Thistle and Weeds {Apple}

[Apple]

Two green eyes stared at Raziel as he tried to explain blood, somewhat confusedly. When he was finished, Apple tapped her chin. "I think I get it. Blood moves much faster than sap." she said with an air of someone who is determined to get it but is still unclear on the whole business.

Apple wiped her face and beamed as she found out she wasn't going to die. She trusted Raziel completely, although she had known him for less than half an hour. If he said she was fine, she was fine. She was glad to have that sorted out - but her foot still hurt.

Good thing Raziel would carry her! How nice of him! Apple knew they were destined to be...Best Friends! She was excited. Of course, if they were to be friends, Apple needed to show him her tree. She was terribly proud of it - it was very large and quite healthy for a tree its age. Apple was nearly squirming in excitement.

She waved her hand at Raziel. "Let me get the backpack!" And with a smile, she picked up the staff -

- and dropped it. She stared at it for some time, dumbly, before shaking her head and sticking it in the backpack. It wouldn't go all the way, so Apple let it poke out the top. It didn't matter. Apple was happy to let go of the polished wood, although she wasn't sure why.

The dark-haired girl then slipped the backpack on, looking extra gangly among the copious supplies Raziel had packed. The dryad clambered onto Raziel's back, with help of a stepping-stone, hooking her arms around his neck. All this time, she put weight on her foot and found it to be perfectly fine, but! A piggy-back ride! How fun! Apple held on tight. "What's a semantics? ...Your hair smells good! Are there flowers in it?"

[Raziel Och]

With a clatter, Raziel heard his staff fall to the forest ground. Desperately, he hoped nothing odd or paranormal was hanging around them. He’d much rather just have Apple think he had a fancy walking stick, than he did her thinking he went around casually with a quarterstaff for the hell of it. That, and it would be hard to explain why it endowed the holder with the ability to see ghosts and the like.

Apple was, as he had expected, light. Raziel would have no problem with carrying her for an extended period of time, so long as travel up hills was kept to a minimum. But that all depended on where the oblivious girl happened to live, which he could only fathom the location of. He wondered, idly, if she had been beyond the forest’s border.

“Semantics?” He said with a sigh, grabbing hold of Apple’s legs. “It’s the study of meaning, is all.” Etymology was more correct, but he held no desire for correcting himself, and opening the door for more questions he hadn’t the energy to answer.

Despite himself, he found himself laughing at her comment. Flowers in his hair? “You probably smell the shampoo in my hair. If I had flowers in my hair instead, I think you’d see them, yes?” The only shampoo left—he needed to pick up some more—was the one his mother used. It was with reluctance that he had dabbled into his mother’s fruity, floral scented one. Well, that and necessity dictated he shouldn’t be picky with what he used.

“All right, Apple. Where am I headed? You’re in charge of leading the way.” Raziel adjusted his hold on Apple and took a couple steps forward so that he was on the path again. It was whisper quiet in the forest, and a few fat drops of rain fell on his glasses. He wanted to wipe them away, but it would only make the matter worse.

[Apple]

Pointing down a fairly well-traveled path, Apple said, "That way! Go down the hill but turn right at the huge rock that looks like a face with four eyes and then go on for as long as it takes to sing "Maybe" by the Inkspots and then turn left at the strange patch of grass with the thing in the middle and then go straight until you get to the leaning barn, and then you go on the wobbly path until you get to the brick fence, and then it's a right and a left and a right and a left and a left and then you'll see the apple tree in the big area in the food place, and that's home!"

The problem with Apple is that she learned to navigate by sight. She couldn't read well, having never been taught and not caring enough to learn, so she picked out landmarks and identifying natural patterns that helped her find her way home. This made it very difficult to follow her complicated directions. Apple was always surprised by the amount of people who needed to write it down. It was perfectly easy to understand to the dryad.

Apple loosened a hand and raised it to the sky, feeling the now frequent raindrops. She could smell the storm, the moisture in the air. It was refreshing, and Apple took a deep breath. She resumed her hold on Raziel, smiling. "I love rainy days. Don't you?" The greyness of the day was everywhere - everything was shadowed and crisp and cool. Apple wiggled her toes happily as a few drops ran down her forehead. It had been so dry lately - her roots were already soaking up the much-needed water. She could feel the tree as they grew near, how much happier it was to have her closer. Not long now, Apple thought. When she got back to her tree, she was going to take care of her foot. It wasn't broke, Raziel said, but Apple wasn't going to risk it. She'd feel better once she was safe in her tree, among the whispers of the leaves and the scritch of the bark as it grew.

