deadzonewalking

Name: Drew (technically Andrew, but he NEVER goes by it) William Shepherd

Age: 28

Sex: male

Appearance:

Brown hair, usually warm brown eyes. Just shy of six feet tall. He normally has a relaxed, laid back sort of look to him, not really one to dress up, but he's not a slob either. Drew's the kind of guy who looks like he had a busy morning, and didn't quite have time to spruce himself up proper-like. Like he's just one step down from looking put together right. He at one time would have been described as having a very friendly sort of look to him, but recently it's just become tense. There's a scar between his eyebrows, noticeable but not too overt.

Special Abilities:

computer and tech skills, system code/some hacking, remembering way too much information accurately

Supernatural Affinity (Species/Group): Psychic Dead Zone

Supernatural Affinity (Powers):

Shuts down supernatural abilities when they're within range.

Personality:

Drew used to be a laid back, friendly, kind of funny good natured sort of guy. This sort of meant that he played the role of the best friend while his friends were all getting laid, and he was the guy let in on 'girl talk' because he 'didn't count' or the like, but eh. It was who he was.

Lately? He's paranoid, stammers sometimes, and trips over his own thoughts. Sometimes he's got too much caffeine in his system to make much sense, and he seems nervous. He tries to be helpful when he can, though doesn't always do the right thing. There are traces of who he used to be and one thing's remained--he's a good listener.

In a word, Drew's frazzled a lot. He knows there's a huge big bad following him and he's not stupid enough to think he'll ever really escape. He can't run forever--but he'll try!

History:

Drew was from a stupidly small town in Minnesota, and wanted out. He was naturally very good with computers. He seemed to speak their language, really, they made sense to him. Growing up, things were pretty damn normal for the guy. Small town, he filled the role of the 'unpopular but sweet friend of the hot chick who was banging everyone but him' guy. Though really, Drew's definition of attraction sways a little on the odd side, he tends to be more attracted to 'big boned' women so the swizzle stick cheerleader wasn't necessarily his cup of tea--doesn't mean he wouldn't have hit that if he'd had a chance, he just never did.

Initially, when he started looking at college, he'd wanted to be a crime scene investigator(with a fabulous side job of being a highly successful game designer...). School, however, was expensive. So after high school, he started work to save up and that was slow going. He took all the classes he could afford as he could afford them, but he came from a large family that wasn't very well off and things were looking pretty grim.

But he did what he could. He went to school in his slow way, and met a woman he absolutely adored. She was slightly older than he was, but vibrant with a forceful, jubilant personality. She was a big girl in the theater department, who's style of dress was bright and flamboyant, just like her personality. It wasn't too long before she was his best friend. Vicky was someone Drew really needed in his life, she was a positive influence, encouraging, and all around, a great person.

Then there was a car accident. He was in it with her, they had gone to a concert, and were on the way home when a drunk driver pulled out in front of them. Doing 80 on the freeway and suddenly plowing into the driver's side door of another vehicle really doesn't work out well for anyone. It was a huge accident, cars numbering in the teens involved. Three people died at the scene, two more in the hospital later. Drew was thrown from the vehicle, and sustained, miraculously, really what amounted to minor injuries, the worst being a broken leg. The scar on his face between his eyebrows was obtained then, though it's really the only lasting visual reminder of the incident.

What happened to Vicky was something else entirely. Vicky they didn't expect would live. Vicky had massive fucking brain damage, and if she did pull through, no one expected her to be anything more than a vegetable. She proved everyone wrong, however. The events after the accident were confusing, and it's one of the only times Drew doesn't have a perfect memory of. Basically? Shit got wacky. Vicky pulled through, weird shit happened around the two of them, badness occurred, she would get better only to get worse... They even went back to his mom's house, to try and help her recuperate, but things just got worse. Shit was just crazy, all over the damn place. It was really hard not to believe in all sorts of things by the time They got there.

They showed up with the perfect offer.

It was the best solution. His entire college career paid for in full, along with housing, food, all comforts including entertainment and other needs such as clothing,etc. All he had to do was sign all the paperwork, dot all the i's cross all the t's and help out with a grand, secret social service. They would help take care of Vicky, hell they even knew what was happening to her, and had all the accommodations to make sure she got well again. Perfect.

It kind of started out slow. He was introduced to things in a much more academic sense, given a lot of reading material, from very trippy glossy pamphlets talking about Lycanthropy and You, to old, heavy texts that looked hand written. It was all on the supernatural, all teachings on shit he hadn't believed existed but well. Apparently they did.

The weirdest bit was he was supposedly one of them. He was told he was a psychic, only not really. He was told he was a Dead Zone, and not the fun Stephen King kind. No, he shut things down. He killed the supernatural just by existing. He closed it down, shut it off, blinked it out, when he got close enough to it.

Really, this came as a bit of a shock. Eventually he came to believe it, however, when he got brought into situations to calm things down. Like watching through windows, psychics in rooms levitating shit at anyone who came near them, and everything just clattered to the floor when he so much as entered the room. Things were damn wacky, all things told. But he was safe, getting a good deal, and Vicky was getting better.

It started out fine. Minor things. Funny things, nothing too weird or terrible. At first, he really believed he was doing the right thing. It seemed that way, anyways. Some of the psychics, he knew, were being driven absolutely mad by their abilities. In fact, a lot of them they found in asylums across the country. But they felt better when he would go in and sit with them. One girl, Chloe, would always come cling to him, put her arms around his neck and hold on tight, because he made the voices stop. She was just a kid, a teenager. Later, he wasn't allowed to go back, and he never really was told why.

