⇀ Description

• Height || 6'2
• Build || Lean
• Eyes || Blue
• Skin tone || Pale
• Hair color || Medium brown
• Hair style || Short, very slightly wavy
• Demeanor || Imposing
• Style || Professional

It's funny how someone with a round nose, soft face, short chin, and gentle jawline can look so damn scary, though really, most of that's just a side-effect of her personality and the fact that she can remain totally cool-headed even when soaked in viscera.

If Molly was a foot shorter and wasn't always stone-faced (or quasi-glaring), she'd actually be pretty cute looking. Her medium-brown hair is just a little bit wavy, getting curlier the longer it gets, and her eyebrows are fairly small and dainty. She's got the general features of gentleness, but they so harshly contrast with her personality that they're easy to forget about. It doesn't help that her style of dress is thoroughly masculine and very sharp, preferring to eschew all forms of decoration and mainly wear suits, vests, and extremely expensive leather shoes. The closest thing she owns to jewelry is her pocket watch, which she keeps wound to exacting precision, and her father's gun, which has a small amount of decoration on its ivory plated handle. She keeps that last one hidden, though. Well. Most of the time. Unless she's threatening to shoot you.

And Molly will threaten to shoot you, particularly if you're a ghastly ghoul trying to eat her friend. Molly may be training to be a doctor, but she will not hesitate, and that general sense of commitment to her choices is present in her body language. Another thing contributing to her general aura of intimidation is the general sharpness of her body-lines - she's flat chested, broad-shouldered for a woman, has particularly long legs and fingers, and actually is decently strong. Molly's not a body-builder, but she lifts. Maybe not shredded, but she lifts.

She keeps herself pretty clean, with well-manicured fingernails, spotless shoes, and well-pressed clothes, though sometimes her hair looks a little bit messier than she likes because of its thickness. It's something she struggles with, and she isn't particularly fond of it.

⇀ Important Notes

• Molly is very tall and doesn't often smile.
• She can be drawn in a wide variety of suits, vests, and sweater-vests.

⇀ Moodboard

⇀ History

Born to a wealthy and well-established household, Molly's concerns growing up were mostly social in nature.

Her father loved her dearly, just as he loved all of his children, though she had the enviable distinction of being his favorite. He would never have admitted to being most fond of his 'pretty little princess', but it was clear that he paid her a particular amount of attention, in part due to her interest in the various relics and artifacts around his study, but also in part because she just... didn't mesh with people her age. She was the sort of kindergartner who sat in the corner, hoarding the wooden blocks and making grandiose, color-coordinated castles out of anything she could find. She was the sort of first-grader who'd already taken to reading books in the middle school section, and she was the sort of third-grader who read the encyclopedia for fun. It wasn't that she didn't like people around her; but she was frequently overwhelmed with the energy they all exhibited towards playing, and she also simply... naturally threw herself into whatever interested her. She didn't want to separate herself from society. It just happened as a result of her personality. At first, she was completely unaware of the fact she was different. It didn't bother her that she wasn't invited to play with others - she would just read at the edge of the playground and be happy absorbing the fact that people were around her, thinking of that as a perfectly fine way to experience social life. It didn't even occur to her that others didn't see it at way, viewing her as this odd, stoic, unfriendly child that wanted nothing to do with them. In her innocence, she had absolutely no idea that other people... didn't like her.

She liked them, so why would it be any different in reverse?

When the class began joking that she was one of the robotic servants of the main villain in the Captain Comet books, Molly didn't really understand why, but it didn't trouble her because, in her mind, it was bringing others joy. When one of the boys took all of her books and scrawled 'robot girl' across the pages, Molly was a bit upset, because she liked her things and hated having them tampered with, but her father - always fond of her, and never wanting her to suffer - took her out to the bookstore and let her buy whatever she wanted.

By the time Molly was in fourth grade though, when she was pushed down on the black-top and laughed at because 'it's not like she can feel pain, she's a robot!', she started to understand that what people around her felt towards her was malice, and she became very, very deeply troubled.

Molly relocated schools after that, being placed in a much more prestigious private school for 'gifted children' in the hopes that she'd fit in there better.

In some ways, it did, but the pressure on her increased exponentially. Her environment was now one of fierce competition, where she was surrounded by a slurry of children who were both intelligent and ambitious. Molly was only one of those things, so she felt somewhat uneasy about the change. She didn't quite understand the benefits of making connections and fostering future collaborative development. Truthfully, Molly only wanted to pursue her interests, and she'd always preferred people who were content and cheerful to her now over-pressured, permanently dissatisfied peers. She never complained, but it did unsettle her, and she similarly was unsettled by the fact that she was only here because she'd inspired such genuine animosity in others in her previous environment. She'd never wanted that. All she'd wanted, really, was to be like her father, who was a friendly, beloved man, who no one ever complained about.

This desire to be like her father lead to something rather unfortunate, because unbeknownst to the innocent Molly, Isaiah Burke had a dark secret.

On initial examination, Isaiah's estate seemed fairly normal. Classically styled and well-kept, it was clear his career as a doctor lead itself to a healthy amount of financial security. Much of his time was spent in his study, which was - in true, academic fashion - lined with bookshelves and leather-bound tomes. He had collections of textbooks, novels, plays, poems, and rare volumes... and curiously enough, he also had a glass-covered, locked cabinet dedicated to the occult. To Molly, these were interesting curiosities. She treated them like storybooks, like how a child would become fascinated with Egyptian myths or Greek cosmetology. When she went upstairs to visit with her father, she'd go to this locked section of his collection and express clear fascination at the strange looking things contained within - and if he had them out? She'd gravitate towards them immediately, flipping in awe through the pages before he could stop her. At first, he tried to keep her away from this restricted collection, attempting to distract her or redirect her interest to something more palatable, but it soon became clear that Molly wouldn't be swayed. Something drew her to them, even though she didn't understand their history at the time.

