Alec McDowell 1

X5-494, or Alec, was an X5 created by a secret government program known as Manticore as a clone of X5-493, or "Ben". He was trained to be the perfect soldier. He was one of the 10 Beta soldiers, created with the ability to use flirtation as a tool. He escaped Manticore in 2020, the year it was destroyed in an attempt to cover up the existence of the program.

Shortly before Impulse (an electromagnetic bomb released on the United States), in 2009, Max (X5-452) and several of her fellow X5s escaped from Manticore. X5-494 was not among those escapees, as he was not in their unit, although his identical clone Ben (X5-493) was. Manticore tightened its grip on the remaining X5s, and the escapee clones were subjected to the harshest discipline for fear that they would follow in the footsteps of their brothers and sisters. 494 would not see freedom for over a decade, until Max engineered the destruction of Manticore and freed the transgenics. 494 did not have a name, so Max named him Alec.

As he is trained as a super-soldier and assassin by Manticore, it is speculated that: he is highly skilled in close combat, reconnaissance, infiltration, tracking, surveillance, escape and evasion, espionage, computers, explosives, and vehicle maintenance (including various military aircraft and helicopters), as well as having achieved fluency in multiple languages, and has a black belt in various martial arts such as Krav Maga, Taekwondo, and Judo.

green eyes, short dark blond hair and barely noticeable freckles. He is strongly built, stands 185 cm tall. Although he appears to be an ordinary person (except for the barcode on the back of his head, genetically embedded in his DNA),