[Raziel Och]

Well, if she wasn’t the worst person to ask directions from. Raziel was lost by the time she brought up some band he had never heard of, and prayed to the powers that be that he at least made it in the correct general area of where her home was. He was more or less a ‘lets follow a map and hope we don’t get lost’ kind of guy, never doing well with verbal directions that were based more on landmarks than they were streets, or things like west or north. To say that her directions did not confuse him would be kidding himself.

“Uh, right. I’ll try my best to remember all of that.” But he be damned if he ever admitted that he needed her to repeat them. Like he’d actually say he got them lost. No, never. He would stumble about the forest with Apple strapped to his back for hours before he even considered the notion of admitting it.

With minor trepidation, Raziel set off on the path she pointed out. For the most part, they lapsed into silence until the storm grew in its intensity. He didn’t mind the quiet, no. He wasn’t the type of person who needed constant conversation, he didn’t feel awkward with someone didn’t speak all the time.

It wasn’t long before Apple chirruped again, inquiring about his opinion about precipitation. “Honestly? No. I don’t like rainy days.” He said simply, keeping his eyes out for the ‘strange patch of grass with the thing in the middle’, which was really some dilapidated Chevy truck long forgotten. Raindrops poured down then, coming down in thick sheets that would leave them drenched. Raziel was never one for the rain, hated it. It just left his glasses a streaky mess and made his clothes stick to his skin. He picked up his pace, traveled the ‘wobbly path’ until he saw the brick fence and took a right. It was by pure stroke of luck he recalled Apple’s rapid fire ‘left rights’. He was sure she must have wanted to get out of the downpour just as much as he did.

Raziel came across a clearing where a restaurant and an apple tree sat. He assumed, naturally, that she meant ‘home’ was the restaurant. It wasn’t unheard of for commercial properties to have apartments on top or beneath them. Gently, he let her off of his back, rolling his shoulders once he stood up again.
“Is this the place?” He asked, gesturing to the restaurant with a jerk of his thumb.

[Apple]

Sliding off of his back, Apple beamed at Raziel. "Yes. This is it!" The restaraunt was small and quiet, a courtyard surrounded by a red brick fence. The tree grew in the middle, huge and almost as big as the restaraunt itself. Apple had never known the name of it, but it would have pleased her to know it was called "The Apple Tree Cafe." The shop had closed the outside patio for the day - the wrought iron tables and chairs were sitting empty, and the cafe was lit from within. You could see people moving about, the echo of laughter and talk from inside. It was almost a cozy feeling.

The rain was near pouring by this point, and Apple's hair was plastered down, saturated with cold water along with her clothes. She stared up at the clouds, rain plattering onto her upturned face. She carefully tugged off the backpack, letting it fall to the ground, never taking her eyes off the sky. Her face was getting very wet.

"Can you hear it?" She said, thoughtfully. "It's like music. Da bum da da da bum da bum," she hummed. Rain didn't talk like humans or trees or birds, but it could communicate in a way all its own. Apple couldn't translate, because this specific part of nature never needed to "say" anything to be heard. It just had to be. Rain never tried to be anything else.

After a moment, Apple dropped her arms and looked at Raziel. She studied him for one moment longer, face strangely blank. It quickly folded into a more characteristic smile. "Thank you for bringing me home," she said. That's what humans did, right? Say thank you? That's what they did whenever someone brought them food at the restaraunt. Apple thought for a moment. She felt that the moment needed something else - it was lacking. The rain, the goodbyes: it was like something from a romantic movie. Usually, the woman would give the man a token before he rode off on the horse. Raziel didn't have a horse - or maybe he did! The dryad hadn't seen one, but she rather hoped that he kept it at his house and just decided not to ride it today. It was probably white. Apple began searching her person for something. A token, a token... She came up empty.

Until she remembered the bandage.

Apple unwrapped it from her foot, hopping around on the other as she did so. Finished, she looked at the gauze, and then at Raziel. "Here! A token of my appreciation!" She looked incredibly pleased with herself.

