Username: Samuzuki
Time Zone: GMT
Journal Type: [I-J]
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Character info
Name: Adam Fletcher
Age: 14
Gender: Male
Appearance:
Describing Adam Fletcher’s appearance as respectable would certainly be a stretch yet respect is something he easily commands from his gangs of peers, wherever his young adventures take him. Standing at a slightly above average height for his age, with scruffy dark hair and ebony black eyes Adam is a boy teachers would do well to keep an eye on. Adam hails from a fairly large and largely poor family of four siblings and his two parents, he is a middle child and acts accordingly always looking for fun, lacking in patience and mindfulness. His father was once in the military and is the sort of dad any son would look up to, the sort of Father that would always represent the fun half of the parenting couple much to his wife’s resentment. Nonetheless she loved him dearly despite their difficult quality of life and cramped household, Adams father is a good man who worked tirelessly for his family.
Adam can almost always been seen wearing the same clothes apart from once a week on his family’s wash day. This outfit consists of a pair of worn sturdy boots which are slightly too big for him, a pair of falling apart cotton slacks held up with a leather belt complete with metal belt buckle: the family heirloom given to Adam by his father, a show of favouritism not unnoticed by Adams siblings. To complete Adams rustic outfit a baggy white shirt with an old tight fitting waistcoat and to top things off a navy hat Adam cunningly stole from a market stall run by an overweight collector.
Personality:
Adam is a confident youngster, a natural born leader he commands the respect of the other children his age as naturally as the tides rise and fall. Adam is a very physically based person, this meaning he puts most value in his ability to react, travel and interact with his environment, he does not like to think about things too much. In other words Adam is a doing, practical person. Freedom is the joy of life to Adam and he sees those in authority as people trying to restrict that freedom he relishes with every fibre of his being. Adam struggles with more subtle social interactions and thus keeps conversation with his posse to a minimum. Despite Adams outgoing nature, when all the fun of the day has died down and the sun is setting Adam sits alone on his windowsill and feels lonely and lacking in any real friendship or affection in life.
Keywords: Adventurous, Loyal, Socially awkward, Mischievous, Rebellious.
History
Adam was born a healthy child and named after his dad; Adam was a father’s boy from day one. As Adam grew into a toddler within the bustling activity of the Fletcher household, he was a dynamo of energy and showed an independent spirit, fighting with his older brother and sister despite being four years their junior; holding his own. Adams father took a shine to the boy, unlike he had with his siblings and when not working, Mr Fletcher could be found teaching Adam how to play sports and filling his head with stories of battles from the Panic Era. Adam made hard work for his mother during the day and rebelled against her attempts to discipline him, and his father only grinned when she told him what trouble Adam was causing during the day. The local gossip queens could be heard discussing the signs of resent from Adam's mother.
When Adam turned seven his parents scraped together enough money to send him to a local primary school, if only to save his mother the stress of his hyperactive presence in the house. It was also at around the same time his younger sister was born. Adam was used to receiving most of the attention in the house and threw a tantrum whenever he felt like his needs were being neglected because of his newborn sister. Things weren’t any better for him at school in this period of his life; he was shy at first and was targeted by the ringleader of the boys in his year, a snooty kid from the rich part of town who decided anyone as scruffy as Adam would be easy laughs for him and his lackeys. All of Adams attempts to befriend his peers where either met with a cold shoulder for fear of the ringleader or condescending insults about his clothes or class. Of course Adam did not tell his parents the trouble he was facing at school.
After four years of secret unhappiness at school, on a particularly bad day the playground ringleader had been insulting Adams family, calling them lower than dogs and saying his kind should have been eradicated during the Panic. Finally, Adam snapped and charged towards his childhood nemesis; two of his lackeys stepped up to grab Adam but where both shoulder-barged to the floor. So enraged he barely noticed them, Adam flung at his rival and they tumbled together to the ground with a thud. The ringleader cried out “get this mongrel off me” but none of the children stepped in. A series of brutal blows were landed to the boys face and a flash of inspiration came to Adam from his father; a vicious technique he had learnt in the army. As tears began to stream down Adam's tormentor's face, Adam thought he saw a sort of bright energy out of the corner of his eye, but the struggling of his nemesis bought his attention back to the four years of pain he had endured, and only one thing burned in his mind, vengeance. As Adam wrapped his forearm under the arm he had gripped like a vice, he hesitated for a moment, and then there was silence, a snap, and a blood-curdling scream.
