The Cast
The Rainbow Soldiers (guys):
Dante--If you were to look up the word "Macho" in the dictionary, this badass's mugshot would be the description. Though all the guys are narcissists on one level or another, at least there's room for other people in their thoughts. With Dante, there's almost none. His main interests extend almost solely to his dual pistols, Ebony and Ivory, and his willful sword, Alastor, which embodies the spirit of lightning. Being part human (minus the conscience) and part devil, he's the man to put up front when the shit hits the fan.
Squall Leonhart--Squall is the cool, calculating type, and as such he is half the brains of the Rainbow Soldiers. The best way to describe him is the opposite of Dante. He is mostly courteous and the least vindictive of the bunch, unless irked, then things get ugly. Besides wielding a massive gunblade, Squall is the closest thing to a leader the guys have, and many will follow him on a word to the forbidden girls half of the castle. It is said, though not proven, that he even has the coveted gift of limited control over Zidane.
Link--Link is the other half of the brains of the RS. Supplier extraordinaire of good sense and ass-kickings, he is able to render any opponent a mere shell of what (if anything) he once was by either his rock hard sense of what to do at any given time or his superb fighting skills. This guy was weaned on Iron Knuckles. A sword and shield are his staple fighting gear, but few can match his accuracy with a bow, even if they dared to try with a top of the line sniper rifle. If his cap goes missing, there'll be hell to pay, no matter who took it.
Zidane--A word of warning: DO NOT piss this one off. You WILL regret it. Though slight of build, his thievery skills are top-notch. A master of stealth, camouflage, and subterfuge, and with the agility and reflexes of a cat, even Crash Bandicoot couldn't sniff out his trail. His weapons/tools of choice, double daggers, only serve to augment his skills as a wall-climber, lockpick, food thief, and revenge tool, among others. Though the only thing that truly controls Zidane is his stomach, he can usually be bought off by various forms of bribery, making him a household name in the "Damn-I-Want-That-Thing-But-I-Can't-Get-It-Myself" business.
Cloud Strife--Cloud is either very lucky or cursed beyond all others, depending on your point of view. On one hand, he has two girls that both vie for his attention in various interesting ways. On the other hand, they are both extremely possessive over him, and when they're together in the same room, you can start placing your bets on who will win the fight. Personal gifts/problems aside, he is like the middleman. Average of temper and mannerisms, he is the one most girls, boyfriends aside, can stand to be around for any length of time. As a weapon, he carries one BIG-ASS sword, the Buster Sword. It could cleave a block of titanium in two in one swipe. Usually slow to anger, his wrath is something that is undesirable, to say the least.
Tidus--Tidus is the water boy. Water is his life. Hell, he's the star of an underwater sport, Blitzball. He barely leaves the water, since in it he can find food, shelter, and companionship with the various sea creatures that populate the waters around Mallet Island, where all these fine folk live together in a castle that spans half the island. But getting back to dolphin-boy, he is capable of living on land, being human and all, but he much prefers the water. If you need him for an underwater job, just stick a message in a bottle and throw it out to the wide, wide ocean. He'll get it eventually. He can hold his breath almost indefinitely, and some have conjectured that he actually has gills somewhere on his body. Only he knows for sure. A master of underwater demolitions and other such nefarious deeds, he has great agility, in the water. On land his abilities are lessened somewhat. Did I mention he loves the water? Because he does.
Auron--Whether Auron is actually a member of the RS is up for discussion, but since he's a guy, that pretty much inducts him, whether he wants it or not. Like Cloud, he has a fixation with obscenely large swords, and he even more silent than Squall. Even harder to surprise than Zidane, Auron seems to take everything in stride. The fact that he is a walking ghost doesn't seem to bother him or anyone else at the castle very much at all. His true age is unknown, but people reason that he's been alive so long he must have gotten almost infinite patience. Must have. He refers to himself as "ageless", and there are certain times when he is easier to anger than others. Like meditation time. Or private sword-shining time. Or meal time. In fact, one might say that he is fairly easy to rouse. Not that you'd want to. If he comes after you, they'll be burying you with your head in your hands.
