ooc; written 2009

[billybumbler]

Full Name: John "Jake" Chambers

Age: twelve, almost thirteen

Abilities: Near preternatural aim with almost all projectile weapons, including the plates with sharpened edges ('rizas) that he currently carries in a bag. He also has psychic abilities which are more pronounced when with his ka-tet (allowing mental communication between them), but still significant on his own. He can read people's thoughts -- he thinks it's rude without their permission, but still sometimes "hears" things without meaning to. He occasionally has prophetic dreams or visions/feelings about certain things, due to his strong link with ka (something like destiny), but these usually require some interpretation. And he's generally a little deus ex machina in that respect.

Point in Canon: Post-series.

Brief History (Some spoilers for The Dark Tower)

Jake grew up in New York, the only son to two people who couldn't be more indifferent to his existence if they tried. Still, they provided pretty well for him -- he didn't want for much -- and their housekeeper Greta Shaw gave him most of the emotional attention he craved. His childhood was one of bowling, comics, and a whole lot of book-reading.

Jake was eleven years old and attending Piper School (the best school in the country for a boy his age!) the first time he died. He was pushed in front of a car by a serial killer (or perhaps the man in black, originally, for there are other worlds than these), and ended up at a way station in Mid-World. Here, he met Roland and accompanied him on the first part of his quest for the Dark Tower ... and was killed again, by the gunslinger himself this time, when Roland deemed his quest more important than the life of the young boy in his charge.

But when, a few weeks later, the gunslinger saved the boy by preventing Jack Mort from killing him in the first place, a paradox was created: Jake could remember both dying and not dying, and almost went crazy over the next few weeks as he remembered two versions of his own life. He gained an obsession with doors, thinking that each one he opened would lead him back to Mid-World and the gunslinger -- and eventually a door did lead him back, thanks to Roland, his ka-tet, and a house in Brooklyn. The ka-tet -- Roland Deschain, Eddie Dean, Susannah Dean and Jake Chambers -- was almost complete, with its final member to be a billy bumbler named Oy (like a cross between a dog and raccoon, but extremely intelligent). Oy would become a constant companion to Jake, obeying and protecting the boy above all others, particularly in one instance where he led Roland through a maze of junk to a kidnapped Jake.

The ka-tet's quest was a long one that saw them in many worlds (all heavily featuring New York, or versions thereof), always pursued by the man in black, a villain also known as Walter O'Dim, Marten Broadcloak -- or Randall Flagg. During their quest, Roland and Jake grew to love each other as father and son, so much so that by the end, Jake calls the gunslinger his true father, and even the stoic gunslinger displays an obvious, visible love for the boy. Eddie and Susannah become family, too; in fact, in another world, Jake and Eddie are actually brothers. Jake's loyalty is to Roland through and through, despite the fact that the gunslinger let him die -- but his secondary loyalty is to the Tower, which he would -- and does -- die to protect.

It's in the keystone world, supposedly our world, that Jake dies for the third and final time. It's the year of 1999 and he and Roland intend to save Stephen King, whom they have heard has grown lazy and stopped writing about the Dark Tower -- and who is going to die before he finishes. This cannot be allowed to happen, so the pair travel to Maine and track down the writer while he's out walking, with the help of a local woman. And find him they do -- just as a van is about to run him over. Roland falters due to a bad hip, and Jake leaps out in front of him to push Stephen King out of the way ... but is crushed by the van himself, fatally so. He has time to give messages to the woman and Oy, while Roland speaks with the writer and van driver (and hypnotises them so they don't remember). When Jake dies a few minutes later, it's final; time only runs one way in the keystone world, and there are no do-overs. He's buried in the woods nearby (by the gunslinger himself), and the woman later plants a rose to mark the grave, a memorial that fits him well -- for the rose is the Tower, so it is, and the Tower has been saved, thanks to Jake.

PB: Zachary Winard