Aerith Gainsborough

Aerith Gainsborough Age: 22 Gender: Female Height: 5 feet 4 inches Occupation: Florist Hair color: Brown Eye color: Green Aerith Gainsborough, is the last of the Cetra, an ancient race with powerful magical abilities. Because of this, the Shinra Electric Power Company has hunted her throughout her life, seeking to exploit her powers. She meets Cloud Strife in Midgar and the two become close, leading her to join his quest to fight Shinra and hunt down Sephiroth. Aerith is upbeat, carefree, and joyful, being flirtatious towards Cloud and compassionate towards others.

Aerith wields staves in battle and is in the back row by default, as she primarily uses magic from equipped Materia in battle. Her Limit abilities are defensive, either providing restorative powers, healing other party members, or bestowing status enhancements.

Personality Aerith is compassionate, upbeat, and joyful, as well as street-smart with a spunky and cocky attitude. Aerith maintains a hopeful and positive outlook in the face of sadness and danger, cheering the others on when she can and always tries to see the good in people. She is nonetheless still able to identify an unequivocal evil in the form of Shinra and Sephiroth. Against such threats, Aerith wishes to help however she can, but is morally opposed to violence and sees it as a last resort. She is not above harboring resentment for those who wrong her, although she puts on a front of cold defiance and conceals her weaknesses when distressed. Aerith loves nature, particularly flowers, and tries to commune with them.

Aerith craves freedom and the ability to make decisions for herself. Raised in the slums of Midgar, she is almost entirely unfazed by the danger of monsters or Shinra. Aerith is familiar with the slums, and has grown to love her surroundings for the few flowers that grow, as well as the passions of the denizens, to the point that she wants to stay. In spite of this, Aerith still loves adventure and trying new things, craving one day to ride on an airship. Coupled with Aerith's adventurous nature is her stubbornness, with Elmyra recognizing that they cannot talk her out of something after she has made up her mind, regardless of how much danger she is putting herself in.

Appearance Aerith plaits her long, light-brown hair with a large pink ribbon; within the ribbon, she keeps the White Materia orb given to her by her mother. Segmented bangs frame Aerith's face, and she has emerald green eyes. Aerith's attire comprises a shin-length pink dress that buttons up the front and a red bolero jacket. She wears brown boots and has metal bracers on her wrists and around the edges of her jacket sleeves. In subsequent appearances, Aerith's attire is more detailed. Her jacket, button-up and has zipper pockets and a belt at the bottom.

Abilities As the last living Cetra, Aerith has many unique powers in her ability to commune with the planet's life force. This leads her to being able to sense the loss of life around the world, seen most clearly with the loss of Elmyra's husband. The exact means of her communication with the planet are unknown: though Aerith talks to flowers, she confessed to Cloud that they do not simply have a conversation with her, but nonetheless, she believed that they had something important to say. Aerith's powers also allowed her to reach out to Red XIII and calm him, imparting knowledge to him. Her powers also include an ability to somehow affect the portal to the Singularity to follow Sephiroth, though her abilities are weaker than his as she is unable to control the Whispers like he can.

History Early life Aerith was born to Ifalna and Professor Gast Faremis in Icicle Inn on February 7, 1985, making her half-human and half-Cetra. When she was barely twenty days old, Professor Hojo tracked Gast down, killed him, and captured Ifalna and Aerith.

Held in the Shinra Building, Aerith and Ifalna became subject to numerous experiments at the hands of Hojo and Shinra. She had minimal social interaction aside from with a friend named Lonny, a boy two years older than her and the son of Ifalna's caretaker, Marielle. In 1992, Aerith discovered that she had inherited Cetra powers, as her mind was flooded with images overloading her senses. A man named Geddie Bach, who watched over them, witnessed when Aerith's images led her to draw what Geddie interpreted as the promised land, the land of legend that Shinra believed was fertile in mako energy. Lonny instructed her to draw Mideel after seeing it in a magazine, causing Geddie, who was looking to make money, to head there, hoping to find the promised land for himself, where he assumed the identity of Glenn Reiner.

Knowing that Aerith had Cetra powers and, thus, was a suitable backup test subject, Hojo began to employ crueler methods when testing on Ifalna. Aerith had to witness Faz Hicks, another scientist, inject Ifalna with painkillers to endure. Hicks ultimately helped the two escape the building.[6] Ifalna, heading for the Sector 5 slums church, took Aerith to the Sector 5 slums, but collapsed at the Sector 5 Undercity Station. Aerith looked around for a doctor, but found Elmyra Gainsborough, who adopted her as Ifalna passed.

Elmyra gave Aerith a bed at her house, which had belonged to her father-in-law, Gabriel Gainsborough, two months prior. Aerith met people from Gabriel's family business who Elmyra invited over, beginning with Mr. Meguro, who advised Elmyra to claim that Aerith was the daughter of a relative who she was adopting and that Aerith should go by a different name to hide her from Shinra. The two ultimately stumbled on naming Aerith "Ronna", the same name as Mr. Meguro's daughter, in a meeting with another member of the business. The day after choosing the new name, Aerith told Elmyra that her husband, Clay Gainsborough, had died and returned to the planet, something Elmyra rejected as she did not believe in planetology. Following this, Elmyra received a letter from Shinra informing her that Clay had indeed passed.

