I knew I had this handy somewhere... just had to remember where I put it, I guess. Anyway, for your reference: the original character description/history for Alex... don't think too much has changed since this write up... maybe a few subtle details but still pretty much good.
General Description: Alex is 5’10” and weighs between 160 and 165 lbs. He’s got a rather shaggy mop of brown hair that has just started showing signs of gray (it used to be cut close and kept much neater before Emily was killed and he left the police force but, these days, doesn’t look as if it’s been properly cut since shortly after her funeral) and, more often than not, several days growth of beard the same color. His eyes are gray and frequently give away when he’s had a bit much to drink. Typical clothing for Alex is a pair of relaxed fit Levi’s, a rumpled, button-down shirt (sometimes with a t-shirt or undershirt worn underneath, other times not), a battered leather coat, and a pair of Timberland chukkas or boots. (Pic attached for a general idea of Alex’s standard look). Although Emily’s been dead for three years or more, Alex still wears his wedding ring and a pentacle necklace/amulet that belonged to her. Additionally, Alex bears a multitude of notable scars including what appear to be burn scars on his hands and forearms (the result of getting a little ‘crazy’ with Elemental Fire) – these would be the most likely to be noticed – others that are typically hidden from most folks are numerous scars on his chest and abdomen that look as if someone tried to carve some sort of symbols into him at some point.
Character History: Alex’s parents, Avery and Isabelle Sharpe, were both members of a Wicce coven and, as such, Alex himself was raised and nurtured with Wicce Theology as his ‘religion.’ While he understood the precepts, tenets, and other aspects of the faith as a youngster, Alex, as most rebellious young men are wont to do and despite his natural Gift, didn’t embrace the Covenant of his parents beliefs and philosophies and, for a long time, aside from writing ‘wiccan,’ on forms and such that requested a religious affiliation, had very little involvement with the craft. Of course, he would attend rites with his family and, on occasion, study half-heartedly. Other than that, though, Alex stayed away from overt practice of the Craft, himself, throughout the majority of his young life.
He did take a slightly more active interest in the Wicce Covenant in his late teens and early twenties, though. He was studying Law and Criminal Justice at the University of Chicago when he met Emily Lenox, a Gifted young woman from a long line of Wicce in Vermont, who was studying Humanities and Psychology at the University. The two dated, fell desperately in love, and eventually married. Despite his relationship with Emily, though, and even though she’d brought him closer to the Wicce covenant as a whole, Alex still wasn’t what any would have called a devout practitioner. After college, Alex joined the Chicago Police Department while Emily (after working a series of ‘unfulfilling’ jobs in Social Services agencies and the like) eventually opened an ‘occult bookstore’ on the first floor of the greystone building that they had purchased in the Old Town neighborhood of Chicago (which often served as a regular meeting place for Emily’s coven). Alex eventually attained the rank of Detective Sergeant on the force (working in both Homicide and Vice units at different times) and Emily enjoyed the modest but comfortable success of the bookshop (which she preferred to think of as a Wicce library and/or outreach center).
A few years ago, Emily’s coven became aware of a ‘dark coven’ in the area that had come to serve, if not outright worship, the demon Azazel. Realizing that Azazel’s influence would certainly not bode well in a city like Chicago (where corruption, vice, and violence was easily found almost anywhere one might care to look), it became a major goal of Emily’s coven to work against and, if possible, stop this ‘Cult of Azazel’ before they became powerful enough to actually summon the demon. The Azazelites, unfortunately, were already more powerful than Emily’s coven had initially thought and, as a result, the two groups became embroiled in a fairly intense conflict… a metaphysical punch-counterpunch sort of thing with rites and rituals performed on both sides in hopes of diminishing or destroying the other. As the conflict grew, so too did Azazel’s cult. Emily’s coven, on the other hand, had difficulties maintaining any more than thirteen practicing members and, in a lot of cases, fewer than that number attended meetings let alone any of the rituals that the coven performed in their battle against the Azazelites. Eventually, of course, the conflict between the groups came to a head and culminated in the one event that would bring Detective Alex Sharpe closer to the Covenant than anything else in his entire history.
