Though many things that Tyson found enjoyment in from his time in the army with The Colonel and their escape across the Middle East have been sullied by bad memories, there are ones that only conjure up good memories of those days.
One of those is hot-springs, hot tubs, and saunas; of the conventional forms of stress relief, Tyson does tends to get good results from those that require heat. Since those days, there is an added benefit in helping to soothe the pain from his old wounds.
Something that Tyson has observed when travelling around is that certain people have a ‘radar’ for finding certain places within a city. Dick and Sebastian, and many others with a dependency on alcohol, will immediate narrow in on the location of a bar.
Without failure, Kim would make a beeline for any stall selling sweet, sticky treats in the ever-changing and rearranging marketplace in Turkmenistan. He can always trust Billy to track down the best Italian restaurants and Nate seems to have a magnetic connection to any place that sells brunch.
One of the other places that Tyson could reliably expect The Colonel to home in on as reliably as Tyson’s Synesthesia could were hot-springs and saunas. He has good memories of team bonding exercises, The Colonel dragging the First Bangalore Pioneers out during a week break between deployments to go to an artificial hot-spring he’d managed to track down.
Tyson remembers passing through one of the few larger towns that Sebastian and he dared to brave during their escape, his entire body aching and being surprised when Sebastian decided on impulse to spent their scraps of money on a hotel room/suite. Looking back, he should have guessed that there would be a hot tub on the balcony. The hot food that they absolutely did not pay for was also a nice treat.
Though Tyson wouldn’t choose to cosplay on his own volition, he is willing to do so for his nephew, James. Especially in Redemption!Verse, where Tyson’s anxiety is - practically speaking - non-existent and going to events with his nephew is much easier.
The characters that Tyson would agree to dress up as are characters that Tyson likes and that James likes, and specifically requests his uncle to do. The general theme of them are characters that James sees a little of his uncle in, but there is an occasional exception that James simply thinks would be fun to see.
Tyson is a decent sewer and painter, he’s pretty good with makeup, and money is no object when it comes to getting materials. So, the main barrier for Tyson is needing to find the time to create whatever his nephew asks for. It’s easy to justify the time in his mind as good practice for disguises for the web.
Within Tyson’s main universe and Redemption!Verse, these are the characters that James has asked Tyson to do so far. The pieces of those costumes are stored in Tyson’s storage locker on the other side of London, where he keeps his motorbike.
Garrett Hawke (Mage) - Dragon Age
When James plays Dragon Age 2 as male!Hawke, James always ends up playing him as he imagines his uncle. This began the first time he picked one of the purple/humorous dialogue options and recognised it as exactly what his uncle would say in that situation.
Any time that Tyson has to grow a beard for one of those costumes, Tyson never wants to keep it - to avoid looking even more like his father - but he does prefer the way he looks with facial hair; and the way his nephew’s eyes lit up with glee is worth it every time.
If he could get away with wearing armour every day, Tyson one hundred percent would. He wears particular sets of clothing as armour anyway. The bloodswipe/kaddis on his nose is never perfectly correct, but that’s because James always likes to apply it himself and then to put a matching one on his own face.
Kaidan Alenko - Mass Effect
Kaidan was chosen for a similar reason as Hawke, though not for the humour part. Kaidan’s awkward seriousness, yet open honesty and gentle understanding is exactly what Tyson always shows his nephew.
James didn’t mention that to Tyson, however. He simply told his uncle that he thought biotics were really cool, which is true. Though Tyson suspects that there is more to it than that, he isn’t going to press his nephew too hard over something that makes him happy.
Tyson finds that costume much easier to wear, it’s not as bulky as Hawke’s armour, and it was easier to make too. He’s gotten pretty good at pitching his voice to match Kaidan’s for James’ amusement.
The Outsider - Dishonored
James’ reasons for wanting Tyson to dress up as The Outsider are far less profound.
He simply thinks the Outsider is a really cool character and Dishonored is a series that he only ever plays when visiting his uncle, taking turns after every death or getting spotted to do no-kill stealth runs through the game; or various other self-imposed challenges.
The eye makeup is a little bit of a pain, but The Outsider is one of the easier ones for Tyson to do.
Red Robin/Tim Drake - New 52 DC
Tim Drake is James’ absolutely favourite Robin and DC character overall.
He started reading comic books during the New 52 era of DC, so when James thinks of Tim Drake, he thinks of that version of the costume first. Though James likes Tim’s character more, he wanted to dress up in Damien’s Robin costume and to be a character with a skin tone more like his own.
Tyson is always happy to pull out the two superhero costumes if that’s what James wants, but he really wishes that Bobby would stop standing on the cape and tripping Tyson.
Adam Jensen - Deus Ex
Though James doesn’t know what Tyson does for a living, he’s not stupid.
