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5. Ariana Dzerchenko

In Campaign One, Ariana Dzerchenko was one of the originally planned romantic interests for Jack Davison, the diminutive thief whose sole purpose in life was to look after and support his little brother, John. Jack was a bit shy and introspective, so Ari was viewed as a great choice for him, since she was also rather introverted. However, in a somewhat unexpected turn of events, Jack wound up sacrificing himself very early on in the campaign, in order to save Johns life after John had been captured, drugged, and cannibalized by a monstrous man in the unregulated and uncontrolled free-for-all territory between the south and central islands of Gotham City. Jack eventually found love in the form of Greta Hayes, aka Secret, but this didnt do much to help Ari.

Eventually, the cast DID meet Ari, when a summit arose in the aftermath of the Patchwork section of the campaign. This collection of territories contained some of the most lucrative factories in all of Gotham, and whichever territory got to claim control would earn a considerable leg-up over the rest of the city. Of course, most territories didnt see fit to send their leadership, instead opting for representatives to put their best feet forward. In the case of Oswald Cobblepot (aka Penguin), he sent one of his most trusted employees, the hard-working dock manager, Vari Dzerchenko. Vari has been one of the best dads across two campaigns (as I mentioned briefly during the Rex write-up), but as he had to leave his post in Penguins territory to attend the summit, he decided to bring his darling daughter along to keep an eye on her.

Vari absolutely adores his daughter, even going so far as to praise her for a vision he had that she would one day become a powerful member of the Green Lantern Corps. But, upon meeting and interacting with Ari for any length of time, it seemed apparent that she wasnt exactly up to the standards of the Green Lanterns (willpower is a key component of their corps). Rozetta (because Rozetta is a nerd who likes reading, and is an alien while Ari loves science fiction), and Tali (because she works in a library, has speech issues due to English not being her first language, and because shes played by me) both took to Ari, trying their best to befriend her and just generally make her feel comfortable around them. Ultimately though, Ari was just a bit too standoffish and bratty in the first campaign, and I feel like the core of her story never really got to come to fruition. She was a side character at best.

This brings us to Campaign Two, where Ariana Dzerchenko is a top five character (in my opinion). Once again, we met Vari Dzerchenko fairly early into our forays in Gotham City, and he remains one of the best dads around. However, this time, he couldnt watch out for his precious little future lantern. No, like most children in Gotham City, Ari was taken from her family and transported to Bristol Township, where it was hoped that she could be indoctrinated alongside countless other youths to become subservient Equated. Vari was naturally desperate to get his daughter back, and given that were not monsters (plus Pepper has strong emotions when it comes to family, and kids being put in harms way), we made a plan to breach the Brentwood Academy and get Ari back (along with Tefe Hollandwho was probably the more pressing concern to everyone other than me).

We get to Brentwood and start exploring the place, and the first hint that perhaps Ari had more going on with her this campaign was when we stumbled into the art gallery. One of the brainwashing methods the academy was using was to force the kids to paint pictures that would inspire the Equation to take root in their minds. We found Aris painting, and it was utterly disturbing, with great amounts of death, blood, and violence. Honestly, when we saw that, my heart immediately sank, because I assumed Ari had already been Equated, and that painting was just the result of an Equated mind being given free reign over a canvas.

It turns out, however, that this wasnt the case. We found Ari just fine, and she hadnt been Equated or anything like that. Steph had some choice words to say about her when questioned, but Steph thinks everyone is a little bit weird or beneath her by comparison. Honestly, when it comes to the plan of going to a location, finding a person of interest, and successfully extracting them back to the safety of Zonn ZorrAri has gotta be one of the easiest missions weve ever had. Now granted, she wasnt exactly the PRIMARY person of interest we were searching for, but still, we found her and we brought her back with zero real difficulty. Thats pretty nuts, given the number of steps required to rescue, say, Casey Washington, or Zoe Lawton.