Tagged as Alexandria Hypatia, Grim Alex, Bartholomeus Vasco, Luca Abele

Contributors:

Hydria, Tim, Megido, Hiaen, Alex

The original Addermire solution/serum and transformation timelines

Also in doto addermire solution is recalled, which like, ???

I know it was primarily a mechanics thing because billie doesn't need to replenish mana in the same way as the other protags due to how the void connection works for her, but damn it arkane that has IMPLICATIONS for hypatia

the wiki just says "recalled once she realized potential adverse side effects." Guessing it's because she realized that maybe the potential for personality-splitting effects weren't completely gone in the refined version of the serum?

*gestures at alex* do ya think there's some void related bullshiet goin on there

glowing fucking eyes and all the other weird shit she's got goin on ig

because Evidently addermire solution has (probably unintentional) magic-based stuff going on seeing as how it restores your mana

Yeah it is weird how she physically changes

Like, they're pulling on some serious Jekyll and hyde vibes, and that's what happens there too,

yeah and in J&H, there really wasn’t much of a physical change between hyde and jekyll

so like *gestures* void bullshit

something about the consequences to an accidental connection to the void? like one that happened without the outsider doing it? Could it have been something Delilah did or something related to that?

vasco's diary said she was created in 1850 but uh

she attended the seance in 1849

Hm

[both vasco and hypatia tested it in 1850]

it's more likely a "devs overlooked a timeline blip" more than any sort of woaaah what if she was made eaaarlier than vasco saaaaid kinda conspiracy shit but

is it. possible vasco just didnt see alex until 1850??? whats the wording on vascos diary gimmie a sec

maybe the change wasnt physical for a while but he does say that she literally called herself. grim alex gbhdfsjh

in-game alex is. yknow. alex. for the seance But that brings up what you see in the little setup of it in the void, where it's different

its like. in between. and i could definitely see this as a transition phase type thing where alex doesnt quite have her own full unique appearance just yet but it's building toward that, probably with more exposure to more serum over time (idk how long she took it for but it's said that shit ramped up over multiple doses)

ah didn’t it say that the testing started in 1849? or was that whenever they started Development

bc like, citing J&H again, jekyll tested a bunch of different things on himself in a short period of time and only one of them really made him turn so maybe it was the whole, building up thing with all of the tests she did herself.

Yeah Vamp that’s what I was thinking?

Just that it would take a while from testing start to hitting on something that actually makes alex happen. Or having taken enough doses of what makes alex happen, once it's created. i am, once again, thinking abt that test and wondering what the fuck happened, "i cant commit to paper all that occurred umu" please, please do, pl

Something™️ happened to both of them involving "absolute loss of empathy" and "unfettered appetites" but vasco's too ashamed to describe it

also, backpedaling to the question of "diiiid she start looking like alex immediately?", in the audiograph where Vasco gets yoinked he seems to not be able to tell the difference at first. gets all relieved when she walks in before realizing it's not hypatia in control. plus in his notes on the experiments he never really mentions any physical change besides saying she seemed "disheveled" and that her movements were weird

no, y'know, "jesus christ she's fucking gray now" or anything of the sort

Vasco perhaps not wanting hypatia to know what's happening??? Perhaps she's already suffering with y'know, the sitch in serkonos so her body is already just like hey look at how much self care i need pwsshhh so the knock-off hj7 brings in alex and after a painful few minutes bam alex!!!!

how the fuck did alex get to dunwall and nobody noticed either alex or a disheveled and confused hypatia wandering around dunwall

hypatia mentions a “trip” like, twice? maybe three times idk

“I was in dunwall, studying diseases found among whaling crews” (not sure if what she’s referring to is recent but I think she says it right after you ask about sokolov) and “coming back from my trip hasn’t relaxed me as I thought it would”

so maybe hypatia did in fact take a probably-duke-funded definitely-for-research-he-swears trip up to dunwall where she may or may not have committed crimes

Luca's influence on the transformation

Hydria: I find the “the duke was poisoning her” explanation for hypatia to be really... weird, like

yeah he was a slimy bastard who DID manipulate her and yeah she did get ‘poisoned’ but he wasn’t the one who made her do it,, she did the original serum test of her own volition and since then it sure seems like alex was the one doing the further poisoning. so when stuff like “the duke tricked her into injecting herself with a flawed version of her serum” (pretty sure that’s the quote) is said I’m like...... huh??

Hiaen: from what I remember, I completely had the impression that Hypatia injected herself the first serum of her own volition, and that the following injections were done by Alex

Hydria: Yeah and that IS the case but emily/corvo keep making it out to be completely the duke’s fault

Hiaen: I feel like it could be read indirectly (as in the Duke facilitated/encouraged Alex into doing it)?

Hydria: there’s the “someone was poisoning you” quote from the cutscene which can also be interpreted as them referring to alex but. based on all their other explanations of it they’re probably referring to luca there as well.

"No, someone was poisoning you, but you should be better now."

"The duke tricked her into injecting herself with a flawed version of her serum."

something else though is that luca DOES “encourage” her to keep working on her formulas which isn’t really The Same as what’s being insinuated here but that could have a hand in it. “just keep working on your stuff and i’ll have my guards,,, protect you yeah yeah protect you :)))) we gotta get a cure fast yeah :)”

oh yeah speaking of i am also eternally curious of how that came to his attention in the first place

how did he realize and just Him and no one else...... IF he was already involved beforehand and didn’t just start encouraging her afterward after noticing her condition that’d make a lot more sense

in fact I believe there’s smth about addermire solution being “commissioned by the duke” (on the ad posters I believe?) so,I think I initially just thought he was being a bastard and taking the credit but I mean

Alex: I mean...idk what its based on but the wiki page says "Hypatia was not aware of these changes, and did not fully understand why the Duke gradually restricted her to Addermire Institute" so maybe poison means pressure. In dh2 (according to the wiki) it's been going on for 3 years

He could have done a lot of shady shit in that time. Gaslghting for one