fandomtownies | The Park; Tuesday Afternoon [02/28].

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The Park; Tuesday Afternoon [02/28].

Somewhere in the park, a tree was sighing.

Rain, snow, cold, Boc had certainly bore the brunt of some interesting weather these past few days, sitting lonely in the park with nary a squirrel or a duck that would give him the time of day, much less find him, apparently! He supposed there were worse fates, at least he wasn't being beaten up or harassed by his fellows in the cave any more, but he did rather wish he was still there or that they'd had at least let him take his things with him before kicking him out. Now, with nothing else to do, he could only sit there and lament his fate, and the loss of his prized possession, his mother's sewing needle, although he supposed it wasn't too great a loss if he didn't even have fingers anymore to even use it with...

So the tree sighed, and lamented, and wished that someone would come by eventually and perhaps he'd have more luck this time than he had with the few people that had gone before him. He was starting to think he was invisible, really, (probably for the best; ugly as he was, it would be no wonder if no one would want to help him, if they could see him!), and was just destined to spend the rest of his life here as a tree.

There were, he supposed, again, worse fates, to be sure....

[[ and open for all your park-related and/or mysterious, unlocatable talking tree dealings! At least until the thread with Nell, which should occur last chronologically, please and thank you! ]]

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After work Nell had gone to find the NotExactlyATree in the park. Trees did not suddenly appear full grown somewhere, not even in Fandom. Unless, of course, something odd was going on. Which in Fandom could be a good thing or a bad thing. This one felt, well, sentient for lack of a better word, not that she'd ever sensed a sentient tree before.

It didn't take long before she was standing in front of it, after all she knew where all the trees were on the island and even if she hadn't, the sighing and sadness would have made it impossible to miss.

"Hello? Is there someone in there?" She didn't feel a separation, didn't think it was someone actually somehow stuck inside the tree trunk, but it seemed a good starting point.

Wallowing in his own despair while also trying to pep himself up with accepting this new plant life he'd managed to somehow stumble his way into, Boc wasn't even sure it was worth it, to call out to the woman in the park to beseech for her help or if it would just be as frustrating as the last time he'd tried, to no avail. But when she started to call out, he felt a no doubt foolish surge of hope inside of him that maybe, just maybe...

Oh, but surely she was just talking to someone else! Surely, she'd just lost track of something else entirely...

Still, it certainly wouldn't hurt to try, now, would it?

"H-hello?" asked Boc, with a bit of uncertainty, a bit of reluctance, but the fact that the woman was right there seemed to instill at least a little more confidence in him. "Y-yes! Hello! Y-you....you, there! I'm right here, cully! Can you see me??"

"M'not Cully, I'm Nell, but yes, I'm talking to you," she said. "And of course I can see you. You're standing there big as life - some sort of tree I've never seen before - and believe me, I know my trees."

She walked around the tree, never taking her eyes off it. "Never knew one to talk before though. Or are you somehow stuck inside the trunk?" They couldn't have been, though. It wasn't big enough and there didn't seem to be a separate being there - just the tree.

And now that someone had found him, and could, in fact, see him, and was actually doing quite a bit of seeing him by circling around him so intently, Boc felt the urge to cringe and cower and cover himself up so she didn't have to be exposed to looking at the likes of him.

But, of course, he couldn't, since he was a tree, and couldn't really move at all, 'cept what the wind was kind enough to nudge or sway back-and-forth.

"I-I am stuck," he confirmed, sounding a little embarrassed about it, because, really, now, who got themselves all stuck like that as a tree? "I can't....I can't move at all, and I've been tryin' to get someone's attention, but no one seems to have been able to find me. Until....until, well, you, I suppose..."

Nell frowned as she considered the situation. "Do trees normally - are they able to move around where you're from?" she asked. "Because they don't here and I'm not sure how I could help you with that."

"Well," Boc reasoned, with a bit of frustration and despair over his situation leaking into his somewhat pleading tone, "I'm not normally a tree, either, is the thing!"

"Oh!" Nell nodded and breathed out a sigh of relief. "That makes so much more sense. Oh course you aren't, but Fandom has got you stuck here."