To a ten year old girl, what do things like Necronomicon mean? The Book of Lies? Aleister Crowley, the Key of Solomon? They were just interesting things to look at. They didn't really have any affect on the world.

It was only later in her life that she began to realize that a couple of things were strange about her situation. For one, she was aware that sometimes, very late at night, men would come visit her father and they would all convene in the basement. Out of curiousity, she put her ear against the door once, but could only detect an indecipherable murmur coming from its depths. For another, she came to realize just how sickly her mother was, and how much her father fretted over her. He brought strange people up to her room, and they would fill the house with strange smells. And one night, Molly woke up to the sound of incomprehensible, guttural screaming tearing through the home. Her sisters never liked acknowledging any of this. She didn't question it; she attributed all of these oddities to dreams, or simply... the eccentricities of other people.

Perhaps if this had continued onto adulthood, Molly would have drawn the obvious conclusions, but when she was twelve, Isaiah Burke was murdered, his things were disposed of, and her mother and older sisters refused to ever speak of the circumstances regarding his death. They became strange, withdrawn - demanding, in her mother's case, Naomi Burke began to control her daughters and strictly keep track of their whereabouts. Molly was enrolled, along with her siblings, in self-defense classes. They learned to shoot. They learned to check rooms before entering, to look behind them constantly to see if they were being followed, to be wary of the motivations of strangers. Molly didn't connect this paranoia to her father; she simply thought that her mother had gotten sicker after his passing. It was an easy conclusion to draw. She drank too much, she looked haggard and worn.

Neither fitting in at home nor at school now, Her poor social skills meant that she was unable to reach out for help. She didn't think like other people, giving her no support network to rely on, and having no friends, she had no framework to process that what was happening to her was strange. She only knew that she felt empty, lonely, and so she began completely immersing herself in her studies, hoping that if she became a useful enough person, she'd find a place she felt like she fit in. Where she belonged. Maybe if she became skilled and competent, her mother would praise her and stop being distant around her. Maybe if she reached the top of her class, someone would want to become her friend.

Ironically enough, her efforts did bear fruit, though not in the way she expected. One day, around the age of fifteen, Molly Burke's 'training' allowed her to save a strange boy named William Hare, who she then began to tutor and eventually befriend. It was through William that she began to realize the true nature of the world and the supernatural things living within it, and it was through William that she finally realized the truth.

Her dear, beloved father, who had always tried to understand her, had been a cultist deeply involved in an eldritch secret society worshiping a dark god... and as much as her mother had wanted to hide her from it, this meant Molly was destined to become involved in some bizarre events indeed.

⇀ Symbol

Chessboard. Though knowing it's stereotypical for someone of her archetype, i.e. the 'cold genius', Molly is very fond of chess... and the board itself symbolizes her way of viewing the world very well. Molly views things in black and white - figuratively and literally - and she is most comfortable when people behave in predictable ways, such as the regulated movement of chess pieces.

⇀ Abilities

Aside from Molly's wide and eclectic skill-set, her good aim, and her self-defense ability, she also has the power of 'inheritance', though this is more of a concept than an actual ability. Isaiah left an occult legacy to the daughter who admired him so much, and to the supernatural world, she is his heir. Within Molly is the largest remnant of Isaiah still existing in this world, and everything he left behind belongs to her - including his attachments to the cult and the odd artifacts he had in his possession. Among them is her gun that can kill anything, even the living dead, but firing it demands a terrible price. With every shot, the world looks less... colorful to the wielder, and a part of their spirit dies along with it. Molly would gladly use it to protect William, as at this point, she sees nothing of value within herself. This distresses William mightily.

⇀ Flaws

Most obvious is Molly's inability to properly deal with people.

She gets so nervous about social interaction that she clams up, and while her tone is generally one of professional, polite distance, having a prolonged conversation with her reveals her tendency to say insulting things without meaning to. She has very little ability to read facial expressions and interpret people's moods, which makes it very easy for her to be oblivious of people being cruel to her, making fun of her, or outright tricking her. She's pretty bad at sarcasm, though she's getting better with it due to the help of William, and despite wanting to reach out to people and help them, she never knows what to say. Sometimes, her tendencies can be endearing, but her harsh demeanor and general, uh... ability to stick her foot in her mouth cause frequent unintended offense. Though, being quite honest, now that she's an adult she's more likely to find people who are empathetic to that kind of problem, but her childhood traumas and the resulting crippling self-hatred make it difficult to befriend her. Basically, to get Molly to understand that you like her, you've got to say it in incredibly forthright terms. Otherwise? She just thinks you're putting up with her.

Secondly, Molly doesn't really... obey the law? Her mother instilled in her a casual disregard for rules and regulations, which means that Molly's totally cool with things like... breaking and entering! Theft! Battery! Murder! Like, she doesn't really do any of that unless she has a pretty specific reason for it, but there's no little voice in her head that says to her, 'hey Molly, um... maybe don't do that?' This can also weird people out.

Thirdly, Molly is picky and weird and has a bunch of little eccentricities. It's impossible to convince her to wear gloves, she is incredibly bothered (to the point of distraction) by things not being tidy, and it often takes her a really long time to accomplish tasks because she's a total perfectionist. If it's done by Molly, it has to be done perfectly, which is... bad if a deadline is looming or if the task doesn't really need to be done with exacting finesse. She's also pretty forgetful about pretty basic things like eating, and it's easy for her to get completely hyperfocused on one thing to the expense of everything else in her life.

⇀ Trivia