Internship

As a teenager, Tyson interned as a vet.

His father had intended for Tyson to - predictably - intern somewhere more academic, but Tyson had remembered the age Jethro had been when their father pushed him into an internship at the college and instead took the initiate to get his own internship first.

Tyson was banking on two favours: it would look bad if Tyson bowed out of the first internship and his father would not want that, and it would show that he was ‘trying to better himself without prompting’ and give his father ammunition to boast with at his dinner parties.

Both of those points paid off and Tyson was free to internship at a local vet’s clinic. Mostly Tyson was just at the register, but it gave him enough ‘proof of experience handling animals’ to get into the service dog program almost immediately, which is what Tyson had intended.

Style

Generally, it can be assumed that Tyson either be dressed to the nines, or like a perpetual college student after a Saturday lecture. There is honestly no alternative.

However, the specific niche of college student does vary across Tyson’s verses.

In verses where Tyson is more confident, he’s more willing to wear fewer layers and less long sleeves; though generally avoiding shorts remains. The exception is corruption!verse, where Tyson is the most confident, as he tries to avoid letting his tattoos becoming too recognisable.

Unlike the normal teenage!Tyson, who dressed as a punk, Orphan AU 3 - Teen!Verse Tyson is more of a middle ground between a pastel punk and a hipster. Teen!Verse Tyson is very comfortable in short sleeves and likes his scarves, though retrains Tyson’s aversion to hats outside of beanies.

Hot Airballoon

Whilst Tyson generally favours air travel as being safer, he is vehemently against hot air balloons.

No, Sebastian, it is not romantic.

It’s a terrifyingly easy to rock basket, far too high off the ground with minimal control.

Please, please, please just put us back on the ground before panick attack round two happens.

We’re too high up to hyperventilate safely.

Tyson’s anti-hot air balloon campaign is long fought by this point and one that he stands by regardless of verse, context, or intent.

Hot air balloons are evil, and that’s an end of discussion.

Different Paths

If Tyson didn’t have the father he had and if he can’t crossed paths with The Colonel, Tyson would look fundamentally different.

Beyond being a carbon-copy of his father, that is.

Tyson prefers the way he looks with facial hair, yet because his father had a beard, the former Lieutenant almost always keeps himself smooth shaven.

He genuinely loves tattoos and if Sebastian hadn’t instilled such a deep fear of permanent markings into Tyson, he would be covered in tattoos by this point in his life.

Outside of corruption!verse and the sigil designs from the Moriarty Mirrors, Tyson would be unlikely to have tattoos on his hands, but his neck and the rest of his body would have been fair game.

In most universes and threads, it doesn’t matter how many changes Tyson goes through, he remains recognisable at a single glance. A Tyson untouched by his father and The Colonel is unrecognisable, a grown-up Tyson from any of his Orphan AUs would be completely unrecognisable in appearance.

His personality at its core would still be Tyson, the same self-sacrificing idiot of a mathematical prodigy, but his appearance, his presence in a room would be fundamentally different.

Comfortable in his own skin in a way that ‘normal’ Tyson never can be.

Swimming

Though Tyson rarely swims anywhere other than a private pool to avoid people seeing his scars, he genuinely loves swimming.

He feels reinvigorated when he’s swimming. He can only really float whilst facing downwards, but he’s a strong stamina swimmer and his best stroke is front stroke.

He loves swimming underwater and exploring the things around him. He’s pretty easy to keep out of trouble for a few hours by repeatedly throwing things into the water for him to fetch.

Some of Tyson’s most treasured memories are of sneaking out to swim with Jethro in the creak by the family manor or swimming in the rivers in India with Sebastian to cool off, and then heat up, after a day escaping pursuit.

There’s a freedom to it that Tyson can’t fully explain. That weightlessness, yet also resistance in the water, reminding Tyson that he’s still solid, that he’s not drifting off. It’s like having a safety net around his entire body.

Underdog

Whilst utterly refusing to admit that he is an underdog, Tyson goes out of his way to make sure people see him as an underdog; to make sure people underestimate him.

Being seen as not a threat is essential to the way Tyson operates, but on a personal level, Tyson refuses to admit that he’s an underdog.

The first thing he does when meeting a person is accessing their threat level to understand if he can stand his own against a person, but even then, even acknowledging that the other person is better than he is, Tyson refuses to admit that he’s the underdog.

Always a way out. Always a way to win. Too stubborn to back down.

For Queen and Country

Though the phrase ‘For Queen and Country’ is rather common in Tyson’s vocabulary, it’s always either flippant or a code to mean the Moriarty Mirrors.

