Might add some more characters later :3

[hider=Malik Thornton]
[center][img=http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_bEN1tIfBtM0/TRVpPgsUgGI/AAAAAAAAAig/VQ832-wg3RA/s1600/hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.bmp]
[b]MALIK THORNTON, 21
NURSING STUDENT & PART-TIME HOSPITAL PORTER[/b][/center]
[b][u]APPEARANCE:[/u][/b] As pictured. Malik is particularly weed-like with a thin figure at 6'2”. Despite this, he is not particularly healthy, living on junk food and takeaways – he is just blessed with a difficulty for putting on weight. He is traditionally handsome with (fairly girly) windswept hair and strong, angular facial features. Darker skin betrays his mother's Indian heritage and he is the mirror image of the men in her family.

[b][u]PERSONALITY:[/u][/b] Malik is an easy-going, loud-mouthed student who is so “chillaxed” (as he puts it) that he is borderline lazy and disinterested in life. Somewhat immature, he has a bad habit of aspiring to be the best and becoming apathetic when he doesn't reach that target. Despite his lack of achievements, he is fairly arrogant, having been told all his life that he is gifted and destined to amount to something; therefore, he likes to be independent and thinks he can do a job better than anyone else – including leading a group to survival in this post-apocalyptic world – even when he is unsuited to such a task.

[b][u]ETHNICITY:[/u][/b] Mixed – mother is Indian, father is White American.

[b][u]EQUIPMENT:[/u][/b] All of his supplies are in a large, expensive hiking bag that has never before been used. It is dark brown and still has its price tag on it:
– Pilfered first aid supplies including bandages, surgical scissors, antibiotic creams, rubbing alcohol and hand sanitiser.
– Over the counter drugs like paracetemol, ibuprofen and anti-histamines as well as boxes of heavy prescription painkillers.
– One 2L bottle of what was once Pepsi, now water.
– Two heavy textbooks from his nursing course with basic medical information.
– Two sets of clean clothes, thin and unsuited to the falling temperatures.
– A brown army jacked inherited from his father and a purple scarf with a princess pattern on it.

[b][u]WEAPONS:[/u][/b] Nothing to take out a walker with – only scalpels, which are more suited for use on a human target, and syringes.

[b][u]FAMILY:[/u][/b]
Rashmi || Mother || Unknown || Left family when Malik was seven. Sparked her son's interest in medicine.
Eddie || “Father” || Unknown || Lives on other side of town. Malik moved out and took sister with him.
Kali || Sister || Alive || Age 16. Has made her way across town from school to find Malik.

[b][u]PAST:[/u][/b]
The Thornton family was never destined for stability. His father, Eddie Thornton, is a Vietnam war veteran significantly older than his mother. Rashmi is a scientist who emigrated to America in search of an opportunity to have a career in biological science and Eddie was her chance to have children and a 'housewife' life while maintaining her position as a woman in a STEM field. After a rushed wedding, marital bliss was hard to come by with fertility issues on Eddie's side making not impossible but certainly difficult for the pair to reproduce. On her quest to get her two point five kids, Rashmi took matters into her own hands and had an affair for the sole purpose of having Malik.

Though there were doubts, the truth behind Malik's paternity was not revealed until after his younger sister was born (who is legitimately Eddie's child). In an argument about some unrelated problem, Rashmi came out with it as she was leaving for another state. After this, while he was never physically abusive, Eddie became distant from Malik – an understandable reaction. Therefore, as Malik grew up hearing awful verbal abuse from the veteran, he didn't blame the man himself. Instead, he turned his anger towards his mother and by extension, women.

Tensions were heated even further in his teenage years as Malik's grades began to slip from brilliant and prodigious down to above-average, mostly because he spent most of his time wandering the streets with a crowd of other 'slackers' rather than in his own home. School work and studying became things to avoid, even though he did in his heart want to become a doctor. His results in the end were decent but nowhere near good enough to get into medical school as he dreamed so he was forced into the 'lower' path of becoming a nurse.

