Jack Harkness
From Ars Arcanum Wiki
Contents |
The Mun
- Name: Aubrey
- Contact
- Email: aubrey@beyondtherift.com
- GChat: aubrey@beyondtherift.com
- AIM: allfireburns
- LJ: http://allfireburns.livejournal.com/
The Character
- Name: Jack Harkness
- Age/Birthdate: Looks to be somewhere in his 30s. In reality, he's about 200, give or take. Or 2200 if you count that time he spent buried under Cardiff.
- Canon: Doctor Who/Torchwood
- Canon Entry Point: After "Journey's End".
- Journal: http://impossible_thng.livejournal.com/
- Card: Two of Wands (Reversed)
- Card-Related Abilities/'Card Tricks':
Defining Abilities and Attributes
Tall, brown-haired and blue-eyed with roguish good looks. He dresses somewhat anachronistically, looks like he walked straight out of WWII and tops it all off with a military greatcoat. Never without his leather wriststrap - an Agency wrist device with built-in Vortex manipulator, now mostly broken but still useful for certain functions. Scarily good with almost any weapon you can give him, trained in strategy and tactics, plenty of leadership experience... and, probably most importantly, he can't die. Or, rather, he can, but his body just resets itself and he comes right back.
Personality
Most people see Jack as confident, cocky, charming, sometimes aggravating, flirts with anything with a pulse... and all of that is absolutely true of him. (Well, not anything with a pulse... just most of them.) He can be friendly, seem open, easy to talk to, if he wants to - but he's just as likely to be sarcastic, unreadable, mysterious and kind of intimidating. It all depends on the circumstances.
Jack has lived longer than humans are meant to, seen a lot more than anyone should, and he's got quite a bit of built up cynicism toward the universe, though that doesn't keep him from facing it with a cocky smile and brash confidence. In any crisis situation, he's bound to take the lead, take command, and he's the first to put himself between his friends and danger (the fact that he'll come back if he dies somewhat lessens the heroism, but hey, point still stands). That said, he long ago learned the need for calculated risks and necessary sacrifices, and if that's what it takes... he won't hesitate.
Jack falls in love with people easily, though don't expect him to ever have any "one true love" - monogamy is a concept he finds quaint, along with categories of sexual orientation and gender. With people he cares about, when the world's not in danger, he's often playful, warm, very physical, and very flirtatious - you will know when Jack likes you, and you'll know just as quickly (and probably more painfully) when he doesn't.
Background
Jack Harkness is many, many things to many people. Former Time Agent, former conman, former companion, former freelance agent for Torchwood, current Torchwood leader. How much he'll let you learn about himself depends on who you are, what you want, how he's feeling at the time, sometimes the phase of the moon...
Long story short, he used to be a Time Agent, a member of one of the most powerful organizations in human history. One day he woke up to find himself missing two years of his memory, and he immediately quit the Time Agency and started conning them - in the long run, being a Time Agent and being a conman is only different in that Time Agents get an official Agency paycheck. It was while pulling one of these cons, in World War II, that he ran into Rose Tyler and the Doctor, mistook them for Time Agents, nearly destroyed the human race (accidentally!), nearly died in an exploding spacecraft, and was rescued at the last second by the Doctor, Rose, and the TARDIS. He travelled with the two of them until they arrived on the Game Station in the year 200,100, and he was killed by Daleks, resurrected by Rose after she looked into the heart of the TARDIS, and stranded there when the TARDIS left.
Attempting to find the Doctor, he ended up in 19th century Cardiff, where his wristband burnt out, he found out he couldn't die, and he had to live through the 20th century waiting for a version of the Doctor who coincided with his timeline. In the meantime, he started working as a freelance agent for the Torchwood Institute - they were devoted to finding the Doctor as well, albeit for different purposes, so their interests... almost lined up. Eventually, he joined Torchwood as a proper employee, and when every other member of Torchwood Three died on the night of the new millennium, Jack broke off from Torchwood One and built his own team, trying to change Torchwood into something that would have made the Doctor proud.
He's found the Doctor since then, and lived through a year of hell for him. He's found out what's most important to him, and lost some of it. He's helped save the universe with the Doctor, yet again, and now he's got Torchwood, and his team, and some friends. Not a bad deal, all things considered.
