An alcoholic and general ne'er-do-well, Ari is a strange woman with no clear motive...it's all for the sheer Hell of it.
'What color are they wearing, and what language is everyone swearing in? Shit...'
There are times at which she can be charming to a fault, and others where she's definitely not above calling someone's mother a whore. Likely due to a variety of chemical imbalances--some of which may well be instigated by her insatiable thirst for vodka--it's difficult to determine how the Ri'ehn woman is going to react in any given situation. The only perceptibly consistent characteristic she displays is a rather lackadaisical disregard for her own well-being and good sense.
She has a naturally addictive personality--and while some of her crutches are readily evident, others are not. For instance, there's her rampant alcoholism and curiosity--the latter tending to get her into more trouble than the former, and the former actually occasionally lending her some idiot savant capacity to get herself out of that trouble.
The relationships that she develops with people tend to be rather intense, but most aren't lasting. For the while that she maintains her affections, she is unwaveringly loyal and will do anything for those people... All the way up until the day she up and vanishes from their lives, without so much as a by-your-leave.
Planning is not her strong suite, and so a majority of the decisions she makes are on the spot, comprised purely of impulse. Hindsight tends to be a quite painful experience for her. Although she overtly expresses a lack of concern for the consequences that could be rendered by her choices, she tends to lose a lot of sleep over them--or demolish whole bottles of alcohol at an alarming rate. Although she will boast the attitude of being free and willing to do whatever it takes to maintain her liberty, she sometimes displays a disconcerting handicap in regards to making autonomous decisions, especially if there is an apparent possibility that what she does may bring the few people she cares about to harm... In these instances, she is wont to let someone else tell her exactly what to do--partly to alleviate the burden of responsibility, and partly because she cannot trust herself to make the right decision.
As though in reflection of her way of throwing caution to the wind and the weight of the consequences, she has a minor addiction to games of chance and wagers.
All in all, it can honestly be said that Ari is a passionate creature. Before she found herself all too involved in things much bigger than herself, she could not at all be moved to care about anything that did not at least peripherally involved her.
-A well-worn musette bag with modified internal compartments to accommodate the following.
-Black leather-bound sketchbook. (Musette bag.)
-B.I.C. mechanical pencils. (Musette bag.)
-Black fine-tip R.S.V.P. ball-point pens. (Musette bag and pouch.)
-Silly Putty. (Very important.) (Musette bag.)
-Pink-pet eraser. (Musette bag.)
-Charcoal sticks. (Musette bag.)
-A chopstick with a particularly sharp point. (Musette bag or in her hair.)
-Indian ink. (Musette bag.)
-A tightly-sealing glass bottle of about twenty ounces that carries gasoline, kerosene, or lamp oil. (Musette bag.)
-Depending on her financial status or good fortune, there's likely a bottle of vodka in that bag. (Musette bag.)
-An apparently broken watch of indeterminate use. (Worn at all times around neck.)
-A spring-assisted Kershaw Scallion knife. (Pocket.)
-A small B.I.C. lighter. (Pouch.)
-Mace. (Pouch.)
-A little color-changing glass one-hitter pipe (with a dubious, likely illegal residue) wrapped in a soft cloth. (Musette bag.)
-A small Moleskine notebook with all manner of randomly scratched notes. (What is in English doesn't make sense; what isn't in English is in Elder Futhark, or Ri'ehn script.) (Pouch.)
-Four-inch L.E.D. flashlight. (Musette bag.)
-Full-tang five-inch blade (nine inch total length) knife with...a rather old-looking blade and leather-bound hilt in leather sheathe. (Right hip.)
-Black-glazed ceramic shot glass that bears the Seattle skyline and claims that the city is the "coffee capital of the world". (Musette bag.)
-Small wooden puzzle box that smells suspiciously like something green that's inexplicably illegal. Bears a wolf howling. (Musette bag.)
-Sidewalk chalk of a variety of colors. (Musette bag.)
-A much-loathed, very cheap, rarely used cell phone. (Musette bag.)
-An in-ear device directly linked to a good friend of hers. (In ear.)
-Halo P.D.A. (Musette bag.)
-A Scatteran gun. (Musette bag. Right hip.)
-Bullets for aforementioned gun. (Musette bag.)
-Level four disruptor pistol. (Left hip.)
-Personal computron (Aschen P.D.A.) (Right hip.)
-Combat vest. (Underneath L.D.A. issue suit.)
As far as Ari is concerned, there is little about her past that even concerns her anymore. When she fled Earth, she left everything and everyone behind. She came to Terra to start a new life...
Two years ago, she was performing a working interview at Gambit's bar; having no idea whose Ambrosia she was serving, she brought a poisoned glass of the anti-freeze green intoxicant to Admiral MacGregor's wife. It all went downhill from there--the Aschen dropped on her, assuming that she was a terrorist. Of course, it wasn't in Ari's nature to just give up--especially since she had hardly the faintest notion what was happening. Naturally, she became a fugitive for almost a year and a half...
Ever since her first encounter with the Aschen, she had not felt all that keen on them. As they continued to harass and hunt her down, her disposition mutated from a peripheral dislike to a very focused hatred. It was then that she started looking into making contacts with stronger, more able factions that might be able to offer her protection from the Confederacy--or at least offer her avenues for revenge. In so doing, she has grown rather fond of the Invictus and the Red Halo.
In the last six months, these allegations and the persistence of the Aschen have brought her through Hell and back. They have done everything from pursuing and detaining her under both legitimate and false pretexts to torturing and humiliating her. At one point, they had implanted her with a microchip to keep track of her, as though she were some kind of dog... When trying to apply for legitimate employment, she was denied.
They ended up charging her--legitimately--with assault on an agent...and even though they had claimed to drop the charges for attempted murder on Admiral MacGregor's wife (on the grounds that the actual responsible party had been identified), they were once again brought up against her. It was only by paying through the nose for the Scum of Caprica to defend her that she made it through a pre-Triad indictment and avoided going to full-on Triad. She was put on probation and told that they would get back to her about confirmation of employment. For once, Ari had stopped running and turned around to face the Aschen and play their game. She thought that perhaps then they would leave her alone...
That was a foolish assumption on her part.
The Aschen had suspected that she was hobnobbing with different factions since the fateful day in Gambit's when she had simply delivered Ambrosia--and so they had been watching her closely since then. They weren't aware of the nature of her contact, exactly--but they intended to find out. It was made painfully clear that they were done fooling around with Ari and entertaining her whims when her first probation meeting turned into an interrogative torture session. They gave her an ultimatum: They would entertain her existence a little longer, so long as she acted as their inside agent for the Red Halo and the Terran Liberation Front. She agreed and was released...
After less than a month, the Aschen requested that she formally be inducted into the L.D.A.--though, the term 'requested' is loosely utilized here. She really had no choice, as per the usual when dealing with the Aschen... It was either join or be terminated on the basis that she was affiliating with terrorist factions.