general information.
full name dr. vikram aarav jain
nicknames vik / viki ( by odette only ) / jain / dr. jain
age 38
date of birth june 1st, 1986
place of birth great neck, new york
zodiac gemini sun / aquarius moon / scorpio rising
gender cis male
nationality first-generation american
religion atheist
occupation clinical pharmacologist
orientation aromantic bisexual
physical attributes.
face claim dev patel
voice claim dev patel
height 6'2
weight 187 lbs
build lean muscle
exercise habits low impact exercise / yoga
allergies pollen ( tree + grass + weed ) / insect stings ( bee + wasp + fire ant )
afflictions mixed connective tissue disease
hair color dark brown
hairstyle somewhat long / styled away from face
eye color dark brown
glasses/contacts occasionally
dominant hand right
tattoos none
scars burn scars spanning upper left torso / stab wound on left pectoral
piercings none
jewelry/accessories a thin gold chain necklace
background information.
hometown great neck, new york
current residence new york, new york
spoken languages english / hindi / gujarati
driver’s license yes
familial information.
relationship status single
mother priya jain, deceased sept. 1999
father aarav jain, deceased sept. 1999
siblings odoti jain, deceased sept. 1999
other none
children none
pets odette winters / human, test subject
personality.
positive traits observant + intelligent + organized + meticulous + adept
negative manipulative + deceitful + cruel + duplicitous + selfish + detached
likes elaichi chai + painfully hot showers + antique medical textbooks + silence
dislikes cold weather + mindless conversation + nosy minds and hands + rain
moral alignment lawful evil
mbti intj
meticulous and organized, vikram has a compulsion to keep his surroundings as tidy as his mind ; nothing out of place, nothing askew. a fortuitous trait for as studious a mind as his, he has demonstrated a profound and lifelong passion not just for academics and research, but the pursuit of knowledge simply for knowledge’s sake. he is a naturally curious creature with an innate desire to understand the world around him and the exact mechanics by which it operates, a trait perhaps due in part to the distinct disconnect he’s felt from everything — and everyone — around him for as long as he can remember. this sense of alienation led him to pursue a doctorate in medicine as well as a phd in pharmaceutical science — to not only understand how people truly work when broken down to their most essential parts, but to learn how he can manipulate those basic functions through the application of very specific chemical compounds. if you can’t beat them, learn how to control them.
for as estranged as vikram feels himself to the world at large, you would never guess it to speak to him ; the mask he wears for the world is carefully crafted, a polite and professional visage modeled after years upon years of observing the social interactions of others, learning by careful scrutiny of example what qualifies as acceptable behavior — how long to maintain eye contact, when it’s appropriate to smile during a conversation, how to sound like he cares. and he does it well ; to be fortunate enough to know only the vikram he chooses to present himself to be is to know a soft-spoken and mild-mannered man, sympathetic and polite to the degree that his manner of speech at times almost feels anachronistic. vik is intelligent and articulate, punctual and reliable ; he makes an effort to appear as such, to walk a line between unassuming and invaluable that would leave his closest friends and colleagues shocked should they ever discover what he does behind locked doors.
in truth, dr. jain is a cruel man. he has very little regard for human life in comparison to the scientific gain that can be offered in its sacrifice. he does not wish to make people better on an individual basis — he is not a physician — but he wishes to make people, as a whole, better, and oftentimes found himself biting his tongue professionally to keep from overstepping any ethical boundaries when it came to the testing of new pharmaceuticals. but the skew of his moral compass extends beyond big pharma ; he has no qualms with torture and has, on multiple accounts, overseen and personally administered chemical compounds against the will of the recipients with the intention to reconfigure or otherwise permanently damage their cognitive and executive function.
biography.
TRIGGERS - neglect / animal abuse / death / physical + chemical torture / medical procedures
even were he to truly think on it, vikram jain would be hard-pressed to procure but a single memory of a time that he did not feel estranged from the world around him ; as a child, he provided his parents more strife than he ever did pride, though not for a lack of effort on his part. vikram was a peculiar child, abnormal in both the eyes of his parents and his peers ; he was quiet and observant, with wide, owlish eyes that seemed to silently soak in everything around him. for the first several years of his life, vikram was non-verbal — in fact, he did not speak aloud until the age of four, by which time he could do so in complete sentences to clearly articulate his thoughts. and even after he did find his voice, socialization did not come easy. children could be cruel, after all, and not least of all toward what they do not understand. and poor vikram, for all that he sought after it, never truly felt like they understood him. his parents, aarav and priya jain, would protest that they did everything they could to give their son a normal childhood and that it was a fault of his own that he resisted. the unfortunate truth of the matter was that they were ill-prepared to handle the idiosyncrasies of a child such as vikram, and rather than try to address his needs and figure out where the disconnect began, they resorted to ignoring it, stifling it ; overstimulated outbursts were punished, subtle self-soothing tics scolded away.