He does not care about the royal family nor does he have a particularly strong sense of patriotism. He loves London and Cambridge, and that is about it.

He finds the history of the royal family and royalty in England to be interesting from a historical point of view, but that is where it belongs to Tyson: a part of history, left in the past.

Tyson joined the army to spite his father, not to serve his country.

Drink and a sandwich

Beyond more obvious defences, Tyson has dozens of pre-prepared lines to help conversations go smoothly and several strategies to help endear himself to other people.

One of Tyson’s main strategies is bringing a drink and a sandwich to a meeting for the person he intends to meet.

This works for several reasons. The first one is that it forces Tyson to actually attend the meeting. After his time fleeing the army on scraps, he hates to waste food and if he’s brought food for someone else, it would be a shame to waste it by not attending the meeting.

The other part is that Tyson knows this will generally endear him to the person he’s meeting, because it looks like he went out of his way to do something nice for them; and if knows anything about their tastes, that he picked something he knew they would like.

Which in turn helps Tyson stay comfortable and confident, which means his stutter isn’t as bad and Tyson can converse more fluidly rather than relying on the practised turns of phrases that whilst useful also add more distance between them and make it harder to find his true comfort zone around people.

Attack/Defense

Though strictly speaking Tyson favours strategic offence, it should surprise no one that Tyson favours defence over attack.

The best defence is a good offence, after all.

Reality doesn’t always allow Tyson to do as he wishes, but he puts a priority on ensuring defensive capabilities rather than attack. If he can survive an attack, it doesn’t matter if he hits first, wears the person down, or waits for an opening to return the attack.

The same applies when Tyson is planning out missions for the web. He would naturally favour strategic offence, but if given the choice between prioritising how the employees would attack or how to keep them defended, Tyson will favour defence. Taking down an enemy of the web doesn’t matter if they stretch themselves too thin. 

He would argue that it’s a more versatile area of battle and strategy, and has many times in his work with the army and the web.

Army of pets

Across all of his verses, Tyson has an army of pets.

He cares deeply for all of his animals and the animals of his friends as well. Tyson has helped many people train their animals or helped find them a pet in the first place.

• Amanda
  Snowshoe cat owned by Molly Hooper.
• Brian
  Brown donkey in Tyson’s XPirate!Verse.
• Bobby
  Tyson’s pet Dalmatian-mix, puppy of Lily through a magic anon.
• Cait
  English Bulldog owned by Jeremy Thornton.
• Cinnamon
  Tyson’s pet Pyjak in his MassEffect!Verse.
• Draco
  Tyson’s pet miniature, colour-changing dragon from a magic anon; naturally.
• Egg
  Old horse in Tyson’s XPirate!Verse.
• Felix
  Ragdoll cat in Tyson’s Redemption!Verse & Cat!Verse.
• Flynn
  Grey Maine Coon owned by Nate Morrison.
• Guinevere
  Brown horse in Tyson’s XPirate!Verse.
• Jack
  Tyson’s pet doberman that he original trained for the army.
• Joe
  Stray Tortoiseshell at Dick Gannon’s apartment, that is more or less Dick’s.
• Lily
  Tyson’s pet Dalmatian-Dhole that he met in Pakistan whilst escaping the army.
• Lola
  Grey donkey in Tyson’s XPirate!Verse.
• Mandy
  Tyson’s grey tabby in Kitten!Verse & Cat!Verse.
• Meg
  Tyson’s Welsh Boarder Collie in Army!Verse & Veteran AU.
• Odin
  Black horse in Tyson’s XPirate!Verse.
• Percival
  Tyson (and Sebastian)’s Blue and Gold Macaw in UA India.
• Quip
  Billy Ramsey’s three-legged and partially deaf Abyssinian Cat
• Riker
  Professor Alinson’s brown poodle
• Rincewind
  Tyson’s fancy mouse, now passed away
• Simba
  Tae Dōjima’s Leonberger
• Sofie
  Brown horse in Tyson’s XPirate!Verse
• Toby (the Cat)
  Brown tabby cat owned by Molly Hooper.
• Toby (the Dog)
  Beagle owned by John Watson.
• Toffee
  Lex’s caramel carpet python.

Oh, you thought I was joking about the army?

This list doesn’t even include all of the pets that Tyson has gotten for people within threads, the Pokémon that Tyson takes care of in his Pokémon AU, the various unnamed Koi that Professor Arlington keeps, the important service dogs that Tyson trained for the army, the various chickens in his XPirate!Verse, or Lily’s other puppies: given away in threads or taken to the Williams’ farm.

