Application: teleios

[the_death_card]

TW: This application contains mentions of child abuse and endangerment.


Player Info

Name: Em
Age: 28
Contact: cotume27
Characters Already in Teleios: Tony Stark (withmoreme)
Reserve: Here.

Character Basics:

Character Name: Jack Wilder
Journal: the_death_card
Age: 24
Fandom: Now You See Me
Canon Point: During the Five Points show, after planting the money in Bradley's car but while he's waiting on the others to get to Central Park.
Debt:

Class A: 2 years

Betrayal

Espionage

Class B: 37 years

Assault

Theft

Robbery

Fraud

Class C: 5 years, 6 months

Crime for hire

Aiding and Abetting

Car Jacking

Conspiracy

Disorderly Conduct

Escaping Custody

Faking own death

Fleeing the scene of a crime

Framing other people for a crime

Harassment

Impersonation

Invasion of privacy

Joyriding

Manipulation

Misappropriation of police issued equipment

Property damage

Reckless driving

Reckless endangerment

Stealing evidence/evidence tampering/destroying evidence

Trespassing

Unlicensed use of heavy machinery

Using underhanded means in a fight

Vehicular assault

Vigilantism

Witness tampering

Antagonizing a federal agent

Misuse of a corpse

Resisting arrest

GRAND TOTAL: 44 years, 6 months

Canon Character Section:
TW: Child abuse

History: Zachary Alexander was born to single mother Eliza Wilder in Brooklyn. His father was an ex-boyfriend who she never told about the pregnancy, and Zack never knew him. To support her child, Eliza worked two jobs, coming up with creative solutions to make sure that Zack never understood how poor the family actually was. She was largely successful at it, and though Zack might have wondered why he couldn't have the hottest new toys like his friends, it didn't affect his childhood.

When Zack was seven, there came a day that the principal of the school he attended pulled him out of class to tell him that something had happened to Eliza. Though Zack was too young to understand at the time, she had suffered a sudden, massive stroke and had been found in their apartment by one of her co-workers. Zack's father was contacted, but he wanted nothing to do with the child, and so, with no other living relatives, Zack was put into the foster care system.

Zack's time in the system came with its share of ups and downs. Zack had trouble adjusting to his new and unstable situation. His case worker did his best to find him suitable places, but many of her attempts were brought down by Zack acting out at home or getting into fights at school. Some of the better ones ended for other reasons, including sickness and another death, and Zack found himself being shuffled off to somewhere else.

When Zack was nine, he was sent to live with a middle-aged couple. What the couple had managed to conceal was that the man was an abusive alcoholic. He never resorted to physical violence, but he was extremely controlling and emotionally manipulative of both his wife and Zack, including withholding food or locking the child out of the house in the middle of winter. Eventually, Zack found an opportunity to run away, but he was returned to the family by police. The abuse continued until a day that Zack collapsed at school from lack of food. His case worker took the time to listen to her charge and to launch a deeper investigation, and Zack was finally removed from the home.

After that, Zack lived with an older woman who had grandchildren Zack's age. Zack actually managed to settle in the woman's home and was doing well both in school and at home when he was dealt another blow. One evening, the woman suffered a massive heart attack. Though she was taken to the hospital, there was nothing to be done, and she passed away a few days later. In some ways, Zack took her death harder than his own mother's, considering he was now old enough to actually understand what was happening. The woman's son was briefly considered as a replacement, but in the end, Zack was returned to the system.

A year later, Zack was sent to live with a family with two other children. Only two nights after his arrival, he woke with a need to use the bathroom. On the way back to his room, he heard sounds from another bedroom and walked in on his foster father molesting his eight-year-old daughter. Before Zack could get away, the man saw him and began to beat him, blacking his eye, breaking his arm, cracking two ribs, and leaving him barely conscious. The family did have the decency to take him to the hospital, and the following investigation led to all three children being removed from the home, as well as the man being taken into police custody.

