Topher Lydon

Interesting you should bring up Doyle. Father Ted, an Irish Comedy show, uses the Mrs. Hudson trope and fittingly named her Mrs. Doyle as a reflection.

Will is... suffering. And in a typical, stubborn, Will-way he's breaking the cardinal rule, talk to your partner. Andrew takes a lot of flak in this book, and the next one, for this. It's implied, stated at other points, and understood more fully later, that Will suffers from Mental Health issues. C-PTSD specifically as a result of what was inflicted upon him. This causes, in Will, a disassociative disorder that plays a crucial role in his development, his ability to survive, and his ability to lead as effectively as he does during the coming ... challenges when he rises in politics. Andrew doesn't know, at this point, what he's wrestling with, and Will can't communicate it. This sets the clock on Carter's Duty, which is a hard book to read. I hope the lens helps. Duty was a difficult book to write, the oldest and the one with the most problems narratively, so... be warned. I was VERY young when trying to write such a complex book.

Poor Mrs. Hudson, easily the most underrated of characters.

Matt, based on one of my own best friends... not so dry humping and all... Good person, if a little over stimulated. There was a hockey game on one night and I glanced at him, next thing I know I am upside down and being taken advantage of, not that I was protesting, but it was a bit like being humped by a brother... nothing sexy about it at all. Just a horn dog. He's got teenagers of his own now... and my god the complaints he makes about the masturbation... his house smells like a gay bathhouse on Saturday morning. Like father like sons.

West is our warrior poet, the poem he writes about his Freckled man: Your face is not a blank, plain page, It’s a masterpiece from a bygone age. Each freckle is a tiny spot, A mark of sunshine, like as not. They’re not just dots of brown and gold, A story in your skin is told. A sprinkle here, a cluster there, A galaxy beyond compare. I sometimes think on summer days, In silly, lovesick, goofy ways, That I could play a little game, And give a name to every name. That one is Fred, and this is Steve, A constellation I perceive. I’d trace them with my fingertip, Upon a joyful, starlit trip. So let the world have skies at night, With boring stars of plain white light. My favorite cosmos is right here, Upon the face I hold so dear. So wear your spots, my speckled man, You're part of my eternal plan. You are my own sweet, starry guide, With all your freckles, spread with pride

Got to start somewhere, and Andrew's had three years to plan it.

so random randomness, I needed to give Peter a birthdate... so I picked at random: 15/07/1983 (July 15, 1983). Leading to the discovery that he's a Cancer... Which explains his honey-badger with a toothache demeanor.

There is only one man who can.

Getting to Will is not an easy thing. The most valuable prisoner in America.

The next chapter is Will's.

Morning Remember:

CHAPTER TWO: THE WOLF BELOW Location: North Atlantic. The Grand Banks. The "Tail" of the Bank. Coordinates: 43°N, 50°W. Asset: HMS Acheron (Astute-class Nuclear Attack Submarine). Time: 0200 Zulu. The silence aboard a nuclear submarine is not an absence of sound; it is a heavy, pressurized entity. It is the hum of the reactor circulating coolant through a thousand pipes, the whisper of air scrubbers cleansing carbon dioxide from the thick, metallic-tasting air, the faint electronic si

I was intentionally writing a pairing that was a path to healing, not the end of healing for both of them. Finn and Garrett are passionate, spice and fire... but they are the worst people to each other. That doesn't make either of them bad, just bad for each other and they know it. Emotions that got confused, and muddled, and boiled over as they tried to sort their heads out. Finn isn't looking for a boyfriend, he can't handle one at the moment. He can barely handle dinner with his family who genuinely love him. But Garrett has been the most important thing for Finn right now, a push to get him to change.

I am trying to be as balanced as I can be. Every side causes problems, even Carter causes his fair share or them. This fictionalized election is one hell of a mess, writing it and researching it has been... exhausting. I never want to sit though another lecture on the art of LAWFARE ever again.

My Granny used to say You have two hopes. Bob Hope and No Hope, and one of them is dead.

i mean, there is only one man those two boys TRULY fear. And with damn good reason, he is going to tear strips off them when he gets his hands on them.

Cripplingly so. The cost of Occupation on this scale coming out of Covid, utterly ruinous to the economy. One candidate to blame for starting it, another to blame for bungling it. And one very angry population looking for an adult in the room.

Shorter, blonder, and FAR FAR FAR more terrifying

It's not their Dad they're worried about.

Make way for the Kyle-Daddy :: chuckles and dies laughing ::

Uncle Peter, being Uncle Peter, and showing Ned the truth of things.

"He took me to *his* home," Peter corrected, the distinction vital. "It went from there. He fed me. He gave me a room—*my* room. He didn't adopt me on paper. The world doesn't have a form for what he did. He just… claimed me. I was his. End of story. I tested him, Ned. God, I tested him that first year. I was angry, I was vicious, I stole, I broke things. I screamed that he wasn't my father, trying to make him prove what I already knew—that he would throw me away like everyone else." Peter leaned forward now, closing the space between them, his gaze intent. "He never flinched. Not once. He’d just stand there in his ridiculous tie and glasses, looking like a confused professor, and he’d wait for me to finish. Then he’d say, ‘Are you quite done? Good. Your turn to take out the garbage. Just like that, it was my turn.’" A tear traced a clean path through the dust on Peter’s cheek. He didn't wipe it away. "You think the King of the North is some mythical warlord on a poster? That’s the armor, Ned. The suit he wears so the winter doesn’t kill the people he loves. The man underneath is a dork who forgets to charge his phone and does crossword puzzles when he’s nervous. He is stubborn, and he worries too much, and he loves with a ferocity that is literally terrifying."

Peter's default is Angry, he responds to being afraid with anger, he responds to being flirted with by getting angry... he's just... amusingly... a little explosive mushroom of rage. And we love him for it