Profile

This journal is for role-play only

Me
Name: Anna
Timezone: GMT
Age: Waaaay over 18

Jack
Name: Captain Jack Harkness
Fandom: Torchwood
Point in canon: Any point from young trainee Time Agent through into way into the future (but NOT the Face of Boe!!!).
(See note below about Niko and Cal Leandros AU - my preferred canon point for Jack nowadays.)

Physical characteristics
Gender: Male
Age: I play him as having been 30 when he was made immortal, so his age at any time point will be 30 + however long it's been since 1869 when he got stuck in Cardiff (give or take a little time-travel)
Height: 6'0"
Build: Solid
Accent: American (with some Britishisms)
PB: John Barrowman

Background
Jack has a long and complicated history (see the Wiki entry for details) but basically he was born in the 51st Century on the Boeshane Peninsula, lost his younger brother Gray to aliens, became a Time Agent to search for him, left the Time Agency when they stole two years of his memories, met the Doctor and found new purpose, got accidentally made immortal by Rose Tyler, got left for dead by the Doctor, and lived through 140 years waiting to find the Doctor again, during which time he was recruited by Torchwood, an organisation founded by Queen Victoria to defend the British Empire against aliens, eventually becoming head of Torchwood Three.

He transformed the purpose of Torchwood to help aliens stranded through the Rift in Cardiff, as well as to protect Earth from harm and invasion, leading a small, hand-picked team. A team he gradually lost, with the sole exception of Gwen Cooper.

Personality
Captain Jack Harkness is a complicated man. He’s lived a long time and he’s been through a lot, and it has left its mark on him. Outwardly, he presents as a very dashing and charming flirt, full of outrageous, entertaining stories of his past. It’s hard for anyone who doesn’t know him very well to determine if these stories are true, however. Despite his loquaciousness, Jack doesn’t actually give away much about himself, deflecting any inquiry that might probe too deep with yet another flippant remark or ridiculous story. In any case, he’s not an overly self-analytical man; he lives each day very much as it comes without dwelling too much on his past or what his future may hold. It’s probably the only way he’s stayed sane as long as he has.

His flippancy also masks deep feelings for those he lives and works with. Jack has a big heart and when he loves, it’s with everything he’s got. Love for the Doctor (the man who changed his life) is what got him through the century and more he spent stranded on Earth waiting to find him again; and ironically, love for his team and for the people of Earth in general is what made him return to Torchwood after he’d finally found the Doctor again. This love brings with it a great sense of responsibility for the people under his command and for those he’s pledged to help, and a great sense of guilt whenever he feels he’s let them down (an example being that when an angry, broken Gray finally tracked him down, Jack’s guilt for letting go of him that day was still so strong that he let Gray bury him alive for what could have been forever, because he felt he deserved it). Jack will forgive anyone, it seems, except himself. He also takes any loss very hard, and grieves deeply for anyone he couldn’t save.

These deep feelings do not make Jack weak, however; on the contrary, they give him resolve and determination. They mean that Jack will do whatever it takes to save someone, occasionally revealing a dark side to him that most people never get to see. Jack can be extremely cold and ruthless when the situation demands, an example being that when his team (and countless other random innocent people) were threatened by a group of cannibals, he showed himself – however regretfully – willing to torture as horribly as necessary to get the information he needed.

As far as relationships go, Jack is not a conventional 21st century human. He was born and raised in the 51st century where values are quite different: the people of that time are extremely open-minded and polyamorous and open relationships are the norm, be they with the opposite sex, the same sex or even aliens. Jack has actually been termed as ‘omnisexual’. He greatly enjoys sex and the fun of flirting and seduction, but he’s not a slave to his hormones – a lot of the time his flirting is just flirting and he won’t follow through on it. He has also been known to use his good looks and that trademark smile to get himself out of sticky situations. Jack is fully aware of his own charm and presence (and his very useful 51st century pheromones), and how to use them to his advantage.

Jack has a knack for not letting himself get committed to deep, long-term relationships (for one thing, it’s awkward when he ages so very much more slowly than anyone else; for another it can hurt too much when he loses them, as he always will) but there are exceptions to the rule, his relationship with Ianto Jones of his team being one such exception. It wasn't an exclusive relationship - at least, not for Jack - but it was a deep one, much deeper than he ever intended it to be, which was why it hurt so damn much when it ended, far too soon.

AU with Niko and Cal Leandros and Gerard Keay
A long-running PSL beginning here where Jack got abducted/tortured/killed by the darkly sadistic and manipulative Niko. Niko gave him the domination and intimacy that he craved and Jack kept coming back for more, eventually forming a romantic relationship with Niko's brother Cal on the side, and later with Cal's new boyfriend Gerard, and prompting a lot of change for the better in Niko too.

Jack has undergone a lot of character development in this 'verse and I'm now incorporating some of the events of the Torchwood audio series Aliens Among Us - well, using them for inspiration and omitting the bits I don't need. If it fits in with characters I'm playing with, this is my default point to play Jack from nowadays. Current point of play is nebulously somewhere around 2017 but there's a fair bit of leeway on the exact year.

Abilities
Jack is immortal – if he dies, he will always come back to life. He also heals faster than your average human.


If you'd like to read more of my Jack in fic, he features in an awful lot of the fics I've written over the years, which can all now be found on my AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Unfeathered/works

Or you can find my musings on writing and fandom in my general journal: https://unfeathered.dreamwidth.org/

You can also find my other current RP muse, Rupert Giles, here: idliketotestthattheory