He knows that Tyson used to be in the army and that he does something dangerous, something that James’ father doesn’t want him to know about and to James, that means it must be even more dangerous than his father’s job as a police officer.
James knows that for two years, from when he was three until he was five, his uncle disappeared and that he won’t talk about what happened. He’s since read news articles about events around Tyson, but James has also read that Tyson was innocent of that shooting.
He assumes that Tyson has a job like Jensen, just real. Something special ops and important where he had to go undercover, or that he used to and is somehow still involved in that life. Like an informant, perhaps. James keeps that assumption to himself.
On Tyson’s end, the hexagon makeup is a little fiddly, but he’s happy enough to throw on Jensen’s coat and glasses for his nephew’s amusement. Though shaving the scars through Jensen’s facial hair involves a lot of swearing when using a straight razor.
Rhys - Tales from the Borderlands
James honestly doesn’t know why he thinks of his uncle when playing Rhys. They just seem… similar somehow.
On Tyson’s end, that hits a little too close to home frankly. To where he is in his life now, or where he used to be in Redemption!Verse.
However, Tyson isn’t going to burden his nephew with that knowledge. The paint for the tattoos and makeup for his info-port are a nightmare to do in the mirror, but Tyson will gladly do it for his nephew’s amusement.
It’s as good an excuse as any to play with Nerf guns and calling out attacks as Borderlands damage types.
Tetsuya Kuroko - Kuroko no Basuke
Dressing up as Kuroko began one Halloween at Rosie’s request. She watches anime with her son and gave the suggestion when it was decided that Tyson would be babysitting James for Halloween.
Tyson is honestly happy for the excuse to have light blue hair again. He likes his normal hair colour the best, but he does have a soft spot for that blue hair as well.
He absolutely hates having to play basketball against Jethro, however.
Dr Strange - Marvel
It was somewhat inevitable that once Tyson handed James a Marvel comic with the good doctor in it that Tyson would end up having to stitch together a cloak of levitation.
The combination of beard and touch of grey in his hair reminds Tyson all too much of his father, but - as you may have gathered by now - Tyson won’t let his own discomfort get in the way of James’ enjoyment.
He isn’t entirely certain that the comparison to Dr Strange is a good thing, but James seems to mean it in a good way. He loves the things Tyson teaches him and the ways he seems to do magic with animals.
The boy likes Clifford the Big Red Dog. There needs be no other reason.
Earth!Verse - Bee - Benjamin The Wasp is James’ favourite Superhero in this verse.
Avatar!Verse - Turtleduck - Cheese Turtleducks are James’ favourite animal within the Avatar universe.
Pokémon AU - Snorlax - Jeremy James got this plush as a tenth birthday present from a friend who’d left to have a Pokémon adventure.
HDM AU - Cat - Luna It was always obvious that his dæmon would settle as a cat.
Within Redemption!Verse, James’ favourite stuffed toys are the same as the main!universe, but Tyson now keeps the crow plush that James gave him - called Shadow - on his person at all times.
Outside of Shadow, there are a few other stuffed toys kept in Tyson’s apartment. In his walk-in cupboard/panic room, there is the teddy bear that used to belong to Tyson’s mother and three stuffed toys kept on the shelves in the living roomfor Tyson’s dogs: a teddy bear for Bobby, a lion for Lily, and a Sackboy plush that they share.
Until was twelve and his father forced him to throw it away, Tyson’s treasured stuffed toy was a Grumpy Bear plush. Jethro won the toy at a school raffle when Tyson was six and gave it to his little brother.
And in many ways, Tyson continues to be a dumbass punk.
In most of his verses, Tyson wore his brother’s leather jacket and used the same pins/patches as his main universe. There are three exceptions that we shall get into below.
In general terms, Tyson largely goes for positive pins/badges/patches. As is true in most of Tyson’s life, he would rather fight for something than against something: even if the end goal would be the same for both messages.
Main Universe
The first thing to note about Tyson’s main universe is that the jacket he wore is the jacket Tyson continues to wear in his main outfit, the leather jacket that used to belong to his older brother Jethro.
This means a) the jacket is not a style that Tyson would otherwise choose to wear, especially with the lack of pockets, b) that despite his decent height and broad shoulders, the jacket always looks slightly too big for him and c) that Tyson would never dare damage the fabric.
It’s a little tricky to see in the picture, but that union flag has a tab to attach it to something; the other side of the flag when looped over Tyson’s right shoulder like a pauldron. This meant that Tyson had something to attach things to without damaging the fabric and that he could quickly remove it, to hide this side of himself from his father at a moment’s notice.
That flag and almost everything that was attached to it was left behind in Tyson’s bedroom at the family manor. However, two patched remain attached to the jacket; the two that Jethro added before he ran away from home: ‘I am my brothers keeper’ & ‘O Pos’.