Instruments

Tyson learnt how to play piano from his grandmother, Ellen Delaney.

He asked to learn to stop Jethro butchering the violin, at his older brother’s request. Their father seems satisfied that at least one of them was learning an instrument and Tyson found that he enjoyed piano enough to keep it up after his grandmother passed away, playing on the piano up in the east-wing attic.

After sitting with Dick through some of his happier spells, Tyson has learnt the fundamentals of guitar cords and he is pretty good with a recorder.

He learnt how to play the harmonica from Sebastian. Originally it was Moran making an excuse to ‘teach Ty the proper mouth shapes to play’ and whilst that was often the excuse, Sebastian did actually teach Tyson how to play. Mostly Tyson plays a G harmonica.

He has considered learning other instruments a few times, largely flute and guitar, but they have always been pushed onto the back burner as other learning opportunities took precedent in Tyson’s mind.

Dogs body

Tyson walks a fine line between allowing himself to be a general dog’s body for the employees of the web and allowing those employees to step out of line.

He is overly aware of his reputation as ‘the second-hand pet’, due to his relationship with The Colonel. He might be in a favourable position with the Moriarty Mirrors, but that doesn’t put him in a favourable light to the employees of the web who aren’t so fortunate.

For the most part, Tyson knows how to play that smart: calculated risks. None of them are foolish enough to do any real damage to him, but if they roughly brush past him during a shared mission Tyson will swallow his pride to let them vent that frustration and keep them focused on the job.

He only allows employees to dump paperwork with him when he either knows that they are overworked and it will be overall beneficial to do so, or else Tyson knows that - whilst a valuable employee in other matters - it’s in the web’s best interests if he handles that work instead.

Tyson plays the system under the pretence of being a dog’s body. He knows that he is strong enough to take whatever abuse they wish to throw at him and that the threat of damaging the Moriarty Mirror’s precious Pup will keep them from doing anything that Tyson would need to stop them from doing.

Bird or the cage?

Elizabeth: Mr. DeWitt–here!
A Gentleman: Bird?
A Lady: Or the cage?
A Gentleman: Or perhaps the bird?
A Lady: Nothing beats the cage.
Booker: These two again? How do– …Never mind.
Elizabeth: Look at these, they’re amazing! Which one do you like more? This one…or this? The bird is beautiful, and… the cage is somber, but there’s really something special about it. I just can’t decide.
- Bioshock Infinite

Does it even need to be said?

Our little Icarus would rather rip his own wings off, if it prevented them from getting clipped again or if he thought the cage door was closing.

He will not be caged. Even the illusion to putting him in a cage, literal or metaphorical, will make sure that Tyson never returns.

Tyson would rather fly free, and have the trust from someone else that he will always come back. That so long as the door remains open, Tyson will tumble in through the window instead.

He assumes that it’s part of being a soldier: the romance of being on the road, always having someone waiting back home, et cetera. That’s more of a commitment to him, than being tied down: having to trust that whilst the other is away, they’re happy and that they’ll be coming back home eventually.

Tyson isn’t someone who will move in with you, but he will climb through your fourth-floor apartment window with a cavalier - devil may care - smile and stay for as long as he can, then leave the way he came with a promise to come back soon.

Which is why his arrangement with the Moriarty Mirrors works.

Employment to the web is for life. You cannot leave.

And yet, The Moriarty Mirrors can tell Tyson with complete sincerity that ‘he is free to leave at any time’, because he never will. And they all know it. There is no danger in allowing Tyson to remove his leash. He will always come back. He will not betray them.

Tyson knows that it’s a far bigger trap than an actual cage. That his loyalty will be his undoing. Yet so long as he has the choice to leave, Tyson will always remain as their loyal Pup instead.

Club Penguin

When Tyson isn’t babysitting or talking over the phone with his nephew, Tyson will interact with his nephew on Club Penguin instead.

James has mostly grown out of Club Penguin now, but it’s become a little tradition for them, so James will always be the one to text his uncle and ask him to come online to play with him for a little bit.

Doctors' Orders

Though generally an agreeable person, Tyson is a walking nightmare for any medical professional.

He will go out of his way to defy doctor’s orders, even - and often - to his own detriment. The only medical professional it can reliably be assumed that Tyson will actually listen to is his dentist and, on the bluest of all blue moons, to John Watson.

It’s not even that he doesn’t respect his doctors, Tyson knows that most work very hard and that the web only employs the best, but whenever he is met with orders from a doctor, agreeable Tyson who will jump through a thousand hoops for a stranger suddenly does a complete and utter turn-about.

