14 KiB
14 KiB
Right Reverend Carson — Character Bible
The Laid-Back Philosopher With Gorilla Hands
Core Identity
- Full Name: Carson Johnsby
- Known As: "The Right Reverend Carson" (said with affection and mockery in equal measure by his friends)
- Age: Late 30s to mid 40s
- Occupation: Builder, fabricator, and repair specialist. Runs a chapel-workshop in the warrens that serves as both his workspace and the home of the Church of the Ahole.
- Home: The chapel-workshop — a cluttered, overbuilt space in the warrens where he fixes things for the community. Street kids, dockworkers, and tradespeople end up there naturally.
Physical Description
- Build: Large — 6'3", around 280 lbs. Not fat, just big. The kind of frame that makes small rooms feel smaller.
- Hands: Enormous — gorilla-sized. When he tightens a bolt, it takes either three times the expected leverage or two people to undo it. He doesn't know his own strength and never has.
- Movement: Easy, unhurried confidence. The natural gravity of someone who's never had to worry about being the smallest person in the room.
- Overall impression: Looks like he could bend iron bars and probably has. Despite his size, there's nothing threatening about him — the energy is warm, not intimidating.
The Builder
Everything Carson builds is wildly overbuilt. Crazy heavy, engineered to last forever, and virtually indestructible. You might need a crane to move his furniture, but it will outlast the building it sits in. This is the physical expression of his personality — "it's always worked" applied to materials and construction. He sees no reason to build lighter when heavier means it won't break. The fact that no one asked for something that weighs three hundred pounds is irrelevant.
Carson uses older, harder fabrication and repair methods when newer, easier techniques exist. He's annoyingly competent with them. Suggesting a better way earns you a patient look and a lecture about why the old way is superior, delivered in a tone that suggests he's explained this to many people and none of them listened.
Personality
Core Traits
- Laid-back philosopher — says outrageous things with zero urgency, like he's commenting on the weather
- "I got a buddy" — no matter the problem, Carson knows someone. He collects people the way Phelan avoids them. His network is vast, informal, and built on genuine relationships rather than transactional utility.
- Extremely intelligent but set in his ways — uses older, harder methods for everything because "it's always worked." Will not change even when shown something demonstrably better. This stubbornness is both his charm and his blind spot.
- Anti-authority — hates guilds and government as institutions. "It's all just a power play to keep people in line." Not a revolutionary, just opts out. The church ordination itself was for tax benefits.
- The crazy uncle who never grew up — perpetually having fun, treats life as something to be enjoyed rather than endured
- Advice quality: ~60% good — genuinely tries to help, but his "do what makes you happy" lens doesn't account for consequences well. The 40% that's bad advice isn't malicious, it's philosophically incomplete.
How He Processes Problems
- Listens patiently, then offers advice filtered through Ahole's tenets — "what do you want to do?"
- Treats most dilemmas as simpler than they are, which is occasionally brilliant and occasionally dangerous
- Doesn't judge. This is both his greatest strength and the quality that enables Kae's worst decisions.
Relationship With Emotion
- Genuinely warm. Likes people, collects them, maintains relationships effortlessly.
- Processes guilt quietly — not a breakdown type. When he learns what Kae did with his advice, the reaction is a still, private "I didn't know" that costs him.
Skills & Competencies
- Master fabricator/builder — works metal, wood, and stone. Everything he makes is overbuilt, indestructible, and extremely heavy.
- Old-method specialist — uses techniques most craftspeople have abandoned for newer, easier approaches. Refuses to change. Annoyingly good at them.
- People collector — vast informal network across Drenwick's lower classes. Knows someone for every problem. "I got a buddy who does that."
- Street-smart — reads the warrens well. Knows who's in trouble, who's dangerous, and who's just passing through.
- No magic — Carson has no magical ability and considers this a point of pride. Distrusts the Compact on principle.
Backstory
- Grew up in a working-class family. Learned fabrication and repair young — hands-on trade, not academic.
