Chigira, the Flower

Shino

It happened on my first day off. I came back from a bike ride and entered my apartment as per usual.

I opened the door to my room to wet the flower I had been entrusted with when I saw someone lying on my floor.

It was a woman with green hair so long that it covered her entire body. I had never before seen a monster that had any color on it, but I was not going to risk it. Green hair for sure wasn't human either.

I grabbed a knife from the kitchen and called on the power of Mizaru and Kikazaru at once. My senses were amped to the max, looking for any sign of ill intent.

I was lucky nobody around had seen me, because I came across as extremely dumb. The woman was sound asleep on the floor, breathing slowly.

Still on guard, I grabbed a pillow from nearby and threw it at her. That moment, her hair started moving. It acted like arms and pushed the woman to stand upright, still sound asleep. She only woke up after the pillow had hit her.

In a fit of panic, the woman grabbed on to the pillow, hugging it tight.

"What? What? What?" she shouted with a worried expression. It was only then that I got to take a good look at her body. I understood then that the first thing I needed to do was bring her some clothes.

"No..." I sighed. I then went to the bathroom, got a towel, and filled a basin with water. In the background, she kept asking "what" every now and then.

I put the basin on the floor, pushed it with my left, and threw the towel her way. When she moved to catch the towel, she dropped the pillow, and her hair ruffled, showing some of her skin. That confirmed what I thought I'd seen. Blood stains dirtied her body, even if there was no blood around her.

The girl simply stood there, holding the towel with both hands as her wet glassy eyes stared into my soul.

"What?" she asked again, her confused and worried expression making me think she was not of this world.

"That blood, wash it," I said. I then turned around and left the room, waiting at the door for her to finish while I grabbed some clothes.

*Thump*

I heard some noise, and I rushed into the room to see what she was up to.

To nobody's surprise but mine, I saw the aftermath of this woman's clumsiness. The only explanation I had was that she'd tried to jump into the plastic basin and failed miserably, turning it over and splashing water everywhere.

With no other choice, I sighed and helped her wipe herself. She would have flooded the house if I let her try once more.

"Your name?" I asked her as I was wiping her back.

"I don't know," she replied in a low voice. I noticed her breathing was all over the place.

I shrugged my shoulders. I wasn't going to try and find a name for her. I was already having plenty a hard time fighting against her hair that seemed alive.

Then, an unfamiliar smell hit my nostrils. It was a smell that reminded me of a forest, yet the forests I had been to had no smell.

It smelled like nature. No, it smelled like nature should smell. It smelled alive. It smelled like...

"Chigira."

In the end, I gave her a name by mistake. A thousand trees, but the good kind of trees. That's what she smelled like, and she accepted that name with a nod.

*****

?

Have you ever carved your name in a tree?

If you have, then maybe you wanted something to remember you.

That's good too.

***** 

Ever since that day, I found her waiting for me somewhere. On the first day after she sprouted out of nowhere, she stood planted in my bike's parking spot. The day after that I found her hanging from the balcony. 

With a bit of effort, I taught her to wait for me inside.

"Do you want dinner? Do you want to take a bath? Or maybe..."

"That's enough movies for you then!" I cut her off while hanging my coat.

Contrary to what I expected, she had no trouble speaking. For all intents and purposes, she should have been a functional human being. The problem lay in how she acted. She had no idea how to interact with others or how the world around her functioned.

Then again, "expected" may not fit too well here. For all intents and purposes, I had taken in a flower in a plastic cup, not a woman with green hair and zero social skills.

"No!" she said and rushed at me. My first reaction was to tense up, ready for a fight.

She grabbed my hand with no hesitation and put it on my chest. There, on my shirt, there was a blood stain. Chigira rubbed that stain with my hand for a little while until she noticed that nothing would change.

She thought up a new plan and grabbed the towel from the bathroom. She even went as far as to pour water from the sink on it, but that's where her inspiration came to a halt. Chigira got out of the bathroom and threw the wet towel on me.

Dazed by her actions, I stood there motionless. I looked at her, and she looked at me with expecting eyes. When she noticed I wasn't doing anything, she came to me, grabbed my hand, and started doing the same thing.

I was about to give up on watching her struggle when she finally found the solution. She licked her finger and wiped my shirt with it. The wet stain dampened, but the color started spreading on the white material. Panicked, she started rubbing harder while repeating the same words.

"Sorry, sorry, sorry, so—"

I grabbed her hand to stop her. It was already getting ridiculous. For almost a week now, this woman that came out of a flower had kept running around my house acting like a child.

I asked her multiple times if there was any place I could send her to, but she kept giving me the same answer.

"No! I have to stay with you!"

It was now time to dig deeper, for I could not let things continue like that.

"Chigira, tell me. Do you actually need to stay with me?"

She nodded, her big eyes staring into my soul once again. The corners of her mouth often stubbornly turned upwards into a careless smile. That moment was no exception.

"Why is that?" I asked.

"Because..."

She hesitated for a second, as if she herself was searching for an answer. She had been so convinced of the effect, so how come she was unsure of the cause?

"Because you said you'd keep me safe!"

To say my jaw dropped would be both an understatement and an overstatement. I kept my expression straight. There wasn't much that could surprise me after those past few days, but that was crossing the line.

A flower got that boy's blood on it and is now asking me to protect her...

Well, she did use the words "keep me safe" instead of "protect me," but that was the least weird part of it all.

After repeating the details in my head, I took a deep breath and accepted them as facts. The one thing that shocked me more, however, was the way she referred to herself.

"Ware?" I repeated.

The pronoun "ware" isn't casually used in modern Japanese. It was seldom used even in the movies I let her watch. On top of that, she knew how to speak from the moment she had sprouted. That archaic word had already been part of her.

What's more, there were only two other people I had ever heard use that word to refer to themselves. I would seldom use it within the family. The other person, I heard him use it in TV a couple of times. He was:

"Tyrant..."

The moment I said that word, Chigira's pupils narrowed. That was enough proof for me. Something was off about this girl/flower, and I had to find out more.

I gentlyon pushed her aside, changed my clothes, and called my operator.

"Ah, Shino. Why aren't you wearing your mask?" Operator asked me, but I ignored her weird roleplay.

"Send somebody else for tomorrow's target," I said bluntly.

"Oh? Could it be that you have a lead on Tyrant? I was actually getting worried..."

"I do, and for that I need a day to set some things straight."

"And what might those things be?"

"I have to..."

The words caught in my throat for a second. It was during that second that a curious green-haired girl shoved her face in front of the camera, still wearing my oversized t-shirt.

"I have to shop for some clothes..."

Luckily, Operator's mask hid whatever expression she may have made.