Need to rest and avoid pulling his stitches? Well, his weekend plans were to stay inside, but sure, he can go parkour across London. Be careful with that leg? Tyson will put all of his weight on that leg without fail. Keep that brace on for a week? The time it takes to get out of the doctor’s eyesight is a week, surely…

Books

Tyson tends to cycle through the books that he keeps in his apartment. When he’s finished with a book, Tyson will either leave it at his pet shop or add it to the library at the Delaney family manor.

Amongst the books that are guaranteed to remain in his personal collection are the series of books that The Colonel published about his adventures under the false name Zachary M. Cohen, and the book on the beauty of everyday mathematics that his father published.

There is usually at least one Discworld book somewhere in Tyson’s apartment and a very dog-eared copy of The Brothers Karamazov. The latest Jack Reacher novel is usually on the coffee table and whichever book Jethro sent along with that month’s care package.

When he has a long journey ahead of him or a stakeout ahead that doesn’t depend on needing to listen out for anything, so much as watching a target, Tyson will listen to audiobooks.

Those audiobooks will usually be some type of novel from whatever video game series he’s been most interested in lately, or else tailored to whatever Tyson thinks will appease his stakeout partner the most.

Chinese Zodiac

Though Tyson doesn’t put any faith in the Chinese Zodiac, he does find that it’s an easy way to conceptualise the passing of time and recognise patterns over a long timescale a little better than simply thinking about each year as a date.

Chinese Zodiacs for those within Tyson’s universe and people that Tyson has notable interactions with within his family tree:

• Anne Williams: 9/7/1953 - Snake (Water)
• Billy Ramsey: 24/1/1965 - Snake (Wood)
• Bùi Kimiko: 25/10/1980 - Monkey (Metal/Gold)
• Charlie Hotchner: 31/8/1982 - Dog (Water)
• Dick Gannon: 2/12/1972 - Rat (Water)
• Dōjima Taeko: 23/5/1969 - Rooster (Earth)
• George Cartwright: 14/9/1962 - Tiger (Water)
• Hal Malone: 15/2/1983 - Pig (Water)
• Isaac Alinson: 27/5/1978 - Horse (Earth)
• James Delaney: 20/3/2006 - Dog (Fire)
• Jasmine Dartmoor: 2/8/1972 - Rat (Water)
• Jeremy Thornton: 24/3/1959 - Pig (Earth)
• Jethro Delaney: 11/7/1977 - Snake (Fire)
• John Delaney: 26/2/1951 - Rabbit (Metal/Gold)
• Lex: 17/1/1970 - Rooster (Earth)
• Nate Morrison: 7/3/1964 - Dragon (Wood)
• Reginald Arlington: 17/8/1945 - Rooster (Wood)
• Richard Delaney: 1/5/1949 - Ox (Earth)
• Rosie Delaney: 30/12/1976 - Dragon (Fire)
• Sebastian Moran: 14/11/1956 - Monkey (Fire)
• Tyson Delaney: 21/10/1981 - Rooster (Metal/Gold)

• Carver Ironwright (Godson): 3/9/2017 - Rooster (Fire)
• Ellen Delaney (Grandmother): 31/3/1913 - Ox (Water)
• Georgian Williams (Auntie): 3/9/1954 - Horse (Wood)
• Jane Gibson (2nd Cousin): 29/5/1971 - Pig (Metal/Gold)
• Lucas Delaney (Grandfather): 23/9/1909: Rooster (Earth)
• Kaidan Small (5th Cousin Once Removed): 17/5/1973 - Ox (Water)
• Rachel Williams (1st Cousin): 3/2/1975 - Rabbit (Wood)

Wishes

Tyson isn’t typically a person to make wishes.

For as long as he can consciously remember, as a child Tyson didn’t make a wish when blowing out the candles. He just paused long enough to make it seem as though he was. It wasn’t that Tyson was already too pessimistic about it working, he simply felt too awkward to do so.

Whenever Tyson has resorted to making wishes, it has been to shooting stars and as an act of desperation. ‘Please, just… let me survive this.’

Aliens

There is a principle in mathematics called the Drake equation, that uses probability to figure out the likelihood of alien life, and - as ever - Tyson puts his faith in mathematics completely.

Whilst Tyson agrees that the construction of the equation is flawed in several ways, it seems more absurd to him to assume that there wouldn’t be other intelligent life in the entire universe.

He believes that there are other answers for being getting abducted and Tyson fundamentally hates anyone who insists that ancient human civilisation and religions were the results of alien influence, but he does believe that earth cannot be an anomaly.