Character History
Season 1
Three months prior to the time frame of the show, Alpha escaped from the Dollhouse. His obsession with Echo lead to him attacking the popular doll Whiskey, viciously slashing her face with bonsai shears, so that Echo could be "number one". Restrained by Dollhouse personnel, he was brought to the imprinting room, where he was to be diagnosed and then sent to the Attic. Instead, he attacked, inadvertently imprinting himself with the diagnostic Topher was running; a composite of all his prior personalities.
One of the many victims of Alpha's massacre was Echo's previous handler Samuelson - it was reported that every major blood vessel in his body surgically severed in eight seconds. Alpha's whereabouts were unknown prior to his invasion of the Dollhouse. He anonymously assisted Paul Ballard in investigating the Dollhouse.
Alpha once again made a move against the Dollhouse when he remotely wiped Echo's imprint during her engagement. Again, his actions tested Echo, possibly to grant her the opportunity to develop skills, beliefs, and a personality. This feat shows Alpha to have access to Dollhouse intel and tremendous technical skills.
Meanwhile, Paul tracks down Steven Kepler, an agoraphobic architect who designed the systems that make the Dollhouse almost self-sufficient. Ballard forces Kepler into helping him infiltrate the Dollhouse and takes him along. While Ballard searches for Caroline in the sleeping chambers, Kepler uses a computer terminal to take control of the surveillance and environmental systems.
In Claire's office, Kepler slashes Victor's face with a knife. Claire, horrified, identifies him as "Alpha." At the same time, Sierra (imprinted as a forensics expert) informs Adelle that the dead man in Arizona is actually Steven Kepler.
Alpha threatens Claire into calling Echo to her. Alpha then takes Echo up to the imprint room, where he imprints her with the masochistic criminal personality previously used by Whiskey on a dual engagement. They kiss passionately, and she calls him, "My prince." They leave the Dollhouse together.
(Alpha is extremely focused in Briar Rose, none of his other personalities leaking through his Kepler persona until he no longer needs to fool Ballard. He's more fragmented in the next episode, Omega, perhaps because he's excited about finally having Echo with him, and perhaps because really doesn't need to maintain a single consistent character.)
Having imprinted Echo with a persona that trusts him and stolen all of the wedges for Echo's imprints, including the original Caroline, Alpha takes Echo to his lair in a power station. He also kidnaps a woman named Wendy. Alpha exhibits sudden shifts in consciousness as the different personalities within him struggle for control.
Alpha uses his own imprint chair to imprint Wendy with Caroline, then creates a composite event in Echo that combines all of her previous imprints, which he calls "Omega." Alpha and Echo fight, and Alpha appears knocked out. Wendy/Caroline talk for a moment, shortly before Alpha shoots Wendy in the neck. Alpha threatens to go on a murder spree, imprinting all his victims with Caroline's personality. Alpha also holds Echo at bay by threatening to destroy the last remaining wedge with Caroline's personality; however, although it appears that for some reason he is unwilling to actually destroy the wedge himself. Alpha flees the power station with Caroline's wedge as Boyd and Paul arrive, with Echo chasing him. He throws the wedge away, but Paul catches it.
Flashbacks and information from Adelle reveal that Alpha was a convicted criminal recruited by the Dollhouse in exchange for a shortened sentence. His methods strongly foreshadow his later behavior as Alpha. Like Echo, he exhibits more consciousness than the other Actives. He's sexually attracted to Echo and kisses her. When someone says that Whiskey is more popular than Echo, he slashes Whiskey's face with pruning shears. The guards drag him back to the chair for wiping, but in the ensuing struggle, he accidentally triggers a composite event. His first victim is Blevins, his handler. His second is the original Dr. Saunders. However, as Paul reveals, his first victim of choice, not necessity, was his own original imprint wedge.
Season 2
When Victor is on the loose with a serial killer's personality inside of him Adelle demands that Topher free him; and Topher guesses she means a remote wipe. He says it is impossible but Adelle responds that Alpha can do it. Topher responds that Alpha was able to access Echo's phone and also used some kind of tech that even he has not thought up. Meaning so far Alpha is the sole master of remote wipes.
Alpha takes to wearing a "southern dandy" suit and begins to murder all of Echo's previous clients who sought romantic engagements. In order to alert the Dollhouse, he pretends to be one of his victims and requests Echo for a repeat engagement. He then sets up an elaborate romantic scene for Echo, with his victim's decaying body as the center piece, leaving her a note which she guesses to be from him. He also hires Sierra under a a false name and gives her a clue to the identity of his next victim, saying "He ages well". This causes Dewitt to order that all of the dolls in the house be wiped so as to insure that Alpha didn't corrupt any of them, not realizing that Alpha had entered a secret program into Sierra, which then infected the imprint chair, which then, unknown to the staff, infects all of the dolls.
Ballard and Langton are able to deduce that "He ages well" means that Alpha's next victim is one of Echo's former clients with a birthday coming up. They lead a team of soldiers up to the roof of an L.A. skyscraper where the victim lives, and discover that Alpha has him held on the roof and covered with explosives, which will trigger if Alpha drops a signal device. After speaking briefly with Langton and Ballard, he throws the device in the air, causing his hostage to explode, and the ensuing chaos allowing him to escape.
After Ballard brings who he believes Alpha's next victim will be into the Dollhouse for protection, Alpha reveals himself to Dewitt by exiting her private bathroom in her office. He briefly talks with her, and as she tries to bargain for her life by offering him Echo, he reveals that he is not there to take her, because "she isn't ready for me yet". He also shows her pictures he took of Echo and Ballard during their three month absence, revealing to Dewitt that Ballard lied about when he found her. He then leads her into the main house, and activates a device which causes the program which he infected all of the dolls with to activate. This causes them to attack their Handlers and all of the staff, and Victor to become completely subservient to him.
He then lures Ballard to the imprinting room, where Victor sedates him. Ballard awakens, tied to the chair, with various wires attached to his skull. He tells Ballard that he wishes to know why Echo has fallen in love with him and not Alpha. He shows Ballard the pictures he has been taking of the two of them together, and says that, because Ballard did not sleep with her when she propositioned him, then Ballard must also be in love with her. Alpha says that he resents this because, while Echo was programmed to love all of her clients, she truly loves Ballard. Alpha wishes to understand this, and begins taking painful scans of Ballard's brain, which leave Ballard brain dead. Alpha then decides that, to understand Ballard, he does not have to get inside his head, but rather to get Ballard inside Alpha's, so he imprints Ballard's personality into his own head.
Echo then attacks him, which Alpha finds comical, and only fights defensively. After Echo knocks them both through the window of Topher's office, Ballard's mind is able to briefly take control, and he begs Echo to kill him. When Echo cannot do this, Alpha regains control and calmly walks out of the house.
NOTE: EPITAPH EPISODES NOT INCLUDED IN CHARACTER HISTORY.