Vincent Valentine

Name: Snarky
DW username: jackalope
E-Mail: marshmallowdragon [at] gmail [dot] com
IM: sargentsnarky | plurk is also sargentsnarky if I happen to not me on AIM.

Other Characters: A/N

Character Name: Vincent Valentine
Series: Final Fantasy VII
Timeline: After the film Advent Children but before the events of Dirge of Cerberus
Canon Resource Link: http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Vincent_Valentine
Character Background: First an important note: Final Fantasy VII is not just one game but rather a complete and utter mess collection of various media, from games to a movie to an OVA to even some novellas that mostly haven’t been officially translated into English. This body of work is known as the Final Fantasy VII Compilation. Some of it actually makes sense and adds to the story. Some of it... doesn’t.

Anyway, as far as this is relevant to Vincent...

We get an overview of Vincent’s backstory in the original game, Final Fantasy VII, and then more details and whatnot are retconned elaborated on in flashbacks, a sequel game called Dirge of Cerberus (DoC). However, DoC is rather poorly written and in some instances outright contradicts the original game (as well as even itself from time to time). For instance, there is a train graveyard that gets destroyed at one point in the original game. However, this train graveyard then serves as a level in DoC, even though DoC takes place three years after this train graveyard should have been reduced to rubble. Why? Who the hell knows. Dirge of Cerberus can be fun to play, but I really, really don’t think its creators put a whole lot of serious thought into it.

Anyway, for the sake of my sanity and simplicity, whenever there is a conflict, I will go first and foremost with what is presented in the original game and what can be derived from that. Secondly I will take into consideration anything shown in Advent Children, since I am taking Vincent from after those events. Only after that will I consider things presented in other ancillary Final Fantasy VII complication Compilation materials, provided they do not contradict the original game or Advent Children.

If you ever have any questions about any choices I make with regards to his character or backstory, please don’t hesitate to ask.

That tl;dr note out of the way, onto character background!

Vincent Valentine was born on October 13, 1950, making him the oldest playable character in Final Fantasy VII. At some point, he became a part of a group of people within the Shinra corporation - a weapons manufacturing company later turned electric company that wields enormous political and economic power - called the Turks. The Turks are a sort of cross between Shinra’s hit squad, mafia and their special ops and are officially known as the Department of Administrative Research. They take care of everything from being body guards for special assignments to assassinations to reconnaissance. Basically, whenever the president of the Shinra corporation wants something taken care of, he makes it a mission for the Turks, and they take care of whatever it is.

Eventually, Vincent is assigned body guard duty for scientists working in a creepy mansion in a remote mountain village on various projects with a being known as Jenova. Jenova is basically an eldrict abomination from space, though they didn’t realize this quite yet. Anyway, while overseeing this, he developed feelings for one of the scientists involved - a woman named Lucrecia Crescent. Dr. Crescent, although she seemed to return Vincent’s feelings to an extent, ultimately rejected him in favor of the other main scientist involved in the project: Professor Hojo. Vincent was disappointed, but hey what can you do. He just wanted her to be happy.

Except that Lucrecia and Hojo had a baby together and decided to experiment on this unborn child with cells extracted from the aforementioned Jenova. Vincent thought this was a bad idea and unethical and so on and told them as much. They ... totally brushed him off - after all, this was Lucrecia’s child, and therefore it was her choice. So Vincent - much to his later regret - just stood by. However, after Lucrecia started suffering plenty of ill effects from the Jenova cells being injected into her uterus, Vincent confronted Hojo one evening to try once more to convince them that no really, this is a bad idea and you should stop because it’s hurting her. Hojo responded by shooting Vincent and then proceeding to use Vincent as an experimental test subject. Lucrecia tried to save him by infusing him with a being known as Chaos, but things didn’t turn out so well, and Vincent eventually wound up asleep in a coffin in a locked room hidden in the basement of this creepy mansion in a remote town in the mountains.

