Jane is a creation of the Department of Myseries' Death division. She is a necromancer made up of the mind, soul and body of three separate people. She's got a bit of a god complex and thinks humans are lovely little play things. Hopefully she won't resort to killing them as she does the lab mice.
Jane Doe[]
Nicknames/Aliases: Project Lazarus, Case #218-433-1, Emily Holmes
Occupation: Housekeeper at the Leaky Cauldron.
Home: Varies. Stays in the Leaky Cauldron on occasion, with Aidan Chambers on a semi-regular basis, will sometimes revert to sleeping in parks when she feels too cooped up.
Finances: Very poor, far below the poverty line.
Household: n/a
External[]
Appearance: Although not entirely reminiscent of a corpse, Jane looks on the brink of death and appears as though she’ll be gone any moment. But, the truth is, that she’s already gone. While her skin was once rosy and bright, it now appears dull and lifeless. There are dark circles around her eyes, and the skin under her nails is purple-grey in colour. Apart from her fading appearance, Jane looks exactly as Dorothy had in life. She, like the girl once was, is wide-eyed, round-faced, and rather doe-like. She constantly seems curious, which can be attributed to her clear blue eyes - clear only when she’s not in a trance - and rather tiny mouth. She’s small in stature, about five feet and too thin, which makes her appear far more frail than she actually is. All in all, apart from the pallor, Jane looks average, normal, and - as cliché as it may sound - plain.
First Impression: Good god, is she alright? That girl needs to be in a hospital. Now.
Internal[]
Personality: Jane’s personality is a mixture of Fabian, Elizabeth, and Dorothy’s traits as well as mimicry of the Unspeakables that she has been exposed to. She tends to be very soft-spoken, and tries her best to dispel the fear and distrust that she so often receives from others - things which are not at all unwarranted. She often says no more than a few words when she first meets someone, but will gradually warm up after she has learned enough about them to feel that she has some sort of grasp on who they are - which equates to control in her mind. More than anything, Jane is a highly curious person who wants to know everything about the world outside of the Department. She is easily impressed, quietly excited over the smallest of things, and much like a precocious child. Jane thrives on knowledge, and is a bit like a sponge for the things she hears. She’s very awkward socially, and has never had any instruction on how to behave around people other than by viewing them in what she refers to as ‘their natural habitats’. Jane says what she believes, and resents nothing, not understanding how people can be hurt since she never has been. She likes people, but only sees them as toys for her interest and play, and can be extremely manipulative in order to get what she wants.
Political Views: Has no interest in the political world, whatsoever.
Quirks/Habits: Often still for hours at a time, plays with her hair often, mimics people, says what she thinks with no thought to how it might affect things, touches others constantly, rocks herself when bored, talks in her sleep, very rarely eats.
Strengths: Learns quickly, communicates with the dead, follows instruction, manipulative, oddly charming, curious, observant, astute. Jane is also able to push past the point of pain, making her body physically more adapt than a human's.
Weaknesses: Doesn‘t understand or have complex emotions, knows things but rarely understands them, has no ability to be empathetic, has no memory of life outside of the lab, fueled by her own selfishness. Decapitation, mortal wounds, severed spine cord, lack of oxygen and anything that causes too much damage to her body's homeostasis would lead to brain death. Without her brain, Jane can’t think, and she can’t perform necromancy. Removing her soul from her body would revert Jane to an Inferius once again, removing any free will she now has. Additionally, Jane's wounds are very slow to heal and must be treated the Muggle way, as healing magic has no effect on her.
Fears: Losing her soul, being captured by the Department of Mysteries, fire.
Philias: Learning, observing, getting what she wants, being in control, art, poetry, touch.
Hobbies: Studying in all its forms, talking to people, learning about emotional ‘pain’ and attempting to cause it so she can see it first hand, traveling/wandering, conversing with the dead, botany.
Interests: Evolution, people watching, politics, natural disasters, board games, theology, space exploration, freak accidents, diseases, death, reading, prisms, origami, serial killers.
Likes: People with power, sweet foods, revolutions, revolts, outspoken thoughts, controversy, watching pain take effect, studying the mystery of relationships, old newspapers, slideshows, graffiti, modern art, classical music, rap, debating, gaining trust, winning.
Dislikes: Weak-minded people, falseness, lies, cowardice, losing, being taken advantage of, being subservient, insults, swear words, cheap humor, being alone.