vikram, of course, could never quite understand what it was he’d done wrong and rather than lay himself out for continued lashing, he withdrew upon himself. it wasn’t difficult; he’d never really understood the value of such connection or emotional intimacy. what should’ve been a warm embrace from his mother only ever made his skin prickle and crawl and any attempted heart-to-hearts with his father — an emotionally stunted man in his own right, in different ways — only ever left both parties feeling more frustrated than before. the only exception to this unwritten rule of distance came in the form of a younger sister, odoti. at first, he showed apathy toward her at best — and near disdain for her constant crying and screeching at worst — but by the time she’d grown from a drooling, babbling infant into something at least resembling a small, cognizant human, vikram found himself strangely endeared to her. perhaps it was because of her own apparent fascination with him, or the resulting truth that she was, in fact, the first person who didn’t look at him like he was strange. like he was some sort of anomaly. no, odoti only ever looked toward him with admiration and curiosity and something vikram still thinks, to this day, is the closest he’s ever really felt to understanding genuine, unconditional love. or something he would think, at least, if he ever allowed himself the opportunity. he does not.
as a young boy, vikram was possessed with a curiosity of his own. a morbid fascination, more like, and one he kept hidden from the likes of everyone around him — odoti included. he had an affinity for experimenting with chemicals — caustic cleaning supplies stolen from beneath the sink or shoved into his backpack from the janitor’s cart at school, various jugs and cartons of automotive fluids, anything he could get his hands on. he’d mix the solvents and solutions with food and leave them out for wildlife and feral animals, hidden away in inconspicuous places. and then vikram would do what he did best. observe. he’d take careful note of which chemicals sedated them and in which dosages, which caused behavioral changes or made them ill and which ceased vital functions altogether. when they did die, inquisitive young vikram would often inspect their corpses, oftentimes hiding them away and returning weeks or months later to collect the bones. he had quite the collection once he’d cleaned and bleached them all, and he insisted — to his parents’ horror — that it was all locally sourced roadkill to alleviate suspicion about their origins. it wasn’t that he thought what he was doing was shameful ; on the contrary, vikram saw nothing wrong with his behavior — but he expected everyone else to disagree, to misunderstand and misjudge him. he’d grown tired of being scolded. it was easier, he found, to just be private.
for years, vikram managed to maintain his morbid pastime. he grew bolder, mixing volatile compounds in glass measuring cups in his bedroom behind locked doors ; he fancied himself a scientist, a chemist. he was just shy of twelve years old when his experiments finally proved beyond the realm of his control. as he would discover, it takes only moments for an open container of acetone to evaporate enough to cause a flash ignition if there is an open enough flame, even one so small as a candle, near enough by. the curtains behind his desk were the first to catch and, for a moment, it was all vikram could do to stare on as the flames began to swallow up the fabric, lapping at the walls and warming his skin. he should’ve anticipated it — he wasn’t stupid, he’d read the warning labels on everything he touched meticulously and at least thrice over. but vikram could hear their voices as he watched the fire grow brighter and stronger — his parents, his teachers, his peers. scolding him, mocking him for being so foolish, so careless! they were screaming at him, their voices drowning out the roar of the flames and instead setting every single one of his nerves alight.
by the time vikram snapped out of his haze, nearly half of his bedroom was engulfed in flames. and in truth, the only reason he’d been pulled from his internal cacophony was because he could feel the sting of the fire against his arms and flesh, the burn of smoldering cotton and sizzling flesh. he didn’t tell them before he fled the house in a panic, made no effort to rouse his parents or his sister as he scrambled into the bushes of the backyard and tried to calm down even as the blaze grew brighter. by the time he could see the glow through the kitchen windows, he could already hear his father shouting. vikram was too far away to make out the words, but he sounded desperate, frantic. his mothers wails wove in between the curses, choked and gasping. this, vikram found, did not upset him, for they could not know that they need direct their anger at him. in fact, if only he could hide long enough, they’d never know the chance to scold him again. but odoti… he’ll never forget the sound of her screaming his name, how the sound of her fear was visceral enough to carry her plea through blistering walls. when emergency services finally arrived to put out the flames, the firefighters on the scene found him trembling in the brush with his hands clamped over his ears and his eyes pressed shut in a pair of filthy, burnt pajamas. there were no other survivors.
