#[ ooc : purple definitely hates him now lmao ]

[greenzilla4]

Triple dog dare you to do a backflip off a huge jungle tree and land with a water bucket clutch

Good news: I was just on my way back from Purple's place, and they live in a huge jungle tree

Bad news:

[anyway-i-love-vanderwood]

I don't know if you got this or if Tumblr ated it but do you have any tips or something with writing fanfiction for Vanderwood I've been trying but I can't help feel it's slightly ooc,anyways thanks for your greatness in general!

✿ SORRY THIS TOOK AWHILE, I had a lot I wanted to say but wasn’t certain how to phrase it.

We really don’t know a lot about Vanderwood. We see them in a few circumstances, but there’s a lot of room for extrapolation regarding their personality. We mostly see them interacting with 707, so that’s where I started. How does Vanderwood treat 707, and why do they treat him that way?

1.) They take care of 707, often citing their obligations to the agency as the reason why.

You could take this at face-value and say “Vanderwood doesn’t care about Seven and is just trying to do their work for a very frightening organization as effectively as possible”, but the efforts Vanderwood goes to really don’t match that. They’ve clearly been cleaning his apartment for a long time, and during Seven’s route, they bring him coffee and are concerned about his inability to work. Again, they say it’s because it is in the agency’s best interests that he work and that, if he doesn’t work, everyone will get punished...

But if that’s the case, why doesn’t Vanderwood, in the interests of preserving their own wellbeing, tell Seven’s boss he’s being useless and punish the kid?

Because Vanderwood does care. That’s a pretty easy conclusion to make, but it’s important to establish that Vanderwood cares a lot about Seven and is unable to express their feelings about him. Vanderwood mentions that they haven’t told Seven’s boss about the RFA, meaning they’re willing to put their neck on the line for him, and the secret endings mention how Vanderwood and Seven have both saved each other’s lives. Vanderwood wants to get Seven medical attention when he’s shot, scolds him for making his injury worse, and visits him repeatedly in the hospital. Yet they don’t really have a close relationship, as exemplified by Seven verbally pushing them away, and Vanderwood being unable to overtly express emotion. Now, why is that?

One conclusion can be drawn is that Vanderwood, in general, has trouble talking about emotions. This is supported by how much of a little shit they are. Their sense of humor is more acerbic than Seven’s ‘wacky randomness’ (their infamous “I don’t understand what’s going on, is this some kind of couple’s fight?” line and their fake laughter in Seven’s route) but they deal with things in a pretty similar way to Seven. Instead of having real, emotional moments, they use mockery to conceal their ~*delicate emotional side*~ and they’d much rather push someone away than express real affection.

So, when I write Vanderwood, I write them as having difficulties expressing themselves, and feeling uncomfortable in emotional moments when they have to be “real”. They often say things that just sound terrible, or aren’t really... sensitive things to say, because they’re bad at being nice. Even when they’re trying, they just mess up.

2.) Vanderwood believes their status as a secret agent means they can’t form relationships,

In one of the VN modes, Vanderwood cautions Seven away from having a relationship with the MC, because they’re both secret agents. There’s also an implication that Vanderwood isn’t entirely happy with their choice of career, which also makes me think it’s something they did out of desperation.

(i mean. like. duh. it sounds like an awful place to work who would want to do that.)

This gives further proof that Vanderwood isn’t the sort of person who’s easy to get close to. They like shoving people away, and believes it’s in their best interests not to let anyone in. That probably contributes to the distance between them and Seven, and also why they’re so bad at dealing with emotions. It also means that they probably have some of Seven’s self-hate going on - but they’re also not the kind of person who gets really... sappy.

They’re embarrassed by sappy stuff. They don’t know how to deal with it. Their form of self-depreciation would be way more bitter, more “god I’m a piece of shit lmao” than “wahhhhh my life sucks and i’m awful”

3.) Even though Vanderwood likes Seven and wants to protect him, they put up relatively little fuss when they have to take Seven back to the agency.

This implies that, above all, Vanderwood is loyal to the agency, and will put their own emotions aside for their work. I personally interpret it also as Vanderwood thinking that Seven brought it on himself for being an idiot, and it’s not something that they can change. They just need to sit down, shut up, and do their job.

In my backstory for Vanderwood, they grew up in a filthy household where they had little agency (explaining their need to have things clean and their obedience) and they’re terrified that, if they disobey the agency, they’ll lose any of the “freedoms” that they’ve gained for themselves. You don’t have to go with that, but when writing Vanderwood, it’s good to at least think about why they are the way they are. Why aren’t they good with emotional stuff? Why are they with the agency? Why is their natural reaction to danger to sass everyone around them?

Vanderwood is interesting to me because they obey authority unquestioningly and care quite a bit about doing their job, and yet they’re incredibly sassy and snarky. So that’s a pretty important trait to keep in mind when writing them.

4.) They’re a total loser

Just listen to their scream when the robo-dog attacks them. Just look at them. Purple shirt? Leopard print lining on their jacket? THEY WEAR IT ON THEIR SHOULDERS. Vanderwood is not cool. They are, at the very least, somewhat embarrassing. (And they definitely are given the run-around by Seven.)

And that’s what makes them endearing, I think. They’re an emotionally repressed, snarky idiot who likes cleaning and is continually bullied by Seven but still likes the idiot.

I... hope that helps, at least a little bit! I have trouble writing long-form character essays like this without it coming out like incoherent babbling. Feel free to send another ask if you’d like me to go into more detail about stuff! A good place to start when learning to write a character is think of actions they make in the story, then ask yourself, ‘Why did this character say that/do that/feel that way”? Once you understand a character’s thought process, writing them gets way more natural.