also hope nobody here minds me shoving headcanons/open starters/fandom specific promos in queue! feel free to interact with them if you’re interested in any of them and ignore if you’re not!
also i rarely get to talk about him please allow me to talk about him for this post
alrighty, first order of business...
not much to say is notable in his portrayal since there’s only the game to get reference off of.
i guess that being said, by default, interactions with him will go as the following:
- dream/fantasy related characters: in-game
- anything else: pre-game
- “post-game”/other verses will gotta be planned beforehand
- if i ever run into any other russells, i am more than fine with switching to playing informant
as for “post-game” verse, it’d really depend. if he’s dead, then i’d portray him as a ghost/in purgatory. if he’s alive, then i’ll be under the assumption that one of the dreamsend inc employees had a heart and took custody of him away from his aunt to adopt him.
so yeah, there’s that, so if you want anything specific then let me know!
so uh, isn’t russell a serial killer? exactly how much in danger am i interacting with him?
i would say about 25% since i won’t usually rp post-game but i won’t usually try to have his triggers present in a thread. but of course, i won’t be making drastic actions without permission first. (it’s 40-50% without those limitations if anyone is curious since a majority of murders were done on impulse/at the heat of the moment)
ships in mind?
ehhh. not a whole lot because he’s fourteen and his entire circumstances make everything way more complicated.
i do like shipping him with informant, and i would be down for the usual ones that he’s shipped with in the fandom (gardenia, chris) but otherwise i just want to wish him to be happy ^q^
what headcanons do you wanna share with the class right now?
in general, russell is the kind of person to have a blank, dead-eyed expression all the time but then his mind is just playing this on loop.
not just loud screeching but i think he doesn’t like loud noises overall. he’ll probably smack you or go freeze/dissociate if you try to surprise him with a shout. continuous loud yelling is just much more directly related so it’d get a nastier reaction out of him.
where does he even Sleep in the apartment??? does he sleep in the couch or does the poor boy like, make a nest out of the towels in the bathroom and sleep there. AU where russell is a bit more of a well-adjusted individual just because he was able to get proper sleep, i bet he was Cranky 85% of the time and got most of his sleep at Chris’ apartment or Kantera’s place
speaking of kantera, i liked to imagine that russell would sometimes stay over at with kantera’s place when he was still around. (russell’s knowledge of japanese culture is a bit more in-depth than just a passing interest imo) he’d help him out around the shop in exchange for staying over like organizing or taking stock.
because of that, i’d like to think that russell has a tiny bit of knowledge of herbology, though he can’t remember the exact names of plants to save his life. he just recognizes a common plant used for helping with itching and go “oh yea, it does that”.
he doesn’t know japanese though. he probably knows some phrases but that’s about it and he’d probably butcher the pronunciation if he tried saying it himself.
chris and russell definitely went to rumored haunted places for shits and giggles. since russell is the kind of person to go “if it happens, it happens” if he got hit by a car, he’d have zero self-preservation and would be the go-to person to summon/provoke any spirits.
[Russell, in a monotone voice while he’s flossing] Goatman I’m dancing on your bridge, it’s my bridge now -
russell doesn’t really believe in the supernatural. well, it’s not like he’s against the idea of being wrong, he’s just the kind of person to try proving their existence by tempting mysterious forces to smite him like the previous point ^q^
he has the kind of aura where cats and dogs don’t really like him, even though he likes them and wants to pet them. he didn’t always have that kind of air to him, but it be like that
has very little standards in terms of food and will unabashedly eat almost anything because it’s not like his parents are making a whole lot of effort to make sure he doesn’t drop dead
i’d say he actually knows how to fish in real life! - i’d like to think that his grandmother lived in a port town so that’s how he came to learn while growing up. though i also think that his parents live in the city so he probably wouldn’t be able to fish much ;;
i haven’t played in a while, so i think i’ll wrap it up there.
figured it would be nice to make general headcanon posts based on clarifying portrayals since i already made one for violet before this turned into an indie multimuse. so let’s get to it!
alright, so first order of business...