The original game implies Hojo sealed him there probably because Hojo is a dick, while other material implies that Vincent willingly went to sleep in the coffin as punishment for what he perceives as a failure to stop Lucrecia from making stupid choices. Personally, I go with a bit of both. Hojo locked him in there to begin with, but later on Vincent chose to remain, even when he might have had opportunities to escape. Vincent develops a guilt complex over this whole chain of events, you see, and although he has come to acknowledge that Hojo is the one primarily at fault, he still blames himself for failing to prevent things going so terribly wrong. Undoubtedly, seeing the destruction wrought by Sephiroth only reinforces this, as Sephiroth is the primary result from the experiments on Lucrecia’s child.

Anyway, due to the experiments conducted on him, Vincent was rendered effectively immortal and forever looking 27ish - the age he was when he was shot, etc. So he slept in that coffin for about 30 years until the player party in FFVII woke him up. At first he was inclined to just go back to sleep, but then they mentioned Sephiroth and Hojo, and Vincent decided to go with them to take revenge on Hojo and also otherwise make amends for the things that happened because he didn’t stop Lucrecia from making choices that in retrospect turned out really terribly.

Vincent then stuck with the party for the rest of the game as various things happened, and eventually they did, in fact, kill Hojo. He did not leave at that point but instead stuck with them until they faced Jenova and moseyed after Sephiroth, who had summoned a gigantic meteor to destroy everything on the planet. Aerith, one member of the party who had been killed by Sephiroth, had luckily enough activated the spell Holy that would protect the planet from Meteor. Sephiroth was not so luckily blocking it from activating, but the party killed him just in time, allowing Holy to work its magic and redirect Meteor so that it only actually destroyed one city.

After this, the party largely went their separate ways. Some of them returned to their home towns, while others helped with rebuilding things that had been destroyed due to Meteor and whatnot. Vincent wandered about the planet, presumably getting used to not sleeping all the time and seeing what all had changed in the past three decades. He didn’t keep in close contact with his friends, but that wasn’t to say he completely cut contact with them. He just remained... distant.

Although he had in some ways come to terms with what had happened to him and to Lucrecia, and although he acknowledged that Hojo was the one who should have slept in payment for his sins, Vincent continued to harbor a lot of guilt about everything. Moreover, it would have been pretty difficult for him to easily integrate back into society, due to the results of the experiments on him as well as the time factor. Thirty years spent out of the loop is a long time, and the world changed a lot in the meantime. There would be a lot of new things and places to get used to, as well as the process of getting used to people again after thirty years of isolation. So it’s little wonder that he only visited or otherwise communicated with his former comrades occasionally during this time.

Two years later, and once again shit is going down! Due to remnants of Jenova contaminating the lifestream (basically the current of souls / lifeenergy of all living things in the planet), a lot of people developed a disease called Geostigma. It was the result of their immune systems trying to get rid of any lingering Jenova contamination. Meanwhile, remnants of Sephiroth popped up to attempt to resurrect Sephiroth again, because he was apparently a cat with nine lives or something.

Vincent’s involvement in all this was non-existent until he appeared abruptly to save Cloud from getting completely owned by Sephiroth’s remnants. Vincent then explained to Cloud what exactly the Geostigma was, and they also discussed if it is possible to be forgiven for things. Ultimately, Vincent wound up helping in the big fight that later occurred against the remnants (who, despite everyone’s best efforts, turned into Sephiroth anyway). Cloud killed Sephiroth for what was, I believe, the third time, and then Aerith was able to begin to purify people of the Jenova cells and thus rid them of Geostigma. Hurrah happy endings!

Vincent purchases a new cell phone to keep in better contact with his friends - in large part inspired by a young girl named Marlene (who is the adopted daughter of one of the party members), who was shocked he didn’t have a cell phone - and then goes back to mostly wandering, and well here we are at his canon point! ... that was probably way more detailed than you wanted, but if you’d like anything clarified or expanded upon, let me know.

In terms of his relationships with other people now, he largely keeps to himself. However, he does have a group of friends, and within that group of friends, he is closer to some than others. Vincent and Cloud share an understanding about feeling long-term guilt about failing to save someone they cared about - Vincent for Lucrecia and Cloud for Aerith - and they also have both been experimental subjects of Hojo, so they likely share an understanding over that, as well. Vincent and Cid are drinking buddies and seem relatively close - probably because they’re two of the older members of the party.

