ataraxion application

[savethebullshit]

PLAYER INFORMATION
Your Name: Danie
OOC Journal: frostings
Under 18? If yes, what is your age?: nope
Email + IM: AIM; xMoonchild10x | email; pyramidhead@ymail.com
Characters Played at Ataraxion: n/a

CHARACTER INFORMATION
Name: Anne Cunningham
Canon: Silent Hill: Downpour
Original or Alternate Universe: original
Canon Point: after killing Officer Sewell
Number: I'm fine with it being RNG-ed

Setting: wiki article
History: It can be assumed from the fact that her child manifestation appeared in St. Maria's orphanage that Anne was adopted when she was a child (which explains why she does not share her father's surname and is also not married, if the lack of a wedding ring on her hand is any indication). Anne grew up a happy child, and makes repeated references in canon to how much she respected and admired her father, Frank Coleridge. Her father was kind, compassionate, and always did what he could to help others, even those who others might have overlooked due to their less than savory pasts. He was also a prison guard. Anne wanted to be just like her father, so it was probably no surprise that she decided to follow his career path as a correctional officer. Frank had a job at Ryall State Correctional Facility, and Anne decided to go down a slightly more dangerous path and work at Wayside Max, an apparently notorious maximum security prison quite far from her father's place of work.

All was well for a short while, Anne excelling at her job as a prison security guard due to her determination and her steely will even at a relatively young age, as well as the fact that she had no qualms being harsh and reprimanding prisoners when they were unruly with her. Then Frank was beaten severely and stabbed in the neck with a prison shiv in the showers one night during a riot in Ryall. There was apparent physical evidence and the word of another guard, George Sewell, that an inmate named Murphy Pendleton was responsible. Frank was rendered a vegetable by the attack, forced to spend the rest of his life in a wheelchair and unable to speak or even really move. Anne cared for her father through the ordeal, a job that must not have been at all pleasant, especially given the fact that at one point she referenced “watching him shit and piss all over himself”. She tried to focus her efforts and energy on just being relieved that Frank was alive at all, but every time she looked at him, she saw Murphy's face and to her, it was the face of a monster.

The life of a vegetable is rarely a long one, but it was several years before Frank finally died, leaving Anne more stricken than she could have expected. While she mourned the loss of her father, darker emotions began to surface inside of her, something more complex than grief. It was a burning rage at the one man who had put Frank in the state he died in in the first place; Murphy Pendleton. For a time she tried to move past the tragedy, but she found it impossible. She obtained Murphy's files and when she heard that he was being transferred to maximum security for the attack on Frank, she set a plan into motion and began to call in favors and pull strings to get him moved to Wayside, presumably so she could murder him and take his life for taking Frank's. She later tells Murphy that she did “sick things” to get the transfer approved, though it is never expanded upon as to what kinds of unsavory things she may have done to make her plan work or what parts of who she was as a person she may have lost along the way. She was so consumed by the thought of revenge that most other things in her life fell by the wayside (no pun intended). It was the only thing she could focus on.

Finally, the transfer was approved. Anne went along to Ryall to pick up the inmates who were being transferred, Murphy among them. Much to his bewilderment, she antagonized him from the very beginning, singling him out as he got onto the bus and glaring at him during the entire long drive to Wayside. Then as the bus was passing the town of Silent Hill, an inmate named Sanchez started questioning Murphy about whether or not he had really killed Frank. Becoming immediately defensive about the mention of her father, Anne snapped at him and told him to shut up. Sanchez retorted with insults and curses, which just made her shout at him more, distracting the driver. In the split second his eyes were off the road, he failed to notice the fact that the road ahead of them was mysteriously gone, dropping off into nothing. To avoid pitching over the edge, the driver swerved, crashing through the guard rail and down a hill, into the forest below.

