Name: Well, if ya gotta be a stickler about it, the whole damn thing is 'Alexandra Isabella MacKaye'. Yep, Scottish to the bone, motherfuckers. Er, y'know. If the whole 'impenetrable Glaswegian accent' thing hadn't tipped you off to that.
Alias: However, you're less likely to be introduced to 'Alexandra Isabella MacKaye' and more likely to meet plain ol' 'Alex'. Actually, that's an oversimplification, because half the time, Alex is neither of those. Alex is just too much of a... well, some would call it 'habitual liar'. Alex prefers to think she just spruces up the truth a bit. Makes it more interesting, y'know? So you might meet Alex, a physics student at the University of Babylon. Or you might meet anybody, from anywhere, from any walk of life; helps that Alex is quite skilled with faking accents, making whatever role she chooses to adopt that much more genuine. For example, there are still people who think she's Russian, because she told them she was and then from then on spoke to them in a Russian accent. Why? Mostly because why the fuck not? It doesn't even matter to her if nobody actually gives a shit, 'cause it still amuses her, and that's all that matters, isn't it?
Age: Alex comes in at twenty four years old. Pretty much looks it too, so there's not much else to say there, really.
Gender: Here's a doozy of a question (Alex really, really likes the word doozy. Don't question it.) If you're asking what Alex's sex is, then the answer is female. If you're asking what her gender is, then things become a little more complicated. See, Alex has never actually felt like a chick. Nor has she ever felt like a dude. In fact, she doesn't understand how what set of genitalia you were born with can have any effect on your mind at all-- in other words, Alex can't see how you can be male or female beyond the physical. She's never really been the 'in your face' type about it-- doesn't mind if you refer to her as 'she' or 'her'. She's gotten used to it, though she might be just a little weirded out if you come up to her all 'hayyy gurl'.
Hometown: The good ol' Gorbals, in Glasgow, Scotland.
Occupation: Alex is a post-graduate student at the University of Babylon, studying theoretical physics. She also has a part-time job at a really old, small-time book store nestled in a cosy, quiet part of the Shopping District.
Appearance:
Alex could have looked like just your average twenty something year old mildly attractive university student... if she had ever had any intent of looking like your average anything. Average is dull and no fun at all, and she doesn't see why anyone would wanna be it, so Alex tends to go all out-- with clothes, with her hair, with her own skin. Alas, some things simply cannot be changed (though considering the insane world she's found herself thrown into lately (or, one should say, soon will be), Alex is starting to think nothing can be ruled out for sure). Height, for example. Alex comes in at a pretty unremarkable 5 feet 10 inches-- what good is that? She wouldn't have minded being just a touch taller-- 7'5, maybe, or thereabouts. She ain't nothin' special in terms of body build neither-- though Alex does recognise the value of physical strength, and she's been working out every now and then the past few years, it's never been any sort of a priority, and as a result, her lithe, slender form is graced only with a modicum of muscle mass. So she's not quite weak, certainly not helpless, but she's not about to arm wrestle Arnold Schwarzenegger. Actually, fuck it, she would totally do that anyway. Just for the sake of sayin' she arm wrestled Arnold Schwarzenegger.
By most regards, Alex physically reflects her Scottish...er, Scottishness, and not only in her accent, when she does see fit to default to her actual accent. Her skin is a very pale, almost ivory sort of tone, interspersed from place to place with a tattoo here and there, a couple of scars, and even a few birthmarks. Most of those are just plain old port-wine stains, though-- of a much darker tone than her natural skin, they're to be found in splotches on her arms, her back, a couple on her throat, like someone just took a paintbrush and splashed paint randomly across her body. When it comes to the tattoos, on the other hand, Alex has never been the 'inspirational quote across my left asscheek' type. In fact, her tattoos don't have any sort of central theme to them-- some follow an Egyptian theme (Egyptian mythology and ancient culture being something of a passion of hers), some are related to bands she's fond of (got the ol' Carcass logo right next to a tattoo of the Vivaldi coat of arms), some are pretty gruesome (a grievous wound on her abdomen, exposing metallic rib bones dripping with blood), and some are just... well, weird. Well, they're all kinda weird, but you get the point. As long as it makes people say 'huh, what does that mean?' or fall over backwards screaming 'JESUS H CHRIST WHAT IS THAT', then Alex likes it. And the scars... well, typical fare for anyone who grew up in the Gorbals. Not like she's been knifed in the face or anything-- you'll find one stretching down her left forearm, generally obscured by a tattoo of Anubis leading an ancient Egyptian funeral rite, or another running a couple inches down her back from her left shoulder blade, similarly concealed by a crescent moon embroiled in a crimson mist. If asked about them, you'll be told she got them in knife fights, or from climbing mountains, or-- every now and then-- she just says she fell off her bicycle.
