ABOUT THE CHARACTER

Name: Alexandra Harper

Newsie Name: Trouble

Age: 17

Gender: Female

Facial Properties: Her face is pale with freckles spotting her cheeks. Her nose is button-like and cute in it's own way. Her eyes are a steely gray color and her hair is a dark shade of red. Her face is slender but not sickly, with high cheek bones and supple lips. The coldness of her eyes seems to sear right through you, and her hair trails down her back, though you wouldn't notice with how often she has it braided away and stored beneath her newsboy cap.

Physique: Her body is athletic like most newsies, slender and curvy. Not that you could ever see her figure through the baggy boys clothes she almost always wears. Her breasts are of a good size, and one could assume the rest of her is pale as well. She does have a slight tan to her, but not nearly as much as the rest of the newsie crew. She usually attributes this to her naturally fair skin. Trouble is of average height for a girl, standing at about five feet six inches.

Personality: Trouble is a fighter, hence the nickname, and she is very quick to lash you with the tongue that she wields like a sword.. She's very kind to people she trusts, but only in one on one situations. She learned to fight at a young age, and ever since then she has had the mindset of a street kid with nothing to lose. She is quick-witted, and she'll attack you with words as well as her fists. She has a soft spot for kids though. In recent years she has taken to caring for the younger ones of the streets, and Lodging Houses' like they were her siblings. She likes to believe that she is the best fighter, and the has the best aim with a slingshot in all of New York. She is cold to everyone at first, but she does have a sense of humor and fun. She is filled to the brim with sarcasm, and tasteful humor. Sometimes she can be rather crude, and violent, but she usually means well. Trouble doesn't believe in love, but rather chooses to believe that love is something unattainable to her. She likes to be straight-forward, but she does tend to dance around her words sometimes to confuse people. She'll never leave someone to be hurt if she can help it, even if it means getting herself injured in the process. She falls back to thievery when she's low on cash, and she also seems to attract trouble where ever she goes; another hallmark of her chosen name.

Likes: -Books (She'll never tell) -Swimming -Fighting -Boys (She'll never admit it) -Sparring -Confusing people -Making Trouble -Helping people (Which gets her into Trouble...) -Marbles -Her Slingshot

Dislikes: -Arrogance -Naivety -Annoying people -People who talk to much -Most other girls -Sitting in one place to long -Being forced into something -Being forced into conversation -Back talkers -People who are rude to her -People who Taunt her about being a girl -People who call her weak.

History: Not a lot is known about her past before she was on the streets, and that's just none of anyone else's business. As far as she was concerned, she was born, and then she was a street rat.


"No one heard a single word you said. They should've seen it in your eyes. What was going around your head. - Bon Jovi "Runaway"


June 15th 1895 - Bronx, New York (five years before the current timeline)

At the young age of eleven, Trouble ran away from home, and found herself wandering aimlessly around the grimy streets of the Bronx. Exactly how she had managed to end up there, she couldn't tell you. The streets were coated in grim and a couple decade's worth of coal dust, and in the dark of the night; Trouble could hear voices all around her. Call it paranoia if you want, but in the few weeks it had been since she had become a voluntary "orphan", she had managed to keep herself out of trouble; for the most part. Thankfully, it had actually been some time since she had lived up to her nickname, but something about the way the shadows were stretched out across the alleyways was giving her a hefty case of the willies.

A phantom wind licked at the bare back of her neck, and she quickened her pace from leisurely stroll to hasty power-walk. As she rounded the corner and entered the small open area where four different buildings intersected, she stumbled into a solid object that by all knowledge shouldn't be there. The impact had sent her sprawling to the ground with a muffled grunt. 'Ow! Probably some damn rubbish bin.' "Agh damn it, what the bloody hell…" she trailed off, her green eyes catching sight of a tattered shirt that definitely did not belong to a rubbish bin…

Standing before her was an obviously miffed boy who appeared to be a couple years her senior. "Hey I'm walkin' here! What's your problem punk, your eyes broken or something?" A prominent frown was etched on his face and his light blue eyes seemed to pierce right through her. She backed up quickly, and a nervous giggle escaped her lips as she lifted her hand up to rub the back of her neck sheepishly. "Oi, sorry 'bout that mate. You came out of nowhere…" her rambling came to a slow stop as she watched nervously as the angry frown on his face shifted to a strange smile. He studied her carefully now, eyes looking her over as if trying to decipher a particularly difficult riddle. Like some sort of feral beast he began to circle her slowly, and never in her life before now had Alex felt more like a sheep who had strayed into the lion's den. "You. You're a girl aren't you? Why you dressed up like some manky boy?" He said this with such disdain that she was fairly certain if he'd spoken any louder he'd have been spitting. On a usual day Alex would have told him to get stuffed, but the way he was leering at her made her nervous.