Cid Highwind--Cid is a first-class smoker/drinking companion. Loud, rude, crude, and not quite out of the potty-humor stage, he smokes like a chimney and drinks like a horse. A running bet is going on how long he'll last with that combination. Unbeknownst to Cid, though, Aeris replaced his lung-eating Marlboros with cigarettes that are actually healthy, but, sadly, nothing could be done about the odor they emit. Unbeknownst to ALL the boys however, is that all the girls got together and, with a mighty feat of sneakiness, replaced all of the beer in Dante's beer cellar with Vanilla Cokes, which are just as addictive but much less damaging to the brain. Cid and the rest only noticed an exciting new flavor of "beer". Cid, rather worryingly, is the castle mechanic. He keeps every gadget in the castle in tip-top shape. His life's dream is to build a system that is almost totally self-serving, but has yet to do so. His lance, though technically a weapon, is mainly used to fetch things from far away, prop things up, menace passerby, and that sort of thing. If you make Cid angry you can count on fluctuating water temperatures in the shower, the microwave exploding your meals, and, among certain other implements, a whoopie cushion in every seat that you decide to plant your butt in.
Crash Bandicoot--Ah, Crash Bandicoot. This piece of work is one of the many things in life that should not be explained, and yet demands an explanation anyway. To begin with, his temperament and personality differ with each passing day. He is a master of the fine art of obliterating everything in sight, and once ate a block of steel. You can bet he had problems with THAT one. His sense of smell is beyond any other nose on the planet, and that combined with his other tracking abilities make him the 24-hour, on-call blood hound. If you lose something, Crash will find it and bring it back. However, if you don't feed him before he leaves, he may bring your lost article back in his stomach. He will eat anything, meat mostly, but some vegetables too. Except eggplants. Even he turns up his nose at eggplants. He will also take a bite out of anything that looks/smells appetizing enough, and the aforementioned steel block was shaped like an eggplant.
Fox Mcloud--Fox McCloud is the leader of the Starfox mercenary team, but the rest of the team rarely have the balls to come anywhere near Dante's Castle for any reason at all. Incidentally, he is also one of the main income sources for the castle. What, you expect everyone else to just leave all those unused bucks he earns for handing Andross's ass back to him every time he tries to conquer the universe, do you? Come on, grow up man. Anyway, besides supplying part of the cash the runs the castle, he is also the best fighter pilot out there. Only the weight of numbers can bring this man down, as he excels at one-on-one combat. Falco can bluster, Peppy can claim the "experience" that comes with age, and Slippy can cash in on pure fool's luck, but none of them can match up to the one and only Fox Mcloud. Also, Fara (former title "The Bitch") was the bane of his existence until--this is all unconfirmed, all we have is Zidane's word--he got her alone in a dark room. She has toned down considerably since. Fox McCloud. A man among men, to be sure.
Barret Wallace--Barret is most well known in the castle for once taking on both Katt and Fara at the same time. A brave thing to do. Foolish, but brave. The odds were evened somewhat because he has a gun for his right arm, but not by much. He lasted a good goddamn while, but defeat was inevitable. He managed to knock Fara out with a good right hook (which, if you'll remember, was the gun arm), but Katt got on his back, and that is someplace you just don't want Katt to be. He went down like the oak his body resembles, but at least he fell on Fara. We're not even sure what got the fight started, or what they did that provoked him into what he knew was a losing battle. This little story should tell even the thickest of you a little about Barret's character. He's braver than most, and has the will to stick it out to the very end. He's the rock every team needs to fall back on every now and then.