Alex has fairly soft features, and indeed, true to her nature, one could say Alex's face is quite like that of a lynx, lending further credence to the impression of intelligence and slyness that she evokes simply by being there. She has the sharp, cunning features of a wildcat, with high, prominently-sculpted cheekbones enclosing around a small, slightly pointed nose accompanied by slender, pale lips--often forming a vivacious smile, or else a cunning, cocky sort of smirk in true 'Alex' fashion, an expression that all but taunts whoever she happens to be looking at, conveying a clear message: "I know something you don't, or something you don't want me to know, and you don't know what it is that I know, but you know I know it." A single lip ring adorns her lower lip, whilst her left nostril is similarly ornamented; both ears are embellished with earlobe and cartilage piercings. Her slender, heavy-lidded eyes would seem to bear a sort of arrogance were it not for the lively quality that constantly fills them, though generally it's the colour that catches people's attention than anything else-- she has inherited a condition known as heterochromia iridum, which in vastly simpler words basically means her eyes look mismatched. One is an almost pleasant shade of woody green-- the other a rather less pleasant mottled brown. Needless to say, Alex is absolutely delighted with this unusual turn of genetics. Her hair tends to be an ever-changing affair, as over the years it's gone from completely shaved to a purple, spiked mohawk to chaotic, pell-mell liberty spikes. These days, it's much, much tamer, falling straight to the base of her throat, though it's only tamer because she's been growing it out with the intent of dreadlocking it when it got long enough; alas, she's grown discontent with how plain it looks in the meantime, so it's possible she'll just cut it all off and rock the shaved head look again, or maybe go back to the 'hawk. Her hair is a copperish red in colour, though she rarely keeps it all that colour, and sure enough, these days she sports a dark purple fringe on one side.
Now, you can probably guess the kind of clothes Alex opts for-- you know, polo shirts, plaid skirts, ballet slippers, the like. Ha-- like hell! Alex wouldn't touch a polo shirt with a ten foot pole. No, her love of the outlandish doesn't abate one bit when it comes to her wardrobe. Generally, whatever shirt she's wearing is concealed by beloved, slightly oversized leather jacket of hers-- covered with all kinds of spikes, studs, anarchist patches, pins with authoritarian messages on them, contradictory, nonsensical political messages. Her lower body is attired in a pair of haphazardly patched slender blue jeans, over ratty old sneakers, or a pair of harness boots. That's not even the beginning of it, however, as Alex's love for the theatrical and the creepy cannot be satisfied by oversized leather jackets and studs and spikes-- because of course, that wasn't showy enough for her, and she must don several accessories she's accrued over the years in her search for things spooky and outlandish. She is never to be seen without a much-loved large ankh tied to a scraggly black fabric cord around her neck, while chains, with an artificial rust design, hang from the loops of her jeans-- chains designed to look like tormented faces screaming in agony. She's quite fond of that one. Inverted crosses made of skulls and pentagrams streaked theatrically with crimson accompany the chains, while a belt of rusting copper bullets* is to be found at her waist, with one side of it hanging much lower than the other because fuck symmetry.