Before she could even process the instinct to scramble away from him, his hands were already buried in her loose shirt and he was roughly yanking her up off the ground. Her eyes widened as fear flooded her body and she began to shake with excess adrenaline. This proved to only spur on the actions of the older boy, and he shoved her back against the alleyway wall; pinning her in place. "Maybe I 'aughta teach you a lesson about pushin' people," he commented smoothly. She babbled out incoherent words as she begged him to release her, but either he refused to listen or just didn't care enough to heed her rambled prayers. She barely noticed when one of his hands released the front of her shirt and he began to cock it back with purpose. Through some divine miracle, this boy was still too young to know the urges of a man, or if he did it wasn't yet strong enough of an instinct to overpower his anger of being bumped into by some street wretch.

Years from now when she looked back on this moment, she would thank whatever higher being had taken pity on her for even just that moment that he hadn't been a few years older or things might have ended much differently. "Maybe if you acted more like a girl, I wouldn't have to teach you this lesson, huh?!" he growled out. It was a fraction of a second later that she caught him readying his fist to pummel her into dust, and she closed her eyes to await the impact that she knew would be coming. Despite her seconds of preparation, she still released a surprised yelp of pain when his fist made impact on the side of her face. "Agh…" It hurt like hell, and she was instantly convinced that he had just broken her jaw; not that she actually knew what that would feel like.

She had instinctually clenched her eyes closed before the punch came, but now they flared open wide and she instantly regretted the action when she watched him pulling his arm back for another go. "Please!" He punched her again. "God please! What did I-" and again "I'm so sorry" and again. This went on for what felt like hours, but realistically it was more like a few minutes. The red head drooped forward in his hands, her body trying its best to curl inward as much as possible. Her breath was all but gone, pissed away by the various body shots and pathetic whimpering that had tumbled off her lips.

When he finally removed the hand that was supporting her weight, she slid down against the wall with a dull scraping sound; her head lolling around weakly on her shoulders. With her vision blurring and her heart-beat hammering away in her ears, she barely caught the sound of approaching footsteps. Her pulse increased as another fresh wave of fear flickered through her aching muscles, her mind already imagining the fresh new hell that she was sure would accompany those shoes. Anyone else might have hoped that those shoes belonged to a knight come to save the damsel in distress, but Trouble was not laboring under false delusions. No one was coming to save her.

Rustling sounds surrounded her, and as she pushed through the crimson haze of pain and fatigue, she thought she heard the sound of voices nearby. "… buddy… coming…. should leave… gets here…" It was all broken garbage and she understood very little of what was being said, but she had gathered enough to understand that it was very possible that she had just been accidentally saved by the lucky appearance of whoever it was these boys feared. The short silence was shattered by the receding sound of feet hitting the ground as the boys thankfully fled in the wake of this potential new danger.

Now that she had a moment's respite, she could tell her lips bleeding when the sticky liquid rolled idly down her chin. She was doubly sure that at least one of her ribs was broken, as it made this horrible creaking sound whenever she tried to move. That was on top of the intense and blinding pain that landed through her whenever she tried to breathe too deeply. Trouble lifted a hand to wipe away the sweat she could feel pooling above her brows, and frowned deeply when her hand came away covered in more blood. 'Guess my heads bleeding too. Bloody brilliant. Just aces.' Sarcasm was a crutch, she knew this, but right now it was the only way she was processing what the hell had just happened to her.

She tried to focus her attention inwards, analyzing further the many aches and pains that assailed her. Her head was aching, her eyes felt like they were swollen, her jaw felt blissfully numb, but it seemed to her that every muscle in her torso felt like how she assumed freshly tenderized meat would feel. They hadn't left her untouched, that was for sure.

It was then that she heard, to her innate horror, the sound of feet once again pounding against the road. By this point she had resigned herself to death and the only sounds she heard over her swiftly beating heart was a panicked call for someone to hurry. She vaguely heard the sound of retreating footfalls, but her instincts told her that there was still someone lingering in her little alleyway. Spurred on by innate curiosity, she tried to lift her head to see who it was that had decided to stick around to stare at her.

A sharp gasp escaped her lips as she felt one of her arms being grabbed and it caused her to instinctively flinch away and her ribs protested soundly. A calm mumbling came from her right, and from what she could tell; whatever he was saying was meant to be taken as comforting. At the resounding echo of multiple people rushing into the alley, she felt her body once more begin to tremble. This served to only continue to agitate her wounds, and she grimaced as painfully as she felt her rib grinding around inside her.