[Raziel Och]

The restaurant was vaguely familiar to him, and he wouldn’t have been surprised if his family and him been to it once, long ago. He regarded her with cursory side-glances as he took in their surroundings. The restaurant had taken it’s dealings inside, understandably, because of the inclement weather. The warmth inside pooled out of the windows in a yellow light, more than inviting when one was caught in the storm. Raziel had half a mind to suggest them going inside to escape the rain, but Apple looked as if she was right in her element. It was cute, really, the way she stared up at the sky so.

“I suppose the rain is rhythmic enough to be thought of in that light.” Raziel mused with a shrug of his shoulders. He never really gave it much thought, the way rain sounded. He hefted his back pack off of the ground and secured it around his shoulders again, adjusting the straps.

“It was no problem. Glad I could’ve been of assistance—and that I didn’t get us horribly lost.” He said with a bit of a smirk.

Revulsion flitted across his face as Apple tried to pawn her dirty bandage off as a ‘token of appreciation’. Was she being serious? Did she really want him to take her soiled gauze? His lip curled up as his mind went through the options. He could say no, and quite possibly upset her. Or, he could be gracious and accept the… small token she so happily presented him. Apple was so thrilled with herself, her big green eyes looking at him expectantly.

Dear god. How could he ever say no? It was like kicking kittens. He made a face and looked away.

“Th—thank you, Apple…” Gingerly, he plucked the used bandage from her slender hand—and had every intention of throwing it out the first chance he got. “You don’t really have to do that…” Voice trailing off, he was at a loss with what to do with the muddy thing.

[Apple]

As Raziel took the banadge, Apple felt a little surge of pride. I'm doing it! I'm fitting in! He hadn't suspected a thing. It was hard, being human, and apple was glad it was paying off. That's what made this so difficult...

She patted Raziel on the arm. "I'm going now! It was fun!" With that, she turned and walked through the break in the low wall and into the courtyard. It was paved with brick, circling out from the tree. Roots had pushed up here and there, cracking the carefully placed tiles. She touched the tree lightly, soothingly. Here, it said simply. [color99cc99]"Here,"

[/color] she said back, running her fingers over the smooth bark. She could feel the relief from the tree, glad to have its dryad back once more. Maybe she was just glad she was home.

The cafe was her home, but she had never been inside. It was an untouchable place, a part of the city that she had access to but had never gone in.

Apple looked back at Raziel, waggled her fingers at him, and disappeared inside her tree. The process was like watching someone in a movie dissolve into nothing - Apple seemed to walk through the tree, fading from view quickly and quietly. The leaves rustled in the breeze, but there was no indication Apple had ever been there. Just footprints leading to the trunk.

Apple curled up in the trunk, enjoying the cozy feeling of being in the tree when it was raining outside. She felt tired - a human tiredness. Walking around in that body wore her out, but it was worth it. [/blockquote][/size]

[Raziel Och]

Raziel smiled faintly at Apple as she patted him on the arm and left. “It was my pleasure. Now you take care.” He still held on to her dirty bandage, had half a mind to toss it when she wasn’t in his vision.

Confusion gripped him as she turned for the tree rather than the restaurant, where he assumed she’d be heading. And then—

She slipped into the tree. The tree.

Apple was not human.

It was as if lightning had struck him between the eyes. Maybe it really did, for thunder boomed somewhere off in the distance. A storm was coming, but he did not move. He was too busy watching the tree, the same tree she seemed to melt right into. He didn’t know what to think, what to do. Heaven’s Gate would have him… dispose of Apple, for that was what the order dictated. They would have him harm her, when she really wasn’t much of a threat to, well, anyone. Hell, he didn’t think she’d even harm a fly if her life depended on it.

He swallowed past the lump in his throat. It occurred to Raziel that Apple really wasn’t lying, that she was saying the truth from the very beginning. Raziel was just too dense to have realized it sooner. Or maybe he didn’t want to. She was so sweet, so utterly harmless he couldn’t even imagine ever hurting her.

The weight of his backpack hanging from his fingers brought him back to the present. With numb fingers, he shoved the bandage into his bag and shouldered it. Raziel would turn a blind eye to her, just as he had the phoenix, as feisty and hot headed as she was.

This wasn’t right. It wasn’t right Heaven’s Gate would have him kill the phoenix or the dryad when they were doing their best to keep to themselves. Maybe it was the fact that they looked like everyday people that stopped him from exacting out what the order would have him do. Maybe it was the simple reason they were not harming people for their own pleasure.

Or perhaps it was Raziel himself, and the growing doubt inside of him.