Favourite Belongings: A man’s silver wristwatch that she stole from someone sleeping on the train to Edinburgh, a book on medical anomalies she took from the library, a bonsai tree she bought in London.
Favourite Places: Parks and trains. Prefers Edinburgh to London for its atmosphere, but prefers London to Edinburgh for the people.
Secrets: She’s not quite alive, really. She was created, not born. She’s running from the Department of Mysteries.
History[]
The Mind[]
In 1716, a young woman by the name of Elizabeth Carmichael was hung in London for witchcraft. Although heretics were normally burned for their crimes so that their immortal souls would be purified before judgement, Elizabeth was not granted such a privilege and was doomed by the judge and jury to an eternity in hell.
Elizabeth was a necromancer, one of only a handful in history.
Considered the darkest form of black magic, necromancy was a practice which was believed by muggles to call upon to devil’s guidance in order to speak with spirits or control the corpses of the dead. Often, the ability was used to find information to aid in robbery or blackmail, and the services of a necromancer fetched a very high price. And often, it was only a farce.
It was at the age of eight that Elizabeth’s ability to communicate with the dead surfaced, and soon after her birthday the young girl began to notice flaws in her memory. In the winter, her mother found her daughter locked in a trance and communicating to a seemingly empty room. After calling the doctor, Elizabeth confided in her mother that the room had not been empty, and that she had heard her talking to a man named Lucien. Lucien, she said, was a thief before his death, and had been murdered during an operation gone awry. He came to her looking for protection for his family, who would be targeted if his debt was not repaid. Her mother didn’t believe her, and thought that she was suffering from the effects of a fever. But two days later the man’s family – his wife and newborn son – was brutally murdered in their home.
As she grew older, Elizabeth was able to harness some control over her abilities, and eventually learned to call spirits at will. But often she would be taken unexpectedly by those who needed her help, who used her as a middle ground between the land of the living and the land of the dead, and who would ask her to relay messages to those who still remained in her realm. When she could, she did their biding, believing that these spirits could not rest until their wishes were fulfilled.
At the age of twenty-four, the spirit of a palace guard told the necromancer of a plot to kill the crown prince, and how it was her duty to prevent it from happening. Not for the first time, Elizabeth went to the authorities. Believing her to be completely insane, the police had dismissed the girl in the past – but three out of the three times she came to them predicting murder, murder had occurred. It was their belief that she had been the one committing the crimes, although they were not sure of how – or what motives she had, and they were only waiting for the slightest bit of proof in order to convict her. After entering their station with news of the assassination, she was swiftly locked in a cell – behind bars they believed she could do no harm. But the next day, despite their precautions, the prince was found dead in the palace gardens.
Elizabeth was convicted of witchcraft immediately following his murder.
After her death, Elizabeth Carmichael’s brain was taken into the Department of Mysteries for study.
The Soul[]
Fabian Prewett is often regarded as one of the bravest men to live through the First Wizarding War. Along with his brother, he was responsible for the death of four Death Eaters in a single night before falling victim at the hands of a fifth.
The eldest of three children, Fabian was considered to be the ‘big brother’ during his years at Hogwarts, going to great lengths to keep his friends and fellow students safe and secure, an ideology which he carried with him long after his completion of schooling.
Shortly after graduation, Fabian entered work in the foreign legions where he traveled to the Middle East in order to find a weapon that would be of use to the Ministry in their attempts to defeat Voldemort. He spent four years abroad before an injury to his eyesight drove him back to England. During the four months Fabian spent recovering, he studied the arts of occlumency and legilimancy in extensive detail. His pursuits and history drew the Department of Mysteries to his bedside, where he was briefed and inducted as an Undercover Operative for their division. Only four days after being released from St Mungo’s, Fabian left England again for India where he once again searched out a weapon to use against the ever-rising Dark Lord.
During his time in India, Fabian received an owl from his brother, Gideon, about the Order of the Phoenix and their mission. With seemingly unlimited resources and an unrelenting determination to see the war meet its end, Fabian began to feed information of his research to the Order through use of the skills he had learned during rehabilitation. The same skills that had led the Department of Mysteries to trust him.