*Note, not real bullets. This refers to a bullet belt, which is made of gunpowder-less bullet casings fashioned into a belt. Quite popular with metalheads, punks, and vaguely sociopathic Scottish physics students obsessed with the creepy and the freaky.
Personality:
Now, there's a question-- hell, what doesn't make Alex tick? After all, Alex MacKaye is many things, but 'simple' is not one of them. If anything, from her very youth she has deliberately crafted a persona for herself that is mysterious, enigmatic, or, failing that, just plain weird. She takes the greatest of pleasure in messing with people--she's a masterful actor, plain and simple, and she has designed everything from her accents to her appearance with the intent of throwing people for a loop. Deception, lying, and casual trickery come naturally to this cunning young Scot, who displays all in all a sly, devious persona--you get the feeling, even in the most fleeting of conversations, or when she seems distracted, that Alex never stops taking meticulous note of every single thing around her, including you, your habits, your psychological and emotional patterns, anything she can use to her advantage if she wants to. And you could be right. For Alex, constant vigilance is the name of the game-- she never lets down her guard, in every sense of that phrase. She's always on the alert, always aware of her surroundings lest she be taken by surprise by anything, and always suspicious of others, even if she seems to like 'em just peachy.
Indeed, that's the sort of demeanour Alex displays outwardly-- a vivacious, friendly persona. She exudes a spunky, mischievous attitude-- mischievous, but never malicious, and she generally seems more playful than insidious, and she's not one to take it from a bit of personal amusement, a bit of light-hearted fun, to actual cruelty or hurt. Not unless she feels it's necessary, anyway. You'll virtually never see Alex become genuinely serious, as she seems to approach even the grimmest of situations with a wide grin and some sort of terrible pun. She's also helplessly, insatiably curious, which is why, if I may be permitted to be outright boastful for a moment, she's become so intelligent: she literally is incapable of not knowing something (almost too true, considering her Psyche), so learning, reading, expanding her base of knowledge on virtually all subjects comes all but instinctively to her. And as long as you don't mind her flaunting that from time to time, as long as you don't mind someone who loves mind games, is incapable of showing any seriousness whatsoever, delights in saying things like 'groovy' or 'rad' or 'far out', and is likely to reply to any questions you pose unto her with a riddle, you should get along... okay with Alex.
But of course, all wells have a source-- especially when the well you see isn't even real. And I completely just made that metaphor up and it probably doesn't make sense, but the point is made. There are people who have dug too deep trying to understand Alex and she became downright nasty-- lost sight of her otherwise adamant self-control, reacted with a vehemence, even violence, that one would be hard-pressed to believe could possibly have come from Alex. Other times, she suddenly seems to change somehow, become a stranger, become someone else, someone disturbing-- for just a split second. She hates it when it happens, hates losing control, especially after all these years that she has sought to mould herself into the image she presents. And it happens all too rarely, but after all, it only takes one person to reveal that Alex isn't at all the friendly, amiable person she wants everyone to believe she is.
Affiliation: For the time being? Reapers and Lost Souls and Demons and whatnot-- Alex knows of them only as aspects of science fiction and fantasy. But you can be sure, if she does end up embroiled in this vast mess that she has no knowing of, she will do nothing except that which she knows will benefit her.
Weapon: Alex does possess a Glock 17C semi-automatic pistol. Doesn't know the damnedest thing about usin' it, but it's there, mostly as a last resort, just in case sort of thing. After all, Alex wins through wits and deceit; if she has to default to force of arms, she's already lost. Other than that, her weapon is her wits and her fists.
Psyche: Alex's Psyche-- which has yet to be unlocked-- essentially boils down to energy sourcing. In other words, Alex, intentionally or unintentionally, draws power from external energy sources (lights, flames, combustion in an engine, even, at its fullest potential, the kinetic energy from a person's movement), amplifies it, converts it (again, intentionally or unintentionally) into destruction internally, and then projects it outwardly. The effect varies depending on the energy source-- were she to draw energy from a light, for example, she would project it as a sort of electric current or energy blast, or perhaps an electromagnetic shield to dispel and protect against projectiles, whereas drawing energy from flames would essentially turn her into a flamethrower, and energy taken from movement would be projected as a kinetic blast of sorts. And at its highest peak, she can even pull the energy of people around her to fuel herself.
