Name: Aeris (Aerith) Gainsborough
Age: 22 (Final Fantasy VII), 16 (Before Crisis), 15 (Crisis Core)
Birth date: February 7th
Zodiac: Aquarius (The same as me! XD)
Occupation: Flower merchant (Most call her a flower girl)
Height: 5'4"
Blood Type: O
Race: Cetra
Home: Icicle Inn (born there), Midgar Slums (currently lives there)
Family: Professor Gast (Father), Ifalna (Mother), Elmyra (Adoptive Mother)
Weapons: Staves/Rods
Limit Breaks: Healing Wind (Level 1), Seal Evil (Level 1), Breath of the Earth (Level 2), Fury Brand (Level 2), Planet Protector (Level 3), Pulse of Life (Level 3), Great Gospel (Level 4)
Game Appearances: Final Fantasy VII, Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII, Before Crisis: Final Fantasy VII, Itadaki Street Special, Itadaki Street Portable, Kingdom Hearts, Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, Kingdom Hearts II
Movies: Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children
On to her personality. Aeris is one of the last Ancients alive, beings who are so much more in tuned with the planet compared to humans. Because of her heritage, she was often a kidnapping target for ShinRa so they could conduct experiments on her. Aeris didn't have many friends (other than Zack, and Cloud and his friends) and spent most of her time in an old, abandoned church raising her yellow and white flowers. She minded though, she always kept a positive attitude present and her dreams alive. She's very tender to strangers, like when she took good care of Marlene, Barret's adopted daughter while he was away, making sure she was safe when ShinRa finally took Aeris. She cares deeply for the people around her, whether you noticed it animated through the compilation or written in her open personality. She tried desperately to save the planets from the game's antagonist Sephiroth using the powerful White Materia, and died for Gaia's people moments later. In Advent Children, during a spiritual communication period (or words to that affect) Aeris was able to contact Cloud from the lifestream, knowing his feelings of guilt for her death were beginning to resurface. It was then she comforted Cloud by saying she never blamed him for her death, and she was just grateful that he even came back to find her. She told him he was being silly, and that he needed to move on with his life as she held no personal grudge. Aeris is someone who couldn't possibly hate most anyone, and feels that there's good and reasoning in the hearts of all.
Aeris's Love life: Living in slums for the entirety of anyone's life would put a damper on their positive outlook on life, but not Aeris. She spent a good chunk of her life trying her best to restore natural beauty to the slums of Midgar through the beautiful buds of her flowers. She raised her flowers in a nearby abandoned church with a hole in the center of the floor, exposing a fertile patch of soil. It was her sanctuary, it was her quite place to work, and it was the location in which she met two men (at different times) whose appearance promised to change Aeris Gainsborough's life forever. They were Zack Fair, a first-class member of SOLDIER, and Cloud Strife, a former member of SOLDIER.
Of the two, Zack was the first to meet Aeris. During a SOLDIER mission in Midgar, Zack ended up falling right through the roof of Aeris's church, right atop her flowers. She looked out for him until he gained consciousness from her voice. The two started up a conversation, and hit it off quite well. She confided in him about her dream to sell her flowers so she could spread their beauty across the world. Zack soon after promised to build her a wagon to carry and sell her flowers around town, and their friendship/love affair (however you want to look at it) bloomed stronger and brighter than any flower Aeris could ever grow. Since then the two are found wandering through the slums or calling each other frequently on their cell phones. In fact, while on a trip to visit Aeris, Zack bought her that signature pink bow always found pulling back a big braid in her hair, even years later.
Seven years later, in the beginning of Final Fantasy VII, Aeris meets Cloud in, yes, her church. Soon after their meeting, the Turks show up to ruin the moment and take Aeris away. Not if Cloud has anything to say about it! He helps Aeris escape the Turks' tyranny, and the two are inseparable since. Aeris joins Cloud and his friends on their journey to defeat the heinous Sephiroth and save the planet, and throughout her short journey with them she exposes some deep feelings for Cloud, however she never comes right out and says it (it's pretty painfully obvious, though). For instance, in some player's scenarios, while the whole gang stays the night at the Golden Saucer, Cloud gets paid a visit by one of the party members he has been the most kind to, and one of them is Aeris. There they participate in a play about a prince (Cloud) who saves a princess (Aeris) and the two act out some pretty romantic scenes, though all are innocent. So throughout the game these two are only really "cutesy". Why? Because, Tifa is here to intervene. She's not cold hearted, but it's also very apparent that Cloud has much stronger feelings for his childhood friend than he does for the flower girl. But I don't think Aeris ever really minded.
Here it comes folks: her death. A heart wrenching scene it was where I, along with my friends and probably millions of others who played the game, wept uncontrollably to where my parents thought there was something mentally wrong with me (parents just don't understand). As mentioned above, Aeris journeyed to the Forgotten City (where she and the others were suppose to go together) alone to try to stop Sephiroth from using his Black Materia, which could destroy the planet, with her White Materia. As she prayed for her powerful materia's power to be unleashed, Sephiroth deviated a cruel, cheap attack on her by taking his sword and stabbing it through her back, ending this flower girl's life. Holy wasn't called, and Cloud and his friends arrived at the Forgotten City a minute too late. Sephiroth disappeared, and her friends laid Aeris to rest right there.
About Her Family: Aeris's family was a complicated one, to say the least. Her father, Prof. Gast, an ex-ShinRa scientist, and her mother, Ifalna, a lonely and beautiful Cetra. If you think about it, Gast's background with ShinRa and Ifalna being a Cetra, their love was just one big contradiction. But it was true, if anything else, and soon after marrying they had their precious baby daughter Aeris. Life couldn't get any better than this, and the feeling was mutual among the trio. Happy times ended soon when ShinRa sought after little Aeris. While Gast stayed behind to try and hold them off, Ifalna and Aeris (who was only a few months old at the time) fled for safe land for many years. Finally their journey ended when Ifalna and Aeris came to Midgar (Aeris now being about five or six). However, Ifalna never was never granted the deserved right of seeing her daughter, in person, grow into a kind and wonderful young lady. As the two stepped off the train in Midgar, Ifalna fell to her death. Elmyra was also at the train station waiting for her husband's return from the war in Wutai and witnessed the spectacle. Before Ifalna drifted away to the lifestream, she asked Elmyra to fill one last request: raise her daughter. Elmyra agreed, and Aeris has lived with her and known her as her mother ever since.
The Battlefield: Now, in the first game, Final Fantasy VII, Aeris is basically a White Mage who fights with staves/rods (whatever you want to call them). None of her Limit Breaks ever physically damage the enemy: they either put a status effect on your foe or heal your party one way or another. And the fact that her White Materia contains the magic called Holy leads to more evidence that she takes on the role of White Mage as that is a common and strong White Mage ability. Thus, her attack power in battle is lacking; she should only be use to heal party members, whether it be with magic, limit breaks, or items.
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