Red XIII-- Red's real name is Nanaki, but everyone, him included, prefers Red XIII. If he so much as hears the word "Nanaki" spoken, he will personally come over, unsheathe his claws, and proceed to rip you a new one. 'Claws?' did I hear the reader ask? No? Well, I'll force it down your throat anyway. You see Red is a really big cat. Slightly larger than a lion. And blood red, with a fiery tail, and a scar over one eye. We suppose that makes him attractive to other members of his species. Of the opposite gender hopefully. If you don't like cats, then tough shit, Jack. He's here to stay. And he's damn welcome if I have anything to say about it. A brooding soul, he is almost always deep in thought. He communicates his finding on various world issues with quite possibly the most extensive English vocabulary I have ever encountered. You won't find any "ain'ts" or "y'alls" here. He is the perfect gentleman/cat, and the girls adore him.
Sparda--Here he is folks, the man (devil actually) we all have to thank for Dante's personality. Let's all give a hearty round of applause for none other than Sparda, Dante's father! A wholehearted supporter of fighting and laughing at others misfortune, he was Dante's only refuge from the horrors of living in the same 20-mile radius as Maria, Dante's mother. How Sparda and Maria got together in the first place is beyond the ken of most ordinary mortals, including myself. Anyway, the fact that they did get together and had Dante is a testament to the powers of compromise. Sparda was also another servant of Mundus until he had "had it with serving that stupid ass inbred!" And so he took up his sword in the name of all that is good and righteous, namely all the drinks and pizza he could ever want.
Kimahri Ronso--Kimahri is a Ronso with a broken horn. The Ronso are a proud race of cat-people who place great value on their horns. In the Ronso culture, the horn is a symbol of strength and power. And Kimahri's was broken off halfway by a troublemaker and his bully friend. To the Ronso, this is a sign of great shame and disgrace, and Kimahri ran from his homeland in his supposed shame. Though his horn-breaking had lasting effects, such as Kimahri's unwillingness to even speak to people he deems unworthy, he eventually paid back his aggressor in full, with a little interest on the side. Kimahri now speaks more freely, and he is on good terms with everyone at the castle. He is another spearman, and competes with Cid and Freya for the title of "Master Spearman/woman" on a regular basis. Known to go out and hunt for food such as innocent birds and game animals on the island, Kimahri is the best tracker in the castle, next to Crash, whom he looks down on. Guardian of Yuna for years now, he has protected her from monster attack many times, and he now protects her from such horrors as Zidane and Crash Bandicoot. Rest assured, wherever Yuna is, Kimahri is never far behind.
Doom--If you don't know this guy, you desperately need to take a history test, with games as the subject. This distinguished individual starred in the two games that really kicked off the first-person shooter genre of games, DOOM and DOOM2. Sporting a generic green marine suit and a cool helmet, he is a match for Dante in killing ability. When his squad was sent to Phobos, one of Mars' moons, he and his compatriots discovered that it had been taken over by a rather hostile alien army. His unit became separated, and all but him were slaughtered or turned into walking zombies, albeit zombies that carried rifles, shotguns, and chainguns. He faced off against Imps, Demons, Cacodemons, Pain Elementals, Arch-Viles, the giant Cyberdemon, and finally the Spider Mastermind in environments ranging from computer stations on the moon base to Hell itself before he was able to return to Earth, where he found that the enemy had beaten him home. He had no other option than to be the ass-kicking machine that we all know him for, and drove the demons from Earth back the Hell from whence they came, chasing them throughout Hell's fires and traps to their source, and dispatched the last of them with extreme prejudice. Now, he is still on alert for another invasion, and constantly keeps himself in shape in order to be ready for the next wave, which he sees as inevitable. The truth of the matter is that they are scared to even show their faces in daylight, for fear that he will catch a glimpse and storm through to stamp their sorry hides out of existence. Trips to Hell are no big deal for him, and he routinely ventures out to waste some fools. Sadly, he seems to have forgotten his name in the course of his harrowing journey, and now refers to himself simply as: Doom.
