un: karma (video)

[torpour]

[the view is not of nehan as the username attached to this video would imply, but of two different plants preserved in jars on a countertop. no erune on your screens today.]

I have a request-- more specifically, an offer for fair trade. If you have an abundance of unwanted plants in your house, please bring them to me. Or I can visit your dwelling and remove them myself. Name your price. [a pause, then his gloved hand comes from the top of the camera, pointing at the plants from left to right.] In particular, I'm interested in these. Lacrimosa, which only blooms in dark areas where no sources of light reach, reeds from an island from my world for healing.

[no one asked him what the plants do, but he rambled anyway because he's a nerd.]

But any plant you don't want will do. They'll be useful, in one way or another.

Also, Flynn, Richie: this is the best opportunity I can give you when it comes to learning and making your own medicines.

Comments

[measuringdicks]

Oh, Jesus, okay. [Hm. Logistics are going to be tough. Richie hums, then looks around the greenhouse.] So, not near the lamp, then.

[He turns around the greenhouse in a small circle, as if trying to clock where would be the best choice.]

What if I grew it in a shoebox filled with soil under my bed? Would that work? And what kinda soil would it need? [These are the things Richie has been occupied with since becoming the sole caretaker of Turtle Cove.] Oh, hey, here. [And he just fetches some of his own gardening tools to help with the picking.]

I used to have a roommate who did more of the gardening than I did. That's his turtle up there. [Nodding to the mechanical turtle.] He was fucking obsessed with Taylor Swift. [He says this with a deep, sad fondness.] You'd have liked him.

[torpour]

[nehan has to imagine that the medic who spurred richie on and the long-gone roommate are the same person, just because he's never heard the boy talk about anyone else.]

Like is a strong word when it comes to my interpersonal relationships. It's rare to find someone I do like. [he does like his students in some manner, however. enough to be nicer to them than with other people. or perhaps that should be just richie? he's plenty mean to the others.] But with you vouching for him... well. It's more likely to happen than not.

[he accepts one of the trowels despite already having one in his bag-- a show that he does trust richie. then, with much huffing and puffing as he makes his knees bend, he sticks it into the dirt around a rose he's selected to uproot first. for all his grumbling about roses, he might as well get some.]

[measuringdicks]

Yeah. Eddie was a rare guy. [He sniffs, a little, still affected by the loss of him even now, and even more affected by the fact that Eddie is fading from his memory, the longer he stays away from Derry, the more he grows up. One day he won't even remember Eddie's name, and that terrifies Richie, deep inside.

But he doesn't let it show, just watches Nehan uproot a rose.]

What are you gonna do with roses? [He's curious now, and he can't stand around in silence very long.] I know you can make some kind of tea out of them, but fuck if I know what that does. Do you?

[torpour]

An antioxidant, mostly. Caffeine-free, good for the skin, it's just not my preference because it reeks.

I just prefer making salve. [the erune grumbles as he tugs the rose out of the ground, roots and all.] It's useless without beeswax, and is really more of a balm for dry skin than a proper healing salve but...

[he shrugs, as he sticks the trowel into the dirt again, for the next rose.]

It will do if someone's lips are cracked.

[measuringdicks]

Doesn't smell that bad, I've smelled way worse.

[Yeah, spelunking in the sewers will do that to your sense of smell, Rich.]

Haven't got any bees around, sorry. I could ask, I guess, but I feel like if I did, I'd get directed to a hive with monster bees instead. [He's very chill about this thought.] Trench is fucking lousy with monsters, I wouldn't be surprised if the bees here were monster bees with stingers the size of my arm.

[Yeah, Richie has a very wild imagination, sometimes.]

Ooh, cracked lips. The fuckin' worst. One minute you're fine the next it's like your lips are bleeding and you don't even know how that fucking happened.

[torpour]

You don't want a bee as large as that, trust me. [because he has firsthand experience with that.] Or wasps, really.

I don't have the right weapons to deal with such things, or even the magical power. [then he pulls another rose, and sets it aside to get a plant that isn't actually a rose. he would like some variety on this excursion, though he's not worried about wrapping up the plants yet-- just makes sure their roots are out of the way of each other and lets the plants lay on the ground.] If one of them ever comes by, call someone who can use a sword.

... If a swarm of them come, get a flamethrower. Or an arsonist Coldblood.

[measuringdicks]

...did you get fucked up by a giant monster wasp at some point?

[Because really, Richie wouldn't be surprised if he did. He has friends who got fucked up by various improbable things in Trench and in Derry. A monster wasp is just a curious story now to him, and one he would cheerfully avoid at all costs.]

I am an arsonist Coldblood. Usually. [He puts his hand down, and on cue a tiny little budding tulip springs up from the soil.] Moon's fucking with that right now, though.

[torpour]

Usually. [a soft snort from nehan, his version of laughter.]

Make a Molotov cocktail. Do you know how? [a doctor, teaching a kid how to make a homemade bomb? absolutely. he's never been that moral in the first place.]

I have never used them on the hornets but that's what we had larger-caliber guns for.

[measuringdicks]

Uh. You stick a cloth in a bottle of alcohol and set it on fire, right? Or I'm missing a step.

[Richie is completely fine with learning how to make Molotov cocktails, and indeed is already pulling out his notebook to write this down in.]

Nehan. Look at me. Look at my arms. [He gestures to his arms, which, indeed, are the kind of scrawny you'd expect on a teenaged boy who doesn't have the healthiest diet.] If I shoot a gun as big as my dick, it'll break my arms. Tell me more about how to make a Molotov cocktail so that doesn't happen.

[torpour]

By your logic, throwing a Molotov cocktail would break your arm as well, unless you use a tiny spice shaker. [now he's just being mean. but he gives richie a nudge, to show he's just joking even if the only way nehan can actually be joking is when he's being mean.]

I'll teach you man, many destructive things to defend yourself with, even make your own firework-- as long as you actually build up your muscle.

You're too thin for a teenager. What happened to your appetite?