Lyra Doyle

[Pippi]

Name: Lyra Doyle
Gender: Genderfluid (Biologically Female)
Age: 18
Grade: Senior
School: George Hunter High School
Hobbies and Interests: Robot combat, magic, myths and legends, the supernatural, puns, fantasy literature, collecting badges and pins

Appearance: Following a recent growth spurt, Lyra stands at around 5'9", a height they are rather happy being. Their weight, however, is much more of a sore point. They weigh around 172lbs with most of their fat being distributed in their stomach; one would be hard pressed to call them anything more than chubby, but it causes Lyra a great deal of stress, as they hate how it looks on them. Lyra is Caucasian, with a fairly pale skin tone. They do tan very easily, however, something that is particularly notable whenever they return home from vacation.

Lyra has dirty blonde hair which reaches just past their shoulders, with bangs neatly framing their face. It is naturally fairly straight, but they make sure it maintains that form through hair straighteners. They also generally keep their hair tied up, occasionally in plaits or a bun but most often in a loose ponytail. They use a variety of cute hair ornaments to keep it tied up, their favourite of which is a hair bobble with a panda's face on it. Sometimes, when they're feeling particularly masculine, they will let it hang loose, but this is rare, as they don't think it suits them most of the time. Lyra has a fairly small nose, a similarly small mouth that looks a little larger due to the almost constant grin on their face, and a pair of fairly dull moss green eyes, framed by a pair of slim rectangular glasses, which almost always seem to be coated in dirt or dust.

The majority of the time when Lyra is choosing clothes, they mostly focus on comfort. They own a few dresses and skirts, but the majority of clothes in their wardrobe could be classified as ‘gender-neutral'; they own a large amount of sweaters, jumpers and hoodies, generally in light, pastel colours, but they also like to wear checked shirts. They have no preference when it comes to trousers and skirts, generally throwing on whatever is at the top of their clothes drawer. Lyra also owns a binder, bought and kept in secret from their parents, that they occasionally wear whenever they feel more comfortable with it. Their favourite outfit, which they wore when they were abducted, consists of a light blue sweater with a stylised image of a bird on the front, thrown over a dark blue t-shirt which featured the words "She's up tae speed now boys!" printed on the chest, as well as a denim skirt, a pair of sky blue knee socks with images of foxes in cardboard boxes printed on them, and a pair cyan and white light-up Heelys.

Biography: Lyra is the oldest child of Johnathan and Frances Doyle, and they have lived their entire life in Chattanooga. They have two younger siblings; Niamh, who is 16, and Dunstan, who is 10. Lyra's parents own a bookshop, and the family lives directly above it. They earn enough to get by on, but the Doyles have always been on the lower end of the economic bracket, meaning a lot of Lyra's old clothes and possessions, already hand-me-downs from their cousins, are given to their siblings when they outgrow them. Lyra and their siblings' rather unusual names come from Johnathan and Frances' desire for their children to stand out, but not to be considered figures of fun in the process.

Lyra's relationship with their family has noticeably shifted over the years. As a child, and for most of their teenage years, they got on much better with their parents, whilst finding Niamh and Dunstan unpleasant and annoying respectively. However, Lyra's opinion of their parents has decreased over the last few years; they frequently feel as though they're condescending to them, and can occasionally be very insensitive about certain issues, such as their weight or their mental issues. Niamh and Dunstan, on the other hand, have matured and mellowed out a lot, and Lyra's conversations with them have gone from petty arguments to relaxed talks about their hobbies and interests.

For the first few years of their life, Lyra was a very quiet and reserved child, sticking tightly to their parents whenever they went out, or playing or reading by themselves at kindergarten and the first year of school. Despite the fact they seemed perfectly content to do so, Lyra's parents were still anxious that Lyra might not be making friends, or getting the full experience from any social interaction, so they gently coaxed them into breaking out of their shell. This ended up working out excellently; Lyra proved to be incredibly easy to get along with. They were pleasant and easygoing, and most notably, able to make most people they spoke to laugh, by retelling jokes their dad had told them, or recounting an anecdote of something that had happened to them over the weekend. Their circle of friends expanded greatly almost overnight, and has continued to grow as they've gone through school.