The Rainbow Soldiers (guys):
Dante--If you were to look up the word "Macho" in the dictionary, this badass's mugshot would be the description. Though all the guys are narcissists on one level or another, at least there's room for other people in their thoughts. With Dante, there's almost none. His main interests extend almost solely to his dual pistols, Ebony and Ivory, and his willful sword, Alastor, which embodies the spirit of lightning. Being part human (minus the conscience) and part devil, he's the man to put up front when the shit hits the fan.
Squall Leonhart--Squall is the cool, calculating type, and as such he is half the brains of the Rainbow Soldiers. The best way to describe him is the opposite of Dante. He is mostly courteous and the least vindictive of the bunch, unless irked, then things get ugly. Besides wielding a massive gunblade, Squall is the closest thing to a leader the guys have, and many will follow him on a word to the forbidden girls half of the castle. It is said, though not proven, that he even has the coveted gift of limited control over Zidane.
Link--Link is the other half of the brains of the RS. Supplier extraordinaire of good sense and ass-kickings, he is able to render any opponent a mere shell of what (if anything) he once was by either his rock hard sense of what to do at any given time or his superb fighting skills. This guy was weaned on Iron Knuckles. A sword and shield are his staple fighting gear, but few can match his accuracy with a bow, even if they dared to try with a top of the line sniper rifle. If his cap goes missing, there'll be hell to pay, no matter who took it.
Zidane--A word of warning: DO NOT piss this one off. You WILL regret it. Though slight of build, his thievery skills are top-notch. A master of stealth, camouflage, and subterfuge, and with the agility and reflexes of a cat, even Crash Bandicoot couldn't sniff out his trail. His weapons/tools of choice, double daggers, only serve to augment his skills as a wall-climber, lockpick, food thief, and revenge tool, among others. Though the only thing that truly controls Zidane is his stomach, he can usually be bought off by various forms of bribery, making him a household name in the "Damn-I-Want-That-Thing-But-I-Can't-Get-It-Myself" business.
Cloud Strife--Cloud is either very lucky or cursed beyond all others, depending on your point of view. On one hand, he has two girls that both vie for his attention in various interesting ways. On the other hand, they are both extremely possessive over him, and when they're together in the same room, you can start placing your bets on who will win the fight. Personal gifts/problems aside, he is like the middleman. Average of temper and mannerisms, he is the one most girls, boyfriends aside, can stand to be around for any length of time. As a weapon, he carries one BIG-ASS sword, the Buster Sword. It could cleave a block of titanium in two in one swipe. Usually slow to anger, his wrath is something that is undesirable, to say the least.
Tidus--Tidus is the water boy. Water is his life. Hell, he's the star of an underwater sport, Blitzball. He barely leaves the water, since in it he can find food, shelter, and companionship with the various sea creatures that populate the waters around Mallet Island, where all these fine folk live together in a castle that spans half the island. But getting back to dolphin-boy, he is capable of living on land, being human and all, but he much prefers the water. If you need him for an underwater job, just stick a message in a bottle and throw it out to the wide, wide ocean. He'll get it eventually. He can hold his breath almost indefinitely, and some have conjectured that he actually has gills somewhere on his body. Only he knows for sure. A master of underwater demolitions and other such nefarious deeds, he has great agility, in the water. On land his abilities are lessened somewhat. Did I mention he loves the water? Because he does.
Auron--Whether Auron is actually a member of the RS is up for discussion, but since he's a guy, that pretty much inducts him, whether he wants it or not. Like Cloud, he has a fixation with obscenely large swords, and he even more silent than Squall. Even harder to surprise than Zidane, Auron seems to take everything in stride. The fact that he is a walking ghost doesn't seem to bother him or anyone else at the castle very much at all. His true age is unknown, but people reason that he's been alive so long he must have gotten almost infinite patience. Must have. He refers to himself as "ageless", and there are certain times when he is easier to anger than others. Like meditation time. Or private sword-shining time. Or meal time. In fact, one might say that he is fairly easy to rouse. Not that you'd want to. If he comes after you, they'll be burying you with your head in your hands.
