Alex Kreiger
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
| [[Image:|300px|]] | |
| Alex Kreiger | |
| Player: @Mercurias | |
| Origin: | Technology |
|---|---|
| Archetype: | Brute |
| Threat Level: | 50 |
| Personal Data | |
| Real Name: | Alexander Franklin Kreiger |
| Known Aliases: | None |
| Species: | Human |
| Age: | 24 |
| Height: | 6' 3" |
| Weight: | 230 lbs |
| Eye Color: | Hazel |
| Hair Color: | Dark Brown |
| Biographical Data | |
| Nationality: | Etoile Islands |
| Occupation: | Part-time bartender (for the company); Mercenary |
| Place of Birth: | Etoile Islands |
| Base of Operations: | Sharkhead |
| Marital Status: | Single |
| Known Relatives: | Robert Kreiger (Father, Deceased) Johanna Williams-Kreiger (Mother, Deceased) Jacob Kreiger (Younger brother, Deceased) |
| Known Powers | |
| Cybernetic body parts grant above-normal strength, agility, and durability; fully synthetic nervous system which discharges massive amounts of electricity for various purposes, modular claw weapons attached to arms/hands | |
| Known Abilities | |
| Experienced brawler, excellent bartender/bouncer, able to make Orion stop being so serious all the time. | |
| Equipment | |
| Cybernetic arms (with modular "claw" melee weapon system), legs (from the knee joint down), heart (secondary), liver, kidneys, right eye, and entirely artificial nervous system; synthetically reinforced bones and musculature (in order to perform on par with his cybernetic limbs without tearing himself apart) | |
| ' | |
(This article is a work in progress.)
Alex Kreiger is a mercenary operating without any current affiliation. He's as well known for his attitude as he is for his reputation as a cybernetic brawler.
Contents |
The Past
"My childhood? I lost the folks early, and then it was just me and Jake. I had to work for whatever I could, so things were tough for a few years until Jake got old enough to help around wherever home was at the time while I brought in money. Sure, we might have let someone take us in, but the odds were too great that we'd be split up. Neither of us wanted that. We were family."
Alex Kreiger was born to a lower class family on Sharkhead Island on April 1, 1986. His father Robert was a steel worker, and his mother was a waitress in a local bar called "The Wrong Turn." By all accounts, Alex was utterly unremarkable except for his loyalty to his family and his willingness to get into a fight at the drop of a hat. By all accounts, he was highly protective of his younger brother, Jacob (born September 3rd, 1992; died December 13, 2009). His family was able to afford a small apartment and live relatively well, until his father was killed in a worker riot in 1996. His mother drank herself to death the next year, leaving the two Alex and Jacob orphans. While he has met any questions regarding abuse during this time with angry refusal, Alex rarely drinks, claiming falsely that it "messes up his gears."
For the next four years, Alex stole, begged, and even fought for money in order to afford food for himself and his little brother. He attended school when he could, lying and pretending with the help of older children that his parents were still alive. In 2001, he joined a local gang and was allowed to work nights in a bar owned by a senior member. By age sixteen he was a bartender and bouncer, and considered one of the most dependable street toughs on Sharkhead Isle. By 2009 the bar had changed hands so many times that no one even remembered Alex was under age, and he had a stable, well-paying job that supporting both himself and Jacob, whom Alex had encouraged to attend school full-time. Life had settled into a happy routine for the brothers, and Jacob was on the verge of graduating high school and attending Aeon University.
Alone
"Sometimes life gives you lemons, and sometimes it kills your only family, cuts your arms and legs off, and replaces them with cheap cybernetics made from car parts. In the former situation, you make lemonade. The latter is a little more complicated."
On December 20th, 2009, Alex and Jacob were ambushed in their apartment by a group of Freakshow. Alex attempted to fight them off, but his eye was ripped from his skull, rendering him helpless with pain and shock. The brothers were both knocked unconscious and taken to an abandoned car garage, where they were pumped full of the trademark Freakshow chemical cocktail (a drug which strengthens the body and makes it more receptive towards cybernetic implants), and were used by a Meat Doctor for experimentation. Alex was strapped to a table, awake, while his arms, legs, liver, and kidneys were surgically removed and replaced with poorly fitting, barely grafted-on cybernetic replacements. The large cybernetic arms contained spring-loaded spikes attached to small electrical generators in the shoulders. For some unknown reason, the meat doctor also wired a metal plate onto his jaw, presumably for cosmetic effect.