There's just one slight problem with all this: her power originates not in her body but in her mind, and (perhaps ironically) the draw of its presence on her mind is immense-- and though her Psyche has yet to be activated, it has lain dormant within her, and it has done its damage. In order to facilitate the potential of huge quantities of energy being taken in, converted, and then unleashed by her brain quickly and all at once, her Psyche has damaged other high functions of her brain-- namely, those that facilitate emotions. It has exacerbated the trauma of her childhood neuroses, perhaps was there before then, and diminished her ability to truly experience emotions, or remorse, or empathy. In other words, Alex's Psyche is slowly twisting her into a sociopath in order to accommodate its powerful abilities. She has yet to truly become one, as evidenced by her many genuine passions in life, her lack of sexual lust (yep, indeed, that's a characteristic of sociopaths), her views, however tenuous, of other people as actual persons-- and, above all, the one thing that currently most separates Alex from the sociopath she is becoming is the fact that she desperately wants to change. She can't stand the idea that there's a whole universe of wonder locked away in her brain-- a universe of genuine joy, of genuine sorrow, of genuine anger, love, hope, and excitement, and to that end, Alex is desperate to find out why she can't 'access' those parts of her brain, because she knows it's not your 'average' sociopathy. Something has simply shut them out, and she's determined to find that something and cull it from herself.
Skills: As of current, Alex's most noteworthy skill is a nigh-genius level intellect. Having spent virtually her whole life doing nothing but reading, studying, learning, Alex has developed a vast base of knowledge and intelligence, in a vast variety of subjects. Specifically, her areas of particular interest lie in theoretical/particle/quantum physics, astronomy, computer science (and yes, its less than legal sister, 'hacking', which she found to be a lot less glamourous than the movies make out), Central Asian and Siberian indigenous culture, cryptography, and neuroscience, along with their assorted skillsets. She is also quite a polyglot, having spent many years of her childhood learning other languages. She fluently speaks Spanish, French, German, and English, with proficiency in Portuguese, Russian, Mandarin Chinese, and, of course, good 'ol Scottish Gaelic. Also knows a word or two of Welsh, though she never fully committed to learning that language. Seriously, have you seen written Welsh? Even Alex knows a lost cause when she sees one.
Otherwise, her greatest skill is her skill as an actor. Alex knows people-- has observed them, even though she spent most of her youth hating them. She's a master of deceit, of putting on a certain façade, and she can completely redesign herself-- give herself a new life story, change her appearance, and then don a completely different accent just to top it off. It's said by some that Alex manages to look like a completely different person in photographs taken moments apart (with regards to her face, that is to say. It's kind of hard to mistake someone with a red mohawk and a big leather jacket), which is another skill she can use when she needs to.
Also a quite good artist. Hell of a chess player. Unparalleled in the art of the tic tac toe.
History:
Alexandra Isabella MacKaye never actually knew her father. In point of fact, she never knew anything about him either-- nothing of his name, his fate, his age, his life, his profession. All she knew was that she was born in Glasgow, the Scottish city also affectionately known as 'The Murder Capital of Europe', to a single Scottish mother who worked her ass off to pay rent for a shitty little tenement located in the Gorbals-- a place that's exactly as pleasant as any other place whose name combines 'gore' and 'balls'. She grew up amidst a festering hellhole of violent crime, drugs, and delinquency. And for that, she grew up hating her father for abandoning her to this fate. She felt that she'd been left alone, even left for dead, perhaps, by someone who, according to what everybody else said, was supposed to love her just for being their offspring.
