lucetilogs | LET'S. GET. GARDENIIIING.

Entry tags:

LET'S. GET. GARDENIIIING.

Who: Everyone!
What: Gardening!
When: Sunday 14th August, all day
Where: Outside the Welcome Centre
Summary: Finally, the time has come to get Luceti's memory garden on the road.
Rating: ...I sincerely hope this won't go above a PG rating.

Early on Sunday morning, Link can be found outside the Welcome Centre - gathering seedlings and seed packets, setting aside a willow sapling, laying out gardening tools. When it's still fairly early by the standards of most people, especially for a Sunday morning in summer, the following message will go out over the journals:

"Hi, everyone! D'you remember the garden I talked about earlier? Well, all the beds have been dug and I've got lots of plants, so come over to the Welcome Centre today and plant something for your friends that have gone home!"

If anyone heads on over, they'll find Link sitting back and relaxing, keeping an eye on the piles of gardening implements, small pots of seedlings and packets of seeds and a collection of bulbs, and a large sheet of paper and bundle of pencils. Across the top of the paper, the words, 'Leave a message for friends!' is written, and Link has already written the first message - 'Hi Vivi, I hope you like the gardens! Love Link'.

There will be snack runs over the course of the day. And if he can convince certain people, live music. Remembering friends, being outside on a sunny day (refreshing after yesterday's storm!), nice food, and music - what could be better?

((OOC: Forward-dated to Sunday. Open to everyone, mingle away! If anyone has questions or needs help or wants to know WTF is going on, Link will be on hand for the whole day to keep an eye on things.))

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She gives him a warm smile. "They must be very happy to have you to keep them company when their brother is away."

"He has... f-four brothers, actually. But... b-but two of them have recently left..."

Robert's tone indicates that he's actually a little guilty about this.

"... I do hope that I... h-help. I can never replace his b-brothers, but... but I do try to give him... s-something."

She looks at him in mild concern. He seems sad. No one should be sad on such a beautiful day.

"Don't worry. I'm sure he's very happy that you're there with him to cheer him up."

Oh, Grune... Robert has been sad for awhile, with the way events happened to line up. Though at least he hopefully gets a bit of a break for a bit, and this planting is cathartic.

He looks up at her again, a little curiously.

"... M-May... may I ask your name? I am... Professor R-Robert Alexander Hastings..."

"I'm Grune! I'm very pleased to meet you, Robert."

She speaks with complete sincerity. Her day really is better for having met him.

He wouldn't even know why that is.

"... It is... a p-pleasure to meet you as well, Grune," he says, nervously but smiling a little bit anyway.

"What brings you t-to the garden today? Do... do you have s-someone to plant for...?"

"Oh, no, I'm planting flowers for everyone. Link asked me to help." She pauses, thinking. "But I might plant some flowers for Harry."

She hadn't known him as well as some of her other friends, but she thought he might like some flowers to welcome him back anyway.

For everyone...? The regimented part of Robert's mind thinks that that's sort of the opposite of what the garden is intended for, but... He supposes it doesn't matter that much. People can celebrate the lives of others however they like.

"... It... it s-seems kind of you to... to i-incorporate everybody into your plans," he says thoughtfully. "Even those you... d-do not know..."

She nods. "If I plant a flower for everyone, then no one is left out, and everyone is happy."

Her logic is simple and straightforward, and even if it's a little off-kilter compared to everyone else, her intent is true.

"Equity," Robert agrees, nodding gently to himself. Yes, it did make an odd sort of sense. This person was... well, she seemed very kind, and it was nice.

"I wish I... c-could make others happy, though. But... s-sometimes it is difficult." The memory of Ingrid does not go untouched upon, at that statement.

"Don't worry." She gives him a gentle smile. "I'm sure they're happy you're trying your best."

"But best is not... a-always enough..."

Frowning slightly, Robert's eyes go to his hands. They're almost spotless but he makes a show of wiping away a bit of dirt from one of his fingertips anyway.

"... Not in m-my case, anyway. My friends are... o-often in danger, and... and there is little I can do..."

She watches him clean the dirt from his hands. "It's all right if you do what you can. It'll make your friends happy."

Robert doesn't know how to put it in a way that this person will understand, and at any rate, he doesn't know how safe it is to spill out his secrets to a complete stranger, even one as nice-seeming as this person. After all, he has to remind himself how kind Oroku Saki seemed on the surface.