Alex was nearly catatonic when his brother was laid onto a surgical table next to him, and he was forced to watch as his brother was cut to pieces, then put back together with equally shoddy parts. For two days, they were side by side in the garage, monitored and fed drugs through an IV drip. For Alex, this is remembered as the two days he was tied up and forced to watch his little brother die.
Jacob Kreiger died on December 22nd, 2009, and his older brother went insane.
Alex tore free of the restraints next night, when the Freakshow members observing the brothers lapsed in their duty and Alex's IV bag ran out. He went through the garage like an electric whirlwind, leaving bodies and parts from his own cybernetics in his wake as he sought the Meat Doctor responsible for his brother's death with single-minded determination. Surviving only by his faulty artificial parts and a reckless disregard for his life, Alex spent weeks hunting down and killing every Freakshow he found, until his body was on the verge of tearing itself apart.
Eventually, his poorly made cybernetics began to grind painfully, and Alex was forced to seek a means to replace them before they failed altogether. Piece by piece, he replaced the poorly made artificial body parts with bleeding edge technology paid for by bounties and other mercenary work. Eventually, the new cybernetics would allow him to pass for a normal human, though some with inhumanly strong senses might hear the sound of servos or the hum of the dangerously powerful cold fusion energy cell in his chest. His abilities, however, changed little. By this time he'd developed his current methods of combat, which relies heavily on electrical fields and blades attached to his hands or forearms.
At some point during these months, Alex contracted with a demon for greater power, willing to throw away his humanity and become a servant in hell if it meant getting revenge. He was gifted with the ability to transform into a blue-skinned demonic form with greater abilities, at first, but after months of waiting for the demon to fulfill her end of the contract, Alex confronted her and had it annulled. His demonic form lingered for a few months before he was no longer able to call upon it, but he claims not to miss it.
In April of 2010, after a four month long campaign against the Freakshow, the leader of one small chapter of the gang revealed the whereabouts of the Meat Doctor who had killed Jacob and her current group of followers.
Alex stormed the abandoned factory building that the gang used as a hideout, and it took two days for the screams to stop.
Finder's Keepers
"Revenge is a leaky bucket. You pour your entire life into it, and when it's over you're just...empty. I had no idea of what to do with the rest of my life, and I was lucky I met Selah when I did. Lord knows what kind of trouble I'd have gotten into if I'd been left to my own devices...
..Okay OKAY, we all know that explosions would likely have been involved."
With no more dreams or goals left, Alex simply buried himself in his mercenary work, and he developed the beginnings of a reputation for getting results. Life began to solidify into a lonely, somewhat dissatisfying routine for him. He went out on jobs, came back to his new houseboat on Sharkhead when he needed sleep or simple repairs, and spent plenty of time in Pocket D, where he attempted to make some sort of acquaintances in the nightclub full of robots, aliens, evolved humans, and even the more abnormal elements that frequent the bar.
Eventually Alex met Selah, the leader of Finder's Keepers. Idle conversation eventually led to an offer for a position in her group of agents, which he accepted more out of curiosity than dedication to the work. He swiftly grew attached to the group, however, and he began to feel more like himself than he had since his old life had ended. Over the course of the months he spent on solo and group assignments, his sense of humor, nonchalant acceptance of the bizarre ("You don't stay a bartender in the Rogue Isles for long if you get upset every time someone waves a tentacle at you."), and deep loyalty began to slowly return to the surface. While he refused to call the Keepers his new family, he stuck with them for a long, long time before they all drifted apart.
Present
"Look, I have the attention span of a chipmunk. There's not way I'm going to be leading my own unit. I financed a couple of bars and semi-retired. If you want me back, you'll need to make the pay worthwhile. Or cover expenses.
I'm BORED."
Equipment and Abilities
"I'm part robot, have built-in stabby objects, and I can zap you from about fifty feet away with electricity. I'm clearly the most awesome person you're going to meet today. Why spoil it with all these questions?"
(WIP)
