The Revival Project Mods (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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revivalproject2024-09-10 11:02 am
trpmods) wrote in revivalproject2024-09-10 11:02 am
[Event] [Open Log] Why Did The Tumbleweed Cross The Road? To Meet He Rows
In a way it’s like a scene out of a Western full of cliches. It happens on a quiet day with the streets more or less empty. A wind rolls in from the south, from the path toward the beach. A large bundle of what looks like twigs and sticks curled up not unlike a tumbleweed rolls along in the wind. An orb that moves quietly as it rolls over the roads in Temba, from the outskirts toward the center.
It moves fast, faster than the winds should have allowed for. Someone catching sight, who might want to follow it, would need to jog to keep up. In fact, following it would only cause the orb to seem like it was rolling away faster. Actually, it is. How strange.
The almost tumbleweed rolls with purpose and ease through the twisting roads and paths of Temba, slowing only briefly once it reaches new paved areas. Again, weird, given it should be able to move easier over something so smooth. Then it’s off again, quicker than ever. Rolling and rolling and racing almost until… until the fountain.
Here the twisted, dried out vegetation rolls right up over the edge of the fountain and settles into it. There it rests for a while, still and perhaps sucking up a drink from the water. Only after ten minutes have passed does the bundle of twigs and sticks shiver. Shiver and tremble and quake, like a dead tree caught in a storm. Then it unfolds. Uncurls. Rises up.
The thing still looks like a large, twisting mass of twigs and sticks and branches. But now it unfolds a pair of arms and three supporting legs. A particularly dense clump of twigs lifts up above the shoulders, tilts as it looks around with faintly glowing amber eyes. All told it rises easily to four feet in height, which is impressive as when it had been nothing more than a bundle of twigs it was maybe eight inches tall. Turns out it was very densely packed in there. Now it looks more spindly and delicate, a mass of thin, twisted branches and twigs, with the only real bulk in the more branch-like legs. Legs that still rest in the water, perhaps still drinking.
Amber eyes peer about before the creature gives a series of trembling, shuddering movements. It makes all of the twigs and sticks around what might generously be called a ‘torso’ to rattling and rasping. Rustling and scraping. Groaning and whispering like trees in a breeze. To any who might be observing without Communications it may sound unnerving and mysterious. To those who can understand languages, well, it is clearly a calling.
Little kin, to me come. I return little ones. Come fruit, come frond. Let us speak and together be knowing of the world. So kin calls to kin, and the old stories are shared, the knowledge comes to be known.
The rattling carries an impressive distance. Near to the edges of the city it carries, amplified perhaps by the buildings still standing. And sure enough, over the course of the day, Funfronds will be seen rushing through the city to the Fountain. And a single Barry soldier, to serve as envoy to the arrival.
But that’s for later. For now the strange new Plantkin looks around, looking for something. Until, at last, it sees a He Row. Then the rattling starts again. Quieter.
It sounds like the hallucination of words whispered when wandering alone in the words. A low rattle that, the more that it goes on, the more it will resolve into a certainty of words.
“Summoned I was. By knowing kin and by the little ones. Come for the knowing. So is calling. Kin calls for me, and I seek for those of whom I was told. Come to seek Link. Seek Sonic. Seek Dustin. Seek Tony. Seek the strange animals who speak. Who build like the kin. Who aspire to know. Come and speak, and through sharing, grow together toward the sun.”
It moves fast, faster than the winds should have allowed for. Someone catching sight, who might want to follow it, would need to jog to keep up. In fact, following it would only cause the orb to seem like it was rolling away faster. Actually, it is. How strange.
The almost tumbleweed rolls with purpose and ease through the twisting roads and paths of Temba, slowing only briefly once it reaches new paved areas. Again, weird, given it should be able to move easier over something so smooth. Then it’s off again, quicker than ever. Rolling and rolling and racing almost until… until the fountain.
Here the twisted, dried out vegetation rolls right up over the edge of the fountain and settles into it. There it rests for a while, still and perhaps sucking up a drink from the water. Only after ten minutes have passed does the bundle of twigs and sticks shiver. Shiver and tremble and quake, like a dead tree caught in a storm. Then it unfolds. Uncurls. Rises up.