"... I did s-something recently, at least. I... I do hope it will help."

Moving at least gets Robert out of the immediate danger zone, in the sense that he won't be targeted in his sleep or something. And during the day it's usually too crowded to attempt an attack...

"It is just that... L-Luceti is full of s-strong people. And... and I am not strong at all."

"Well, then you just need to work hard to become stronger, and not ever give up. Then you can protect your friends."

Life is simple from Grune's point of view.

If only Robert could embrace that kind of simplicity once in awhile - though his mentality probably wouldn't allow it.

"I cannot get stronger, in th-that manner," he protests, albeit weakly and with no real fire behind it. It seems more like objection for the sake of it. "I... c-cannot learn magic... my w-world has no paranormal physics.

And..." He looks down at his slender limbs with something inscrutable. "... E-Even if I was inclined to fight - and I am not - I would... hardly present any sort of threat."

... And yet he still attacked that simulation to help Giles. That still leaves a bitter taste in his mouth.

Robert's philosophy is difficult for her to understand. She comes from a world where humans are not at the top of the food chain; virtually everyone knows at least a few fighting techniques. Someone refusing to fight for reasons of pacifism isn't something she can understand. Minimizing the harm you do, yes--that's her own unconscious philosophy--but an outright refusal to fight is a foreign concept to her the way she is now.

She misinterprets what he's trying to tell her. "Oh, that's why you need to practice every day. Then you can get better, little by little."

And of course, Robert's world is the opposite. He may have, in a way, renounced many of those Terran principles, but they still linger in his mind, tendrils reaching into his thoughts and trying to instill the centuries-old shame and fear that is almost as comforting as a security blanket. Fighting is inherently wrong, it wants to say.

Robert rationalized with it before. Principle of least harm - inflicting smaller amounts of harm to prevent larger amounts. He can understand this. It is compatible with ethics.

... It still makes some part of him a little sick, a little self-loathing, but in Luceti he realizes that he needs to be able to at least think about hurting others... because there are people who will hurt his friends without warning.

"It - it is d-difficult. And... and I am not in the b-best shape. I... I just..." He trails off, momentarily. Admitting that a small part of why he hasn't done much yet is shame is not easy.

"It's all right to start small. Everyone has to start somewhere."

Robert is looking more and more upset, and so she reaches out a hand with the intent to cover his.

Hand-touches. They're a poignant, emotional thing for Robert - even now, when he feels safer holding peoples' hands - and he flinches when Grune's fingers sit over his. They remind him of Ingrid's hands, when he first held them - soft and pale, much different from Helios' cool skin or Giles' weathered hands or Don's familiar, pebbly palms. These hands are more like his own.

"... Ah..."

He looks up, surprised and questioning, at Grune. Why are you comforting a stranger?

Grune misreads his reaction to her touch--he mustn't have been expecting it--and she equally misreads his questioning look.

"I could help you find someone to teach you."

Robert does the misreading thing just as often, so Grune's hardly alone in that regard.

"... I, er... k-know some people.

... But... I would not be a-against expanding the... list of potential individuals..."

... Frankly, he wants to do this self-defense thing like he does anything else - get as much information as possible and then attempt to disseminate the most useful data from it.

Grune thinks for a moment. "Maybe Moses could teach you. Oh, and Fenimore and Stella are taking lessons now." Women-only lessons. "You could ask them."

Really, Robert would do better to ask Link; Grune has a tendency to assume that everyone is like her and would drop everything to help. Understanding that other people have lives and responsibilities is something that comes and goes with her.

All the same, Moses is a friendly sort. He'd probably be happy to give Robert at least a few pointers.

"Moses...?" This isn't somebody Robert has heard of before. The name doesn't even ping anything for him.

"I... s-suppose Moses is... a friend of yours', then? Has zie -" - and Robert hesitates here, because this is awkward to ask - "- e-ever taught somebody who... h-has absolutely no knowledge of... fighting techniques at all...?"

As in, almost literally none. Robert's repertoire is limited to pure, blind instinct, and his are already dulled through centuries of suppression.

"Oh, yes, he's a very good friend," she replied immediately, a large smile appearing on her face at the thought of him. "I'm sure he could teach you, even if you're starting at the very beginning. After all, Moses had to start there, too."

The only difference is, Moses comes from a village of beast tamers. Robert...doesn't.

This is going to go well.

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