For almost two years after that, Zack became nearly out of control. He got in fights nearly every day and was barely passing his classes. He began picking pockets to get money for the things he needed, and, though he came close to getting caught, seemed to have a knack for slipping away unnoticed. Then, a new child was sent to live in the group home where Zack was staying. He was as young as Zack had been after his mother's death, and, despite his best efforts to remain distant, Zack found himself becoming close to the boy. Lee was unable to pronounce Zack's name, calling him "Jack", instead, and after the boy was sent to live with some distant cousin, Zack kept the name.

After that, Jack's life took a turn for the better. His home situation remained unstable, but he found a job at a theater, working first as a janitor, then as an usher, and then in the ticket booth. While he was working there, a magician did a run of shows at the theater. For what felt like the first time, Jack found himself fascinated by the show and began to teach himself everything he could about magic, including pouring over books and using the library's computers to watch YouTube videos. When the magician himself discovered Jack struggling with a card trick one afternoon, he took him under his wing for the rest of his time at the theater, teaching him sleight of hand and how to throw playing cards, among other things.

When Jack turned eighteen, he left the system. He continued working at the theater until declining ticket sales left it shuttered. From there, he worked a series of odd jobs, resorting to picking pockets and performing street magic for extra cash. He was never actually homeless, but things were tight all the same, and he learned to improve his skills to better his own situation.

The pattern continued until shortly after Jack's twenty-fourth birthday (where the movie began). He had made something of a name for himself - even if people sometimes didn't actually know his name - doing street performances. One afternoon, after a moderately successful stop on a ferry boat that left him with a watch to pawn and a handful of cash, he discovered a tarot card - specifically, the Death card - that had been slipped into his pocket. The back of the card listed a time, date, and street and apartment number in New York. When he arrived at the apartment, he discovered three other magicians he already knew there: Merritt Mckinney, Henley Reeves, and Daniel Atlas, of whom he was something of a fan. The door to the apartment was locked, but one of the things Jack was the best at was picking locks, and it was only a matter of seconds before they were inside.

The apartment was dark and dank and looked as though no one had been there for some time. In the main room, though, they found a note that read "Now you don't", a rose, and a pitcher of water. When Henley placed the rose in the water, it started a chain reaction that led to the discovery of blueprints and plans for a set of shows. They later discovered the shows were meant to cripple or bankrupt three people and institutions who had all played a part in the downfall of Lionel Shrike, another famous magician who had died attempting a comeback some thirty years before. If they succeeded with the shows and followed the instructions given, they would also be permitted entrance to the Eye, a secret organization dedicated to the protection of "real magic". Despite the fact that they had no real clue who exactly they were working for, the four of them agreed, and a year later, they took to the Vegas strip as the Four Horsemen in a show sponsored by Arthur Tressler, a millionaire businessman.

During the Vegas show, the team declared they were going to rob a bank. They picked a man from the audience, seemingly at random, sending him through space to Paris and into the vault of his bank, the Credit Republicain, where they "magically" stole $3.2 million and dropped it over the audience. In fact, the man was a dupe, chosen weeks before specifically because of his connection to the bank. They had also stolen the money weeks before by intercepting it on its way to the bank and replacing it with fake money, which they they destroyed using flash paper.

After the show, the team returned to their suite at Aria to wait for their inevitable arrest. It wasn't long before the FBI arrived to take them into custody, and they received thunderous applause on their way out of the casino.

At the FBI's Las Vegas office, they were interrogated by Special Agent Dylan Rhodes of the FBI and Agent Alma Dray of Interpol, who had been spent from Paris to investigate the robbery. The Horsemen gave them all manner of grief and, considering the lack of actual evidence against them, were released and moved on to their next show.

On the plane ride over, a spat between the Horsemen led to Daniel attempting to read Tressler. In fact, the questions were meant to lead him into providing them with the answers to his security questions, the point of which would be revealed during the next show.

The second show took place at the Savoy Theatre in New Orleans. The team further antagonized the agents during the show by dedicating it to them. As this show's final act, Merritt apparently used his mentalism to divine the bank accounts of everyone in the audience, including their benefactor, Arthur Tressler. They bought him on stage and began to "magically" transfer money from his bank account to those of their audience, all of whom had been denied claims by Tressler Insurance.