So, really, at first, he was doing good things. He was helping people. He was brought into situations to aid, and was often times thanked for it, even by those he was 'shutting down'. Later, things got worse. They started employing Vicky for things too, when she was strong enough. They wound up in the areas surrounding Marquette, studying the area and the residents. The place was an anomaly, and so they were interested in it and all. Really, for Drew, it just reminded him a lot of home, and so he really didn't at all mind the slowed down pace of moving to a quiet northern town.

Then things started to go more wonky. While he was stationed there, he would get called away for things. Vicky would get called away for things. She would come back weaker at times, and would need weeks to recuperate. He would get called away and it wasn't the same types of experiences. It wasn't helping, it was getting in range so people could be captured, and he never did get told what happened to them. Once, not long ago, he saw a group of lycanthropes gunned down, and he was told they were dangerous, that they were going to infect the population, but he didn't know for sure on that. He never knew for sure. It looked to him like a fucking execution with extreme prejudice.

He started asking more questions, started trying to refuse missions, and this did not go down well. This was a huge, massively powerful shadow organization and while occasionally he'd been made to feel like he was all spy-tech? Wow was he ever not. He was a computer geek with a memory they liked and an ability they wanted to exploit. And hey was he ever not getting the fuck away just because he said he didn't want to play anymore. On the last mission he was meant to go on, he put up a fight. The last thing he was told before the lights went out was that he didn't need to be awake to do the job. And he wasn't. He was knocked the hell out, and brought wherever they needed him and he woke up later with a mild concussion and a splitting headache.

The worst part, however, was while he was away, Vicky passed away. He never knew if they killed her, or if she just died. She was out on a mission of her own, and he just...doesn't know. He wanted out. With a lot of working out different computer viruses and attempting to come up with an escape plan, he did manage to get out! He just knows that it won't be long before he's hunted down like a dog and probably killed for all the shit he knows. Or worse. They'll chemically induce a coma and just use him for the duration for his ability. He'd like to ally himself with some big guns in Marquette for help, but at the same time, no one will want to because of what he does to them. It's all a huge mess, and he's just running now.

Weaknesses:

Paranoid--just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get you. Well, in this case he knows perfectly fucking well they ARE. And that he only has so long before he's found, and the people around him could very well go mob-justice on his ass and he couldn't even blame them if they found out about him. Being dropped into the middle of a town he'd been studying for a while fucked with his head. There are a ton of supernaturals there, and he knows what happens when he gets around them. At the same time, he knows on his own he's fucked...it's kind of a vicious cycle of crap logic in his head a lot of the time. He's waiting for it all to come crashing down on his head. It might not ever go away, Drew's pretty convinced he'll be spending the rest of his life (probably short life just due to overload of stress) looking over his shoulder. He knows exactly how powerful The Collective were and has absolutely no doubt that they will just forget about him. So he's kind of waiting for the axe to drop all the time.

Sleep Deprivation--yeah, sleep? not going to happen. He wasn't sleeping when he got put into Marquette, he wasn't sleeping before that, he won't be sleeping after. He's too paranoid to do it, he can't quite relax enough a lot of the times to manage. He's actually gotten to the stages where he's hallucinated before before dropping of exhaustion, but generally that'll be his new m.o. going until he absolutely can't function anymore.

Migraines--for the past several months, probably due to stress, Drew's been getting crippling migraines. So far nothing he's taken for them has worked. They come on randomly, and debilitate him for hours at the least.

Ulcer--yeah. he's been stressed out. You do the math.

Anxiety attacks--Sometimes, things just build up far too much and Drew has an attack. They don't generally last very long, but he's useless when he's in the middle of one.

Conscience--Okay so while he understands he's done good things with The Collective--things that really no one but him could have pulled off--that doesn't mean that he doesn't understand that he's also done wrong. Against his will, sure, but that doesn't help his headspace about it. He feels bad. Flat out, he does, and he wants to try and make up for it. He just knows there isn't any making up for some of it.

Bad Liar--Drew really just isn't very good at it. Never was, never will be, he telegraphs just about everything going on in his head in his entire person.

The Man Who Knows Too Much--So, Drew's been studying the town and the residents. Which means he knows things about certain ones. Granted, not all of them, not by a long shot, but some. That's not necessarily a good thing, because he's a fantabulously bad liar, not the best with hiding anything, and tends to flail. Which means if he runs into someone like that he isn't likely to play it off all cool-like, and not draw wicked amounts of attention to himself, and these are people who really probably won't appreciate suddenly being cut off from their abilities--especially when he can't exactly shut it off to convince them he isn't a threat.

Tagged - like any other rare, endangered species, Drew's tagged. He's just not aware of this. But he very much is. The Collective sure as hell isn't letting an asset like Drew just walk away. They orchestrated an elaborate 'escape' he could go about, so he'd think he got away. Really, what they've done is release him into an area heavy with supernatural activity, to observe what the hell happens then.

Strengths:

He's got an eidetic memory. If he sees it, he remembers. Which really just fucked him over in the end because he really DOES have far too much dirt on the collective, people they have or have dealt with, etc. by now.

Determination--one thing Drew's got is that. It took guts to try what he did in the first place, and he's still determined to make sure The Collective goes down for what they've done...or at the very least he wants to try and save as many people as he can from them. He just doesn't quite know how to do that...

PB: Justin Long