Chapter 7: Chapter 7: Rain falls from the sky and our shelter is poor. But the sun will rise again tomorrow

I am at peace.

 

My friend is at peace.

 

We are at peace.

 

Water drips, dropping noisily to the ground, as it slides along the face of the collection of big rocks, which we hide inside of. A shelter.

 

After much drinking and much walking, we escaped the fires of the drylands. Now that we have left them behind us, the rains have come.

 

- An irony, I suppose.

 

I do not have particularly strong feelings about the rain.

 

My friend pulls in her legs and leans against the rock wall. She huddles together, as she stares out into the world, which is being quenched with soft water.

 

I have realized, after much contemplation, that they are 'legs', not stumps.

 

What a fool I have been. Of course they are legs, the things attached to her body. Birds have legs. Frogs have legs. My friend too, has legs.

 

But does that not mean that she can not be a snake? After all, snakes do not have legs.

 

So what are you, friend? Once again, I do not know.

 

The rain hides the sun from me, which I do not like. But the rain also makes the soil flush and rich with water. It nourishes the world. It nourishes me.

 

My roots, dug into the sediment beneath the overhang, stretch out into the dirt of the birchwood-forest, soaking up a bounty of water.

 

The sky shines alight for just a moment, as if the sun were peaking through the darkness above our heads. A roaring crack comes after it. Thunder.

 

Wow.

 

I watch as the glow dies down in an instant. I listen, as the rolling roar travels across the world for a time much longer than that.

 

What an amazing life.

 

Sunflowers usually never see storms. We don’t have eyes, after all.

 

- A conundrum.

 

I turn my head, leaning down closer towards my not-a-snake-friend to get a better look at her face.

 

How do I see, if I do not have eyes?

 

I do not know. This is a question not meant for sunflowers to answer.

You are reading story Sunflower : [A sunflower based litRPG] at novel35.com

 

She turns her eyes, looking my way, not lifting her face from the nuzzle of her wrapped appendages, which are wound around herself.

 

“Hey…” she says. She turns her head, looking back out into the rain-washed world. “I’m glad you’re here.”

 

- An oddity.

 

I lift myself back up right.

 

I suppose that I am glad as well.

 

I watch the rain. A snail crawls along the damp rocks to my left.

 

Wow.

 

It is beautiful.

 

Something cracks. The snail vanishes beneath a rock and I watch as my desperate friend eats it.

 

What an amazing world.

 

---

 

The rain continues. We are still in our shelter, but there is a problem.

 

She is quiet, pressing herself back against the rocks and I do not move as well. Not out of fear, but because there is no sun-glow to orientate myself towards.

 

I find this most unfortunate.

 

Something scurries atop the rocks, sniffing and crawling around in the darkness. This is our problem. It sounds like a not-bird, just above our heads.

 

I think it can smell your eyes, friend. Just like the birds can smell my seeds.

 

Quietly, she looks my way with an expression that I find most troublesome. It seems to be asking something of me.

 

I understand what it is that she wants, but it would be a waste of energy on my part, honestly.

 

I look back towards the overhang above our heads.

 

Perhaps that is what friendships are, however? An inefficient expenditure of energy now, for the sake of long-term benefits. Perhaps friendship is like using a corpse as fertilizer? You will not eat it now, but because of it, you will eat richly of the fat fruit of a nourished tree in a season to come.

 

- Very well.

 

But only because we are friends.

 

---