Cid Highwind--Cid is a first-class smoker/drinking companion. Loud, rude, crude, and not quite out of the potty-humor stage, he smokes like a chimney and drinks like a horse. A running bet is going on how long he'll last with that combination. Unbeknownst to Cid, though, Aeris replaced his lung-eating Marlboros with cigarettes that are actually healthy, but, sadly, nothing could be done about the odor they emit. Unbeknownst to ALL the boys however, is that all the girls got together and, with a mighty feat of sneakiness, replaced all of the beer in Dante's beer cellar with Vanilla Cokes, which are just as addictive but much less damaging to the brain. Cid and the rest only noticed an exciting new flavor of "beer". Cid, rather worryingly, is the castle mechanic. He keeps every gadget in the castle in tip-top shape. His life's dream is to build a system that is almost totally self-serving, but has yet to do so. His lance, though technically a weapon, is mainly used to fetch things from far away, prop things up, menace passerby, and that sort of thing. If you make Cid angry you can count on fluctuating water temperatures in the shower, the microwave exploding your meals, and, among certain other implements, a whoopie cushion in every seat that you decide to plant your butt in.
Crash Bandicoot--Ah, Crash Bandicoot. This piece of work is one of the many things in life that should not be explained, and yet demands an explanation anyway. To begin with, his temperament and personality differ with each passing day. He is a master of the fine art of obliterating everything in sight, and once ate a block of steel. You can bet he had problems with THAT one. His sense of smell is beyond any other nose on the planet, and that combined with his other tracking abilities make him the 24-hour, on-call blood hound. If you lose something, Crash will find it and bring it back. However, if you don't feed him before he leaves, he may bring your lost article back in his stomach. He will eat anything, meat mostly, but some vegetables too. Except eggplants. Even he turns up his nose at eggplants. He will also take a bite out of anything that looks/smells appetizing enough, and the aforementioned steel block was shaped like an eggplant.
Fox Mcloud--Fox McCloud is the leader of the Starfox mercenary team, but the rest of the team rarely have the balls to come anywhere near Dante's Castle for any reason at all. Incidentally, he is also one of the main income sources for the castle. What, you expect everyone else to just leave all those unused bucks he earns for handing Andross's ass back to him every time he tries to conquer the universe, do you? Come on, grow up man. Anyway, besides supplying part of the cash the runs the castle, he is also the best fighter pilot out there. Only the weight of numbers can bring this man down, as he excels at one-on-one combat. Falco can bluster, Peppy can claim the "experience" that comes with age, and Slippy can cash in on pure fool's luck, but none of them can match up to the one and only Fox Mcloud. Also, Fara (former title "The Bitch") was the bane of his existence until--this is all unconfirmed, all we have is Zidane's word--he got her alone in a dark room. She has toned down considerably since. Fox McCloud. A man among men, to be sure.
Barret Wallace--Barret is most well known in the castle for once taking on both Katt and Fara at the same time. A brave thing to do. Foolish, but brave. The odds were evened somewhat because he has a gun for his right arm, but not by much. He lasted a good goddamn while, but defeat was inevitable. He managed to knock Fara out with a good right hook (which, if you'll remember, was the gun arm), but Katt got on his back, and that is someplace you just don't want Katt to be. He went down like the oak his body resembles, but at least he fell on Fara. We're not even sure what got the fight started, or what they did that provoked him into what he knew was a losing battle. This little story should tell even the thickest of you a little about Barret's character. He's braver than most, and has the will to stick it out to the very end. He's the rock every team needs to fall back on every now and then.