with all of his remaining family residing out of the country and no viable guardians to speak of, vikram was a ward of the state by the time he reached his thirteenth birthday. he ended up in a boarding school for young men where he quickly flourished in academics but floundered socially with the same haste. it was not the words of his peers that bothered him — vikram was used to mockery and he took no offense to childish insults and name-calling, even at the expense of his newfound scars and rumored history — but the physical harassment. that he should be intentionally injured in a facility meant for learning just or simply existing, a truth which he could not help, was nothing short of baffling to vikram. but he had a keen eye for observation and an analytical mind and it did not take long for vikram to begin studying the behaviors of his peers, picking out details in micro-expressions and subtle changes in speech patterns and intonations as they engaged with each other. things he could’ve noticed ages ago, if only he’d bothered. things he wasn’t doing. he scrawled notes in his journal, practiced making faces back at himself in the bathroom mirror when there was no one around to see.
slowly, carefully, he began to craft a newer version of himself based on his findings — a mask, the illusion of a more socially palatable vikram. polite and charming, always listening and never over-sharing; he learned when to smile and how to laugh loud enough to blend in but not so loud as to get noticed. he learned when it was better to bite his tongue and withhold his opinions — in his case, the answer was often — and how to ignore the desire to crawl out of his skin at the slightest degree of platonic contact. more importantly, he learned how to wear this mask always. it helps in a way, he thinks even still, the level of control it allows him over how others respond to him, how they treat him. it allowed him the privilege of survival by means of camouflage in a cage full of predators ( perhaps maybe one day he could become the predator… ) until his eighteenth birthday, when the call of higher education pulled him beyond the walls of the boarding school where he’d spent most of his formative years.
as it happened, vikram flourished in a different environment. nobody paid any mind to him at university and outside of lectures and labs; he spoke up enough during discussions that people knew who he was well enough, but nobody ever sought him out or made an effort to befriend him, not truly. this, he decided, was the ideal — the sweet spot socialization. it offered him a chance to observe without actively engaging. nobody could ever say who it was that invited him to parties, but at the same time, no one ever batted an eye at his presence, nursing a beer in the corner with a soft, disarming smile. the thing about college students, vikram discovered, was that they seldom had to be coerced into taking drugs. as he learned about prescriptions and pharmaceuticals in his lectures, he learned about street substances — stimulants, hallucinogens, an assortment of psychotropics — in crowded apartments and abandoned warehouses. between these parties and the lectures and his coursework and dissertations, vikram seldom had time for sleep. he adapted, swiftly learning to live without.
by the time he was twenty-five, dr. vikram jain possessed not one but two degrees — a doctor of medicine and pharmaceutical science. though he was not necessarily lacking in bedside manner, he ended up pursuing a career in clinical pharmacology that left him in a lab rather than a hospital, designing and conducting human trials for new drugs in development. and what might appear on the surface a dream job to vikram was rather a test in patience and self-control, a constant practice in biting his tongue to maintain an appearance of morality. it was a tease, is what it was, and vikram found he could only take so much before he grew bored of the limits and boundaries forced upon him by the pharmaceutical research company that hired him, of the countless medical boards churning out guidelines for ethical practices. unexpectedly adverse side effects for blood pressure pills or anti-inflammatories weren’t enough — vikram wanted more.
but the luxury of big pharma was that, at the very top of the ladder on which vikram remained perched on a relatively lower rung, were a bunch of wealthy bastards with morals just as disaligned as his own. one would need to, vikram supposed, to profit so unabashedly from such a corrupt industry. how he came to do freelance work for such individuals is neither here nor there ; a stroke of luck, a matter of simply being in the right place at the right time and being observant enough to catch just enough of a conversation to deem it worth inserting himself into. and if vikram had any woes about ennui, they vanished in the blink of an eye under the new employ of these men. he was allowed the creative freedom to explore experiments he’d only ever dreamed about under the simple condition that he’d administer very specific courses of very particular, mind-altering drugs at their beck and call. the financial compensation was alluring enough in its own right to make the offer worthwhile, but it was the true respect and appreciation for his particular skill set finally being recognized that made vikram realize he’d found his calling.