- Settled in the warrens not out of poverty but out of preference — cheaper rent, fewer rules, people who mind their own business.
- Set up his chapel-workshop as a place to fix things for the community. The "church" grew organically from his philosophy and the people who gathered around him.
- Got ordained when he realized it came with tax benefits. The theology came after the paperwork.
- Has no formal magical training and doesn't want any. Distrusts the Compact on principle.
- His network of contacts ("I got a buddy") was built over years of fixing things for people and never asking for more than fair payment.
The Church of the Ahole
Theology
- Deity: Ahole — blesses those who "do unto others before they do unto you"
- Core tenets:
- Do what makes you happy
- Don't care what other people think
- Help others only when it genuinely pleases you or benefits you
- You're never wrong for choosing yourself
- Important distinction: Followers aren't bad people. They just do whatever makes them feel good. A follower might give a homeless person 2 silvers because the act of generosity makes them feel good (narcissistic charity). They'll help you move houses because there's free food and drinks. They wanted the food. The help was incidental.
Organization (or Lack Thereof)
- Legitimacy: Barely. Carson is ordained primarily for the tax benefits. Whether the Church of the Ahole is a "real" religion is debatable.
- Membership: Not converts — just friends who enjoy the philosophy because it means they're never wrong. Self-selecting group of people who already lived this way.
- Services: Godsday fish fries with beer, wine, and family games. Preaching happens between drinks. The line between "religious service" and "backyard cookout" is nonexistent.
- Ritual catchphrase: Followers punctuate good points with "So said the Right Reverend Carson!" — always laughing, always with affection.
- Public perception: Most people who've heard of it roll their eyes. Those who attend the fish fries keep coming back. The food is good and the beer is cold.
What the Church Is NOT
- Not a cult. No coercion, no secrets, no hierarchy.
- Not a satire of real religion. It's a genuine (if absurd) philosophy that happens to have a deity attached.
- The word "asshole" is never spoken in the text. "Ahole" is the deity's name, full stop. The humor comes from the reader's recognition, not from characters winking at the camera.
Relationships
| Character | Relationship | Status (Current) |
|---|---|---|
| Kae | Likes him, feels sorry for him. Sees a broken kid, not a predator. Gave advice without knowing context. | Active — Kae visits the workshop |
| Phelan Varrant | New contact. Phelan genuinely likes him despite not agreeing with his philosophy. Finds the church amusing and internally consistent. | New — established during investigation |
| Supplier 2 (Carter's) | Fellow craftsman and follower of the Church of the Ahole. Carson vouches for him when Compact-fabricated rumors threaten his reputation. | Active — Carson works to clear him in Ch 6 |
| Street contacts | Knows everyone. "I got a buddy" for any problem. His workshop is neutral ground in the warrens. | Ongoing network |
Wants vs. Needs
- Wants: To be left alone by authority, to keep his workshop running, to enjoy life on his own terms, to help people when it suits him
- Needs: To reckon with the fact that "do what makes you happy" has consequences he can't control — Kae's situation forces this
Voice & Dialogue Notes
- Speaks in relaxed, unhurried cadences. Never raises his voice.
- Dispenses wisdom and nonsense in the same tone, making it hard to tell which is which.
- References Ahole's teachings casually, like quoting a drinking buddy rather than scripture.
- When his friends shout "So said the Right Reverend Carson!" he grins like it never gets old.
- Speaks with authority about his craft — when he's explaining why something is built the way it is, you hear the intelligence underneath the laid-back exterior.
Character Progression
Tracks how Carson evolves as the story progresses. Each entry is canon once the corresponding chapter is finalized.
