Network: Voice because Alex gotta Alex.

[11calls]

Who: Alex Reagan
Username: alexreagan
Warnings: None right now, will edit to include if things come up.


[Because Alex is most at home in the audio format, that's what she's set this up in, and will respond to everything in an audio format. Her voice is cool and radio ready, but with a Canadian accent that sometimes trips her up on center words.]

You know, it's so weird that this is like five years later than when I'm from. Like the tech and everything is so close but so different. Back home, my podcast was pretty well known, but now there's so many, it's shocking to me. I knew things would get bigger, but I never expected this!

[Alex has been poking around on the podcast apps, of course and trying to see if her show is there on it. It's not, which is both reassuring and not. But it's second nature for Alex to explain what a podcast is so she does:]

A podcast is like radio on demand on the internet, if you know what radio is. Back home, I worked for Pacific Northwest Stories, and I started my podcast with the idea of doing various stories on interesting people with interesting jobs.

[And all that ended up f i n e. Really. Totally fine. Which is one of the reason Alex gets to the heart of the matter:]

One thing I love is people's stories. I'd been working as a producer telling people's stories for three years before I ended up on my own show, and honestly I kind of miss it. More than kind of. Honestly, it's just something that would make me feel more normal. So if anyone's interested, I've got a meal on me if you're willing to talk at my record and answer questions. Oh! I'm Alex, by the way. Alex Reagan.

[A soft and self deprecating laugh follows before Alex adds:]

Which of course you already know from my username. Sorry.

Comments

[11calls]

Definitely sounds like a plan. And oh!

[Alex just attaches an intentionally dorky picture. ]

So you know what I look like when you show up.

[abrightboy]

Right!

[He attaches a picture too.]

That’s me.

[After work, he heads to the coffee shop and steps inside, looking around.]

[11calls]

[Alex is sitting at a table, typing away on a laptop while she has one essentially earbud in her ear. There's a plate with a selection of pastries on a plate in the middle of the table, and directly in front of her is a cup that has definitely been filled too many times. After a second, she lifts her head, and offers him a little smile and a wave.]

[abrightboy]

[He waves when he sees her, then goes to the counter, getting a cup of coffee before joining her.]

Hi. So... this... podcast stuff... you do this at home? What sort of stories do you usually tell?

[11calls]

Yep! I was a producer at Pacific Northwest Stories for a while, and we did a variety of stories with them. I know they don't exist here, but if you're familiar with stuff like This American Life or stories on NPR but that's what we were back home, like a competitor a bit. We've had stories turned into movies, and winning awards. My show was one story though. In the past I've worked on stories about returning soldiers having PTSD and the effects that has on their life, “Sounds Like America,” which featured a segment called, “Love on Tape: Sound Audio on the Topic of Love.”, people overcoming hardships and finding themselves through karate, working with the Innocence Project on several cases. Honestly, with just them I've produced over a hundred stories.

[Leaving out her show, Nic's show and the Innocence Project's subject who happened to be a key player in all of this.]

[abrightboy]

[His attention piques as she talks.]

You specialize in stories about PTSD?

[11calls]

Oh no, I'm sorry! We don't specialize on it. I mean we did one show on it, but it was split into different segments. And that was two years ago for me. So..2015 I think? And I would really hope that there'd be some sort of like... advancements in treating it since then.

[Alex probably has some PTSD herself, but refuses to label it as such, but that's not something that she advertises. The reasons, after all are definitely not something she's ready to talk about.]

Are you interested in PTSD?

[abrightboy]

I’m a forensic psychologist. PTSD is one of my areas of professional interest. [He huffs a laugh down into his coffee cup.] And personal interest. [He’s considering telling her his story; no point being cagey.]

[11calls]

[Alex just gives him a little bit of a nod when it comes to that, because she gets how things become knotted up in your work, knotted up in your (lack of) home life. It's so easy to have that happen, and personal and professional reasons can often co-align more often than they don't.]

Do you work for the FBI? I mean, I know that forensic psychologists do do other things, but most I've heard of do seem to.

[abrightboy]

I used to. I worked as an FBI profiler for ten years. I mainly specialized in serial killers. But we… parted ways a couple of years ago. I’ve been working as a consultant on unusual murders for the NYPD Major Crimes team. [This is the part of the story he’s proud of.]

[11calls]

Why did you end up leaving the FBI?

[Yeah, she's definitely not gonna miss something like that in how he's talking, but she does follow it up with:]

How did you end up with the NYPD?

[abrightboy]

Malcolm huffs a dry breath of a laugh, turning his coffee cup around on the table in front of him between both hands. He looks up at her.]