When she awoke, the first thing she did was attempt to round up the prisoners. Most of them were either dead or missing, and it was by a stroke of luck that she happened to run across Murphy attempting to scale a cliff and get back up to the town. She confronted him gun-first, pointing it straight at his face, despite the fact that he was unarmed and across a ravine from her. He insisted that he was going to town to get help, though she doesn't believe him, saying “and I suppose your cuffs just happened to come off in the process”, implying that she does not believe his claimed innocent motives (though his cuffs in reality were simply mysteriously gone when he woke after the crash). She unwisely tried to reach him by edging across a ledge on the side of the ravine that separated them, despite Murphy's warnings, and unsurprisingly slipped. Murphy attempted to pull her up, but she fell nonetheless, into the deep gorge below.

Much of what happens to Anne after that point is a mystery. It's never elaborated on how she survived the fall, but she appeared not long afterward when Murphy was exploring the mine, trying to find a way into the town of Silent Hill. She confronted him and forced him against the wall with a gun to his head and decided to frisk him. In the process, she found a mourning badge with her father's name on it, and proceeded to completely lose her mind for a moment. Forcing Murphy to his knees, she shouted at him about how her father was a good man and expressed her rage at him for killing him. Murphy reacted with absolute bewilderment and professed his innocence, which just made Anne angrier. Putting the gun up to his head, she told him he didn't deserve to live, but she couldn't bring herself to pull the trigger. Instead she stumbled away and sat down on the ground to cry. Murphy attempted after that to convince her that they would have a better chance of surviving the monster-infested town if they worked together rather than going it alone, but she vehemently refused, telling him to leave. Eventually, he heeded her request.

Later, when Murphy had made his way to the broadcasting studio and was trying to make plans with the DJ there, Bobby Ricks, Anne appeared and pointed her gun at him once more. She tried to get Ricks to let her use the phone, but he informed her that calls came in, but didn't go out. This fact was quickly confirmed, but before Anne even had a chance to react, a horde of monsters broke through the windows in the studio and attacked the three of them. In the confusion Anne's gun went off and killed the Screamer that was attacking Murphy, and, consequently, he escaped unscathed. When things settled down, Anne and Ricks were nowhere to be seen.

Later, when Murphy was attempting to leave the town by boat, Anne appeared mysteriously on the boat behind him (there was really no explanation given as to why she was suddenly just there, though I guess it can be chalked up to this whole thing being Silent Hill), pointing her gun at his head again and telling him to turn the boat around. He responded by saying that there was no way he would, and she might as well shoot him. This time, however, she actually did.

Somehow, Murphy did end up surviving the shot to the head, though it's not clear whether Anne missed, didn't actually shoot, or it was just the town intervening. But he went on to kill an enormous creature attached to four life support systems in the bizarre otherworldly version of Silent Hill's Overlook Penitentiary, a creature that seemed mysteriously like an invalid...

After the creature was dead, when Murphy found himself back in the normal version of Overlook, Anne caught up to Murphy and reprimanded him for killing it. Murphy was confused until its lifeless body transformed into the corpse of Frank right before his eyes. Anne then explained everything to Murphy, how she had pulled strings to get him transferred, how she had been forced to watch her father suffer day after day. As she shouted at him, Murphy changed shape in her eyes, into the monster she had begun to see him as, though much more literally this time. At that point, she started shooting at him, trying to kill him and exact her revenge for what he had done to her father. Murphy managed to knock her to the ground, and had the chance to kill her. Rather than doing so, he walked away instead, and it was at that moment that Anne saw a vision of what had really happened the night her father had been attacked.

It turned out that Sewell, the guard who had originally responded to the scene after Murphy had allegedly attacked Frank, had offered Murphy a deal. He would help Murphy be able to kill Napier— the man who had murdered his son, Charlie— and in exchange Murphy would do a favor for Sewell. The favor was that Murphy would wait in the showers, and Sewell would send down the person he was supposed to kill, the same way he had with Napier. When the person arrived, it turned out to be Frank. Murphy refused, and Sewell demanded that he do it, reminding him of the thing he had done for him and how Sewell himself had had to finish Napier off. Murphy still refused, and Sewell proceeded to incapacitate Murphy and beat Frank into unconsciousness and stab him in the neck with a shiv. The shiv he used was one that belonged to Murphy, that he had used on Napier. It had Murphy's prints on it, and there was enough evidence to convict Murphy of the crime.