Lyra never lost their love of reading, however - they found it nearly impossible to do so, surrounded by books for all their life. Most days after school, if they weren't visiting someone or at a school club, they would curl up on the sofa with whatever book they were reading and spend a couple of hours ploughing through five or six chapters. Their favourite genre was, and still is, fantasy novels. Lyra loves the strange and fantastic nature of them, particularly the idea of humans living in worlds of magic, mythical creatures and different races. They can always be found with a fantasy novel in their messenger bag; either a brand new book they picked up the day before, or a dog-eared copy they're reading for the fifth time. Their favourite books include The First Law series and the Discworld series.

A history class in 5th Grade opened a whole new fantastical world to Lyra, that has similarly provided an interest for the rest of their life. Their class was studying the Ancient Egyptians, and after a few weeks, the topic turned to the mythology of Ancient Egypt, and the gods, goddesses and legends that came with it. Lyra was utterly enthralled, the same things that interested them about fantasy literature drawing them in to this topic. They began to look up more on the topic in their spare time, scouring books and the internet for more information, discovering lesser known gods and myths as they did so. Their interest in mythology soon grew to beyond just that of Ancient Egypt; Lyra absorbed tales from Roman, Greek, Norse, Chinese and Aztec mythology, amongst others. They occasionally try their hand at writing fantasy fiction, although they prefer reading it to creating it, and their interest in myths and legends very obviously influences the names and cultures found in their writing.

Lyra also has a great interest in the supernatural, another interest that clearly stems from their love of fantasy. They enjoy reading about things such as witches and ghosts and poltergeists, as well as cryptids from around the world, and will frequently have a tab open on their computer with titles such as "Top 10 Most Haunted Locations in Germany". Their interest in the supernatural is based more on a desire for it all to be true than anything else. Lyra doesn't really believe that fantastical creatures or ghosts truly exist, but they think the world would be a lot more interesting and fun if they did.

Whilst Lyra doesn't believe that magic and witchcraft exists, their love of that area led them to taking an interest in stage magic as a young teen. They saved their pocket money up to buy a small magic kit, filled with double-sided playing cards, balls and cups, and a plastic magic wand. After a week of practicing, they were ready to perform their first magic show to an audience of their parents. Despite a few slip-ups, Lyra was incredibly happy with how it had gone and eager to perform again. They loved seeing the reactions of their parents upon the completion of each trick, and their natural charm and bubbly nature lent itself well to the pattern of a magician. Lyra will generally keep a coin or deck of cards on their person at all times, ready to perform an illusion or sleight of hand trick whenever they get bored. They generally keep their more intricate and elaborate tricks for their parents, but has occasionally performed them for close friends when they're confident enough. They have an entire drawer in their room filled with magic props, both purchased and hand made, as well as a section of their wardrobe that contains their magician outfit; a black top hat with a red band, a dark purple cape embroidered with stars, and a selection of wands.

One of Lyra's interests that doesn't revolve around the strange and the mysterious is robotic combat; TV shows and events such as Robot Wars, Battlebots and Robots Live, that consist of people building remote controlled robots with weaponry attached to fight against other robots. Their interest began when they were four, when they found their dad watching an episode of the fourth season of Battlebots. While they had little interest at the time in the engineering side of it, they were very interested in the unique designs of each of the robots, and the simple pleasure of watching them tear chunks out of each other. They watched the next episode with their father and loved it just as much as the first, pestering Johnathan to record each episode so they could rewatch them again whenever they wanted to. Lyra would fill sketchbooks and notepads with drawings, both of their favourite robots and of their own designs, which would frequently feature many features impractical for a real bot, and had a section of their desk in their room dedicated to Lego models of robots. When Battlebots went off the air in 2002, Lyra continued to draw and collect merchandise relating to the show, and rewatch old episodes countless times, but their interest began to dwindle.