The team made their escape with the help of some audience members who had been hypnotized by Merritt earlier in the show. While escaping, Jack was also able to plant a tracker on Agent Rhodes, who believed he was actually tracking Daniel through the crowd. By the time he realized what was really going on, the Horsemen were well on their way to New York.

In New York, the Horsemen realized that Agent Rhodes had discovered a bug that Daniel had planted on him in Las Vegas. The other Horsemen fled the apartment, but Jack remained behind to destroy some of the evidence they had. When Agents Rhodes and Fuller arrived, Jack incapacitated Agent Fuller by jamming the sleeves of his suit coat into the apartment's garbage disposal and fought Agent Rhodes. Jack narrowly escaped with a report on Alcorn, who the FBI were already investigating. He led Agents Dray and Rhodes on a high-speed chase through New York City and eventually onto the 59th Street Bridge. There, Jack's car hit the median divider and rolled before bursting into flames. Agent Rhodes attempted to pull him out of the car but was only able to grab the report. Moments later, the car exploded, and Jack was apparently killed.

Though the car chase was real, the Horsemen were waiting for Jack on the bridge to switch out his car with another, identical car, into which they had loaded an unidentified corpse from a local morgue. The real point was to lead the FBI to a warehouse in Queens where Alcorn had been hiding a safe full of money and to get the attention off Jack so he could finish another set of tasks.

The FBI, as expected, descended on the warehouse, just in time to find out FBI Agent Evans had been hypnotized by Merritt into loading the safe into a truck headed to 5 Pointz, where the Horsemen were planning to have their final show. The FBI, again apparently ahead of the Horsemen, followed the safe, Agents Fuller and Rhodes riding along, and waited for someone to approach.

Eventually, the assistant of ex-magician turned debunker Thaddeus Bradley did just that. Thaddeus Bradley, who had also played a part in the death of Lionel Shrike by exposing all his tricks and forcing him into a greater performance that went wrong, had been at every show and had been planning to sell DVDs revealing how the Horsemen had performed the tricks. He told the FBI to open the safe, revealing that the Horsemen were again ahead of them: the safe turned out to be full of only balloon animals. While the FBI puzzled over this development, the show began, and their attention was drawn away.

In truth, the real safe was still hidden in the warehouse, concealed by a false wall. While the other Horsemen performed at 5 Pointz, Jack broke into the warehouse and destroyed the wall. He moved the money from the safe to Bradley's car in order to frame him for the theft. His final task completed, Jack headed to Central Park to wait for the other Horsemen to catch up with him. It was there, in their van, that he drifted off for a quick nap - only to wake up in Teleios.

Personality: Due to the fact that Jack's time in the foster care system forced him to grow up quickly, Jack is simultaneously mature for his age in some ways and immature in others. He is extremely self-sufficient and resourceful and knows how to get by on very little, thanks to things he picked up from his mother and times he had to take care of himself due to inattention from his caretakers. His skills at pickpocketing have provided him with easy ways out, and were he ever forced to hold down a proper nine-to-five job as his only means of gaining money, he would likely find it uncomfortable and boring.

Unlike many others, Jack never had great dreams of being a performer, though once he got a taste of it, he decided it was all he wanted. Magic is really the first thing that Jack encountered that got and held his interest, and he might also have thought of it as a way to even the odds that always seemed so stacked against him. Street performances got him attention like he had rarely had as a child in the system, and he relished in it, in hearing the applause and seeing the delight on people's faces.

As many people as he has made happy, there is also the smaller number who have had their days ruined. Jack feels little remorse or guilt about the people he takes from; he feels he picks his targets well and knows who can afford to lose some extra cash and a watch or necklace. He never uses the credit cards he finds in wallets, nor does he use their IDs; he is shown in canon to be removing the cash from a stolen wallet and then dropping the article into the river with the rest of its contents still inside. He has never used a weapon in his thefts, and the only times he has stolen from businesses, aside from his adventures with the Horsemen, have been while the business was closed for the day. Jack is a thief with a heart of gold, to be sure, and he never means it to harm, only inconvenience. He knows there is a fine line between the two, but he still can't quite bring himself to care when it ensures his personal survival.