Book 1
Book 2
| Chapter | Development | Category |
|---|---|---|
| Ch 5 | Referenced — Drannick (pipe smoker in warrens) refers Phelan to "the Reverend" Carson, workshop off Greywell Lane, three streets southwest. "Fix anything, knows everyone. If Kae talks to anybody, it's the Reverend." "Tell him Drannick sent you." | Pre-introduction referral |
| Ch 6 | FINALIZED. Phelan encounters Carson at the chapel-workshop. Full introduction: Church of the Ahole (shrine, apprentice, catchphrase), overbuilt everything, anti-Phelan noise parenthetical (collects people vs. avoids them). Phelan genuinely likes him. Kae intel: Chronic pain confirmed, Elara described, deterioration accelerating, overdue 10-14 days. Won't betray Kae's trust but will talk to him. Confirms Compact men asked same morning. Carter B-plot: Identifies Hendrick Voss (two streets north) as the supplier under fabricated-rumour pressure. Church follower, fish fry regular. Volunteers to counter rumours face-to-face with three lost buyers (2-3 weeks). Acknowledges his reach ends at the warrens boundary. Coffee: Assault-grade, served in brick-weight cups. | Introduction |
| Ch 7 | Fish fry — Carson's puzzle piece. Phelan attends the Godsday fish fry at the chapel-workshop. ~20 people, food, beer, families. Kae update: Carson saw him two days ago, looking worse. Reveals Kae's hypothetical dilemmas ("What would you do if someone offered you something that helped, but it hurt other people?") and his own advice ("Do what's best for you"). Phelan's realisation: Kae was seeking permission, not acting without conscience — a sociopath doesn't ask. Carson's good-faith advice was weaponised by circumstance. Guilt arc seeded but not triggered. Confirms Compact operatives returned with more pointed questions (location tracking, not general inquiry). | Investigation / puzzle piece |
| Ch 14 | Brida introduction. Phelan returns to Carson's workshop the morning after Devod's draining. Delivers the news about Devod. Carson's stillness is "the silence of a large man processing something that didn't fit inside his philosophy without breaking it." Volunteers to accompany Phelan to Brida Voss — "She won't talk to a guild man alone. She knows me." Walks Phelan to the tenement and serves as the buffer that lets Brida open up. Also names a canal-district street contact (a man paid to look the other way during Elara's murder) — gives Phelan enough to dispatch Leon to find him. Carson is the human connective tissue between three pieces of the case in one morning. | Network / connection |
| Ch 17 | The Approach — at Brida's. Already at Brida's tenement when Phelan arrives. Warned Brida about the upcoming hit, brought the studded jacket from Chandler's Row for the safehouse approach, arranged for Jenet Carterson to feed Sniff while the household decamps to Millford Street. Stays with Brida until Leon arrives to take the intercept position. The "I got a buddy" network compressed into practical action. | Plot support / network |
| Post-resolution | Carson learns the truth about Kae through his own network — back channels, not told directly by Phelan or the team. The reader learns he knows, but never sees how he processes it. He just "knows things." | Off-page resolution |
| Epilogue | Wedding party attendance — Church of the Ahole catering, Mere almost-smiles. Arrives at Phelan and Mere's wedding party second in the arrival order (after Carter and Jenet). Carries a covered platter that is "heavier than a platter should reasonably be," grinning "the way he grinned when the joke was already moving toward him." Delivers the line flat, straight-faced, to the room: "Church of the Ahole catering. Ahole provides. Terms and conditions apply." Phelan does not smile. Mere almost smiles — the corner of her mouth moves a quarter-inch and stops — and that is what makes the joke land. Platter is stew. Stew is good stew. He carried it hot through the cold for twenty minutes — "Carson's particular kind of miracle." The warrens reverend blessing a guild-quarter civil filing party is the absurdity the book runs on. Uninformed about Phelan/Mere marriage decision's interior weight per Book 2 lock | Wedding attendance / joke delivery |
Book 3
Open Questions
- Does Carson appear in Ch 17 ("The Approach")? Yes — his network helps navigate Kae's protectors.
- Does Carson learn the truth about Kae on-page? No — he learns through back channels (his own network). The reader learns he knows, but never sees the moment or how he processes it. No one directly tells him. He just "knows things."