Once he was accepted into college, he moved into a small flat partially funded by his rich great-grandmother despite not being biologically related to her. For spare spending money, he got an 'easy' job as a hospital porter, which also gave him some work experience in the meanwhile. Kali came to live with him during the summers, mostly because Eddie was distant from her – perhaps doubting her paternity too. Like many students, he spent what he had on booze, partying and video games.

On the first day of the outbreak, working in the hospital, he saw a dead man come back to life that had to be put down. Seeing the bite wounds on two of the nurses and a doctor – similar to the ones plaguing the now dreadfully ill overnight workers from the previous shift – Malik instinctively knew this was a bad situation in the making. When reports from other hospitals began flooding in, he went to the pharmacy where only the assistant was working and begged and bribed her to split the supplies with him, determined to prepare for the worst case scenario. It took all the money in his wallet – a few hundred dollars – and a whole lot of convincing before she agreed to split the high-value medicines between them and escape.

Malik had no intention of leaving his house for work or any other reason; however, with no food around and sister sticking by his side, he knows he will eventually need to go outside and find something.
[/hider]

[hider=Kali Thornton]
[center][img=http://www.theamazingmodels.com/models/models_images/koyal_2eea8.jpg]
[b]KALI THORNTON, 16[/b]
[b]HIGH SCHOOL STUDENT & ASPIRING ACTRESS[/b]
[/center]

[u][b]APPEARANCE:[/b][/u] As pictured. Kali, for a sixteen year old, looks like a woman much older – or at the very least, an adult. She has a particularly voluptuous figure with curves in the right places, masking lean muscles and a reasonably athletic build. The remnants of a rebellious phase are still present in the form of two lip piercings and a fading tattoo of a rose on her lower back. Kali dyes her hair a reddish-brown colour but it is naturally black like Malik's.

[u][b]PERSONALITY:[/b][/u] Unlike her brother, Kali is shrewdly ambitious when it comes to her life and sets ridiculously high standards for herself. She is an all or nothing type in that if she takes up a new hobby or aspires to do something, she will research every possible angle and ensures she knows [i]everything[/i] about it. Her demeanour can be easily mistaken for (and usually is) flirtatious, whether it be around friends or her own family. Her arrogance is palpable; it oozes from every pore and is evident in the way she thinks herself infallible. She is not particularly kind – a self-described “ice queen” with a deficiency in morals to boot – but she makes up for it with fierce independence and a hard-working, go-getter attitude. Who needs friends?

[u][b]ETHNICITY:[/b][/u] Mixed – mother is Indian, father is White American.

[u][b]EQUIPMENT:[/b][/u] Kali was in the dorms at school when her brother phoned, asking – if she could – to return to his apartment. Therefore, everything she owns is in a large duffel bag she uses to carry her gear for dancing, singing and drama lessons. It includes:
– Roughly five days worth of clean clothing
– Her dancing leotard and ballet shoes
– Two low-fat cereal bars
– Stolen goods: 3 iPhones, $100, an inhaler, Adderall, bedsheets, a sewing kit
– A copy of a 'A Streetcar Named Desire'
– Mace and a rape alarm on her keychain

[u][b]WEAPONS:[/b][/u] Mace against other humans, otherwise no weapons. She would have to just pick up something from her surroundings if necessary to take out a walker.

[u][b]FAMILY:[/b][/u] 
Rashmi || Mother || Unknown || Doesn't remember her very much; only briefly in contact.
Eddie || Father || Unknown || Ambivalent about father – brother takes care of her more.
Malik || Brother || Alive || Currently hiding with in his apartment.

[u][b]PAST:[/b][/u] 
Kali can't remember a time when her family was fully together as she was very young when her mother left, planting the seeds of doubt in her father's mind that both of his children were illegitimate instead of just one. Her brother was her primary caregiver – not because her father, Eddie, didn't care about her but he was always distant, having bonded with his apparent son only to find out he wasn't his. Like her brother, Kali was a dangerously intelligent child with some of the highest scores in her class; however, she had the cunning and aspirations to make use of it. 