After seeing all of this, Anne found Murphy in the showers of Overlook and told him that she realized that he hadn't been the one who'd killed Frank. He apologized for not being able to help Frank, and the two of them made peace. After they embraced they found themselves back at the bus crash site, and realized that the whole hellish ordeal was over. They shared a brief conversation, and then she let Murphy go free, knowing now that he was not the one who was to blame for what had happened to Frank.

Several days later, Anne paid a visit to Sewell, and this time she brought her gun. It is implied that she murdered him for the role he played in her father's death.

Personality: To put it bluntly, Anne's personality is a minefield. She is a very stubborn person and refuses to give up on something she wants. When she got it in her head to get Murphy transferred to her prison, she kept pushing for it and pulling strings and doing whatever she had to to make it happen. It also shows what a vengeful person she can be; she was willing to murder another human being for her revenge, and she dedicated the better part of her life after Frank died to making sure her vengeance could be completed. This level of determination and strength of will are also a major part of who Anne is as a person. She will not break under pressure and she will not let anything stop her from getting what needs to be done done.

She also has a very strong sense of justice, and will go so far as to break the law or do unspeakable things to make sure that justice comes to pass. For Anne, what is right and what is legal is not always the same thing, and she blurs the line between right and wrong quite frequently, but will do whatever is necessary to make sure that things turn out right. In the end she ends up letting Murphy, a convicted felon, go free because he was unjustly blamed for the crime that extended his sentence, and she didn't even seem to care that she could lose her job over it because it was the right thing to do. Her father was man who believed in justice, but Anne takes it one step further and believes in justice at all costs. Even if there is a lot at stake, she will flagrantly ignore laws and consequences to make sure that everyone gets what they deserve. Even when that means murdering someone. She has her own very well-defined ideals and beliefs about right and wrong, and she will not allow them to be changed. However, she will adapt and admit when she's been wrong, and do what she can to rectify her mistake. For someone so steely, she is surprisingly humble in that regard. Immediately after realizing Murphy is innocent, she changes her entire attitude toward him.

Another thing that needs to be realized about Anne is that she is not a warm and fuzzy person... usually. Her first reaction to things that she doesn't like seems to be to lash out with anger and the harshness that makes up such a large part of her personality map. As a woman in a predominantly male-driven career, it can be inferred that some of this characteristic harshness is to compensate for the fact that she is not as physically intimidating as her male colleagues, and therefore must be intimidating in other ways. And it works. A force to be reckoned with, Anne can hold her own against even the most hardened of criminals, not showing the slightest bit of intimidation when faced with murderers and rapists who are constantly heckling her. She is strictly all-business, going so far as to completely ignore those who flirt with her at work. Unless it's on a personal level, people rarely get to her, especially when she's on a mission. On her way to murder Sewell, she is accosted verbally by every inmate she passes, and she completely and totally ignores them. However, when it's someone she cares for that's being threatened or harassed, it's a lot easier to get to her. An inmate named Sanchez calls her the Spanish equivalent of “slut”, and she ignores him completely, but when he casually asks Murphy if he actually killed Frank, she flies off the handle and screams at him. Since Frank wasn't even actually being insulted, it's a little terrifying to imagine what she would do if someone actually insulted or threatened one of her loved ones. In that respect she is fiercely loyal.

Another large part of Anne's personality is that her emotions and behaviors can be very erratic. Case and point, she spent most of the time they were together in Silent Hill screaming at Murphy and threatening to shoot him, but after learning that it was Sewell who killed Frank, she immediately became friendly and accommodating and gave him a hug. This layer of sweetness that she normally keeps under wraps, probably for the sake of being taken seriously at work, is also part of what makes her such a multi-faceted character. Though she may seem unapproachable and even downright terrifying, she is also a friendly and openly affectionate person toward those she cares for (even the ones she hasn't known for long and hated previously, like good old Murphy). She isn't needlessly antagonistic toward those who haven't done anything to deserve it, though her first instinct in quite a lot of situations is to act harsh and untouchable. Anne is, at her core, a sweet person who has such a fiery temper and a need to show absolutely no outward weakness that she comes across as a complete and total bitch... and that assumption may actually be right.