She considered for a moment then set out her small pink blanket at the base of the tree and sat on it to take off her shoes and socks and push her feet into the ground a bit. It was really too cold for this, but she couldn't just leave without at least trying to help. She closed her eyes and started to sink her consciousness into the ground before stopping with a start

"I'm forgetting my manners," she said. "You know my name, I'm Nell, but what is your name? Might help if I'm trying to figure out how to help you."

"The name's Boc," he offered, and, were he not in his current state, he might have tilted his head and watched Nell as she settled on the ground and dug in her toes like that with a mild, hopefully polite fascination, but, then again, were he not in his current state, she mightn't need to do all that at all.

And, after an awkward moment, he thought, perhaps, to explain a bit further.

"I was pushed out of the cave," he told her. "Told not to come back, not ever. Then, some clod turned me into a tree..."

"Boc," she repeated. "That's a lovely name."

She'd closed her eyes to start communing, but they flew open when she heard what had happened to him. "They pushed you out? Why in the world would anyone do that to another person? And turned you into a tree? That's just not right!"

Edited 2023-02-28 15:21 (UTC)

If a tree could blush, then this tree would certainly be doing just that, although Boc reckoned that Nell was only saying that, about his name, because he was a tree, and she couldn't really see how truly unlovely he was.

"Oh, but they're terrible," he said, "and cruel, in the cave, but I can't say I blame them. Never did take a liking to me, probably just glad to finally be rid of me, once and for all..."

If a tree could shiver, then this tree would certainly de doing just that, thinking back to that god-awful cave on the shore.

"Probably for the best, now, actually," he realized somberly. "Me, being a tree."

This park, cold and wet as it was, was much nicer than that coastal cave, after all, and if being a tree meant unfathomably kind people might think there was something lovely about him, even if just his name, well, then...how could he see that as anything but an improvement on his previous lot?

"It's good you're here at any rate," Nell said. "There'll be no pushing you out of caves here."

She hesitated again, "Do you want to stay a tree? I wouldn't think it would be very comfortable to be a tree if you didn't want to be."

How ironic for someone who would at some point choose to stay a tree herself for many many months.

"I can try to help free you, but if you'd rather I didn't, I could at least promise to come visit you regularly."

The offer to have such a sweet and lovely person come and visit him regularly was doing very little to convince Boc that he wasn't much better off as a tree; in fact, someone had even come and apologized...to him, of all people!...earlier, just for being a tree! Well, for being one that could talk, but all the same...

But if he were to remain a tree, then he couldm't very well be a seamster now, could he? Odd enough, a seamster who was a demi-human! One that was a tree? Unheard of! Impossible, actually, since he could barely even move his branches, much less hold a sewing needle with them! And if he never became a seamster, then he could never rightly, truly, do well by his dear old mum...

"I suppose you could at least try," he decided. "Might not work out, anyway, besides, but it certainly couldn't hurt..."

Ohh, he hoped not, anyway! He'd been battered and bruised and beaten by the others well enough!

"Of course," Nell said and settled herself in, closing her eyes and letting her consciousness settle into the land.

She could feel him then, a NotTree, but being in a shape not his own - similar to a were-creature from her worls, she thought. She reached out to him gently to see if she could connect with him, if he could feel her this way.

He was so sad and lost and hopeless feeling that it broke Nell's heart.

And those feelings of sadness and loss and hopelessness were only about to get stronger, as Boc, somewhat startled, not having known what to expect, felt in Nell's reaching out to him the kind of warmth and compassion he'd only ever felt before from one source: his own dear mum. And with her gone now, and the heavy reminder that he may never feel that kind of caring and love again...

It was a bit of a strange sensation, really, to be reaching out for something when you had no hands, no fingers, with which to reach, but that was precisely what Boc did, and as soon as his energy seemed to have found Nell's...there was a sudden burst of a cloud of smoke, a strange sound like some unearthly creature screaming out some final gasp, and then there was Boc, no longer a tree, hunched over himself with his arms covering his head before he blinked and realized that he could move again.

"Y-you..." He stammered out, blinking as he moved his arms enough to lift his head and stared at Nell with shock and bewilderment. "You did it. You broke the spell!." He ducked his head again, trembling slightly with his disbelief and gratitude, not only that it had worked, but that she had been kind enough to try.

"Thank you," he said quietly, "miss..."