he can vividly recall the day they brought it to him — odette winters. vikram knew there was something special about her the moment he’d gotten his hands on her ; she was a fascinating specimen, reacting to his procedures in unexpected ways. her body did not take to the drugs like the others, nor did her mind ; no, it was a challenge to concoct the correct regimen to do the job, and vikram … well, he’d always enjoyed entertaining tasks that stimulated his brain. ( surely his fondness for her had nothing to do with the way her name sounded so terribly similar to the only one he’d ever missed, the way he could see a familiar spark in her eyes that caused his chest to ache. ) when it was whisked away from his lab the first time in a state of drooling half-sedation, he did not expect to miss it. he knew better than to get attached to ferals and strays, that they never lasted very long in his hands. but she was a curious one, and his mind often wandered back to the file he’d compiled on her. a silly pastime of thought, nothing more.
until he heard a voice call out to him, shouting to him in a desperate plea one evening when he was prowling the streets of the city’s underbelly in search of something new to entertain him and suddenly vikram was taken back to 1999 — to a crisp september night and the acrid smell of smoke and the prickle of thorns in the bushes and the sound of his sister’s terrified screams. odoti. no, no, odette. it was kismet, vikram remembers thinking in that moment ; he was not a spiritual man by any means, nor did he ascribe much to the notion of fate, but there was no other explanation for why chance might have brought it to him twice unless it was meant to be there. meant to be with him. he protected it that night in the alley, and when he did, it felt like he’d been given a second chance. he brought her home, cleaned her up and tucked her in on his sofa with a heavy quilt and an even heavier dose of sedatives, their bitterness masked by the warm spice of a hot cup of chai. he wanted to keep it, in the way as a child he’d wanted to keep many of the animals he experimented on until they grew ill and perished. but this was different in a way that was unfamiliar for vikram. discomforting, even. for all that he desired to poke and prod at it — and he would — he also felt a strange compulsion to protect it.
for years, he kept odette close ; it would come and go as it pleased in the same way a stray cat might, but he made sure she knew his door was always open — and that it was never wise to stray too far. he continued to test on it, insisting that every new session was another attempt at helping them, at making them better. he was a doctor, after all, someone to be trusted ; and more than that, he cared for it. and to a degree, vikram wanted it to rely on him if only for the guarantee it gave him that it would never leave. ❝ oh, but you cannot tell anyone what’s happened, can you? no, of course not, poor thing. they’d be so angry, wouldn’t they? so ashamed, your father. no, that simply won’t do. they don’t understand that it isn’t any fault of yours, that you’re perfect, odoti, they won’t — but i do. i’m the only one. i’m all you’ve got. ❞ whether it believed him or not, it remained close, decorating his office with its bizarre works of art and showing him affection the likes of which he’d never actually known but which felt innately impossible to refuse. for years, they existed like this.
that is, until one unfortunate night when he’d had unexpected company in his lab in the form of a very particular set of employers. and while vikram had foreseen an unfortunate unfolding of events — he knew its mind well enough by now to expect it to react poorly to the sight of them the moment he heard the rumbling of familiar voices outside his door — he couldn’t have anticipated exactly how volatile it would become, nor how quickly. it attacked one of the men with all the blindly feral rage of a frightened animal ; a pet he’d not meant to keep, and here it was biting at the hand that feeds him! he could forgive it, of course, if only he could remove it from the man before it caused any serious damage. but, like an oiled snake, lithe and venomous and ready to strike, it slipped right through his arms. and then it turned on him. if he’d anticipated a knife in the chest from the creature he held dearest, he’d not known it would be so literal.
