G072 - Abert, Quinn [DECEASED]

[MK Kilmarnock]

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Name: Quinn Abert
Gender: Female
Age: 17
Grade: 12
School: George Hunter High School
Hobbies and Interests: Science, woodcarving, fighting games, basketball

Appearance: Quinn is 5'4" in height and weighs 107 lbs. She is slim in build, and her tendency to slouch makes her look a little smaller than she actually is. She is Caucasian and naturally pale-skinned with the occasional freckle and doesn't wear makeup, having never learned how. Her hair is black, straight and kept short, though she maintains floppy bangs that fall into her face most of the time. Her eyes are light blue and often have dark circles under them which resembles bruising. Quinn has a fairly livid scar a few inches in length over her right eye. Quinn's features are spaced quite far apart; she has something of a long face, exacerbated by high cheekbones, a pointed chin, thin lips and a long, sloping nose. Quinn's hands are much more callused than someone would expect for a girl of her age and rough to the touch.

Quinn cares zero for fashion and wouldn't know a designer label if it hit her in the head. Almost her entire wardrobe consists of baggy hoodies and pants, with the odd game-based tshirt design, though she tends to 'wear' hoodies in the loosest sense, often letting them slide off her shoulders and bunch halfway down her arms. When abducted, Quinn was wearing a black hoodie, a black shirt with red 'FATALITY' text, grey sweatpants and sneakers.

Biography: Quinn is the only child of Daniel and Annette, who worked as a bank teller and college professor respectively in Maryville, Tennessee. Quinn was unplanned and unexpected, and neither parent was wholly prepared for a child. However, they decided that they could deal with the surprise pregnancy with some help from their own parents. Quinn was frequently babysat by either set of grandparents for her first few years, developing into a quiet and reserved child. Sadly, her maternal grandmother passed away when she was only three due to a sudden illness, and her grandfather died the following year. Annette handled her parents' deaths badly and retreated in on herself, becoming withdrawn from both Quinn and Danny and creating an air of tension at home, especially as she took to salving her feelings with alcohol. This impacted Quinn's socialisation, and she would spend most of her time playing alone even as a young child. Tragically, when Quinn was only six years old, her mother crashed her car in a drunk driving incident and died in the hospital. The emotional, mental and financial toll on Quinn and her father was devastating, and it only worsened when Danny clashed with his own parents--who had always had reservations around the relationship--about Annette. The subsequent argument was so fierce that they became entirely estranged, completely wiping out the support structure that the young family had been so reliant on. As a result, Quinn and Danny were forced to relocate to a one-bedroom apartment, Danny taking on a second job to manage finances as best as he could. Throughout, Quinn grew more and more erratic in her behaviour at home and elementary school, throwing wild tantrums, destroying toys and plants and becoming physically aggressive with other children or even her father, lashing out against the world in the only way such a young child could. Although Quinn's elementary school offered support with counselling, Quinn proved resistant to talking to the child therapist and would spend most of their sessions sulking or crying for her dad; at most it helped her to vent some of her emotions in a more controlled environment. Realising that their relationship was at risk, Danny made a mammoth effort to spend as much time with Quinn as possible, sacrificing sleep and social connections for the sake of his daughter. These efforts, combined with some eternally patient teachers and Quinn finally managing to recover emotionally from her mother's death, led to Quinn calming down, although she did develop some odd sleeping habits thanks to her dad's work schedule. This period of her life was often marked by the refrain 'It's us against the world, kiddo', forging an incredible bond between father and daughter.

Much to Quinn's dismay, this family situation started to change when she was nine years old and Daniel met fellow single father Colin Ball. At first merely acquaintances, the two men became close friends over the course of a few months and in time the connection became a romantic one. Quinn felt threatened by the emergence of another leading figure in her father's life and refused to behave around Colin, running away from her dad while Colin was around and making rude remarks at him. However, after several stern talking-tos from her dad, Quinn suppressed some of her open animosity, which she instead reserved for when she eventually met Alec, Colin's teenaged son. Quinn was persistently irritating to Alec, doing her best to annoy him, but found that her childish behaviour had little effect on the lazy and laid back teen. In spite of all this, Danny and Colin officially became a couple after around a year and although initially hesitant, given Quinn's one-child rebellion and concerns over how others may react, Danny eventually took the plunge and moved in with Colin. Surprisingly, this actually mollified Quinn to an extent as she found she had her own room and considerably more space, even a garden to play around in, as well as getting to see Danny much more since the move let him quit his second job. She even stopped acting out around Colin, although she refused to acknowledge his relationship with Danny and consistently called him 'dad's friend'. She also buried the hatchet with Alec, mostly because he gave her his old PlayStation 2 and let her play his old games. She tried out various different titles, disliking the platformers and RPGs but enjoying the shooter and fighting games due to the immediacy of the action and frantic pace, though she had to hide the violent games from her dad.