Nell gasped herself as the tree was suddenly not and there was smoke and an unearthly scream and then...

Boc.

She didn't know what she'd been expecting, but Boc was certainly not it. Such a poor startled creature, looking so bewildered. She smiled at him, moving around slowly to face him so as not to startle him more. "Boc! There you are. I'm not sure whatall I did, but I'm glad it worked and you're free!"

Boc blinked a few times over at Nell, before his hands started to paw at himself. At first, it might have seemed like he was merely confirming that he did, in fact, have hands that could paw once again and that there was a body to be pawed, but it was more as if he was searching for something, and the search was, clearly, not going terribly well.

"Oh," he breathed out dismally, shaking his head as he lowered again, "what a shame. When they threw me out of the cave, they took everything I owned, and so this is all I have to express my thanks."

With that, he held out his long hands, and cradled as delicately as one might expect to hold their sole remaining possessions, were ten mushrooms.

"I hope you can forgive me."

Edited 2023-02-28 18:17 (UTC)

Nell very carefully held out her hands to accept the mushrooms. "Why Boc, these are lovely. How did you know that I love plants? And why would I ever need to forgive you anything?"

Was he an odd looking being? Of course he was, but that didn't bother Nell much. She could tell he had a good heart and didn't mean her any harm.

"They took all of your things?" she asked. "I'm so sorry. And you must be hungry. I know plants make their own food, but it can't be very satisfying to a non-tree. If you want to come with me I can at least get you something to eat." And find him somewhere to stay. She could always get him a room at the hotel for the night so he had a place to sleep.

"Oh, no," said Boc, pulling back a little, hands now lifted to the sides of his head as it shook slightly back and forth, "I...I couldn't, what with all you've already done for me, and me without anything with which to properly thank you!

"But," he proposed, dropping his hands and peering over at Nell hopefully, "if you can afford to wait for a while, I could sneak back into the cave, and bring back something of actual value. Then I'd be of some real use to you, I reckon."

"I didn't help you to be thanked with some kind of gitft," Nell said. "I did it because you needed help. And I'm happy to help some more. Plus, who knows what they'd do to you if they caught you again!"

She paused, not wanting him to feel as if his offer wasn't appreciated. "I mean, I can wait here for you if you need to get something, but please don't feel as if you need to do so for my sake."

"Ohhh," Boc shuddered a little, "it's true, it's terrible. My knees start knockin'...just thinking bout that god-awful cave on the shore. But I...I should. Go back, I mean, if only...it's the least I could do, miss. I'll just need a moment. I-I'm frightened of them...so I have to gather myself..."

Of course, there would be an odd mix of relief and distress when he came to realize that there was no such coastal cave here, that he had been quite far flung from the Lands Between, but that was an anxiety to wring his paws over later...

"Nonsense," Nell said kindly. "You don't need to go back there at all. At least come have a warm meal before you decide what to do next."

"But I must, actually," Boc said, with maybe the smallest thread of insistence in his quaking voice, his hands starting to rub together in nervous distress. "You see, one of the things they're stolen,one of the things back in that dreadful cave was...my most prized possession. You see, my mum was a seamstress...and her sewing kit was all I have to remember her by. And I always wanted to be just like sweet old Mum...I can't just leave it there, with those...those ruffians! Oh,I could never live with myself..."

His shoulders sunk, his head lowered for a moment, and he didn't quite whimper, but it sounded as though he was mere moments away from doing just that, before he looked up at Nell again.

"....but a meal would be nice," he admitted. "I probably haven't eaten in days. Er. Well. If it's....if it's not too much trouble, miss."

He didn't think it would be, actually. Nell seemed like quite a different breed than what he was used to.

"I'm so terribly sorry that got left behind," Nell said. "I can only imagine how much you must treasure that."

She smiled at him gently, "It's not too much trouble at all, Boc. I'm happy to get you a hot meal. And if you want I can loan you one of my sewing kits - just until you can get your mother's back."

"I...I would appreciate that, miss," Boc stammered out, bowing his head a few times with his hands pressed together now in a grateful gesture, "both the meal and the sewing kit, if...if you can. It won't be quite the same, not as me mum's, but it's at least something, which is a lot, actually, when all you have..is nothing."