The blood type patch is stitched on the inside of the hood, by the collar. Easy to access and to point out to a medical team. Jethro attached that one when he decided he would be leaving that jacket for his brother when he ran away from home. The brother patch had been stitched inside the cuff of the left sleeve for almost as long as Jethro had the jacket.
Of all the pins, the one that meant the most to Tyson - the one that felt like most like rebelling against his father - was the ‘Not Perfect’ shield. He took it with him into his army service and now it’s hidden away in the bag of his old army gear, stashed away under his bed as a not-so-secret treasure.
As a teenager in Orphan AU, away from his father’s abuses, Tyson has much more confidence in expressing his own style; rather than the more subdued, secretive choices of the teenage Tyson from his main!universe. Also, he leans more towards being a pastel punk/hipster than his purely punk counterpart.
In this verse, Tyson chose to buy that jacket in particular. Second hand as that was all he could afford. It came with the Wonder Woman patch attached on the bicep of the left arm and Tyson had absolutely no inclination to remove it.
The other patches were stitched on by Tyson, on the right inside of that jacket, easy enough to see when its unzipped, but they are more for Tyson’s satisfaction than to be viewed.
Above the zip-pocket on the left side of his jacket, Tyson always has one of the ‘Please Adopt’ pins attached. Whenever there are people visiting the orphanage, Tyson grabs his spare version of the pin and attaches it to whatever t-shirt he was wearing that day.
Of his nine other pins, Tyson only wears three at a time on the right side of his jacket, rotating through them depending on his mood that day.
Though Tyson’s jacket is technically a very dark brown, within Hogwarts AU Tyson is loyal to the Hufflepuff colours scheme with his choices.
Here Tyson is largely away from his father, but Tyson is still bound by his responsibilities to the family legacy. His style remains less subdued than main!verse Tyson, but there is a stronger themeing and sense of loyalty to it.
He also isn’t afraid of damaging the jacket he snagged from a muggle market, as he can easily repair it with magic. Tyson cut out the inside lining of his jacket, originally an odd paisley, and replaced it with the Hufflepuff Quidditch Banner seen in the top right.
On the back of his jacket, Tyson has gold/silver wings like a Golden Snitch painted on; though magically enchanted to ensure the rain doesn’t wash them off. Though the Hufflepuff tie always remained around his left arm, Tyson daily chances which pin he has attached over the knot of the tie.
Along the line of the wing on his right shoulder, Tyson has handstitched the words ‘Half-blood and proud’ with white cotton. It felt important to him to do that part without magic and, though clearly amateur, Tyson is pretty proud of how neatly he managed to stitch the words.
The Nirvana patch is stitched over his right-hand pocket, with the flap covering the name, and the Robin patch is stitched neatly onto his left pocket. The feminist patch goes above the left pocket, like a name tag, and the Arc Reactor is stitched a little higher up over his right pocket; enchanted to illuminate when pressed, giving out just enough light to let him read in the dark.
The leather diamond patches are stitched across Tyson’s right bicep, whilst the two round fabric patches are stitched onto the left: one above and one below the permanently tied tie. The bee patch is only 1cm big and stitched onto the back of his jacket, when pressed the bee will walk to a new location to settle in.
Within his Honey Badge SU, Tyson has moved the tie over to his right arm to conceal the werewolf patch.
He knows that it is incredibly unlikely that someone would decide that patch made him a werewolf, but Tyson is afraid of being discovered; whilst stubborn enough to want to be proud of who he is and refusing to remove the patch.
Though Pokémon is where Tyson’s jacket becomes most like the more subdued style of his main!verse and where he spent most of his childhood under his father’s thumb, Tyson had more independence due to having his own Pokémon; actually having those friends and companions outside of his brother and Jasmine.
In this verse, his jacket is thicker and more designed for rough treatment to better survive various Pokémon and travelling around with them. With the exception of the leather fish patch on his right bicep and the ‘mistake’ patch stitched inside the jacket, all of Tyson’s patches are on the back of his jacket in this verse. He always has the ‘sad soul’ pin over the ‘not dead yet’ patch.
With the exception of whichever pin or gym badge he has chosen to put as his ‘lapel’ pin on the left of his jacket, Tyson puts all of his pins/badges on the back of his jacket in his verse. This tends to avoid any of his Pokémon accidentally pulling them off when he’s interacting with them.
Tyson will occasionally pull out this jacket when he needs to go undercover with Team Skull, throwing it over their signature tank-top to better cover his scars. When he puts the jacket on these days, Tyson will pin a few of his league gym badges onto the jacket.
Travelling around in the Pokémon universe can dangerous, so Tyson has the First Aid and Nurse patch stitched onto his bag to reassure any trainers that he comes across that he can help patch them or their Pokémon up.