Adam felt sick staring at that boy's arm, bent the wrong way, as teachers came and tried to assess the situation. Adam was taken to an office still feeling sick to his stomach. He refused to say a word to anyone, not even his mother, who was fuming at him for at being suspended for a week. Adam just wanted to be alone and shut himself in his room he shared with his sister whilst she was with their mother. Adam's father returned home and sat next to his son on his bed.
"Was that boy bullying you?" His father asked. Adam nodded and his father said "You did the best you could. I am proud of you." Adam embraced his father and sobbed into his dad's shirt.
The next day, Adam's father died from an accident working on the builder’s yard; a job he had taken since retiring from the army, in order to get enough food on the table. When the man in charge came to the door to tell of the tragedy, silence fell over the normally rambunctious house and then tears from all but Adam, who darted out the door, running towards his dad’s builder’s yard. After a mile of running without stopping, he was met with men who kept him from seeing what had happened. Adam pushed them away with a now tear-filled scream and ran into town, sobbing all the way to a back alley where he comforted himself with a sleeve and thought about what his dad would do in this situation.
Adam noticed a comforting glow in front of him suddenly and it seemed to be talking to him, in a soft voice, so familiar yet one he had never heard before. He should have been alarmed but for some odd reason this mysterious appearance, which he now figured out must be his daemon, comforted him greatly, he and the glow shared each others' sadness for a time, and then, when Adam had his composure it faded, Adam knew it would always be there for him, a true friend at last.
The afternoon was coming to an end and the sky quickly changed in tone to a deep red. Adam had ran into some kids from school, and they were telling him what he had done to the playground ringleader was amazing, that they were all glad to have him away from the school. Adam did not know how to react; these were the same kids who would have not even acknowledged his existence previously. Adam just splurged out "Let’s play tag!", without giving away the slightest hint of sadness in his mixed up emotional state.
As Adam ran round into a particularly dirty alley he saw a small girl looking very out of place with expensive clothing, tears streaming down her face looking lost as anything. Adam approached her to joking from his new-found peers, but he ignored them. As she rose her head too look at him, it was as if he were looking into some beautiful unreal painting, her pinkish red eyes glistening with tears reminded him of something from an exotic tale of abroad his dad might tell. Adam decided he would certainly have to do something to help this girl's plight as his daemon had helped him. Sitting beside her, she told him her story of being an over protected girl, and even though this might have been mild in comparison to Adam's tale of the day, he felt great sympathy for this girl; she had none of the freedom he loved as much as he had his father.
Adam led this girl called Ivory back to her home, hands held all the way and, despite everything that had happened, he felt a new dawn approaching and happiness in the shape of a small albino girl. Adam and Ivory would meet again and again as Adam discovered a similarly adventurous side to this small unique girl, whom he felt great affection for. One day after dropping Ivory back at her parents huge house that made his own look like a tired old shed, he spied the perfect present to get Ivory for her tenth birthday; a metal locket (Adam had always found metal fascinating) being presented in the window of a fancy antique shop. He took a loose coble stone and gently tossed it straight through the window and quick as a cheetah, grabbed the locket and sprinted down the street and in and out of several alleys as fast as his legs would carry him.
When home he wrote a message on a piece of paper in his best handwriting; ‘Adam and Ivory; Friends Forever'. When he gave it to her it he felt emotions unknown to him as his face turned red. Ivory thanked him in the most sincere way he had ever seen from someone of her class. After that meeting, Adam did not see Ivory for over a year and was secretly pining and upset despite doing much better in school where he had taken the role of the new playground ringleader, and a far more liked and well respected leader he was too. During this time when he was in his room alone, missing his dad in the evening, his Daemon would manifest more and more, as the thought of the new dawn he had felt when Ivory and he were together had also been taken away from him grew in his mind. Even his mother and siblings had started to notice the manifestations.
One day, Adam's mother came into his room with an excited look on her face and told him he had a special letter. It was from Jaradin College; they wanted him to come and study at their school for those with Daemons. Adam decided he had nothing left for him here and so agreed with little hesitation, secretly hoping to find Ivory somehow.