Emily’s coven came to the realization that the dark coven had grown in power and numbers and, as such, were dangerously close to being able to actually summon the ancient demon. Thus, while they knew they hadn’t the metaphysical resources among them to match that which the cult could bring to bear, they made the decision to perform a ritual that, if it worked, would bind the Azazelites and, possibly, Azazel himself in a manner of speaking. Emily had managed to secure promises from all thirteen members of her coven that each would be there to join the circle when the time came – such an attempt to bind a demon or even its human devotees with any fewer than 13 in the circle would have been folly – and having done so, began preparations for the ritual to be conducted in coincidence with the next full moon. Alex, of course, was aware of the plans and, while he questioned Emily’s readiness for such an undertaking even with a full circle of thirteen, he supported her (as he always had) and her coven as best he knew how… even offering to help by, maybe, running some of the cultists in on any sort of charges he might be able to come up with on them. She assured him, though, that as long as all thirteen members of her own coven stayed true to their word and participated in the ritual, that the worst that could happen would be that the incantations would simply fail and flatten with little effect for better or worse (other than having exhausted parties on both sides and, perhaps, sapping available power from both groups for a time). Unfortunately, on the night that the ritual was to be performed, only ten of the thirteen members of Emily’s coven showed, leaving them short of both available essence and the mystical strength associated with the number thirteen. As the Azazelites power had grown in recent days, though, and despite not having the numbers they would have wished, the coven decided to proceed with the ritual with nine members in the circle (the remaining member was to stand watch ‘just in case’) because, to do otherwise was risking the cult growing powerful enough to be beyond any intervention of which they might be capable. Even more unfortunately, the Azazelites were better prepared (and more powerful) than any in Emily’s coven suspected or even imagined. During the ritual, Emily’s coven was overrun and, for lack of a better or more fitting term, slaughtered by Azazelite minions (both gifted, mundane, and purely supernatural).
On the night of the ritual, Alex was in the midst of working a crime scene on the city’s South Side when he received a call on his cell phone from a number he didn’t recognize (he would learn later on that the number belonged to the member of Emily’s coven who had been assigned ‘watch duty’ during the ritual). He knew exactly what the call was about, though, when he lifted the phone to his ear and heard the gods-awful sounds that came through it… screams of pain, the sick gibbering laughter and merciless howls of carnage and destruction, all the sickening sounds of something gone horribly wrong. Alex abandoned his partner at the crime scene without a word and raced for the location where Emily had told him the ritual would take place. He arrived too late. When he entered the old warehouse (selected because it had been built over an ancient place of power) the slaughter was all but complete. Aside from the blood and bodies the only living things that Alex found were four ‘lesser members’ of the Cult of Azazel who had been tasked, apparently, with hanging each of the members of Emily’s coven from the ceiling (directly above the positions in which they had stood outside the circle) and opening them up from neck to navel and letting their innards fall into the ring of salt below. Alex shot one of them before thy noticed he was there and managed to get off several more shots (despite the sickening pain in his heart and the tears that clouded his vision) before the other three managed to subdue him… staring at Emily’s defiled body, he lost consciousness (hoping that he’d soon be seeing his wife again) well before the Azazelites torture reached it’s height. He remembered awaking briefly, still on the floor of the warehouse and still alive. The cultists were gone, Emily and her coven still hung from the ceiling in a mockery of the circle they had created, and a man (a Vampyre, actually, as Alex would learn sometime later) was standing over him telling him that the essence here was horribly tainted and, also, that help would be coming.
Alex Sharpe spent several days thereafter in the hospital recovering from the wounds to both his body and his psyche. His body healed quicker than his mind though and he found himself plagued by recurring nightmares of the phone call and finding his wife in that hellish place and what the Azazelites had done to him… to her… to all of them. Along with the nightmares came guilt, depression, and soon enough, the thirst for revenge against those (human or otherwise) who had taken Emily from him. He managed to stay employed with the Chicago PD for a time and was able to use the resources available to him as a result to help in finding some of the cultists but soon realized that ordinary, mundane police work wouldn’t ever be enough to get the results he wanted… also, his obsession with exacting revenge on the Azazelites (which often ‘Distracted Detective Sharpe from the actual cases he had been assigned’) coupled with the facts that a) he had started drinking and smoking quite heavily and b) had started demonstrating a particularly cruel streak when dealing with suspects, led to him being referred first to a department shrink and, finally, to the Internal Affairs bureau, convinced him that it was well past time to put the Chicago PD behind him. Shortly after making the decision (within hours, in fact) Alex Sharpe tendered his resignation and spent the next several months fully immersed in the study and practice of the magical arts and, having built a modicum of power and a decent arsenal of incantations, spells, and other workings of the Craft, began hunting the Azazelites.
Shadows of the Empire Q&A
Shadows of the Empire
Neva
ving the posts all around, gang! I don't even thinks there are words to express how much fun I'm having with this already. I owe each of you a beer... or glass of wine... or Capri-sun... whatever your drink of choice might be. 
