Oerba Dia Vanille

Oerba Dia Vanille [væniːl] is a playable character in Final Fantasy XIII. She is a mysterious young girl with red hair tied up in pigtails. Despite facing many hardships, she remains an upbeat and caring person. Vanille serves as the game's narrator, and in the English dub she has a Southeast Australian accent.

Appearance and Personality
Despite her chronological age, Vanille has the physical appearance of a nineteen-year-old young woman. She has red hair that she ties into pigtails, and both her ears are pierced, adorned with small silver hoops. Her outfit is apparently inspired by the traditional clothes of the Namibian Himba women. According to Dengeki PS3, the fur sash she is wearing was made from a bear she defeated by herself. She is also seen wearing the robes that the people exiled from Cocoon wear. Her l'Cie mark is located on her upper left thigh.

Vanille seems to have a child-like innocence. When she is with Hope, she shows a compassionate side. Vanille also cares deeply for Fang and constantly worries for her. Vanille is shown to be very caring and somewhat stubborn, but she mostly appears to be happy when truthfully she is actually afraid by "losing herself in happier days". During her time with Sazh, as he talks about his son Dajh, Vanille starts to show guilt for the part she played in his accident. Once Jihl Nabaat reveals the truth to Sazh, Vanille breaks down and runs off crying. She ultimately feels guilty for her lies causing many people grief.

Story
Vanille is a resident of Pulse, along with Oerba Yun Fang, and a l'Cie like the rest of the main cast. Five centuries before the events of the game, during the War of Transgression between Pulse and Cocoon, Vanille and Fang both lost their families at the hands of Cocoon's l'Cie and fal'Cie and became close friends after meeting at Oerba's Orphanage. When Fang became a l'Cie in order to protect her and Pulse, Vanille, worried about Fang and not wanting to be left alone, tagged along with Fang and decided to become a l'Cie, too. By the powers of Pulse's fal'Cie, Vanille and Fang are granted the power of Ragnarok and given the Focus to destroy both sides. In the climax of the Great War, Vanille is too scared to use the power of Ragnarok and Fang was forced to become Ragnarok on her own. Fang's incomplete Ragnarok is unable to destroy Cocoon, yet she and Vanille were crystallized as they managed to lay waste to Gran Pulse. Five-hundred years later, Vanille and Fang were revived within Cocoon after they were brought in by Galenth, who infiltrated Cocoon in order to complete its destruction. As Vanille and Fang are awakened, Vanille discovers that Fang has lost her memories of the events dealing with Ragnarok and pretends that she has forgotten them as well to hide the truth and prevent Fang from risking her life again. Events force Vanille and Fang to be separated and by the time the game begins, with Vanille meeting Serah and apologizing to her for the hardship she is to suffer in spite of her support.

As the game opens up, Vanille is among those saved by Snow Villiers and NORA from the train carrying exiles to Pulse. After Hope Estheim loses his mother, she provides him some comfort and encourages him to follow Snow in order to get the pain off his shoulders. Together, they ride an air vehicle into the Pulse fal'Cie. Hope asks hers if she is scared, and she says "Not so much." After Hope criticizes Vanille for not understanding the situation, she pouts at him and does a speedy explanation of the current events in what she calls, "The Purge in a nutshell." Hope worries that PSICOM will try to Purge them again for being in the fal'Cie. Vanille hugs him and tells him to calm down, but Hope pulls away from her. After journeying further into the fal'Cie, they are assaulted by Cie'th as Snow comes to their aid, joining him to save Serah before her companions all become l'Cie. After waking in Lake Bresha, everyone is wondering how to complete their Focus, so Vanille tells them that how to complete it is entirely up to them. A while after separating from Snow with Lightning, Hope, and Sazh, they come across ancient ruins. She runs ahead to explore the area despite Lightning's warning, but she is soon chased by a Garuda Interceptor. She outruns it and hides behind Sazh. After the creature is defeated, Vanille finds a Sanctum airship, and the party boards it and fly out of the ruins. Soon, they crash in the Vile Peaks, and several events separate her and Sazh from Lightning and Hope.