Nanaki (also known as Red XIII; he is not human but is rather a lion wolf thing with a flaming tail. His species is never named, but it is quite long-lived.) and Vincent share a particular bond about being the members of their group of friends doomed to live the longest. In the story On The Way to A Smile: Case of Red XIII, they discuss as much. Vincent reveals to Nanaki that he is effectively immortal, and they agree to meet near Midgar once a year from then on. Nanaki also makes mention of how easy Vincent is to talk to - likely because Vincent is very quiet and nonjudgemental in his listening. Th last relationship worth mentioning is that of Yuffie and Vincent, who share an interesting friendship. Yuffie frequently calls his cell phone and otherwise seems to enjoy tagging along with him or bothering him. Although he gets annoyed at her calling his cell for no reason, he otherwise doesn’t seem to mind her presence.

Abilities/Special Powers: Hoo boy!
Superhuman reflexes, agility, speed, strength, endurance, etc. Due to the experiments conducted on him, he has been rendered incredibly durable, unaging and also rapidly healing. He is therefore nigh unkillable but only in cut scenes. He also apparently has no need to eat or drink, if thirty years spent asleep in a coffin are any indication. Not that he can’t eat or drink, but simply that it isn’t required.

His left arm seems to have been replaced with a metal claw. In his original game design in particular, it appears prosthetic, and it still seems unlikely to be entirely natural in Advent Children and Dirge of Cerberus. I take this to mean that it is a prosthetic arm given to him by Hojo during experiments.

In addition, like most other people in the world of FFVII, he can make use of materia - small spheres containing magical properties - to use spells or otherwise amplify his abilities. He has particular talent with magic, if his stats are anything to go by in-game. He has the second-highest magic of all playable characters.

However, the experiments on him did not only render him nigh immortal, they also enable him to transform into one of four different demons. In game, these manifest as limit breaks, implying that the transformations occur mainly due to extreme injury or perhaps heightened emotion, though he seems to gain some control over the process as time goes on. By the time of Dirge of Cerberus, he is more or less able to transform into the first of the four demons at will. (Granted, it is with a ‘limit break’ item, but he’ll also transform without said item in cut scenes so... yeah. I interpret this as he gains more control over the process with time.) The four are as follows:

Gallian Beast. A purple beast monster with a mane of sorts and claws, horns and sharp teeth. It can tear things apart and also spit fire. It gets an updated design in Dirge of Cerberus but does not fundamentally change.
Death Gigas. A Frankenstein-like monster that can bash things and also electrocute them. It does not appear in Dirge.
Hellmasker. A monster with a hockey mask face and wielding a chainsaw. It can, of course, slash things with the chainsaw, but it can also use an ability called ‘nightmare’ to, well, project nightmares onto enemies, inflicting a myriad of status effects. It does not appear in Dirge.
Chaos. ... Chaos deserves very special mention. In the original game, it is simply Vincent’s ultimate limit break - a large demon with very large wings and powerful non-elemental attacks. However, Chaos’ origin, powers and story (as well as design) get significant expansion and retconning in Dirge of Cerberus.

On the planet FF7 takes place on, there exist creatures made by said planet called WEAPONs. Most of them exist as a sort of planetary defense in case anything threatens it, but there is also a special one called Omega. Omega’s purpose is - should sufficient extinction of life occur on the planet - to gather up the entire lifestream (that is, the life-blood of the planet; a collective ‘river’ of all spiritual energy and souls of everything on the planet and the planet itself) and take it to find another suitable planet, leaving a dead husk behind. But while Omega’s purpose is to move the lifestream, there exists a secondary weapon thing associated with it called Chaos, and Chaos’ purpose is to kill any remaining things on the planet so that all that’s left is just the raw lifestream energy for Omega to take.

Now, Vincent is not yet aware of what, exactly, Chaos is - he doesn’t learn until the events of Dirge - but it is relevant to explain what it is in order to explain why it is so powerful and why it has a very, very destructive streak. Moreover, although there is a special piece of Materia - called the Protomateria - embedded in Vincent’s chest that allows him to have more control over Chaos, it is not completely foolproof. If it is removed, Vincent will lose a lot of his control over Chaos and be significantly more unstable as regards his transformations. ... but hey, if it gets yanked out, don’t worry! At least the big bloody hole in his chest will heal right up given some time!

