438. Fleur, 9

(Rose)

It’s been too long...

Look at me. Without you, I’ve burnt myself again...

I regained consciousness feeling unusually heavy. My body had sunk into the ground and I couldn’t move well right away.

All I could hear was my slow, steady and unusually loud heartbeat. It felt weird, too steady.

My eyes adjusted to the light after a moment of blindness.

I could feel strings attached all over my body and into the ground, as if I was entirely tied up with threads that dug inside everything.

I saw my skin pale as snow, and blood vessels protruding here and there weirdly.

Roots grew out of my ruptured veins all over my body, and dove into the ground like roots.

Buds and spring brambles grew out of my chest. I sighed in relief when I saw that. A few leaves, fresh, were spreading from that floral growth.

As I recovered my strength, my movements ripped the roots away, leaving scar tissue on my skin and spots of dry blood as if I had been prickled. It had already begun drying before I woke up and detached without much efforts. The roots were turning brittle.

I was still corpse pale. My skin also felt really as cold as the earth below me.

I didn’t realise it while I was down there in that dream, but I think my body died that day.

It seemed obvious only now that I was back in reality.

In his last breath, Priest had thrown lightning at me, and succeeded in killing me. My heart stopped, and I died.

And I’m alive again on this new day, thanks to Blume and my wish...

That was the easiest death and resurrection I’ve been through so far. Back in the same body, that will return to normal gradually.

On one hand, it feels like my life is inconsequential, that it doesn’t really matter what I do since I have fair chances to easily resurrect later on, as if I simply was truly immortal.

On the other hand, I know I’m not.

The elements were again in my favour this time, but it doesn’t mean they always will be.

I’ve won this game of dice, again, but I will lose eventually as I keep pushing my luck.

And I don’t want to fall as hard as I did last time. Never again...

So I still feel some worry about my mortality.

R - I need you Blume...

She wasn’t really awoken yet I think, as I heard no reply.

I need her to survive, or at least her help to prevent my next stupid demise.

~

This time was a case of reanimating my body, the same one. Nothing had the chance to take it over, since I already had. It’s handicapped actually. I realised quickly that my heartbeat was unnatural now, and it didn’t change no matter the efforts I did. Something between my heart and a normally functioning human brain is not yet back.

So I almost passed out as I did any efforts, like sitting, standing up or leaning to grab something.

The part of my brain in my autonomous system supposed to tell my heart to adapt its rhythm to the efforts was still down.

Unless the foreign intelligence of Blume had actually taken control of my heart and bloodstream, and is currently maintaining this rhythm, because my brain currently cannot impart it any rhythm at all...

How much of my intelligence and body functions actually have recovered and returned, I begin to wonder.

I can feel weirdly some parts of my intelligence are still off. But overall, I’m myself and alive.

Just, I wouldn’t be, without her support right now I think.

I notice I’ve lost a toe to a burn and my skull also has a small burnt spot. My clothes are alright, but many of my wish stones have exploded on my necklace.

One of them has changed colour. I think I know what happened to it. The others that are now gone must have been consumed by Blume to grow and heal me so far.

I’ll continue healing myself with another I think, because I’m really weak and morbid right now.

In the rubbles, where Priest was brought done, all that remains are dead flakes and stains.

I find something there I wasn’t expecting.

A kind of arborescence, like blood vessels, but made with that fake gold I encountered a while back.

A spot, from which spread a foreign contaminant, unable to replicate itself like a virus, but spreading as far as it could like anything alive.

Was Priest contaminated by that thing?

I will never know, but I’ll remember that possibility. Maybe beings-like-her can become sick from foreign contaminants and other forms of microbes.

It left some bones as well, covered with ashes as well, and turned gelatinous already.

From what I could see, it had even grown bones in its wings.

That beast was a prodigious organism, to be able to live in such efficient marriage with magic as an essential part of its metabolism. Everything seems possible with the right use of T.I. Just look at me. But he, he was something else, more old school and more refined than I ever was. Real flesh, real enzymes. Possibly a real genome as well.

He used T.I. like myself to regenerate, better than I ever did, but not to live like the ghosts do.

I created toxic light, he found a way to summon thunder.

I believe a part of that specific power remain in the wish stone that changed colour on my necklace. It might have caught some of its power. I’ll check that another day.

Funny enough, Priest’s head had no skull. Nothing was left behind, but I think he eventually evolved that way, after everything we’ve been through. We kept destroying his face, so he might have evolved to live without one.

A strong body but without head to be a weak point anymore. Where his intelligence lied in the end, I wonder.

Enough time spent on him.

May he rest in peace, as I move on.

~

I went into the ruins of one of the outer buildings of the NPP compound. One of these office buildings where fruits had grown sheltered.

Reasonably safe there, I used another of my wish stones to speed up my recovery.

These things can even create matter, but they’re more efficiently used in improving and accelerating the metabolism. Or even just to create warmth. That’s basic thermodynamics.

And It behaves similarly to radioactivity, my friend was right about that in more ways than one.

Using it without knowing the science behind it, it works as if it was magic. It’s also like using a computer as a hammer: a little of a wasted potential, but it does the job. The more you actually know, the more efficient you can become.

It reminds me of pictures of the universe and other galaxies. All magic to me...

More powerful than everything I’ve encountered so far. Magic of knowledge, and sight beyond what your eyes could ever reach.

It’s a little sad they’re now lost. They were beautiful things there, blooming magnificently, once upon a time.

A different time than the one I live in.

I’m pressing a towel that I’m keeping very warm with the gently help of a stone, against my clammy skin.

I’m not doing anything glorious and reckless; just keeping myself warm for now, easing some metabolic processes inside my flesh to repair and reactivate what can be.

I’m daydreaming meanwhile, just resting really.

As I lie there, in what soon becomes a small sauna, I notice the buds on my chest moving and growing.

The small pale roses begin to blossom, with soft rustles like sliding silk.

I feel my eyes tearing up now you know.

I’m mostly confused right now. I wouldn’t know where to start with everything that happened since we last saw each other. It feels like an eternity, and literally a different life...

My heart aches at the sight of these little lilies of the valley kind of roses. They trigger something deep.

I can feel my heartbeat rising now, warmer, more profound.

I’m so happy and already nostalgic, of seeing these flowers blooming and thrashing around again on me. I hear that bell sound anew. I had forgotten it. I shiver. She’s there.

What should I say? I missed you...

R - Welcome back you...

~