Jack is slow to true anger though quick to frustration, usually when he feels someone is underestimating him. He will never hesitate to get in a fight or throw a punch, but it is almost always to prove himself. He has lost fights over the years, but he has won many more simply because he believed he could. He is also extremely stubborn, which has led to getting his way as many times as it has led to something coming back to bite him.

He is sarcastic and quick with a smart response. He has a wide, easy grin that people see often and is quick to be there when someone needs a hand. He loves to be in the middle of things, especially when it comes to the performances, and the idea that his part of the shows might be limited was enough for him to try and speak to Daniel on the plane about his part on the show, hoping for more to do. He can be kind of a brat about it, sometimes, but he had never worked with another magician before aside from the one who taught him, and it took him some time to adjust to there being other people with more experience to deal with.

The Horsemen are the first people Jack has ever known who he would consider an actual family, for someone else to have his back - and for him to have someone else to care about other than himself. He knows they all look as him as something of a little brother, and most of the time, he enjoys his position in their family. He still has some trouble opening up to them and feeling comfortable getting close to another person, but his time with them have helped him with that, too.

Jack is still a kid, in many ways, and being part of the Horsemen forced him to grow up in ways he hadn't yet. When faced briefly with the threat of prison, Jack admitted to being scared and attempted to balk, but the others forced him to stick with the plan instead of running as he might have done in the past. The team provided him with a sense of stability he had never had, forced him to be accountable to someone he cared about other than himself, and he grew as a person and as a performer because of it.

Powers/Abilities: Jack's primary focus is up-close magic and sleight of hand. He can throw cards with extreme accuracy and force, even using one to cut Agent Rhodes's face during their confrontation. He is seen in canon to be able to remove a man's watch and wallet without being caught until he was well away from the scene; in a deleted scene, he is also able to switch much of the clothing of a pair of volunteers without them catching on. He can palm cards and pingpong balls with ease, as shown during his fight with Agent Rhodes and during the Las Vegas show, respectively. He has also never met a lock he couldn't open, including handcuffs, which he can slip with barely a second thought. He can mimic voices easily, as shown during the fight in the apartment when he fools the FBI's response team by copying Agent Rhodes's voice over the radio.

Jack knows how to read a person's body language and tell how they are going to move. Because of this and his smaller than average size, he can slip easily through crowds, frequently without being noticed. He is an excellent hand-to-hand fighter, though he has never had any formal training and might just be described as a scrapper. He knows how to make use of his surroundings and how to use his other skills at magic to win a fight, including throwing cards or flash paper to distract his opponent or how to get them tangled up in their own clothing. To say he is fearless would not be entirely correct, but he has never entered a fight he didn't expect to win.

Though Jack is currently not aware of it, he also has the potential to perform real, actual magic. He seems to tap into this at various points in the film, including the fact that he manages to take a weapon out of Agent Rhodes's hands without the other man noticing and the speed and skill with which he is able to throw the flames the provide him the distraction. He will of course lose this ability upon arriving at Teleios, but in the event he were able to regain it, he would be able to perform real versions of things that would otherwise be classified as illusions. It would take a physical and emotional toll on him, the degree of which would depand on the complexity of the trick performed.

Appearance: Jack stands a relatively short 5'7", and though he is thin, he is also solidly built. He has brown eyes and light brown hair that he keeps cut short. He is quick and light on his feet with a talent for getting through crowds unnoticed. He wears suits on stage, but he dresses more comfortably off stage, favoring jeans, a plain t-shirt, and an ever-present leather jacket.

It is the writer's headcanon that he has a skeleton key tattooed on the back of his right calf, from ankle to knee, that he got based on his often repeated phrase of "nothing is ever locked" and the fact that he was, after years of having other people tell him what to do and where to go, opening his own doors.

Samples:

Actionspam Sample: Here.

Prose Sample: Here.