Growing up, people were never very high on Alex's agenda. She was emotionally distant from everyone-- her mother, her peers, and, once she got into school, her teachers and classmates. Her views of other people in general tended to vacillate-- at best, on most days she saw people as distractions, as irritations, and she wished to be left alone by them so she could go about her life in peace, away from their pains and their sorrows and other such inane drivel. At worst, there were times when Alex felt genuine loathing towards people in general, mostly because to begin with she convinced herself most people felt genuine loathing towards her. She suspected that most people, for one reason or another, hated her, and in rationalising this along with the reason her father could possibly have abandoned her to the Gorbals, Alex ended up with the conclusion that must have been because everybody had some sort of predisposition against her-- even her mother, who only ever showed her kindness, who gave her daughter all she could and more, Alex suspected that her mother saw her as nothing more than a burden, a pest without whom life would have been so much more enjoyable. When the other kids approached her they were met with a long silence as Alex stared at them trying to figure out what they wanted from her, before tentatively delivering a single inquiry: "No sooner broken than spoken--what is it?" The message intended was pretty much lost on the kids, because the little bastards weren't about to discern the answer to the riddle for what it was-- silence. Alex wanted to be left alone. She didn't trust the other kids-- some part of Alex's mind simply failed to understand that those kids approached her simply because they wanted to befriend her. She completely bypassed that possibility and instead obsessed over the ulterior motives she was convinced lay behind their actions. And when the teachers saw Alex spending her lunch times alone and detached from the other kids, and approached her in the friendliest of spirits, she reacted the same way--with suspicion and rejection.
Which sounds, as Alex would undoubtedly put it these days 'emo as all hell' and 'totally not groovy', but she skipped past the whole 'wearing all black, listening to Evanescence, and writing cliche poetry about how I am a lone wolf in a sea of people who will never understand me' emo stage and went straight to simply rejecting others. Even when she was aching with loneliness and she was getting sick of being alone, she distanced herself from others, instead pre-occupying herself with 'actual pursuits'. While the other kids were out playing on the playground, Alex was shoved up in some corner reading a book about cellular biology, or astrophysics, or the internal mechanics of a car. When she got home, she went straight to her room, shut the door, and began drawing, or painting, anything that came to mind, and whatever came out she'd keep under lock and key for nobody to see. When her mother's strict eye was averted, she'd sneak out to one of the few 'parks' in the Gorbals, to study the plants and the animals first-hand. Sometimes, she'd amuse herself by studying riddles, until eventually, she was making up her own, and posing them to herself for lack of anybody else to test them out on.
Needless to say, not the healthiest of childhoods. Alex became remarkably intelligent, extremely cunning, and a pretty good artist too, but she suffered the whole time. Though she had convinced herself that there was something to be afraid of in all people, that she had reason to suspect others of ill will and intent, simple human loneliness was biting at her nerves and making her even more miserable. She staved it off as best she could-- look around you, she reasoned. Look at all the people dying, hurting each other, drugs and violence and hate. Do you wanna be a part of that? The beginnings of a strong self-preservation instinct began to form in Alex to reinforce her budding misanthropy-- she learnt, or thought she had learnt, that in order to survive, you had to push others away. 'Let people in and they'll just need a shorter knife' and all that dumb cliche crap-- that was her line of thinking.
Obviously, it's quite a change from that to the Alex you see elsewhere in this profile-- from hating people to putting up a friendly, vivacious front to them. Hell, maybe she never even stopped hating people, certainly not as a child. The years of her adolescence passed in much this way-- largely without event. In retrospect, she's fortunate for that-- fortunate that the only incidents she encountered merely scarred her body, and that she forged her way through life in the Gorbals without having that life snatched from her. She consistently made high marks throughout her time in school-- probably because she spent virtually all her time studying-- and began to take a particular interest in the way the physical world itself worked. Her mother thought that, given her daughter's evident passion for drawing, she could be an artist, but Alex had other ideas. Namely, she wanted to go to university, and study the workings of the universe as a theoretical physicist.