Abilities, Weaknesses and Power Limitations: Anne has the ability to remain calm under pressure, but only to the extent that she won't be afraid. She will get angry and fly off the handle at the drop of a hat, which pretty much negates that ability. She is also a good shot with her pistol and seems to be rather physically fit. That's sort of a given, since to be a correctional officer she needs to be able to take down prisoners if necessary, and being physically strong is key. Another ability is her uncanny tendency to look fear in the face and keep moving forward anyway. Her weaknesses mostly lie in the fact that she allows her emotions to get in the way of reason, becoming irrationally angry and letting it rule her behavior. This girl has one hell of a temper and it will not be stifled, not for anything. Also, she suffers from impulsiveness that tends to get her into tricky situations.

She has no supernatural powers that need to be limited.

Inventory: Colt series 60 pistol (serial number 80-664690), prison-issue flashlight, nightstick, her correctional officer's badge
Appearance: Anne has auburn hair (that she usually wears pulled back into a ponytail) and green eyes. She has a rather slight build but she also is pretty damn strong, and she can subdue a grown man if necessary.
Age: 26

AU Clarification: n/a

SAMPLES
Log Sample: For the first time in a very long time, the sun felt warm on her cheeks. Underneath the enormous trees with the crisp scent of autumn leaves perfuming everything with the long-missed scent of reality, Anne looked to the sky, tucking a lock of flyaway hair behind her ear and just letting herself stare at the sky. It looked like rain, but between the clouds there were bursts of blue, bursts big enough to let rays of sunlight fall on desolate stretch of woods where she stood beside the twisted wreckage of the prison transport bus. For a moment all was still and silent, the sloshing sound of Murphy Pendleton's footsteps fading as he disappeared from sight. Then the silence was shattered by the hum of an ambulance up above on the highway, and the garbled voices of humans as they came skidding down the embankment.

“Is anyone hurt?” asked the calm, even voice of a paramedic as he headed for her, the white of his shirt blinding and for a moment she had to squint against it.

“I don't know...” she replied, pressing a hand to her head where she could feel the stickiness of the blood that had pooled around the gash there and run down her face. “I just woke up. “ it wasn't a lie, not really. She had woken up hours ago but she wasn't in the real world then. All of this was still so confusing that she drowned out whatever else the paramedic was saying, and allowed herself to recede inside of her head for long enough to try and get a grip on what had just happened. All of this time, she had been trying to desperately to punish Murphy for what had happened to her father, and in the end it turned out that he wasn't even to blame. It felt a bit like losing something of herself, but at the same time it felt like a weight had been lifted. Murphy hadn't been responsible. Frank had not been betrayed by someone he thought he could trust.

Still... she was back at square one with what to do about all of this. Everything that had happened in that town, everything she had seen, it had changed her. She knew this much already, even though the blood hadn't even begun to dry. She wasn't the same person who had gotten on the bus that morning, that was certain. It was difficult to pinpoint what the changes were, but she felt a little stronger, felt that she had a little more clarity. Though she had seen people die, killed monsters, been forced to fight for her life constantly since waking up in that town, she felt refreshed, somehow. Now that she knew just what sort of despicable person was responsible for what had happened, now that she knew it wasn't some awkward but polite man who'd once been a father, the world felt a little less cold. There was still the matter of Sewell being crooked that made her feel a little dirty being a prison guard, that was a matter she could deal with later.

For now, she could just breathe.

Comms Sample:

[there is a very angry-looking woman on the screen, her jaw set and her eyes cold and furious. For a moment she doesn't say anything, just scowls into the camera with a look that could probably melt lead if she was a superhero, and then she starts speaking and it's with an intensity that could make just about anyone feel uncomfortable]

Where the hell am I? I need to know, and I need to know now. I'm sick of this bullshit.

[the look on her face says that she is indeed serious, and somewhere in there under all the rage is confusion and fear, well-masked but still visible to the especially observant, adding even more layers of unpleasant emotion to the look that's in her cold green eyes]

If anyone can help me figure out what's going on, please just do it.

[and then the feed cuts]

Comments

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[savethebullshit]

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