Red XIII-- Red's real name is Nanaki, but everyone, him included, prefers Red XIII. If he so much as hears the word "Nanaki" spoken, he will personally come over, unsheathe his claws, and proceed to rip you a new one. 'Claws?' did I hear the reader ask? No? Well, I'll force it down your throat anyway. You see Red is a really big cat. Slightly larger than a lion. And blood red, with a fiery tail, and a scar over one eye. We suppose that makes him attractive to other members of his species. Of the opposite gender hopefully. If you don't like cats, then tough shit, Jack. He's here to stay. And he's damn welcome if I have anything to say about it. A brooding soul, he is almost always deep in thought. He communicates his finding on various world issues with quite possibly the most extensive English vocabulary I have ever encountered. You won't find any "ain'ts" or "y'alls" here. He is the perfect gentleman/cat, and the girls adore him.
Sparda--Here he is folks, the man (devil actually) we all have to thank for Dante's personality. Let's all give a hearty round of applause for none other than Sparda, Dante's father! A wholehearted supporter of fighting and laughing at others misfortune, he was Dante's only refuge from the horrors of living in the same 20-mile radius as Maria, Dante's mother. How Sparda and Maria got together in the first place is beyond the ken of most ordinary mortals, including myself. Anyway, the fact that they did get together and had Dante is a testament to the powers of compromise. Sparda was also another servant of Mundus until he had "had it with serving that stupid ass inbred!" And so he took up his sword in the name of all that is good and righteous, namely all the drinks and pizza he could ever want.
Kimahri Ronso--Kimahri is a Ronso with a broken horn. The Ronso are a proud race of cat-people who place great value on their horns. In the Ronso culture, the horn is a symbol of strength and power. And Kimahri's was broken off halfway by a troublemaker and his bully friend. To the Ronso, this is a sign of great shame and disgrace, and Kimahri ran from his homeland in his supposed shame. Though his horn-breaking had lasting effects, such as Kimahri's unwillingness to even speak to people he deems unworthy, he eventually paid back his aggressor in full, with a little interest on the side. Kimahri now speaks more freely, and he is on good terms with everyone at the castle. He is another spearman, and competes with Cid and Freya for the title of "Master Spearman/woman" on a regular basis. Known to go out and hunt for food such as innocent birds and game animals on the island, Kimahri is the best tracker in the castle, next to Crash, whom he looks down on. Guardian of Yuna for years now, he has protected her from monster attack many times, and he now protects her from such horrors as Zidane and Crash Bandicoot. Rest assured, wherever Yuna is, Kimahri is never far behind.
Doom--If you don't know this guy, you desperately need to take a history test, with games as the subject. This distinguished individual starred in the two games that really kicked off the first-person shooter genre of games, DOOM and DOOM2. Sporting a generic green marine suit and a cool helmet, he is a match for Dante in killing ability. When his squad was sent to Phobos, one of Mars' moons, he and his compatriots discovered that it had been taken over by a rather hostile alien army. His unit became separated, and all but him were slaughtered or turned into walking zombies, albeit zombies that carried rifles, shotguns, and chainguns. He faced off against Imps, Demons, Cacodemons, Pain Elementals, Arch-Viles, the giant Cyberdemon, and finally the Spider Mastermind in environments ranging from computer stations on the moon base to Hell itself before he was able to return to Earth, where he found that the enemy had beaten him home. He had no other option than to be the ass-kicking machine that we all know him for, and drove the demons from Earth back the Hell from whence they came, chasing them throughout Hell's fires and traps to their source, and dispatched the last of them with extreme prejudice. Now, he is still on alert for another invasion, and constantly keeps himself in shape in order to be ready for the next wave, which he sees as inevitable. The truth of the matter is that they are scared to even show their faces in daylight, for fear that he will catch a glimpse and storm through to stamp their sorry hides out of existence. Trips to Hell are no big deal for him, and he routinely ventures out to waste some fools. Sadly, he seems to have forgotten his name in the course of his harrowing journey, and now refers to himself simply as: Doom.