The reasons they gave or the real reasons?

[11calls]

The real reason, of course. I'm guessing that the reasons that they gave are the most boring version of the story. They normally tend to be in my experience.

[For the most part anyway.]

[abrightboy]

[He smiles faintly, fingers still fidgeting at the coffee cup.]

The reason they gave was peripheral to the real reason, but both require some context.

[He takes a breath. It’s almost a meditative exercise but it doesn’t do much to mitigate his restless, anxious energy.]

My father was a renowned heart surgeon. Top of his field. When I was ten years old, I discovered he had a much less… savoury hobby. I found a woman in a travel trunk in our basement. He chloroformed me to make me forget. He chloroformed me so aggressively in the days that followed - I still don’t know how many days - that the chloroform began to lose its effect. I didn’t realize time had passed. I called the police. When they came, they arrested him for the serial murders of twenty-three people, but the woman - the one in the box - she was gone. I… thought I was saving her. But she was gone.

My father - Martin Whitly, known as ‘the Surgeon’ - is one of the most famous murderers in the world. He resides in a maximum security psychiatric facility for the criminally insane and he’s never getting out.

After my father’s arrest, I became interested in police work and the psychology behind murder. The arresting officer kept in touch with us. Mentored me in law enforcement. When I finished my psychology degree at Harvard, I decided to go to Quantico to become a profiler. The Bureau gets all the worst violent cases. I changed my name after high school. When I left for Quantico, I severed all contact with my father. I was successful at the Bureau. I had a very high close rate. But eventually I trusted the wrong person and my secret got out. After that, they were just… looking for an excuse to get rid of me. On what turned out to be my last case with them, a local sheriff backing me up shot the suspect after he surrendered. I punched him in the face and gave them one.

[11calls]

[Alex is aware of the fact that she's not turned on the recorder, and it feels more than a little bit odd to her. In head she can practically hear Nic telling her to get things on tape but Nic is three thousand miles, five years and an entire world away just like her show is. So right now, Alex is letting it go, and there's the added bonus of not having the names he was worried about on tape when he'd agreed to come and talk to her in the first place.

But all of that is lost when the man mentions that his father was a serial killer. Being someone who's normally expressive, Alex's eyes go wide at that, but she doesn't interrupt him until he's done and it's very clear that the woman is giving him all of her attention.]

Wow. I would definitely be interested in PTSD then too if it were me. And the sheriff deserved to be punched--I'm guessing that it was going to be the sort of situation where no one would ever try and pull him up on police brutality charges?

[abrightboy]

[Malcolm gives her a small, tight smile.]

Nobody cares about a dead serial killer. We were standing next to jars of his victims’ pickled faces. They probably gave him a medal.

[11calls]

[Letting out a little surprised sound, Alex just frowned at him for a moment.]

You cared, though, right? Otherwise why punch the sheriff?

[abrightboy]

[He leans forward earnestly.]

Nobody’s born broken; someone breaks us. Claude Springer should definitely have been held accountable for what he did. He ruined innocent lives. But the justice system is meant to decide what that looks like, not one coward with a gun and an itchy trigger finger looking to be a hero.

[11calls]

[Thinking back to Simon Reese, Alex just gives him a quick nod of understanding.]

Justice isn't justice if it's just some asshole doing things like that. I take it the NYPD is better about things like that if you're working with them?

[abrightboy]

This team is, at any rate. The lieutenant in major crimes was the officer that arrested my father. He took me under his wing back then. He’s the best man I’ve ever known. He has real integrity.

[11calls]

Wow. That's excellent to know. He sounds like my Dad honestly. He was a cop too. Not really something like major crimes but he was on the force too.

How long have you been working with Major Crimes now?

[abrightboy]

A couple of years now, before I was brought here. But he’s here, too. His name is Gil Arroyo. What department did your dad work for?

[11calls]

Wow, you're only the second person I've spoken to who has people from their worlds and not just them.

[That seemed a pattern, of course. And one that Alex was definitely going to note for later.]

He was a detective in Vancouver, but he retired two years ago, I think. I mean back in my timeline.

[abrightboy]

Do you think it means something? That we’re here together, from the same day? That we arrived together in the same… [Closet, but he stops short of saying it.] Place?

[11calls]

I don't know. It seems impossible to decide without like a bigger sample size. It's one of the reasons that I'm seeking out stories: to see if there's some sort of connections between well... anything I guess.

[Alex just laughs softly.]

Probably going to be like a month before I'm in a basement with red string, probably.