School stabiilised for Quinn, and she fell back into being one of the quieter kids, always paying attention to the teacher but not usually speaking up in class. She made a few friends among the other kids who trended towards academic enthusiasm; her grades quickly improved and she developed a sincere interest in her science classes, especially those focusing around animals, plants and ecosystems. Assembled, they let her start to put together an understanding of the world she lived in and what made it all function. Colin, who worked in engineering and had been an enthusiastic student in the sciences, tried to bond with her over this, but Quinn clammed up around him and refused to engage or accept offers of homework help. The extended olive branch was swiftly burned to a crisp not long afterwards when at the age of eleven, Quinn learned that she was going to move again, this time to a new city entirely, Chattanooga. Upset was an understatement, doubly so when she learned it was so that Colin could start a new job. She immediately started screaming that she hated him and he ruined everything, and then Danny's legendary patience finally snapped. Danny's frustrations exploded in a furious tirade towards his daughter that left her in tears and deeply affected her for several months afterwards.

The family's new life began soon thereafter as they relocated. Quinn spent most of her time playing video games, pulling in on herself even though Danny's temporary unemployment meant he was around constantly; he eventually found new work in a pharmaceutical company. She acted similarly at school, resulting in her gaining a reputation for being particularly quiet and strange, as she would frequently refuse to talk to people or just walk out of conversations she didn't feel like participating in. The one bright spot was her academics, which continued at a high standard. This was especially true for the sciences as they split out into the more defined disciplines; while Quinn's physics was a little weaker, her biology and chemistry were outstanding. Given her consistently odd behaviour, however, the first teacher-parent meeting saw a suggestion for Danny to see if Quinn was interested in any hobbies or sports to help her come out of her shell. Initial attempts were met with a lack of enthusiasm as Quinn claimed she'd rather just play games, but eventually admitted that she liked some of the practical subjects at school. This led to trials of art and design, neither of which Quinn liked, and then, on Colin's suggestion, woodcarving. Quinn refused on principle at first, but then relented after Alec showed her some sculptures he'd found on the internet. Starting out very clumsily, Quinn wasn't bothered by her failures, as she found the mistakes almost as if not more interesting than the successes. She began to attend regular hobby sessions and heavily researched techniques and history, even reluctantly accepting an artbook gift from Colin.

Quinn had a similar experience with sampling sports. Although Danny thought she might enjoy more technical and self-disciplined solo activities, Quinn loathed golf, archery and shooting almost as soon as she tried them, as they felt like a whole lot of standing around to her. Surprisingly, it was the team games she took to most as she found the direct competitiveness exciting. Although she quit baseball after only one session because she couldn't hit the ball, she then tried out basketball, which she turned out to be much more proficient at playing. Her jumping ability and shooting weren't the best, but she found herself to be a very skilled dribbler of the ball. Even on the court, though, Quinn remained quiet a non-vocal, not opening up to her teammates. Still, the new hobbies had the desired effect of allowing Quinn to express herself more, and she stuck close to them without prompting or intervention from Danny. These efforts from her father helped repair the damage from their previous argument, getting somewhere close to where they had once been.

School-life and homelife proceeded similarly over the next few years. Quinn focused harder and harder on her lessons at George Hunter, rarely engaging with her peer group except when necessary for class. Her struggles with connecting with others continued, finding that she ran out of things to say very quickly even when she tried to make conversation. This was under her dad's advice, who had grown concerned that Quinn didn't seem to have any friends. At length, Quinn gave up forcing it and stuck to safe subjects, talking about basketball with other players, homework assignments with other academics. This didn't especially bother her, as she felt that if she wasn't lonely by herself then she didn't need to try and make friends just to please other people. Besides, being friends with her dad was enough for her, and while she wasn't any closer to accepting Colin as a stepfather, their relationship was at least no longer actively hostile. A landmark moment was Quinn giving both Danny and Colin gifts for their five year anniversary as partners, though she did it much more for her dad's sake than Colin's. When Quinn was fifteen, she came out to her dad as being attracted to other girls and somewhat repulsed by the idea of being intimate with boys, but told him she wasn't putting a label on it before she felt comfortable. Danny, of course, was very supportive and did his best to guide her through the familiar process of navigating the confusion.

