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info post;
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| Name | Jack Townsend |
| Gender | Male |
| Age | Late 20s/Early 30s |
| Canon | Tales from the Gas Station |
| PB | Jay Baruchel |
permissions
| Backtagging | Y |
| Threadjacking | Y |
| Fourthwalling | Y |
| Mind-reading | Y - he has strange psychic Stuff, hit me for details |
| Injury | Y |
| Death | Y |
appearance
• Pale
• Messy black hair in need of a cut
• 5'9", underweight
• Looks younger than he is
• Bags under his eyes at all times
• Green eyes
• Resting bitch face
• Prosthetic leg - right, knee down
• Missing finger - smallest, left hand
• Messy black hair in need of a cut
• 5'9", underweight
• Looks younger than he is
• Bags under his eyes at all times
• Green eyes
• Resting bitch face
• Prosthetic leg - right, knee down
• Missing finger - smallest, left hand
about
❝At the edge of our town, there’s a shitty gas station that’s open twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. If you were to go inside, you’d see row after row of off-brand chips, cookies, potted meats, and pickled curiosities. Expiration dates suspiciously missing from the canned goods like they were filed off years ago in some misguided attempt to control inventory turnover. A faded “wet floor” sign from way back covers a large crack in the foundation by the cooler where layers of sticky spill-off have formed a miniature tar pit, preserving countless insect corpses and the occasional small rodent.
Nobody ever complains about the aesthetic. By some providence bordering on the supernatural, the health inspector has repeatedly signed off on the business, always kindly ignoring the faint smell of some kind of mysterious chemical cocktail that is the defining characteristic of the establishment. More noticeable than the steady mechanical hum of the frozen drink machine that was installed in the seventies and never once serviced. More distracting than the random pockets of cold and warm air that seem to follow you around. And more annoying than the family of mutated raccoons that lives in the crawlspace behind the grease trap.❞
Jack Townsend is the main protagonist of Tales from the Gas Station, he is a chronic insomniac and works as the central employee. Jack is trusted greatly by the owners, so much so he would eventually find himself as the new owner. He bears first-hand witness to most of the weird things that happen within the gas station, and he uses the long stretches of time without customers to document his findings in a blog. — wiki
Noteworthy Psychic & Magic Stuff: Proficient magic users or characters who have the ability to detect supernatural aspects may pick up on the fact that Jack is a walking sponge of a thousand lifetimes' worth of powerful dimensional void-rift radiation, meant to make him the ideal vessel for a demigod. Many lesser beings who aren't deities themselves perceive this as something just being off or inherently impossible about him. He can't actually use this himself, he's just a battery or a vessel.
Psychics or people with extremely advanced knowledge of sleep disorders may pick up hints he might be actively dreaming even while having a conversation with them, or while going about his day performing basic tasks. Throughout the day, he intermittently dips into the lightest stage of REM sleep while seemingly awake.
He has a mild natural immunity/resistance to compulsions & charms, and is in essence fully immune to being knocked unconscious/put to sleep by any means, including medical-grade anesthesia or god-tier deities. The more complicated answer is that he's got a sleep disorder that does not allow his brain to go further than the lightest stage of REM sleep, which means his mind retains some level of awareness of his surroundings, and his parasomnia/somnambulism means he walks, talks, and physically moves to act out his dreams. So he's... asleep, but awake and functional. It's complicated.
Jack has the ability to accidentally, randomly experience memories of the people around him, first-person and with all the necessary context, as if he were the person living it as it plays out. If you'd like Jack to experience a memory, just let me know, I love using this in RP!
personality
In the words of his therapist, "Jack, you have a hyper-logical approach to dealing with grief. I worry that you may have already shut down emotionally as a way of coping with your impermanence. You aren't dead yet, but sometimes you act like you don't know it.”
To which Jack responded, "Okay. Cool."
Jack is generally an easy-going person with a remarkable ability to mind his own business. Jack seems to be fairly intelligent, even if he doesn't believe himself to be. His chronic illness and brain damage make him act in ways that are a little smooth-brained sometimes, so people tend to think he's stupid until they get to know him better.
