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Eshaa shifted grumpily from foot to foot as Wystan fumbled with the keys. It had been a long, unproductive day at the dig site clearing foliage from a bunch of ruins. No curses, no booby-traps... in fact, nothing remotely Indiana Jones about the day at all. Admittedly, Eshaa was an anthropologist and not an archaeologist, but she liked adventure and she fancied herself a daredevil on occasion.

With a flourish, the centaur in front of her opened the door. Eshaa followed him in and trudged past him into the kitchen.

"Whaddahyouwantfordinner?" she grumbled. "Immagonnamakepasta. Ifyouwantsomethinelseyougottacookityourself."

Wystan, not about to argue, set about clearing the breakfast dishes while she put some water on to boil. He opened a can of vegetables, poured them into a dish, sprinkled them generously with salt, and shoved them into the microwave on high.

"There's a leaf on your back," he said, reaching out and something green off her shirt.

"What?" asked Eshaa, shooting him a look.

"This thing."

A plump, green leaf was pinched between his fingers. It could have easily gotten stuck back in the jungle. He opened the window and was about to let it out into the wind when Eshaa's empathy flashed. There was something special and alive about the leaf.

"Don't!" she exclaimed, snatching the vegetative visitor away from him.

"Huh?"

"I've got a feeling about it, okay?" she said. He nodded. "Good."

Maybe this day was be so boring and pointless after all.

"Y'know what the weirdest part is?" Eshaa demanded as Wystan searched his pockets for his house key. The centaur shrugged, stomped his front hooves impatiently, and slung his pack around to look in it.

"No," he said, tugging at a lanyard, "What's the weirdest thing?"

"I checked the trees around the ruins," said Eshaa, sighing and taking out her own key. She opened the door and let them both in. "They're all tropical. The leaf... isn't."

"Still on about the leaf?" he asked, dropping his bag on the couch and clomping towards the kitchen. "How's salad sound for dinner?"

"Only what's in the fridge," she answered warily, remembering the leaf sitting on the desk in her bedroom. "I think there's some lettuce and a tomato, and maybe a lemon if you're lucky."

"I think I see an avocado," said Wystan, his head in the fridge.

"That thing's old. It might bite," warned Eshaa, waiting to hear sounds of a struggle. None came. Sighing, she opened the door to her room.

Her empathetic sixth sense was overwhelmed by something feral and deeply feline. She blinked, and her eyes settled on the leaf, perched happily on a rubber plant.

Well. That was interesting. She stepped towards the desk, plucked the leaf up off the plant (it gave her a frustrated burst) and set it back down on the desk. "Stay where I put you, huh?" she asked it, chuckling to herself. It was probably just the AC had blown it towards the plant and it had gotten caught. Yeah, that was it. Humming, she went to go see how Wystan was doing with dinner.

The centaur had produced an edible-looking salad and two cans of root beer. Eshaa served herself and sat down. Wystan kneeled across from her.

"That leaf," she said, swallowing, "Is driving my empathy crazy."

"Maybe you're just crazy?" he suggested teasingly. Eshaa flicked a cherry tomato at him.

"Something's up with that thing," she said, taking a bite of avocado. "I bet you there is."

"Loser cleans the bathroom for a month," said Wystan, grinning demonically.

"You're on," she grinned.

Shouko carried a small orange pot in her arms and clutches a small note in her left hand. There were butterflies in the young teens stomach as she rode the elevator up to the the eleventh floor. It wasn't a hard task delivering the pots but it always made her wonder. What would the child this pot was for be like when they were born?

The elevator door opened and Shouko walked out and headed towards the door ignoring the pink veil her hair was coming as it moved in front of her eyes more and more with each step.

It took only minutes for Shouko to complete her talk and disappear once again into the elevator leaving behind only the flowerpot, soil, some soil and a note.

Quote:

Dear Eshaa,

I'm not sure if you've heard of us yet, but we're an organization called Eden Project. The leaf you have found is a very special one. It will grow into a child if you take care of it. I know it sounds strange, but that's how it goes. To start the growing process you need to plant the little one. That's why I've attached a flowerpot and the soil. Every leaf seems to react different to this so please be gentle. Feel free to visit our headquarters near Barton Town if you have any questions or concerns..

Have a nice day

~ Shouko

A note and a flowerpot came today from somewhere called "The Eden Project". I'd never heard of them before, but apparently the leaf is from there and apparently it's going to turn into a child! This certainly explains why my empathy was wigging out - the leaf has the soul of a roughly human *thing* in it!

I - I'm really not sure what I'm going to do with myself. I can't believe this thing is going to turn into a child at some point! It's on my desk right now, wiggling and being all leaf-like. I should probably pay the project a visit, though, just to see what this is all about before I do something crazy like re-decorate the third bedroom.

I'm really glad that this loft space is so massive!

This looks like it should be an adventure worth writing home about!

Here

With Lisi. Will log on completion.

Looking up from the report she was writing, noticed an odd tinge coming over the leaf. Choosing from her repository of Grandfather's swears carefully, she released a particularly resentful one, followed by the question, "Did I do something wrong?"

She'd done just what the lady from the project had said! Maybe it needed water? Or sunlight? Fresh air? Fertilizer? She opened the window, set the pot in the square of light it made on the desk, and hurried to get a glass of water out of the kitchen.

"Crap crap crap crap!" swore Eshaa when she arrived back and saw that had done nothing to improve the condition. While she highly doubted it would help, she went ahead and dumped the glass of water on the leaf. If it was going to explode, she was at least going to keep the room from going up in flames.

Shouko had said nothing about anything like this, but she *had* in fact heard of exploding plant life before.

"Holy shiii---" exclaimed Eshaa, before catching herself. Young ears. Right. "Nahuel?" she asked cautiously, approaching the rather self-accomplished looking child. He was grinning, a feral look in his eye and a small tooth already poking out over his lip.

And that hair...

As a small child, Eshaa had met a few warriors from her mother's people. They had worn their hair long and wild, like Nahuel's was now, and it was of a similar texture and color, too. Cautiously, she stepped forward and knelt before the little boy.

"Hiya, Nahuel," she whispered. "I guess I'm your mom."

The little boy moved quickly to flip from a sitting position to a crouch and then a crawl. His forehead brushed against her knee and then he looked up at her with eyes alternately black as night and amber as pumpkins.

He made a vaguely feline noise, like a purr, and Eshaa was not totally sure how she would handle this, but she would get by.