However, the dawn of YouTube in 2005 saw an instant revival of Lyra's love of robot combat. They quickly found grainy episodes of the first three series of Battlebots that had been uploaded to the site, reminding them exactly why they'd fallen in love with the series in the first place, and watching these episodes quickly led them to discover shows like Robot Wars, Techno Games and Robotica. Lyra's interest has, if anything, grown even further since then; even after they ran out of episodes to watch, they kept up to date with the live circuit, and the status of robots they'd seen competing in Robot Wars, on sites such as Reddit or the Robot Wars wiki. When the revived series of both Robot Wars and Battlebots were announced in 2015, Lyra decided to begin work on something they'd dreamed about doing for years; creating a combat robot of their very own. After consulting fellow aspiring roboteers, they began work on designing an Antweight robot, due to the relative ease and low cost of building one of that weight class, which they are currently calling Chiron. The process has been slow, due to them finding difficulty in obtaining motors for it and due to their lack of experience in engineering, and Chiron is currently less than a third completed, but Lyra is greatly enjoying the experience nonetheless. Unfortunately, they also happen to be exceptionally clumsy, constantly bumping into or tripping over objects, and this nature frequently rears its head during construction; they've often gone to school with bandages covering burns and cuts across their hands.

For a few years now, Lyra has collected badges and pins relating to the things they're interested in. They enjoy talking about their hobbies and interests, and they've found that putting pins on their messenger bag catches people's attention, providing a good launch pad for a conversation about them. They'll frequently rotate which pins they have attached to their bag – they'll only put on their bisexual pride flag badge if they're going somewhere they're comfortable in having it showing, for example – but there are two pins that never get rotated out; a pin of the Robot Wars logo, and the pride of their collection, a pin that says ‘Mothman Is My Boyfriend'.

Undoubtedly the biggest occurrence in Lyra's life is also the most recent, one that happened shortly after their 16th birthday. From the age of around nine, they'd always felt uncertain about particular aspects about themselves. There was always an odd feeling whenever their family or friends or teachers used ‘she' or ‘her' to describe them, one that was distinctly unpleasant but hard to describe, and one that they generally assumed was related to some other matter that was bothering them. There would be days when they looked in the mirror and desperately wished that their breasts would vanish and their hips would be less wide, and other days when they were perfectly happy with those aspects of their appearance. These feelings, subtle at first, grew more and more prominent as Lyra themselves grew older, and they found themselves incredibly distressed and panicked about them. The very few close friends they told about these feelings had little to offer in the way of advice. Lyra instead turned to the internet to see if it could offer them any help, and a few brief Google searches led them to believe they were a transgender male. They asked their closest friends if they could start using ‘he/him' to refer to them, but after a couple of days, this quickly turned out to feel even less comfortable than ‘she/her'. A much, much more thorough search of LGBT resources and websites led Lyra to consider whether they were instead genderfluid. A second test run of a change in pronouns with their closest confidants proved much more successful; ‘they/them' felt right to Lyra, and the description of genderfluid people perfectly matched the constant shifting of identity they felt within themselves. To date, the few friends that Lyra talked to when they were figuring out their gender identity are still the only people who know that they are genderfluid. They haven't told any of their other friends or classmates at school, for fear that it'll somehow find its way into the rumour mill and into the knowledge of any bullies, and they haven't told any members of their family as they have no idea how they'd react, especially due to their recent negative feelings towards their parents. Lyra is also bisexual, and is much more open about this, although their parents are unaware about this fact too. They've only dated guys in the past, but they've had major crushes on people of both genders, with a particular inclination towards the athletic members of their year.

At school, Lyra does decently, gaining Bs and Cs in most classes, and a few Ds in Maths, PE and Chemistry. Their best subject by a long margin is History, consistently gaining As in it, even when the subject doesn't revolve around mythology. Despite only truly excelling at one subject, most of Lyra's teachers consider them a good student, who puts in a lot of effort to their studies and is eager to answer questions in class, even when they end up being wrong. Lyra is certain that they want to go to college after graduating, but isn't sure which one they want to aim for, or what subject they want to study. Ancient History is currently looking like the most likely option, but they are concerned about the limited job avenues that would lead to, and they're also toying with the idea of engineering, to further their interest in robotics.