Jack has a passionate love for reading as both a personal hobby and a way to pass time amidst long periods without rest.
Jack thinks extremely literally, often latching onto the first thought that comes across his mind when in conversation. While not shy about asking for clarification, he can often phrase questions in an overly blunt way or rude way.
He has a tendency to be irritated with others, especially if they happen to be strangers. He's pretty self-aware about being socially awkward, and he's okay with it.
Beneath all that apathy and awkwardness is a very caring guy with the ability to step up and take charge when necessary. He has a lot of baggage, a lot of lingering trauma, clinical depression, and a desire for permanent family that even he isn't fully aware of.
Quotes:
I meant to scream, but it happened so fast it totally slipped my mind, so instead I asked, “What're ya doin’?”
I hadn't gotten any better at improvisation or deception, so I said, "We're gonna go touch butts."
I was fighting and pleading for my life and Marlboro’s life not because I didn’t want to die, but because I didn’t want Tony to become a killer. That would be worse than dying. That would be so much worse. It really would.
To which Jack responded, "Okay. Cool."
Jack is generally an easy-going person with a remarkable ability to mind his own business. Jack seems to be fairly intelligent, even if he doesn't believe himself to be. His chronic illness and brain damage make him act in ways that are a little smooth-brained sometimes, so people tend to think he's stupid until they get to know him better.
Jack has a passionate love for reading as both a personal hobby and a way to pass time amidst long periods without rest.
Jack thinks extremely literally, often latching onto the first thought that comes across his mind when in conversation. While not shy about asking for clarification, he can often phrase questions in an overly blunt way or rude way.
He has a tendency to be irritated with others, especially if they happen to be strangers. He's pretty self-aware about being socially awkward, and he's okay with it.
Beneath all that apathy and awkwardness is a very caring guy with the ability to step up and take charge when necessary. He has a lot of baggage, a lot of lingering trauma, clinical depression, and a desire for permanent family that even he isn't fully aware of.
Quotes:
I meant to scream, but it happened so fast it totally slipped my mind, so instead I asked, “What're ya doin’?”
I hadn't gotten any better at improvisation or deception, so I said, "We're gonna go touch butts."
I was fighting and pleading for my life and Marlboro’s life not because I didn’t want to die, but because I didn’t want Tony to become a killer. That would be worse than dying. That would be so much worse. It really would.
history
Jack grew up in and out of the foster care system from an early age. His father was extremely physically and mentally abusive. Jack mentioned that his father had taken him to his first Klan rally when he was 3, broke his arm and 3 of his toes when he was 7, refusing to take him to the hospital, resulting in him having to hitchhike. At one point, his father even threw him out of a moving car because he couldn't stop hiccupping. Jack's mother is an addict, and from ages even earlier than seven she would lock him out of the house. He routinely wandered the apartment complex after he got home from school looking for people who would give him something to eat.
Jack was incorrectly diagnosed with Fatal Familial Insomnia as a teenager.
He began working at the gas station right after graduating from high school.
From seven years old onward, he had a friend (and eventual girlfriend) named Sabine, the daughter of the owners of the gas station. She was the only permanent person in his life. After learning of his condition being fatal, the pair decided to leave together and see what they could of the world. They barely made it a mile out of town before another car ran them off of the road, leaving Sabine in a permanent coma. After several years of this she would eventually die — but Sabine wasn't human in the strictest sense. Who knows what death really means for her?
Jack was incorrectly diagnosed with Fatal Familial Insomnia as a teenager.
He began working at the gas station right after graduating from high school.
From seven years old onward, he had a friend (and eventual girlfriend) named Sabine, the daughter of the owners of the gas station. She was the only permanent person in his life. After learning of his condition being fatal, the pair decided to leave together and see what they could of the world. They barely made it a mile out of town before another car ran them off of the road, leaving Sabine in a permanent coma. After several years of this she would eventually die — but Sabine wasn't human in the strictest sense. Who knows what death really means for her?
𝕠𝕗𝕗𝕚𝕔𝕚𝕒𝕝 𝕣𝕖𝕡𝕠𝕣𝕥