After Alec left home to go to college, he left Quinn his games consoles once more, and she pounced on the opportunity for newer titles. With fighting games a major favourite of hers, Quinn made sure to be on top of all the new releases, starting to play Tekken, Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat online. She climbed the ranked ladder, putting in as much effort researching combinations and techniques as she did with some of her school papers, and developed into a strong player, especially in Mortal Kombat. Quinn has participated in several local and online tournaments over the years, placing a handful of times but never winning any. With Mortal Kombat XI soon to come out and feeling that she was late to the competitive scene with previous titles, Quinn intends to be in on the ground floor with the newest release. She is in infrequent contact with Alec, mostly to keep him updated on her progress in gaming, and they have something like a sibling relationship these days.

Quinn has kept up her other hobbies through her teenaged years too. She has become skilled with her hands and working with tools, and her room at home is filled with sculptures of varying size that she carved herself. Her signature style is to either incorporate some flaw in the wood she is using into the finished piece or to intentionally create imperfections. Her favourite pieces remain those where she has made errors that distort the finished product, and at times has evoked them, such as a horse with a tiny head or a man with a missing face. In basketball, Quinn eventually joined the varsity team for George Hunter, becoming a backup point guard for the team. She worked hardest on her one on one skills, becoming known for persistent and irritating defence as well as flashy dribbling, having a host of moves to beat her man. She is also known for being extremely calm and seemingly immune to nerves, sinking shots and free throws just as casually in the dying seconds of overtime as the first quarter. Quinn is weak at calling plays, however, and often seems to be on a completely different wavelength to her teammates in terms of picking passes and giving defensive or offensive help.

Her best moment of individual basketball skill has unfortunately been overshadowed with an asterisk; in a late-season game, Quinn had been having a huge game off the bench, racking up a big points total and several steals. After scoring yet again, Quinn stared down her opposing player, who she had repeatedly stolen from and made fall three times with dribbling moves. The other girl's frustrations boiled over, and on the next play she egregiously fouled Quinn, catching her with an elbow and opening a cut over her eye. Quinn got up, felt the cut gushing blood, and promptly punched the other girl in the face, almost sparking off a court-wide brawl. In the aftermath both players were ejected, though Quinn needed to go to the hospital for stitches regardless. The fight almost saw Quinn suspended for the team's playoff run, but the coach was able to successfully argue that Quinn hadn't instigated it and get her ban reduced in length. Quinn felt that she was justified to protect herself but eventually did apologise to the rest of the team for losing her cool.

At school, Quinn remains a low profile figure, arriving, turning in straight-A assignments, and then blending right back into the background. Most of her achievement comes naturally to her as she's great at retaining information from classes, and she only goes above and beyond in her advanced sciences programme. She was thrust into the spotlight for a short while in junior year when another student broke into her locker and discovered a stack of love letters which she had written to Paloma Salt, although she had never sent them, embarrassed by her own crush. The clumsy verbiage and awkward verse were an instant comedic hit as other students circulated the letters and Quinn endured consistent taunting for the next few months as other students quoted her own overwrought poetry at her. Quinn didn't rise to the bait, however, and her various tormentors eventually got bored with the game; unfortunately, she is still best known among the student body as 'the weird love letter kid'. She doesn't have many friends, but gravitates naturally to other academically-inclined students, since she can at least connect with them on a scholastic level.

Quinn has an offer in place to attend college after graduating and plans to see what university-level chemistry and biology entail prior to pursuing one discipline or the other. However, she is gravely concerned about the notion that if she fails to achieve an academic scholarship when her grades come out, she will be relying on Colin's financial contributions to cover tuition.

Advantages: Quinn has good hand strength, hand-eye coordination, and manual dexterity, all of which may help her with both delicate work and potentially wielding weapons. Her intelligence and array of academic knowledge will likely come in handy if any technical problem-solving tasks arise or should she choose to try and assess the game's technology. She has good physical stamina from basketball and is fast enough that she may well be able to outrun danger.
Disadvantages: Quinn struggles socially and interpersonally and would not have an easy time persuading someone to her side or even accurately assessing their intentions. Similarly, she has few or any people who she could easily count on as allies, especially with her negative reputation for weirdness. Her lack of effort in getting to know the rest of the student body means she would not recognise many of them by name or appearance, and hence may fail to recognise known killers or other threats.

Designated Number: Female student No. 072

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Designated Weapon: Bullwhip

Conclusion: Look, I could make references to the song all day (and it's stuck in my head, thanks a lot), but it's a lot more constructive to focus on your fiery temperament. Psyche yourself up enough and you're bound to LP LP forward LK HP somebody's block off before they even know what's happening. - Dennis Lourvey

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