Elspeth (EHLZPeh-TH) Graves was born in rural Scotland to Richard and Alicia Graves, one of two twin girls. Her early life was simple, her mom a teacher and her father a businessman often away from home in Edinburgh. Unlike her sister, Elspeth was a quiet and reserved child who preferred to spend her time either reading or engaging in fancies of make believe.
She excelled in her school years, graduating near the top of her class in high school alongside her sister. While her sister travelled to Britain for uni, Elsepth travelled to Ireland, where she began seeking a degree in education with the intention of becoming a teacher. While her sister attended nursing school, Elspeth returned home to Scotland and began teaching at a small secondary school in their hometown.
When the Bomb happened in the United States in 2006, it initially had little effect on her everyday life. The revelations that superheroes walked among the world passed her by - not out of a want for ignorance or normalcy, but simply because it had minimal impact on her life. That is, until her sister came to her one day flustered and excited.
Aislinn had moved to Edinburgh, only to excitedly show up on Elspeth's doorstep in late 2007. Even before Aislinn could get the words out of her mouth, Elspeth knew why she was there: Aislinn was "special". She could feel it in her soul. As the only person who knew about her sister's gift, she endeavored to help her sister keep it secret, supporting her and encouraging her however she could while promising to carry her knowledge of Aislinn's ability to her grave.
Years were spent keeping her sister's secret - hidden from friends, family, and anyone else who might pry into what Aislinn could do. Instead, Elspeth continued to remain focused on teaching, and on not letting the state of the world outside her school get to her. It behooved her to not worry about what was happening in the US, lest she risk seeming too invested as public opinion began to turn against the Evolved both at home and abroad.
It was just before the Civil War broke out in the US - just as regulations in the EU were starting to grow more and more stringent - that Elspeth convinced her sister that it was time to do what had to be done and get out ahead of an impending shitstorm and register. As Aislinn spun this into an excuse to go back to school to study biochemistry, Elspeth once more fell comfortably back into the role of helping her sister's dreams come true.
As the sanctioning of Evolved individuals in the EU grew more and more oppressive, though, Elspeth watched her sister become more and more disgruntled with the direction the world was turning around them. As he sister's work begiun to get thrown out or censured, Elspeth came to her with a bold plan: Use her ability to help synthesise a new medicine, show them her worth and back up her talk about evolutionary and biological imperative. Her sister excitedly agreed, though she initially balked when Elspeth agreed to be her clinical trial.
It was a disaster. What Aislinn was sure would be a potent curative turned toxic, instead acting as a paralytic nerve agent that plunged Elsepth into a deep coma.
For Elspeth, this state wasn't entirely an empty state of nothingness, however. At first it was quiet, peaceful. And then one day, the dreams started. Unexplained but vivid dreams of fantastical places and events. In one,. world where a virus had decimated New York while the sisters are on vacation, with a pointed and heartbreaking goodbye shared between them. A world where a similar clinical trial under the eyes of Arthur Petrelli had instead killed Elspeth, yet somehow the two of them reunited. A world ravaged by war, her and her sister waiting quietly in the UK for the end of the world, both too scared to go to the US and help despite desperately wanting to. A post-war world where her sister had taken a sociopathic turn and become a terrorist, responsible for the deaths of several as she worked in the US towards a secret agenda.
Eventually the dreams faded, and as the end of 2019 approached, Elspeth awoke from her coma in a hospital in Edinburgh. As she underwent analysis and physical therapy so that she could get back into the world, she discovered many shocking things. Her vivid dreams weren't exclusive to her, as many others had experienced what had been called "overlays" of otherworlds. Worse, the dreams of her sister as a terrorist had been dreams of this world.
But why? No one else seemed to experience visions of a sibling or loved one. And why had her sister turned to what she did? Was it her fault, having pushed for the trial of an untested agent that had led to her coma? In the months after and through her recovery, the questions only grew for Elspeth until, finally in March 2020, she set off for the United States in the hopes that she could get answers. About her visions, about her sisters, about a great many things.