"Wait, don't tug him like that, jeez!" The clarity of which she heard this new voice was startling, as everything else until that moment had sounded like they were talking to from her underwater. Almost blindly, she had turned her head towards the voice, but before she could get a good look in, two strong arms slipped around her body; one beneath her legs and the other cradling her torso gently and supporting her as she was lifted from the ground. Intense pain ricocheted up and down her entire body and she couldn't hold back the sharp gasp of pain that flew from her pale lips. Alex could feel the boy attempting to shift her around in his arms; trying to find a more comfortable position for her, but she could feel herself falling away into unconsciousness. "So sorry…. Please…" she whispered faintly, but then there was nothing but darkness.


April 3rd 1897 - Bronx, New York (three years before the start of the current timeline)

It had been a few years since the newsies of the Bronx had found her fading away in that dank back alley, and she was fourteen now. Alley, the leader of the Bronx newsies and who had been the one to find her, had taken her beneath his wing and taught her everything she would ever need to know about being a newsie. He had welcomed her into their little family with fully opened arms, and because of that he would always have Trouble's undying loyalty. Alley had taught her how to fight, to sell, to "improve the truth" in order to better peddle her wares, and eventually she had even convinced him to teach her the finer points of poker. He'd regretted teaching her the game ever since.

That day had been a particularly hard sell day, and she was finishing up much later than usual. For the first year or so after the Bronx boys had saved her, Alley had commanded she be protected by at least one other boy at all times, but as the years had flown by without much incident; everyone had grown a little complacent. Plus, it hurt your image whenever you had a babysitter lurking around the corner eyeballing you all day. So, that day her escort had finished up earlier though he had protested, she'd sent him off to the diner without her; reminding him that she was a 'big boy who could handle her own shit'. He'd simply shrugged her off and left wouldn't a second complaint.

So when once again Trouble found herself wandering down yet another alley, she couldn't fend off the sudden wave of deja vu that washed over her. Her steel-grey eyes darted around anxiously as the small hairs on the back of her neck began to prickle uncomfortably when she began to recognize the area she had just wandered into. Just like back then, she met the cold eyes of the boy who she had just caught staring her down. The worst part was when she came to the startling realization that she recognized them.

Recognition flared up within those cool brown eyes of his, and he smirked wickedly while crossing his arms over his chest. "Well, well, well. Look who the cat dragged in. Been a while, ay girlie?" Once she had overcome the initial shock of seeing him standing there, she hurriedly launched herself at the boy; her fighting instinct kicked in fast. No, this time she wasn't going to be the one who ended this curled up on the ground. Things ended in the flash, and she found herself pinned to the ground by her neck. She frantically looked around for something to fend him off with, fingers of both hands fumbling around in desperation for something to grab on to.

Luck seemed to be on her side today and her fingers hit against a lone brick. She quickly clasped her fingers tightly around the couch surface and swung it down against the boy's head. His body immediately went limp, and she struggled with all of her might to push him off of her. It took some work, but eventually she managed to wiggle herself free. Huffing and panting, she stared down at the forming puddle of dark fluid that weeped down from a rather large gash that parted the hair on the side of his head. For a minute she didn't breathe, her eyes trained stoically on his chest. "Oh shit... Shit! What the fuck... Don't be dead..." When he didn't breathe she learned forward and placed a pair of fingers on his neck; searching for a pulse. Seconds ticked by and Trouble felt her breathing sharpen and then grow ragged when it became obvious to her that she wasn't going to be feeling his heart beat again. She'd killed him. "Bloody hell."

She scrambled to her feet and ran. The redhead had no idea where she was going, or what she was going to do when she got there; she just ran. Her feet instinctually carried her to the Bronx Lodging house, the place that had sheltered and protected her for the last three years. Steel-grey eyes glanced around, alighting on the few familiar objects that signaled that she was home. Alley would understand that she had done what she needed to do to protect herself, but she was pretty sure that the others wouldn't. After making a quick decision, she packed what little stuff she had and scrawled out a quick goodbye note for for the Bronx leader. She took off from the Lodging house, and didn't look back. They wouldn't understand..


Notes

Welcome to the revised chapter 0 of 'Trouble in Brooklyn'. Trouble is no longer Irish, she's now British. I lost her Irish voice in my head and have been struggling to recreate it.

Please feed the writer some lovely reviews!

20 points to whoever can guess why Trouble ran away. 10 points for the attempt!