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| - Ardette came as part of the last wave of subjects to enter Step City before it was cut off from the rest of the world (X083-84). It was a confluence of brilliant minds and an opportunity to get away from her family, and she wanted in. Ardette was a precocious teenager who was too mature, too self-confident, obnoxiously bright, and utterly alone, which made it easy to lie about her age. If anybody knew she was barely 17, they didn't care. The handsome young Scientist who got her a boarding pass and a room in the Research District certainly didn't seem to mind.
- Ardette was born and raised in Brussels, Belgium, and when World War I broke out, she was determined to die there, too. Young, stubborn, and idealistic, Ardette refused to leave her family home and flee to the Netherlands, even when her fiance was sent to the front lines. By the time fleeing started to seem like a good idea, the Germans had already erected the Wire of Death. And so, she stayed, bolstered by the promise that her fiance would return. He didn't. Alive or dead. No body, no apologetic knock on her door, not even a letter.
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| abstract
| - Ardette came as part of the last wave of subjects to enter Step City before it was cut off from the rest of the world (X083-84). It was a confluence of brilliant minds and an opportunity to get away from her family, and she wanted in. Ardette was a precocious teenager who was too mature, too self-confident, obnoxiously bright, and utterly alone, which made it easy to lie about her age. If anybody knew she was barely 17, they didn't care. The handsome young Scientist who got her a boarding pass and a room in the Research District certainly didn't seem to mind. The Research District turned out to be an excellent place for a student abroad with a developing knack for languages, and her time spent there was mostly academic. She eventually legitimized herself as something of an off-duty interpreter for the STEP Project's international faculty. Ardette was never allowed to be privy to any of the actual Research aspects of the STEP Project, and most of the Research Tower was off limits to someone who was nothing more than a civilian kid, but eventually her presence in Research stopped raising eyebrows... Even when she started living with her Scientist Friend in the Pavilion. For a while she was genuinely happy, and satisfied with her decision to move there. She couldn't have known that this would put her within critical range of the V-Day events. V-Day (X086) - Ardette was nearly killed in the blast and the tremors that followed. Her Friend - miraculously unscathed, and untouched by the Vibe - found her in the rubble and nursed her back to health. Ardette spent several months in what was left of the medical ward, and in her weakened state, it took a long time for her Vibe to present itself. When it finally did, it took longer still to learn how to control it. Even with the relative isolation of the Research Pavillion, and the Scientists' continued secrecy around civilians, Ardette could see the swift degeneration of Step City as she knew it. (X087) Despite her slowly blossoming Vibe and often overwhelming desire to dance, her Friend convinced her to stay with him in Grey. It was unsafe out there, he said. They'll come for us and end all this, he said. On good days, Ardette told herself he wanted her to stay because he loved her. The rest of the time - most of the time - she knew it was because he wanted to study her. She let him, until X089. Ardette's history is a little hazy around the time of the Scientists' Rebellion (X089). Her Friend and two of his colleagues in the Pavilion - all jamdeaf and allegedly co-conspirators in the crippling of the city, though this can't be proved - were all found dead, due to complications of massive epileptic seizures. Ardette had disappeared, and she was presumed dead. She went anonymous, under the radar, which was easy, given the chaos. The years that followed were spent exploring and then perfecting her vibe. The occasional abandoned building that got trashed, or run-ins with would-be assailants that ended gruesomely, were filed under the general violence of the city post-Rebellion and went largely uninvestigated. Ardette eventually made an abandoned warehouse her home base and spent much of her time alone, until the mass exodus of exiles to the Grey District in X093. Ardette used her vibe to aid in the clean-up of the Research District, making the area somewhat habitable for her fellow Squares. But for the first time, she found herself surrounded by a population abuzz with Vibe, and that's when she discovered a side-effect of the Vibe she couldn't have during her isolation. It appeared that dance was another language she had acquired. Her knack for language and interpretation had translated to an ability to read dance in other people, to form "sentences" and the most volatile combinations of steps to manipulate vibe. What was once part of her own training and survival now became an extremely marketable service that she could provide a population that was weak and disenfranchised. The more clients she took on - in exchange for food or manual labor on what would become her studio - the more attention she got. Soon, her clients were the powerful and influential, and cred started coming in. Thus were the humble begins of Le Conservatoire de STEP . Many of the steppers she trained, on both sides, killed and were killed in the War of '99, right on her doorstep. The War of '99 is a touchy subject. Ardette, to this day, stubbornly refuses to pick a side. Perhaps this is because of her early connection to the Research District pre-V-Day. Maybe it's because she doesn't want to jeapordize the protection that her neutral status and studio offers to her. It could be because she's seen true ugliness on both sides. All there is to say is, good luck trying to recruit her.
- Ardette was born and raised in Brussels, Belgium, and when World War I broke out, she was determined to die there, too. Young, stubborn, and idealistic, Ardette refused to leave her family home and flee to the Netherlands, even when her fiance was sent to the front lines. By the time fleeing started to seem like a good idea, the Germans had already erected the Wire of Death. And so, she stayed, bolstered by the promise that her fiance would return. He didn't. Alive or dead. No body, no apologetic knock on her door, not even a letter. After the war, Ardette traveled through Germany looking for her fiance’s grave, or at least clues as to his death, if he had died at all, but he had by all accounts disappeared. She would later learn that he had deserted, and died by electrocution trying to cross the border into the Netherlands. He was buried in a mass grave. To learn that he had given up and left her behind while Belgian citizens were being slaughtered felt like the highest betrayal, and Ardette began her journey home defeated. Suffice it to say, Ardette got a little… lost… on her way back to Belgium, and found herself in Streitstadt a little over a year ago. She's a forward-thinking city girl who's found herself in a tiny, backward-thinking village and her first year in Streitstadt has not yielded the warmest of welcomes. The townsfolk, general wary of outsiders, did not take to this foreign woman traveling alone and without an escort. There is the occasional rumor that she is a witch; after all, she wears trousers, has a garden, and doesn't attend church service... Needless to say, Ardette does not have many friends in Streitstadt, but in all fairness she hasn't bothered to try and make any.
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