The thing still looks like a large, twisting mass of twigs and sticks and branches. But now it unfolds a pair of arms and three supporting legs. A particularly dense clump of twigs lifts up above the shoulders, tilts as it looks around with faintly glowing amber eyes. All told it rises easily to four feet in height, which is impressive as when it had been nothing more than a bundle of twigs it was maybe eight inches tall. Turns out it was very densely packed in there. Now it looks more spindly and delicate, a mass of thin, twisted branches and twigs, with the only real bulk in the more branch-like legs. Legs that still rest in the water, perhaps still drinking.
Amber eyes peer about before the creature gives a series of trembling, shuddering movements. It makes all of the twigs and sticks around what might generously be called a ‘torso’ to rattling and rasping. Rustling and scraping. Groaning and whispering like trees in a breeze. To any who might be observing without Communications it may sound unnerving and mysterious. To those who can understand languages, well, it is clearly a calling.
Little kin, to me come. I return little ones. Come fruit, come frond. Let us speak and together be knowing of the world. So kin calls to kin, and the old stories are shared, the knowledge comes to be known.
The rattling carries an impressive distance. Near to the edges of the city it carries, amplified perhaps by the buildings still standing. And sure enough, over the course of the day, Funfronds will be seen rushing through the city to the Fountain. And a single Barry soldier, to serve as envoy to the arrival.
But that’s for later. For now the strange new Plantkin looks around, looking for something. Until, at last, it sees a He Row. Then the rattling starts again. Quieter.
It sounds like the hallucination of words whispered when wandering alone in the words. A low rattle that, the more that it goes on, the more it will resolve into a certainty of words.
“Summoned I was. By knowing kin and by the little ones. Come for the knowing. So is calling. Kin calls for me, and I seek for those of whom I was told. Come to seek Link. Seek Sonic. Seek Dustin. Seek Tony. Seek the strange animals who speak. Who build like the kin. Who aspire to know. Come and speak, and through sharing, grow together toward the sun.”
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"You mean like... writing on yourself?" Like a tattoo?
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"This One and all of those who Journey make notations on special layer of bark, under surface bark. Have word for this, but it not translate to speaking Animal This One thinks."
And once it peels back a little more it starts unwrapping, and something like thin, scroll like paper unrolls with each twist. It's covered in extremely tightly written, thin, dark spots. Something like writing.
"When learn Journey from Seedparent, first step is to transcribe all the prior knowledge of Journeys come before. Knowledge is part of This One."
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"That kind of reminds me of something called a tattoo," Keith said. "People have artwork and words permanently inked into their skin." He didn't have an example to show as he'd never gotten a tattoo himself. He looked at what he was being shown, though.
"But, it seems hard to share this way. Does it hurt to do all that writing on yourself?"
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"Like the little funguskin make drawings on stone to show stories? How interesting. This is thing speaking animals do? This One must make so many notes."
Clearly this was going to be a near area for questions.
"No. Why would it hurt?"
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Oh...
"Ah, yeah... That's because, in order to put ink on our skin, we have to use needles to inject the ink."
He was pretty sure that didn't make sense, but... yeah.
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"Needles? Those are a defensive measure for animals. You do not possess them. Do you make them like the littlekin do to cut?"
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"Like stingers. Intriguing. This is a cultural thing?"
And oh how the light in its eyes brightens at that.
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"So different speaking animal species have different interactions with these tattooing practices?"
It could not fathom that Keith's people could actually have separate cultures within itself.
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Keith was definitely not an expert, but he knew enough, he supposed. He wondered just how much this bush was going to ask...
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So truly it was not prepared for humans having different ones.
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"I mean, that's the best the I can think of to explain it," he said. "There's probably smarter people that have studied all that who can do a better job than me."
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Because it could only learn from what was given to it. And that was not always easy for it to pick up on.
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They have other ways to communicate. But these animals, they have language, and so it is trying!
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And it is positively happy with that. Why, it could shoot a new sprout!
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"Is there anything you needed?" or wanted? or... Keith wasn't sure where to go next at this point. He still hadn't actually taken the little tumbleweed creature to see Tony, but it also didn't seem all that urgent about doing so anymore...
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"I'll show you where you can usually find him," he said, and then turned, starting to move in the direction of Tony's lab.