It was in 1981, while bringing plans of a weapon to Dumbledore, that Fabian and Gideon were killed. His use of Legilimency had alerted the Department of Mysteries, specifically the man heading the weapons project, Augustus Rookwood. The fifth death eater, a man with a personal vendetta against Fabian, Rookwood trapped the man’s soul just before his death, where it was first brought to Lord Voldemort and then recaptured by the Ministry following his downfall.
The Heart[]
Dorothy Ann McKinnon was born on July 2, 1963 to Matthew and Julia. The youngest of four children, Dorothy had a parade of footsteps to follow in. Her eldest brother, William, was ten years old at the time of her birth, and would become the youngest coach of the Holyhead Harpies in the team’s history. Jacob, six years older than Dorothy, was a news photographer whose ground breaking work on the First Wizarding War is now prominently displayed in history books and museums alike. Her sister Marlene, three years older than Dorothy, was one of the original members of the Order of the Phoenix, and served as an Auror during what may be considered one of the darkest times in wizarding history.
Raised in a prominent pureblood household to two major ministry leaders, Dorothy never wanted for anything in her life. Her childhood was, by and large, a quiet one – the family’s manor in the Scottish countryside was rarely disturbed by anything more than a bat or coyote, things that Dorothy welcomed. A great lover of nature, especially of animals, she spent most of her time outdoors – in the woods studying foxes, or in the barn with the horses and pegasus. The youngest McKinnon was a quiet girl, soft-spoken and someone who was easy to overlook.
Sorted into Gryffindor like her entire family had been before her, Dorothy’s years in school were a blur. She preferred animals to her fellow classmates, and more often than not spent her lunch hour with the librarian instead of in the great hall with the others. Her marks were average at best, even in Care of Magical Creatures – the class in which she excelled.
Unsure of a career path to follow, Dorothy left school with plans to join the Peace Missions in the spring of 1981, at a time when the war was at its most brutal. But her plans never came through.
Shortly after dawn on Christmas Day, 1980, five Death Eaters entered the McKinnon household; home for the holidays, Dorothy and all five of her siblings perished along with their parents within ten minutes of their arrival. Their corpses were taken to Lord Voldemort while the bodies were still warm, and were used as puppets by the dark wizard for the remainder of the war.
Project Lazarus[]
In 1941, the Department of Mysteries began an interdivision project codenamed Project Lazarus - or Study #218. Slated to run as long as necessary, the project was created as an attempt to raise the dead. Thought impossible for as long as history had been recorded, the Ministry of Magic sanctioned studies to further investigate the possibility of resurrection. Kept hidden from even the Minister of Magic, Project Lazarus was considered to be one of the most controversial studies to ever take place in the Department. It was, essentially, playing god.
For forty years, Project Lazarus continued without progress, and was often put on hold for studies that required the researchers' more imminent attention. But in 1981, following the First Wizarding War, the project made its first step forward. After following up on the many developments Voldemort had made, the Department took interest in his use of Inferi and their ability to be molded into mobile beings. It wasn't a large development, but to the Department the revelation was a huge leap. From that point on, rather than focusing their attention on resurrecting corpses, the project turned toward the possibility of soul transplantation and Inferius sentience.
After countless failed attempts, the department successfully transplanted an unknown soul into a male Inferus in 1998. But the soul rejected the nonfunctioning brain and heart, and consequently withered.
It was in Thought that Project Lazarus found Jane after five more unsuccessful transplants. 'Jane' was an Inferius from the First War who was the recipient of an eighteenth century Necromancer's mind. Her heart, while not beating, was an anomaly - the properties that it governed were still thriving, even after what they assumed to be nearly a year of death and dark control. It had been concluded that something had not died along with the rest of the body, and allowed for the organ transfer to be possible.
Although functioning on the most basic of levels, Jane still possessed no free-will, and existed as a mere tool for the Division to use as a means of communication with the dead. Project Lazarus sought to change that, and in 2004, transplantation of Fabian Prewett's soul into the young woman was declared successful.
For four years, Jane has remained in the Department of Mysteries to be studied. Her position as a conscious Inferius is, what they believe to be, unique. Jane, like all Inferi, is difficult to harm by magic and has not aged past the point in Dorothy's life when she died. Additionally, she is capable of communicating with the souls of the deceased, and is able to relay messages and warnings that would otherwise remain unheard and unfound.
Meta[]
Journal: raising
PB: Sara Forestier
Player: Alyson