In addition to his Limit Break transformations, Vincent has also been seen to turn into a sort of flowy flying cape thing in Advent Children. And he seems to be able to fly and hover even when not transformed, both in the original game and in Advent Children. In Dirge he simply double jumps unless it’s a cut scene because there is a severe segregation of cut scene and story abilities in that game. This, along with the fact that he doesn’t seem to change outfits and the fact that the cape gets incorporated into some of his transformations (particularly Chaos’ wings), it can reasonably be assumed that it is to some extent a manifestation of his transformations.

Lastly, Vincent has some more mundane abilities, as well. He makes very good use of guns and is known to have very good aim / sharpshooting skills. Moreover, as a former member of the Turks, he undoubtedly has other miscellaneous skills associated therewith.

Third-Person Sample:

To say Vincent found Gold Saucer a bit overwhelming was an understatement. Even a couple years after he’d first visited with Cloud and the rest of their companions, the brightness and the noise still got to him, and he felt like he would never get used to it. He thought he would have enjoyed it before he’d been altered, but now the bright lights and the constant cacophony distracted him and hurt his eyes and his ears. And that was to say nothing of the crowds. He’d been trained to pay attention, keep on guard, always be wary especially in crowds, and those instincts remained, but this was a different era with different slang and different politics and different concerns, and he found it difficult to integrate even ignoring the typical response to his strange appearance - all of which only exacerbated his tendency to be on guard and to shy away from significant social interaction.

If he’d had his way, Vincent would probably have never set foot in this place again, after the whole mess with the Keystone, but he wasn’t here for himself. He was here because of his friends. Most of them rather enjoyed the resort, with its arcade and its roller coasters, its shows and its chocobo races, and everyone liked the occasional vacation away from home. Therefore, they’d collectively elected to meet at the Gold Saucer in celebration of the end of the Geostigma and what would hopefully be a bit of a breather for them all (or, rather, Cloud had suggested it and Tifa, Marlene, Denzel, Yuffie, and Cid had all been enthused enough about the prospect to convince everyone else to go along with it, lest they deal with disappointed puppy eyes from Marlene and whining Yuffie in particular).

And so, here he was, grimacing and hunching further inside his voluminous cloak. He fixed the woman at the entrance with an icy glare as she chirped at him to have a wonderful time and was slightly mollified to see her pale and shrink away. It wasn’t that he enjoyed frightening people, exactly, but it was nice to know there were some people he could still intimidate (unfortunately, it never worked on Tifa, Yuffie or Marlene who were all well-aware of the fact that he was secretly a usually nice person and took shameless advantage of it from time to time, when they could pin him down). Stalking into the resort proper, he squinted at the neon glowing signs and followed the paths to the bar attached to the haunted inn. It was the dimmest, quietest part of the whole damn place, and it was where he was determined to spend most of his time here (especially since Tifa had expressly forbidden him from playing the snowboard game again, after he’d very nearly shot it for being a poorly-designed exercise in frustration). He knew his friends would know where to find him, if they wanted to talk at him or tell him that he needed to eat more and visit more or otherwise be the well-meaning busy-bodies he knew and maybe kind of sort of liked. And that was fine by him. A few shots of liquor always made it a little easier to endure the anti-social vampire jokes, anyway, and with any luck, Cid would join him for a nice discussion on combustion and the latest prototypes for new airships.

First-Person Sample:

video

[ If he were honest, Vincent would have preferred to use simply text or voice, but the small buttons are somewhat difficult to use without stabbing them with his claw, and besides he’s still getting used to the device. Phone technology has progressed a long way while he’d been asleep, and just as he is getting used to it, suddenly he is here in a new place with an entirely different mobile device for him to grow accustomed to. So really, no one should be surprised when he inadvertently sets it to video instead of audio. But now that it’s on, he decides to simply roll with it and carry on with the request he wishes to make. ]

Good afternoon...

[ His discomfort with the technology is not readily apparent, however, as his voice is calm, and his expression is blank, glowing eyes betraying no hint of his uncertainty. ]

I have been experimenting with the closets... and I have inadvertently generated an overabundance of 12 gauge shot gun shells. If others could make use of them and take them off my hands... it would be appreciated.