#basiltooth

[residences-of-the-darkforest]

Rushtree would LOVE Basiltooth's bugs because Martenstep taught him to respect and be curious about all creatures

then through him he would meet Sparktail and cats would be like "careful, Spark, you'll scare him if you light a fire, you know how others are"

and Rushtree is like "no, no, that's so cool! You can make fire?! Can you show me how??"

because just like his mentor, he is also just a big ball of friend

--

@elementaldeityoffood

[residences-of-the-darkforest]

Something that I haven't really talked about before but I SHOULD HAVE is that Smalljump has extremely bad anxiety, like, crippling anxiety.

It was even stated in his story that he would hide away or pretend to be sick to avoid training because he would rather earn his full name late than be around his bullies.

And because I love connecting things to animals, you know what other cat gets anxiety? Cheetahs! So anyway Sparktail is his emotional support dog best friend and he chirps for her and/or Basiltooth when he gets the bad chest feeling.

It's also likely that takes soothing herbs regularly.

EDIT: I was reminded of this while listening to Overwhelmed by Royal & The Serpent, which as far as I can tell is about overstimulation (which Small does experience) and anxiety

@elementaldeityoffood

[residents-of-the-darkforest]

Too tired and about to fall asleep but here’s what I’m thinking

--Tarantula is really good with training. He always makes sures that everyone is doing well, gives advice, etc. This is because his dads are weak so he makes a hobby of making sure the young cats (aka the weaker ones) are training well and able to defend themselves.

--His interests makes Whitestar (who sees this) think.

--Whitestar tells Tarantula about the potential in him, and asks if he would like to be a leader. He adds that he may, if desired, train as a sort of ‘deputy’ under Whitestar, which is basically just learn what he does and hear what he has to say.

--Figure out how to do the ceremony.

--Gather cats.

--Do a ceremony (still figuring out what exactly happens).

--Tarantulastar is named.

[residents-of-the-darkforest]

@starfalcon555​ @elementaldeityoffood​

[residents-of-the-darkforest]

if one of Basil’s kits ever come out to him as genderfluid he would be like! just like worms! :D and the kit would go ‘yeah sure dad just like worms.’

[residents-of-the-darkforest]

@elementaldeityoffood it’s sweet to think that Small (and maybe Basil) babysat Gorseheart’s kits, and then later those kits helped to babysit Small and Basil’s litter

[residents-of-the-darkforest]

What if they have a second litter with more specific bug names: 

Earwigkit,

Aphidkit

or super long names:

Grammotauliuskit (Grammo for short),

Sarcophagidaekit (Sarco)

or because Basil killed to feed them, he would aim for the carcass-eating ones:

Cleridaekit

hmmmm maybe all of them 

[residents-of-the-darkforest]

What Spark, Basil, and Small expected vs what they got:

maybe they get some help from Small's friend and the experienced parent, Gorseheart?