When she was a teenager, her great-grandmother paid for her to attend a prestigious boarding school specialising in the theatrical pursuits of drama, music and dance and she made the most of it. Well-loved by her teachers if not her peers, she was often given leading roles as the dramatic antagonist or anti-hero for no reason other than she was excellent at it. Entering an amateur beauty pagent hosted by a partner of the school, she won first place – and it certainly did wonders for her ego, if not her social life. Her success, percieved by many to be the result of sucking up to the teachers (as it was), did not win her any friends, only passive-aggressive enemies.

As soon as Malik moved into his own apartment, she decided to share with him during the summer months rather than head home to be with her father – a man beginning a slow descent into alcoholism. She manipulated her brother into letting her live there without getting a part-time job, although she did manage to find a role in a commercial for a second-rate skin product. The money went on a black scooter that she stores at the school.

On the first day of the outbreak, Malik managed to get a hold of her over the internet and told her to return home immediately out of worry for her safety. Kali obeyed, to an extent, and took the time to pilfer the rooms of missing students nearby – a fitting revenge for their cold treatment of her. Then she ignored the orders of the adult supervisors in the dorms and headed outside, taking her scooter to the apartment on the other side of town. Somehow, she made it; however, she noticed a lot of strange, sickly people either collapsing on the streets or attacking folk recklessly on the way. Just before she reached Malik's home, she was knocked over by a car swerving to avoid a walker (though she didn't know it at the time) and had to limp the rest of the way there.
[/hider]

[hider=Writing Sample]
“Damon? I fuckin' hate you sometimes, man.”

Crouched over, clutching his stomach as if it was trying to wriggle away from him, Malik emptied his breakfast, lunch and dinner onto the filthy ground. Alleyways were gross, he decided. If the beers hadn't already sent his innards into doing loop-de-loops, the stagnant water mixed with mushy cardboard and cockroach-infested cans certainly would have.

Damon, a pale-skinned student with blonde hair and blue eyes – the very image of an angel – laughed and laughed until tears formed in the corner of his eyes, illuminated by the street lights. “Thought you were a medical student, bro. Didn't expect you to get so... ill,” he said, stifling chuckles. Malik couldn't understand just what was funny about him vomiting like he never had before, but he wiped his mouth unhygienically on the back of his hand and stood up to face his friend.

“Nursing student,” Malik spat out, glaring at Damon. Idiot, spiking his drink – why couldn't it have been some blonde girl's instead? Then maybe he might have actually gotten some action. “If you weren't my only hope to get home, I'd kill you right now with my bare hands. Now, so help me God, you [i]will[/i] phone me a taxi and you [i]will[/i] pay for it.”

Damon waved him off, citing, “'Course I'm not going to pay for it. You owe me ten–“

A girl in the distance screamed bloody murder, mixed in with a few 'help me's and 'Oh God's that were obviously male. When Malik concentrated past the feeling of his head and the earth spinning in different directions, he could tell that they weren't too far over from them – on the other side of the street, actually. Thus, when a gunshot went off, both the drunk students jolted upright.

“What the [i]hell[/i]?” Damon asked, rolling up his sleeves and preparing to head out there.

The same girl from before, hysteria plain as day in her voice, shrieked, “He bit me! Who even does that?” It wasn't in response to Damon, of course, but the timing was almost divine in its delivery.

“Damon, [i]someone[/i] over there has a gun. And I ain't going to stick around to see if they're trigger-happy or just friendly, 'cause this is the bad part of town you brought me to,” Malik managed to get out, using the wall as a crutch to follow the alleyway in the opposite direction from the commotion. 

Damon shook his head, staring for one last moment and turning to walk with his friend. “Nah, man. It's not the bad part of town. Something's not right there.” 

A few more drinks would erase the memory, and worry, from their minds.
[/hider]