- "I won't let them simply...wash their hands of her, like she was never here. Like she never existed. She deserves better than that. She deserves to be remembered. She was a person. A girl."
- ―Dr. Jeanine Park[src]
Faith is a girl who communicates appears throughout Dreamfall, urging Zoë Castillo to "find her - save her; find April Ryan, save April." As the game progresses, her identity, existence, and abilities become of the game’s chief mysteries.
Faith appears as a small child in a white nightgown with long black hair, clutching a small doll. She interacts with Zoë in two different ways: via monitor images, and via dreams induced by the Dreamer Console. She is usually found in a snowy landscape, with an eerie Black House in the background, her image broken up, as if by static.
Dreamfall[]
Beneath the Factory[]
When Zoë is hooked up to a Dreamer Console, she finds herself in the Winter, the landscape she has been seeing. The little girl - whose name we later learn to be Faith - appears to Zoë, again urging her to save April, and causes the ice under Zoë's feet to collapse. When Zoë awakens, she is in Arcadia. This happens twice, with Faith acting as the go-between for Zoë 'travelling' to Arcadia.
Following Reza Temiz's trail to WATI City, Zoë meets Damien Cavanaugh, who explains that a virus or some kind of system corruption is affecting WATI's Project Alchera and the DreamNet that is its core. Eventually, with Zoë's help, Damien traces the origin to an abandoned doll factory in Russia that hides a secure lab in the basement. Here, Zoë finds an observation room mocked up as a child's bedroom, complete with a bed, grandfather clock and doll's house.
A data cube containing the testimony of a research scientist, Dr Park, chronicles experiments done on Faith, and Helena Chang fills in the gaps. She is revealed to have been a child created by JIVA for an unknown purpose. Helena Chang just describes her as an experimental subject, though Zoë seems to believe Faith was originally created to research dreams. Chang had intended to give Faith to a foster family because she didn't have long to live, but WATI had other ideas, and used Faith to test their drug, Morpheus, a key element of Alchera.
Faith's snowy landscape
Faith spent her days in the observation room, colouring pictures - that seem to depict Zoë and even, possibly, the Undreaming - and playing with her doll's house. However, the experimentation weakened Faith's heart, and she died after a massive dose of Morpheus on the 3rd of November, 2218. In her testimony, Dr Park uneasily suggests that, at the moment Faith died, she saw a flickery image of a wintry landscape and Faith's doll house - which strongly resembles the black house - on her computer screen, though she passes this off as stress and overwork.
Traces[]
However, according to Helena Chang, Faith remained, to an extent, alive in the Wire, that she became a "ghost in the machine, whatever you want to call it," and is the cause of the deadly Static affecting systems across the world. She claims that Zoë and Faith share a degree of genetic similarity and that Faith has bonded with her, a bond Zoë can use to prevent any further damage.
Knowing that she has to prevent any more deaths from the Static and that Faith is, technically, already dead, Zoë returns to the Winter. Faith is playing inside the Black House, which is essentially a reproduction of the observation room where she spent her life.
Faith tells Zoë that she is not the only visitor to the Winter. A woman Faith calls the "White Lady" has also been there. This 'White Lady' has a message for Zoë - "you did good, that you saved April", despite the fact April has apparently been fatally injured in the swamplands by this point. According to Faith, this 'White Lady' was the one who told her about April to begin with. She confirms that she and Zoë are sisters, something the White Lady told her as well, but that Faith also knows instinctively, and despite Zoë's gentle arguing, says their mother is not dead. This relationship is why Faith has bonded with Zoë and appeared to her personally. Assuming that being a Dreamer is genetic, this could explain some of the power Faith has, especially her control over the Winter. She seems to realise why Zoë is there, and that she is "supposed to be dead". While Zoë sits with her, Faith slowly begins feeling cold, then sleepy, and finally curls up on Zoë's lap to rest. Zoë promises to stay with her, and then Faith disappears, finally at peace.
Dreamfall Chapters[]
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“Where have you gone to, Dreamer. Whose dreams are you dreaming?” — Spoilers for Dreamfall Chapters follow. |
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While Faith does not appear in Dreamfall Chapters, further context is provided explaining her existence and abilities, much of it recontextualizing or even contradicting claims made in the previous game.
After Zoë awakens inside a JIVA facility in Mumbai, she discovers information on the company's experiments, which include references to not only herself but to Faith. Eventually, Zoë recaptured by Helena Chang, who explains how she and Faith came to be.
Like Zoë, Hanna, and Hope, Faith was birthed by Helena Chang and JIVA, and engineered with the genetic potential to become a dreamer—someone with ability to alter reality via dreams. The last of the JIVA children, Faith, like the others, was believed a failure, unable to channel the dream energies in order to reshape the universe in accordance to Helena's wishes. Unlike Zoë or Hanna, who were allowed to live mundane existences in relative freedom, Faith was kept under WATI control and observation, which lasted until the moment of her death.
Abilities[]
As a dreamer, Faith, like Zoë, can reshape reality via dreams. While less stable and more limited than Zoë’s abilities, they nevertheless allowed her to project binaries of herself, both within The Wire and into a world of her own creation, which existed independently from her physical body.
Trivia[]
- In an interview Ragnar referred to Faith as "an eight year-old girl" meaning, if her time of death was on the 3rd of November 2218, she was born in 2211, or 2212 if her birthday was after the 3rd of November.
- Given Helena Chang's description, Faith is a 'ghost in the machine.' This concept of a living soul on an online system has similarities to the anime series Ghost in the Shell, and another series known as Serial Experiment: Lain. Faith certainly had a great degree of power, both in the Winter and in the Wire. But she was still just an innocent young girl, and it is entirely possible she was being manipulated by her 'White Lady' or outside forces.
- On the Dreamfall soundtrack, the final track 'Faith' plays Faith's theme, then has dead air for several minutes. At the end is a rush of static noise, Faith's familiar whisper: "Find April Ryan... save her..." and then a discordant turn where Faith calls out Zoë's name as if frightened. This may or may not have any relevance to the events at the end of Dreamfall.
Speculation[]
There has been much speculation concerning the link between Zoë and Faith. Some have pointed out that Faith's physical death coincides with Zoë's loss of direction in her life, her 'loss of faith'.
Dreamfall places a heavy - possibly heavy-handed - emphasis on faith and trust. After Faith's name is revealed, many statements take on new meaning. For example, when the White Dragon speaks to Zoë in the Dark People's Library, she says that "faith will send you where you're needed the most", before Zoë vanishes and reappears in the swamplands. In retrospect, knowing the child's name is Faith, this suggests that Faith has control over Zoë's 'dream presence' in Arcadia.