the pain was searing, white-hot, as vivid crimson began to soak through the pristine white of a lab coat. but more than that, it felt almost karmic. hard-earned and well-deserved. he saw his sister in it for a second, in its eyes, and even with the hilt of a knife jutting from his pectoralis major, he couldn’t find it in himself to be angry with it. not even when it yanked the blade free before he could protest. not truly. ❝ out! get out! ❞ he’d insisted anyway, his words wet and crackling but sharp as he stumbled toward his desk, one hand wet and sticky as he clutched it to his chest in a desperate attempt to apply pressure to the wound. not in an attempt to scold her, but to protect her. she needed to leave ; the man on the floor had not come alone and he expected that they’d be back for her sooner than later. that someone would be back for her. but his dot was a stubborn creature, and one of the last things vikram can recall is the sight of her tearful face and the sound of her apologies as she fluttered over him, desperate to help. ❝ do not cry, ❞ he managed to mumble, dizzy and hoarse, ❝ remember… remember what i said. ‘s not your fault, odoti. ❞
and that was the last time he would see it. when vikram woke in a hospital bed less than a day later,it was to a swift and unfortunate series of discoveries ; not only had she managed to puncture his lung, but in the process of calling for aid, she’d gotten herself detained. institutionalized. of course he had no intention of pressing charges, but they’d deemed his odette a danger to itself and others and they’d kept it, stolen it away from him as if it had not been thriving under his care before the incident. life went on for a few months following. vikram had never been the healthiest himself, in spite of his profession ; recovery was slow and unpleasant and the break from work it forced upon him was torture for idle hands and an overworked mind. and even when he could return to his day job in clinical pharmacology, it was several weeks still before he could return to his true passion. he’d only just begun to dip his toes back in when the outbreak hit new york.
a man with a skill set such as vikram’s was invaluable in a world as lawless and anarchic as his had become ; he’d been selected and sought out by one of his private clients, offered security and protection in exchange for his medical expertise at access to a camp of survivors stationed at the hotel elysee in midtown. seeing an opportunity and no reason to refuse, vikram remained at the hotel elysee for several months ; the men he chose to align with were a vicious lot, cruel and thieving, but their efforts meant that vikram lived in luxury. his suite was not a modest one, and he’d been gifted an additional adjoined set of rooms to transform into a makeshift infirmary of sorts. what he did behind the locked door of that second room was a business entirely his own. he thrived in this camp through the winter, all the way up until the moment of its collapse — a power struggle that ended in foolish decisions and bloodshed and rendered the hotel overrun by biters. it was by the skin of his teeth that vikram managed to escape, but he was fortunate in that he’d already had his belongings packed. he’d seen it coming. perhaps not to this degree, but he’d anticipated some sort of catastrophe all the same.
it was not chance but a fortunate tip that led him to the wexley, received from one jeremiah rose — a contact he’d not anticipated coming across in the wilds of this new city, though he should’ve guessed the other man was resilient enough to survive. he does not know what to expect upon his arrival, but vikram has grown accustomed to a certain standard of living in the new world order, and he has every intention of gaining that back.
headcanons.
vikram would occasionally engage in non-consensual ( but explicitly platonic and non-sexual ) behavior with his test subjects while they were sedated ; this self-soothing behavior for the touch-starved man included draping their arms around him in an embrace or climbing up beside them on the exam chair he’s strapped them to and resting his head on their shoulder for a while.
vikram has moderate scarring on the left half of his body from burns received during the fire he started in his home as a child, mostly spanning his shoulder, chest and upper arm. these are mostly hidden by his wardrobe choices, although if one were to look closely enough at his collar they might catch a glimpse of the glossy, disfigured skin creeping up his neck.
he suffers from a connective tissue disorder that causes chronic pain he keeps under control with a careful cocktail of drugs for himself, and he made sure to utilize the raiders from his previous camp to ensure he had an ample supply, even after he left the hotel elysee. on his worst days, vikram employs the use of a cane, but years of practiced control over his expression mean that his pain is carefully concealed.
this condition is what complicated his recovery from pneumothorax after being stabbed in the chest; he still experiences sporadic, stabbing chest pains that have been known to steal his breath away for moments at a time and his lungs tend to rattle a bit at times if he breathes too deeply, lending to a dry cough he often smothers into a handkerchief.
supply list.
one nondescript black duffel bag containing the following:
a variety of various pharmaceuticals ( narcotics / opiates / stimulants / muscle relaxers / cns depressants / antibiotics / anti-inflammatories / mood stabilizers )
an extensive first aid kit ( including but not limited to gloves, gauze, various bandages and dressings, medical tape, tweezers, scissors, antiseptic, antibiotic ointment, isopropyl alcohol, several needles and surgical thread )
a rubber apron and a pair of reusable elbow-length gloves
two changes of clothes / three pairs of socks / a sweater / a lab coat
a personal supply of nutritional supplements and vitamins
a beretta 30x tomcat with 32 rounds of ammunition
custom made support cane with engraved handle and concealed 18’ stiletto blade