basically i’m gonna portray basil as nonbinary. he goes by he/him pronouns, though he also likes they/them. not a huge fan of she/her. and i’m not super knowledgeable enough about neopronouns to tackle that slkfjlk that being said, i’ll probably interchange pronouns with him while writing so there’s a heads up if you get confused reading replies.
also i will not be spoiler friendly, ESPECIALLY considering how involved basil is in the main story. so do at least finish a route before interacting with him if you don’t want to get spoiled about the general plot.
what’s the situation of AUs atm? lookin’ a little sparse there -
there’s like. a lot of AUs people are cooking up in the fandom atm so i'm fine with accommodating with other people’s takes, it’s just that unless basil's circumstances are pretty different (such as, he takes aubrey’s place as the hooligan gang leader in an AU or something) i’ll probably have a catch-all tag for AUs like everyone’s alive or the truth wasn’t covered up.
also! still in planning stages as i am currently writing this but eventually i’ll have basil have his own headspace for more interesting dream world interactions. (especially since, mari aside, some of the denizens in sunny’s headspace are implied to not be native from his dreams)
it’s probably not gonna be as expansive as sunny’s though, since i pegged sunny to be the most imaginative of the group to begin with and i’m still not sure if he’d have a full-blown alter like in sunny’s case. but we’ll see!!
but yeah otherwise i’m just trying to think of better verse tag names as i am writing this shh shhhh
got any ships?
guilty of being a sunnflower shipper lol but i’m not gonna be actively seeking it since i value chemistry over anything and i’m open to whatever that isn’t horribly illegal. most importantly, i just want this kid to have some friends. or like. have more interactions with the friend group he already had, you know -
that being said though, basil is mentally... a bit of a mess, to put it lightly. he’s a sweet boy but oh Boy is romance the last thing he should be tackling as he is now. so i reckon a combination of a timeskip and slowburn will be required for anything to come to fruition. i don’t mind like, rping crushes/pining at his current age but he’ll probably take a rain check if asked to start anything.
ok before we go, do you got any particular headcanons standing out in your mind at the moment?
uhhhhh some misc headcanons here we go
he’s taking his time getting comfortable with figuring out how he’d like to dress himself. for example, he’s been interested in trying on skirts/dresses but he gets cold feet about it.
has the kind of aura that makes grandparents want to feed him and knit him sweaters. though i guess being raised by your grandmother tends to do that for you.
is he pacifistic and friendly and wants to be helpful because he is a genuinely kind person or is he like that because he’s incredibly lonely and want people to like him? yes
i’d like to think that basil is also pretty handy, he likes to fix/make things. a lot of it is like, building his own trellis, or making his own pots that he learned in pottery class, or doing maintenance on his camera. he also used to like doing scrapbooking, but he hasn’t had any reason to do so in a long while.
i’d say his parents are just. too absorbed with their respective jobs to be actual parents. the most they do is send letters and souvenirs, though they don’t know how to talk to basil and any presents they give aren’t all too personalized. i also kinda feel like they probably aren’t in good terms with basil’s grandmother so oof. very rarely do they show themselves for holidays.
i’d like to think that aubrey first approached basil as kids because they can both relate on not fitting in with others and feeling alone. maybe it was something like they were in the same class together and she noticed that they weren’t able to adjust being in class very well. maybe he was getting bullied and she stood up for him. who knows
if he played video games, he’d probably like RPGs and games like animal crossing/stardew valley in his spare time.
speaking of games, he’s one of the few in the friend group who’s absolutely merciless to play against. poker, monopoly, mario kart, among us - your best chances of surviving is just bringing him down before he takes you down first. though if you’re teamed up with him, he generally prefers being in a more supportive role.
going to college... i’m not sure. they could either go as a business major so that he could become a florist and open his own shop orrrrrr they could get into journalism/photography. feel like the journalism/photography route is a bit more interesting but then i can’t see his love for botany taking a backseat any time soon.
You're drowning. A sea of emotions, responsibilities, people, things, everything. You just can't handle it all, you need to escape, but you can't. Even talking to someone and being told it's okay, compliments, nice things people say, it all adds up to drown you further. Guilt, for feeling this way when everyone's being nice and you're not enough.
Will you sink or swim?
(fun fact, her results actually tied with picture. and. Yeah both sounds about right. :’D)