"Of course," Nell said. "I'm more than happy to help. They're little enough things to do for a person. Is there any kind of food you like in particular? I have a nice beef stew on the stove at home. Or we could stop and - have you ever had a pizza?"

Boc's eyes went wide and eager at the mention of something like a hearty stew, his mouth beginning to water and what little lips he had smacking in anticipation, but he blinked a little at the end.

"Piz....za?" he asked, with a question of whether or not he hot that right, then shook his head. "N-no, I don't....I don't think I have. My...my apologies, miss, I don't evdn know what that is, I'm afraid."

Whatever it was was clearly something much too good for the likes of him!

"What if... we could pick up a pizza to have at my store. And if you don't like it I can bring down some of my stew." She nodded, thinking it over. "And then we can figure out where you can stay till you get settled here."

Nell was very kind and more than happy to arrange for a night or two at the hotel for him, but she wasn't letting anyone stay at her house unless she knew them very very well. (And perhaps not even then.)

"I'm sure I'll be grateful for anything yoi'd be kind enough to offer, miss," Boc insisted gently, his head shaking again. "And I don't need much, for getting settled, just a nice patch of dirt or maybe even some grass would suit just fine. Maybe even a cave without other wretched demi-humans, or a nice outcropping of rock. Good shelter, sometimes, in ruins, too, but it looks as thoigh you might not have so many of those, around here..."

"Perhaps a room at the hotel," Nell said. "No need for you to be sleeping out in the open. Not in winter."

She stood, brushing herself off and folding up he small blanket. "Come on. Lets get you on the outside of something warm."

Boc felt compelled to argue that he didn't need a hotel, bit he didn't know what that was, so he couldn't very well make that argument, could he? A room, though, seemed terribly extravagant, but Nell had been so kind that he really shouldn't argue with her about anything.

So he didn't, and, instead, when she started to get up, he scrambled up a bit himself and prepared to dutifully follow her wherever she may lead.

At some point before Nell came to the park, Raiden swung by because after hearing the radio the other day he felt like he should apologize to the talking tree for not realizing it was a talking tree. It was only the polite thing to do.

"Uh, hello?" he said tentatively once he was in, he thought, roughly the same part of the park he'd been in on Saturday. "Mr. Tree?"

Oh! It was the gentleman from a few days earlier! Boc felt a sudden flutter of hope that perhaps his luck with the fellow would turn around, perhaps work out a little better, but then very quickly reminded himself that he'd best not be too hopeful, lest he just make himself more miserable.

"It's Boc, actually!" he offered out. "Not Mr. Tree, although I suppose that's just as accurate, now, isn't it? I'm right over here; can you see me now?"

Well, Raiden definitely saw some trees. He was just unclear on which one was talking to him, was all. "Oh, sorry, Mr. Boc," he corrected himself. "I just wanted to apologize for the other day. I didn't realize you were a tree! I never met a talking tree before, but I shoulda been more open-minded."

"Well, I didn't even realize I was a talking tree until just a little while ago," Boc admitted, with a bewildered tone, because it was an awful lot to process. "I'm not usually one. A tree, I mean. So I can't say I blame you."

"Oh, I'm sorry," Raiden told...a tree. Was it the right tree? Who knew? Not him! "That sounds terrible. Is it a spell? I know some witches...not...not around here, unfortunately...but I know there are some witches around here!" Well. He knew Jane had a friend who was a witch, but Jane's friend also thought summoning demons was for funsies so he wasn't sure about trying her.

A terrible thought occurred to him. "Do trees get hungry?"

"I think it must be a spell," Boc reasoned, somewhat miserably, because sorcery and incantations were often a rather messy business, the kind demi-humans were best off leaving to their queens. "What else could it be? All I know is that I was chased out of the cave, and told to never, ever to come back, and now I'm here, talking to you..."

That last part seemed to require a bit of thought.

"I don't feel hungry," he offered, hoping that was helpful, but Boc was also the type to convince himself he was fine even if he were starving.

"Oh, good," Raiden said. "I mean, good that you're not hungry, not good that...all that other stuff happened. That sounds like it was bad." And now he was a tree, which was probably definitely bad.

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The Park; Tuesday Afternoon [02/28].

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