Name: Joseph William Allen
Age: 24
Gender: male
Sexuality: straight
Role: Unsavoury man
Appearance: Short, red hair cut close to his head, soft and thinning slightly. No discernible hairline, bushy sideburns fading into light, wispy stubble, more concentrated around his chin, pallid, almost sickly, veined skin dotted with large moles and gaping pores. Watery, washed-out eyes, a pale grey that was once a much more pleasant green but faded over time, short, sparse eyelashes and thinning eyebrows, a more circular face shape as opposed to ovular. Short, 5’5”, average weight, slightly stocky, with small hands and feet. Dirt constantly under his fingernails, red-rimmed, almost bulging eyes, shaky hands, slightly bent posture.
General Attire: Slightly crumpled clothing, usually a few years out of fashion, murky shades of brown and green, colours never completely matching.
Personality: Snappish, easily angered but easily frightened, skittish, goes through sudden mood swings. Lashes out, blames others for things that are wrong with him, a lot of pent up anger that he uses as an excuse for.. well, everything he does. Trusts his gut instinct as opposed to his logic— but that’s not to say that he rushes in to situations blindly, he’s much smarter than that. Doubts and second-guesses everything, has little to no self control.
Flaws: Won’t hesitate to manipulate people to get what he wants, isn’t above bribing, blackmailing, or threatening, a very jumpy and overly anxious person, untrusting and untrustworthy, little to no sense of loyalty, broken moral compass, overly sly, never accepts responsibility for his actions.
Backstory: His father, Lawrence Allen, was a chemist and apothecary, and Joseph grew up working and helping out in the shop. In Victorian England, drugs that we consider harmful and illegal were part of everyday use, whether recreational or potentially dangerous ‘medical’ uses, and it wasn’t difficult for little Joseph to filch a few pills here and there, becoming addicted at a young age. He was aware of the potential dangers, so at first he used them sparingly, but by the time he was nineteen his cravings had surmounted to a need higher than water in his sick mind.
His father had always been a hard man, and his mother withered away into a shadow of herself, meek and almost never talking after the death of her twin brother. Joseph always blamed her for the cruelty of Lawrence and how the neighbourhood children stayed away from him, rendering him lonely and friendless. He was an only child, and when he was old enough, he inherited the family shop. One night after the while street was asleep, when he was under heavy influence of ‘medicine’, his father came downstairs drunk and tried to attack him. A fight ensued, and Joseph came out on top…. with a broken piece of glass stuck in his father’s throat. The deranged man threw the body out onto the street and terrified, hid in his room. The police came the next day, chalked it up to a runaway drunk, and left, leaving Joseph safe, but with an awful, burdening guilt.
Other: Left-handed, always has some sort of addictive substance on him.