force fields. This is usually how they interact with the physical world, as they lack bodies-an aspect that essentially translates to the ability to turn intangible at will, much like traditional ghosts, and to survive in a vacuum.

They have less power over people's minds, but are capable of controlling all of a human's senses and communicating telepathically. As with their spatial warping powers, they use control of a person's senses to be visible and audible despite lacking physical bodies.

Testaments can manifest physically to be able to interact more directly with the physical world, but are in complete control of their form and can shapeshift at will. Because of this, most have at least one gnosis-like alternate form for combat. Although he rarely uses them, Allen has two: one geared toward defense at the cost of speed and damaging ability and one that hits hard and fast but is easy to damage.

In addition to the spacial and mental powers, Testaments display powers that ordinary living people can learn in their world, called Ethers and ranging from elemental attacks to status afflictions to healing. Allen himself is capable of healing Ethers, inflicting various status effects and using powerful beam attacks.
Weaknesses: Testaments have very few physical weaknesses, but each one seems to be susceptible to a certain element. Allen is very weak against electricity.Additionally, the Hilbert Effect can lock him into a physical form. Beyond that, all of his real weaknesses are psychological. His biggest weakness is that he's too nice, even now. He has a difficult time saying no to someone who needs help even if he has to go significantly out of his way to do so. Though difficult to startle or unnerve due to everything he's been through, when he is surprised, he'll quickly lose his composure and turn awkward.

A more subtle weakness that could also be a strength at times is his stubbornness. When he's set his mind on something, he doesn't know how to back down, even if continuing to try would cause him extra suffering or even kill him, if he's good and truly set.
Possessions: A beam based crossbow that draws on his Ethers to fire and a hand held computer called a Connection Gear. Both are kept in reduced scale storage.
Marking Location: Side of the neck.
Miscellaneous: I will be using the theory that Allen is a genetically modified human, but it will be mostly irrelevant as the power canon hints at him having is essentially astral projection and thus moot because a) he's already a ghost anyway and b) it would probably just put him on the second level if he did use it.

First Person: What the-what happened to the Recurrence? Did she change her mind at the last second or something? No...I saw Zarathustra activate.

*He frowns, looking at the backs of his hands, which as far as he knows, shouldn't exist.*

This shouldn't be possible. Some sort of anomaly even Wilhelm couldn't predict? But that shouldn't have made a difference at this point...so where am I?

*He shakes his head and starts walking, shifting to the blue haired and pale skinned form he uses when interacting with ordinary people.*

Well, I'm not going to figure this out standing around... *sigh* Why can't anything ever be simple?
Third Person: His last words to Shion had been “I'm sorry”. He knew it was too little, too late, that two simple words couldn't make up for everything she'd been through. She had agreed. She hadn't so much as looked at him as she activated Zarathustra and everything faded away.

The next thing Allen knew, he was standing in an old looking city. He'd thought nothing could surprise him at this point, but now he had to spend a few seconds staring. If he'd just died, he could have believed that this was what his mind currently perceived the edge of the Collective Unconscious as. But he hadn't just died. With the Recurence, everything should have been brought back to the beginning, and he shouldn't even have existed until he was born in the new cycle, with no memories of the old one.

But here he was, no deader than he already was. Had Wilhelm lied to him? He supposed it was a possibility...Wilhelm and deceit did go together.

“But what would be the point? And why wouldn't Mary or Yeshua have said something?”

He shook his head. It didn't make any sense. But there were other people here, so maybe he could shift into something a little less conspicuous and get some information. As if the day hadn't been long enough already.