Following their separation from Lightning and Hope, Vanille spends a fair part of the game traveling with Sazh, and the two develop a close friendship. However, that friendship is tested when, thanks to Jihl Nabaat, Sazh learns of Vanille's inadvertent role in his son, Dajh, becoming a l'Cie, something Vanille herself had been about to tell Sazh before getting attacked by Jihl and a squadron led by her. Vanille runs off crying with Sazh following. Coming across the Fiendlord's Keep, she has a vision of Sazh calling her a cold-blooded killer pretending to be like the others, and how she brings them suffering by being alive. Admitting fault, Vanille tells Sazh to shoot her for all the suffering that she caused him and his son, and after Sazh asks her if she thinks he will forgive her if she dies, Vanille asks him what he wants from her, since she can not live yet can not die. After Sazh summons Brynhildr, who is about to strike him, Vanille stands between them in order to shield Sazh. She helps him defeat and tame Brynhildr, but still feels that she has to die for her sins. Soon after, Sazh almost commits suicide, they are both captured by the Sanctum, and she is restrained in a Purge robe walking in a funeral procession overseen by Jihl while Sazh is encased in the casket. During their captivity aboard the Palamecia, Vanille tells Sazh about how she became a l'Cie to fight Cocoon centuries before, how she and Fang awoke in Cocoon with a new Focus, and how Fang lost her memory. Vanille says that she was afraid of their new Focus hurting innocent people, so she pretended that she did not remember anything either in an attempt to run away from her Focus. Sazh forgives Vanille when he realizes what happened to Dajh was an accident and not really her fault.

In the Fifth Ark after everyone defeats Cid Raines, Vanille helps Fang tame Bahamut with Lightning. After a Pulse monster attacks their airship, she gets sucked out along with Hope. She manages to grab his wrist before losing her grip on the ship, but they are eventually saved by Fang and Bahamut. Much later in a section of Pulse called the Mah'habara Subterra, upon realizing Fang had remembered that she was responsible for the destruction of their tribe, Vanille tried insisting that Fang was not. This causes her to go into a state of emotional distress, and her l'Cie brand begins to glow, initiating the start of her battle with her Eidolon, Hecatoncheir, which Fang helps her tame. In the Sulyya Springs, Vanille reveals to Snow that she had met Serah, after the latter helped Vanille when she scraped her leg on the beach. Vanille told Serah that she wanted to apologize to Fang for lying to her. Serah told her to face it later if it was too much to deal with, and that running away from the ones that she cares about is not love. Although Vanille might want to shut them out for their safety, that will hurt them even more. This inspired Vanille to stop trying to escape her Focus and become a Cie'th.

At the end of the game, the fal'Cie Orphan forced her and Fang to summon Ragnarok to complete their intended purpose. However, Fang decides to once more assume the form on her own in an attempt to destroy both the fal'Cie and herself. But when Fang turns out to be unable to assume the form, Orphan tortures her to force Vanille into becoming Ragnarok, almost accepting the fal'Cie's demand were it not for their friends saving Fang. After Orphan's destruction, Vanille and Fang manage to summon Ragnarok together to stop Cocoon from crashing into Pulse by crystallizing it, and themselves.

Abilities and Equipment
As a l'Cie, Vanille summons Hecatoncheir, a many-armed Eidolon that transforms into a bipedal mech with four machine gun turrets. In battle, Vanille's weapon is a unique rod called the Binding Rod. The Binding Rod's head piece looks like a pair of antlers and the body consists of four long wires with hooks that deal damage to enemies by latching on and pulling. She concentrates on casting magic spells from a distance, as opposed to the close combat style of Lightning and Snow. Vanille is ranked second (along with Lightning) for highest Magic Attack making her a good Ravager, with the ability to learn all elemental spells up to the -"ra" rank with Fire and Ice being her -"ga" specialty. She also makes a very effective Saboteur, possessing abilities the majority of enemies are weak to. There's even her full ATB skill, Death, that deals non-elemental magic damage to an enemy and may inflict instant KO. Where Vanille truly shines is the Medic role, where she rivals with Hope when it comes to effective healing.

Musical Themes
In Final Fantasy XIII, Vanille's Theme is composed of solo piano. There is a variant of her theme "Memories of Happier Days," which plays when Sazh tells Vanille about his son in Nautilus, and the moment between her and Serah.

Trivia

 * Her Japanese voice actor, Yukari Fukui, has also voiced Terra Branford in Dissidia Final Fantasy. Though a coincidence, Hecatoncheir's Gestalt Mode slightly resembles Terra's Magitek Armor from Final Fantasy VI.
 * Vanille's crystal is in the shape of an apple.
 * Vanille shares her middle name with the spell Dia from Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy XI.
 * In the English version Vanille never calls her Eidolon by its full name, Hecatoncheir, she instead uses the pet name "Hecaton".
 * Vanille is the oldest of the series' "perky young girl" characters, with Krile, Relm, Yuffie, Selphie, Eiko, Rikku, and Penelo also included.
 * Vanille's major roles are Ravager, Medic and Saboteur.