Solomon Todd

From Shadow Unit Wiki

FBI Rank: Supervisory Special Agent

Joined: unknown; possibly Feb 2002 [1]; founding member [2]

Born: 1953-02-13 (Age 55) [3]

LiveJournal: http://ace-cub-reportr.livejournal.com/ (very infrequently updated)

Biography

All we really know for sure about Solomon Todd's past is that he was once in the Army and was once a journalist [4]. Beyond that, his habit of telling shaggy-dog stories has obscured his history. It can be confirmed that he did four semesters at Penn State. He says he then became a hippie on a commune in rural New Hampshire. Again, it can be confirmed that he got caught by the draft lottery and went to Vietnam. When he came home, he returned to Penn and got his degree in journalism in 1975.

As a journalist, he contributed to The Atlantic Monthly and Rolling Stone, among many other publications. He claims that he rode with the Hell's Angels at least once. He will always claim to know anyone with an interesting or shady background, and when tested, this proves true more often than not. He has had women move in with him (or vice versa) several times, but he has never been married. He has written a few books, including Life by Misadventure, (1978), his first, which has a significant cult following. [5]

He has several graduate degrees: a masters' in comparative religion, another in psychology, and a Juris Doctor. He put off taking the bar exam until 1986, when he was in the process of joining the Bureau. [6] He has been investigating the anomaly since before there was a Shadow Unit[7].

Hafidha Gates has uncovered that Sol was at Jonestown, but got out before the mass death [8]. It is unclear whether he was there as a believer or as an undercover investigator. ("Todd was reminded of a seductive cult leader he'd known once, among whose disciples he'd lived, briefly and under cover."[9]).

From his thoughts during the end of Refining Fire, he may or may not have been at Waco or Kent State.

He is a runner [10] and owns and rides both a Harley Softail (on weekends) and a Vespa (to work). He has a hobby of collecting masters degrees.[11] Sol is known to have absolutely weird luck, so that he consistently finds himself at the center of bizarre chains of coincidence[12].

He met his girlfriend, Liz [13], during Act IV of Overkill. She has since married an ex-boyfriend of hers from Ireland; Todd was "surprisingly OK with that" [14] and attended their wedding. [15] On his return to Bethesda, he invited Hafidha, Daphne Worth and Chaz Villette over for pizza, wine, cake and John Belushi films.

He also has an elderly father and a (possibly twin?) sister named Salome. [16].

He lives in Bethesda, Maryland, and has a fish called (but not named) Pleco.

Retirement

FBI agents are legally required to retire at age 57, although there are ways in which that requirement can be waived. Solomon is approaching that age. [17]