Lyra is a generally popular person, and well-regarded by the majority of their peers. They constantly try to act bubbly, peppy, warm and cheerful around people, doing their best to make their friends happy. Their favourite way of doing so is through telling one of their vast collection of puns, developed over the years through listening to their dad tell them and through the joke books that find their way into the bookshop. Lyra knows just how awful their puns truly are, but considers the highest quality praise for a pun to be how many groans and noises of disapproval it gets. Despite their popularity, there are still a number of people who dislike Lyra, who see them as a weird, strange person due to their interests and general personality. Their clumsy nature is also well known amongst the student body, and nine times out of ten, any loud crashing sound is immediately pinned on them.

Currently, Lyra's relationship with their parents is good for the most part, but there are notable moments of stress between the three of them. Lyra often feels as though Johnathan and Frances talk down to them and refuse to treat them like an 18 year old sometimes, and they believe this is due to their interests and hobbies, particularly their love of magic. This, obviously, upsets Lyra, and they can occasionally be quite frosty and terse with their parents, which in turn upsets and confuses them, as they don't realise what they've done to deserve this treatment. Whilst Lyra gets a lot of their humour from Johnathan, he has a habit of sometimes being insensitive with his humour, particularly when he makes 'fat jokes', which does nothing to help Lyra's self-esteem on that front. They still get on well with Niamh and Dunstan, often discussing what they've done at school over dinner or cracking jokes whilst watching TV. Lyra has tried to introduce both of their siblings to the art of magic, and whilst Niamh is much more content to watch Lyra perform, Dunstan has shown an interest in it, and has learned a couple of simple card tricks.

Though they are legitimately happy and positive most of the time, Lyra also suffers from rather severe depression and anxiety. They'll generally enter depressive slumps for several days at a time before breaking out of it again, and there are a number of factors that cause this to happen. The biggest one, currently, is Lyra's appearance, their weight in particular. At their lowest ebb, they see themselves as hideously unattractive, and has occasionally not eaten lunch at school in a desperate bid to lose weight. Lyra is generally considered someone who can take a joke, and whilst this is generally true, sometimes these ‘jokes' can seriously affect them if they end up hitting too close to home. They never say anything about it, however, not wanting to feel like they're ruining other people's fun. They can fall into moods where they'll harshly blame themselves for the tiniest mistake, or feel like they've ruined a friendship or let someone down if they accidentally say something insensitive or hurtful. Lyra both loses all motivation to do any work and stress-eats when in a depressive slump, something that only causes them to go into a spiral, as it makes them feel even worse about their weight. Lyra's concerns and confusion over their gender identity was also a major factor in their depression, and whilst their revelation over being genderfluid solved many of these, it also brought in brand new issues. They frequently feel out of place at school, as so much there is divided along the lines of male and female, and they worry that they'll never end up being accepted by anybody. If their depression hits whilst they're feeling particularly feminine, they'll worry that they're a fraud, making up their gender issues as a way of attention seeking. As with their gender identity, Lyra has told very, very few people about their mental health issues. They know that they really should see a therapist, but they are very reluctant to do so, as in their eyes, doing so will confirm that there's something ‘wrong' with them.

Advantages: Lyra's carefree and easygoing nature means they're easy to get along with, which could give them a better chance at gaining allies with people they don't know. They are also friendly with a good amount of people who could also be allies. Lyra is an optimist, for the most part, and would try and keep on going in most circumstances, even if the outlook is grim.
Disadvantages: Lyra's depression can be incredibly debilitating, often manifesting when they feel as though they've let someone down, and could be triggered very easily on the island. This could cause them to lose focus of everything around them and to completely lose the energy to do anything. They are very clumsy, and they often manage to do things such as trip over their own shoelaces, which, at best, could injure them, and at worst cause serious calamity. Lyra's rather odd nature could also unsettle people on the island, or make people way of them. It could also, along with their optimism, make Lyra seem as if they're not taking the whole thing very seriously, which could also annoy and anger people. They also have absolutely no experience in sporting activities, outside of PE classes, meaning they lack the stamina and strength of a lot of their classmates. If Lyra loses or breaks their glasses, their vision will be severely impaired; they won't be blind, but everything that isn't directly in front of them will be incredibly fuzzy.