Her mother had never actually graduated high school, and she feared Alex's determination to make it to university was far-fetched, that ultimately she would be disappointed. And yet nobody was more delighted when misanthropic, solitary seventeen year old Alex MacKaye, freshly graduated from high school, was invited... to the far, distant, but prestigious University of Babylon. After all, say what you would about her behaviour (people always seemed to have a lot to say about it, much to Alex's general distress at the time), her excellent marks were catching attention, and she had at last been provided the opportunity to make something of her dreams. Alex, however, remained sceptical, uncertain of how to approach the idea that something was actually about to go her way. In a way, this is when Alex's worldview began to change-- she'd always believed that fate in general was predisposed against her, and yet here she was, on the cusp of venturing out to unexplored territory-- to a prestigious school, to be with educated, intelligent folks who shared her passions. Something good was about to happen, and Alex didn't know how to deal with it. Her current way of thinking could not accommodate for this series of events. Adjustments would have to be made. A time of great change, in Alex's general perception of people and the world, was beginning.
At seventeen years old, Alex left the Gorbals at last for the United States. It was supposed to be easy-- she'd thought she'd have been happy to leave it all behind once and for all. It made sense, and she felt she'd only ever suffered here. And yet, when the days to her departure were winding down, Alex realised she was almost afraid to leave. Not just because it was unfamiliar territory-- but also because there were things she needed to get off her chest and things that needed to be said. So a couple of days before she left, she sought her mother out-- an unprecedented occurrence, for her mother had never known Alex to actively want to speak to her. So Alex sat her mother down, and, with great difficulty, apologised for always being a burden to her, said she was sorry she'd fucked with whatever plans her mother had had for her own life, and said that now that she was goin', she hoped her mother could live freely, free of Alex.
She'd figured she'd say that, her mother would say 'fuckin' finally dude, about time ya hauled ass outta here and lemme do my own thing'. And that would have simply been an affirmation of what she'd always known was true, so she was prepared for it. But her mother cut her off midway through the apology as she ground it out through her teeth, and demanded to know if that was really how she'd felt these past seventeen years, if she'd gone all that time thinking that way. To which Alex replied by staring at her mother for several seconds, trying to figure out why she was asking something like that, before her mother launched into a practical goddamn speech that woulda rivalled the greatest works of Churchill and de Gaulle. A speech that consisted half of anger, half of sorrow, and half of pity, the impossibility of something having three halves notwithstanding. It basically boiled down to 'how could you think I've hated you when I've only ever loved you? How could you think everyone hates you when you never let anyone even try to get to know you?'
Yeah, it was a whole thing-- like in those drama movies where the music crescendos and the hero realises at last that they are loved and they stand up in triumph and declare that they will henceforth show naught but love and kindness for their fellow man and there's not a dry eye in the audience and the person next to you is rather obnoxiously blowing their nose into a handkerchief and sobbing about the humanity of it all. Except in this case, Alex just sorta stared at her mother, and realised that maybe, that which she had always thought was wrong with the world... maybe something was wrong with her. That was the first time that Alex began to suspect that something had divorced her of the feelings and sensations that other people took for granted.
They spent the rest of the night before Alex had to leave for university just talking-- more words were probably exchanged in those hours than in the entirety of Alex's life. They talked about the way Alex saw the world, why she'd grown up so distanced from everybody, why she felt so determined to think everyone hated her-- why she'd thought her own damn mother hated her. It was like the Buddha, sitting beneath a pipal tree, realising enlightenment at last, except that enlightenment was slow in the coming and Alex fought it every step of the way. She did not like having her worldview challenged and shaken-- did not want to think that the way she'd been thinking all this time was wrong, that people could actually be trusted and cherished. She didn't want to think that way. It was different. It was unfamiliar. She wanted to stay in the comfortably familiar misanthropy and suspicion she'd lived her whole life in-- there, she would always know what to expect, from people and from the world. To step foot into unfamiliar ways of thinking... it was daunting even for someone so curious and exploratory as Alex. She would have to think this through. Who would she be, if not the distant, laconic creature she'd always been?