In February 1993, Carlo Kincaid, from the Gainsborough family business, planned a party for Aerith's eighth birthday. The party would have included others from the business and the Sector 5 House orphans, which excited Aerith, but was cancelled after Mr. Meguro suffered a heart attack.[16] Afterwards, Tseng of the Turks arrived at their doorsteps, revealing that she was a Cetra to Elmyra and attempting to persuade her to return. Tseng told them that Shinra regretted their treatment of Ifalna and would leave Aerith alone if she told them the location of the promised land. Elmyra struck a deal with Tseng that he would leave her alone if she kept a close watch on her and told them the location if Aerith knew and Aerith confessed to Elmyra that she was indeed a Cetra.

After Elmyra and Meguro handed the Gainsborough business to Carlo, Elmyra was busy around the slums often, but placed harsh restrictions on Aerith, only allowing her to work for the Sector 5 House as an assistant. Aerith at one point confronted Elmyra about being restricted from watching television (a way of keeping her in the dark about the outside world), the restricted zone placed around her, and the harsh rules. Aerith ran away in protest, running to the Sector 5 slums church that Ifalna had told her about years ago, only to run into Faz Hicks there, who chased after her and professed his love of Ifalna and a desire to be with her. Elmyra fought Faz off with a broom and aimed an unloaded pistol at him to deter him away, bringing Aerith home safely when Faz was shot by an unknown firer.

Due to the mako reactors draining the life out of Midgar and the surrounding areas, little could grow around the metropolis. Aerith transplanted some of the flowers to the garden outside her house. The flowers and other vegetation grew well there due to the lifestream-imbued water in the river running alongside her house; that same river runs under the church.

Relationship with Zack I have twenty-three tiny wishes, but you probably won't remember them all, so I put them all together into one... I'd like to spend more time with you.

In April 0001, a 16-year-old Aerith met Zack Fair after he fell into the church from Mako Reactor 5. After mistaking Aerith for an angel, Zack asked her out to a date, but Aerith brushed him off. Impressed by her flowers in the church, Zack suggested that Aerith sell flowers to make money, as flowers were a luxury item in Midgar. She showed him around the Sector 5 slums and Zack bought Aerith her trademark pink hair ribbon. The vendor who sold it asked if Zack was her boyfriend and Aerith answered coyly that maybe he could be.

The two visited the Sector 6 park and Aerith told Zack that she feared SOLDIER members for being experiments who love to fight, but apologized when Zack revealed that he was in SOLDIER. She added that he didn't scare her and flirted with him, admiring his eyes. Zack promised to see Aerith again after he was called back to headquarters. He also promised to take her to the upper plate, where they could sell flowers together, and Aerith agreed. The two kept in contact for the next two years, with the Turks aware as they were watching Aerith. After Zack's mentor, Angeal's, death, Zack visited Aerith, who held him as he cried. Angeal's will lingered in the form of a canine copy that, in chapter 7, settled at the church and defended Aerith from rogue Shinra security robots.

Zack finally built Aerith a cart afterwards and the two left for the slums to open her business, but it did not initially go well. Aerith asked Zack for "23 tiny wishes" and he had her write them down, which she summed up as "I'd like to spend more time with you". They also promised that whenever they would go on date, she would dress in pink. Unbeknownst to them, this was the last time they would see each other, as later that day, Zack was dispatched to Nibelheim with Sephiroth and never returned. In the coming years, Aerith overcame her fears and ventured above the plate to sell flowers, although she used a basket as the flower wagon had lost a wheel.

Aerith also sold flowers to Rude of the Turks on his date with Chelsea. On August 9th, 0002, a Turk met Aerith as she exited her house, surprised by the blooming flowers. Aerith told the Turk that she wished to leave Midgar and see the world, as she could hear the wind calling to her. The eco terrorist group Avalanche arrived searching for her and the Turk helped Aerith evade them. Shears from Avalanche defeated the Turk and Aerith was taken to the church to meet Elfe, the leader of Avalanche. Elfe urged her to join them to help them defeat Shinra and protect the promised land, but Aerith heard an "old voice" emanating from Elfe, inadvertently leading to the discovery of the Turk spying on them from the rafters. After the Turk battled Shears and Fuhito, a sudden weakness struck Elfe and Avalanche retreated. Tseng arrived and the Turks allowed Aerith to flee while they distracted him.

Years later, when Zack escaped Shinra custody, the final Angeal copy that was left watching over Aerith was dying and sought him out. It left behind a letter from Aerith. As Zack read it, he discovered that she had been doing well for herself selling flowers in Midgar and, during the four years he had been gone, had written Zack eighty-nine letters, the rest of which he never received. Tseng held the letters and sent the Turks to save Zack before the Shinra army could locate him to deliver the correspondence, but the Turks ultimately failed. Aerith tended the flowers in the church while, outside Midgar, Zack was gunned down by Shinra forces, something she seemed to sense.

On December 9, 0007, Aerith met Cloud Strife as he fled the bombing of Mako Reactor 1 during "No. 1 Reactor Bombing". Cloud could either warn her to get to safety, buy a flower for 1 gil, or blow her off.