Some days later, students in Professor Johnstone's undergraduate physics class entered the lecture hall to be greeted by two things: first, a severe, rather irascible-looking physics professor, and then, a lively, all-too-convivial young woman with a Welsh accent who told everyone her name was Eneuawy, a name that was properly pronounced by nobody, not even the actual Welsh guy in the class. Then along came Professor Johnstone, ol' berk that he was, to kill the fun. Alex kept up the Welsh accent for quite a while, but they made her stop telling people to call her Eneuawy. Killjoys. She switched to Russian and 'Anastasya Ivanovna' anyway.
It took some getting used to, and a hell of a lot of teeth gritting and fist clenching. It wasn't easy to force herself to be vivacious and happy-peppy like it was what she naturally was, but there was anything Alex learnt in those first few days, it was that she was one hell of an actor. It took some self-control and restraint, and at the end of the day she always had to go off and be alone to unwind from the immensely draining task of pretending to be someone she wasn't (yet), but before long, the façade was flawless. And it worked, because Alex knew none of these people had ever known her before. Reinventing herself was easy from then on. Acting like this was what she'd always been was a cinch, because hell, how would any of 'em known any better?
All along the way, part of Alex truly hoped that this image she had engineered would eventually become who she really was. She did earnestly want to be able to enjoy hanging out with the 'friends' she began making at the university without tormenting herself with questions of why they'd decided to befriend her, what their motive for doing so was. She had yet, it seemed, to learn that people approached her because they liked the image she was giving them-- old habits, they say, die hard, and the same goes for old ways of thinking. Alex was still getting used to people seeing her as a friendly and lively type and not the solitary weirdo she'd been before.
If anything, however, it did her good to be amongst people who shared her passions. You can imagine just how many people back in the Gorbals had any interest in quantum physics, or plant biology, or acoustics, or painting, or Enlightenment-era philosophy, or anthropology, or Gothic architecture-- heck, Alex could count on one hand how many people she'd ever met in the Gorbals who even knew what the word architecture even meant. Here, though-- she was in her element. If she wanted to talk about anthropology, the anthropology department was down the hall. If she wanted to discuss molecular chemistry, Professor Harding's door was always open. If she wanted to discuss philosophy, the guys from the philosophy department were probably getting high and listening to Pink Floyd in a closet somewhere, and it was just a matter of finding which. It helped along the process of growing more comfortable with people in general when those people were her equals in cunning and intelligence-- when her riddles fell on ears that could actually understand them and she had an outlet for her opinions. Her love of the written word burgeoned-- having grown up in times where she was lucky she'd even learnt to read, she now had access to an entire library, where she could go at the end of the day and curl up in a nice big armchair with a book. Alex had never really thought there was a heaven, but it turned out there was, and it was Babylon University.
Though she's found a place where she 'fits in', however, Alex remains obsessed with finding out just why she can't feel-- not the way others can, not to the same depth, at least. She visits the neurosciences department often, asking all these questions-- what makes a sociopath? How are those higher functions of emotion simply blocked? Is there any way to make them work again? She has yet to drop her pursuit, but the answers she's getting aren't satisfactory.
Theme(s): For lack of an actual 'theme song', I'm just going to post something weird, because that's what Alex would do.
Other:
Alex listens to pretty much everything. And sure, when somebody says they listen to 'a little bit of everything', it's cause for you to scoff and say 'Tch, sure, whatever. What's the last goregrind band you listened to then, freakazoid?" Except in Alex's case... literally. She listens to everything. Grindcore, death metal, hardcore punk, crust, goregrind, blues, modal jazz, gangsta rap, trance, black ambient, Tuvan throat singing, Celtic folk, alternative, indie rock, noise music, baroque, minimalism, postminimalism, totalism, new wave, 80s synthpop, drone, goth rock, disco, post-punk, shoegaze, Oi punk, ska, you name it, Alex probably listens to it. You don't name it, Alex probably still listens to it.
Her favourite authors include Dostoyevsky, Eliot, Poe, and Lovecraft. Her favourite poets include the aforementioned Poe, Sexton, and Plath.