Companion Planting (Over the Garden Wall / Prototype)
Chapter One: Germination
Alex travelled slowly, unable to move through the woods' thick foliage at anything approaching a decent speed without leaving a trail a blind man could follow. He tried running up a larger tree to get a better look at his surroundings the same way he'd scaled skyscrapers back in Manhattan only once. Needless to say, the forest was down one tree.
Eventually he found a road. Well, road was perhaps too generous a term to describe the narrow dirt trail traversing the woodlands, but it was better than nothing. He sped up to a jog, impressive not in speed but in its tirelessness, and continued on for a time. He did not know how long it had been since he'd awakened to the forest, but the moon was still high whenever he glimpsed it behind its veil of gently waving leaves.
He passed no fellow travelers. There was more life than he'd seen in the deep forest, the occasional squirrel or small bird glanced amongst the trees, but there was still very little. It wasn't until he reached the forest's edge, hulking ancient oaks long replaced by their more sprightly juniors, that he caught his first glimpse of civilization.
It was a tiny little town, barely more than a cluster of red roofed houses, a chapel, and a large barn. In the pale moonlight it was difficult to make out the contents of the farther fields, but the one bordering the path was burgeoning with ripe orange pumpkins.
It was an idyllic sort of place to which the term 'pretty as a postcard' fit so well one could believe it was right out of one, but the longer he looked the more on edge Alex felt. The town simply felt safe, and that was not something he was in the habit of feeling. Certainly not when he also felt that he was being watched.
Whipping around, Alex scanned the tree line. His eyes changed, components shifting until they more closely resembled hollowed pits than simple human organs, his vision shifting with them until it settled into the shades of the thermal spectrum. A sparrow, formerly a dull grey among greys under the dim light of moon, lit up with yellow-red fire against the cool purples of the tree branches around it.
Searching the tree line Alex found a few more birds and small animals, but no hidden watcher. Scanning the pumpkin patch itself proved equally fruitless, although the silhouette of what was perhaps a large scarecrow did catch his attention for a moment.
Returning his eyes to a more human form, Alex took another glance at the town, then started towards it. At the very least someone there might have a phone he could borrow. He didn't get more than a couple steps, however, before he put his foot right through a stray pumpkin.
There is no dignified way to remove the clinging guts of a wayward squash from one's foot, so Alex settled for a strong stomp and a hopping foot shake to remove the offending plant matter.
The distraction, minor as it was, did occupy him enough that he missed a brief twitch of movement among the vines. In an instant he was dangling suspended by his ankle, gripped by something thin but surprisingly strong.
Shifting the flesh and bone of his arms as smoothly as most would flex a muscle, Alex readied his newly grown claws. A massive shape, the former presumed scarecrow, moved into his field of vision.
It was far bigger up close, an orange fabric head with a jack-o'-lantern grin looming a good two stories above him. A mass of green tendrils supported it from below, the same sort as the one wrapped firmly around his ankle. How something that big had snuck up on him he had no idea.
"Well …" a booming voice began, but Alex gave it no chance to finish.
Severing the tendril holding him with a swipe and twisting catlike midair, Alex landed on his feet. With inhuman strength he pounced, striking at the center of the creature before him. The strike landed true, but under his claws neither flesh nor bone parted. Instead green vines and ribbons cut cleanly only to be replaced by dozens of their fellows. In a moment he was once again strung up by his ankles, this time thoroughly cocooned so tight he could hardly breathe.
"As I was saying," the voice continued, "You are trespassing on private property, and that simply needs to be punished."
As it turned out, the punishment for trespassing, destruction of property (one pumpkin, about 30 square feet of farmland, and a fence), disturbing the peace, assault of an elected official (the magistrate of the Pottsfield Chamber of Commerce), and murder (just kidding), was three days of manual labor.
Alex received this sentence bound in the ribbon tendrils of the aforementioned magistrate, shocked into compliance by the sheer surreality of the situation.
Observing was a group of local citizens, all covered head to foot in pumpkins, corn husks, straw, and miscellaneous vegetables in addition to simple hats, scarves, and dresses. Though their faces were hidden by the painted expressions and shadowed carvings of their pumpkin headwear, Alex had the distinct impression they were all staring straight at him.
"Now due to the violent nature of their crimes," the magistrate continued, a slight tilt of his head emphasizing the jagged tear in the fabric under his left eye, "A warden must be appointed to supervise. Does anyone volunteer?"
A man stepped forward from the crowd, tipping his corn cob bedecked hat before speaking.
"I'll watch 'em Enoch, could always use a helping hand with the fields anyway." His painted gaze turned to Alex, and the straight line of his carved mouth looked stern. "You got any experience with fieldwork, troublemaker?"
A memory not his own /-the brush of cornsilk on skin as husks were peeled and discarded by the practiced work of calloused fingers-/ surfaced and on reflex Alex nodded.
"Splendid," his captor said, and Alex felt himself being gently lowered to the ground. Something metallic clicked shut around his ankle, and with its placement the tendrils restraining him withdrew. He looked down. There was a literal ball and chain clamped to his foot, almost comically large lock included.
"Now why don't you give our guest here the grand tour Mister Peters, while we here move on to the next item on the docket. Yes Miss Elizabelle, we will be regarding the library budget later today, but as I was saying, first we must discuss what will be done about …"
The towering creature having clearly dismissed them, Alex was firmly led out of the barn by Peters and into the streets of Pottsfield. The door closed behind them, shutting out the chatter of the town meeting and leaving him alone with his minder in the dim predawn light.
Finally free of the baffled daze in which Enoch had left him, Alex quickly evaluated his current situation. He was restrained by a device he could crush in an instant and guarded by a pumpkin cultist he could easily overpower. He was unsure of the extent of the Enoch creature's senses, but while distracted in the barn Alex figured he could probably make it to the woods uncaught if he ran full tilt. That would inevitably create even greater property damage for the small town, but Alex really couldn't bring himself to care all that much.
He could even take the farmer, consume him mind and body and take the knowledge of where he was and how to get home straight from the man's pumpkin clad skull.
His body rippled at the thought, short red and black tendrils briefly extending hungrily from his body at the prospect of warm flesh in which to burrow, but Alex squelched the urge. He was a monster, but these strange people didn't truly mean him any harm. And even if it got him home to her faster, Dana would surely disapprove.
Unaware of his captive's predatory ponderings, Peters led on.
"Now don't get to thinkin we'll be coddling you outsider, but with how long you'll be working here we'll provide food and water for ya. You can sleep nights in the barn, but only after you've finished all your tasks for the day. First off, though, you'll be fixing up that fence."
He pointed, and Alex saw that they had reached the site of his extended scuffle with Enoch. Huge furrows of dirt were torn through the ground, smashed pumpkins and shredded vines littering the battlefield. The fence bordering the path was in absolute ruin, a casualty of Alex's attempt to simply smash Enoch like the piñata he resembled against its edges. Obviously, that hadn't gone as planned.
Alex still bet he would have won if he'd kept fighting, but once it became clear that the strange creature wasn't actually trying to hurt him, Alex had decided to simply play along. To his best knowledge Blackwatch did not employ any giant pumpkins, so it had seemed a risk worth taking. He could escape any time he wanted, and had a feeling he was a long way from home. The trial had certainly been a surprise.
Still, there was clearly more going on in this little town than met the eye.
Under Peters' unwavering supervision, Alex began the work of mending the fence. He could escape, but now that he thought about it he wasn't sure he wanted to. This was the only town he'd come across in a whole night of searching, and with no knowledge of the area there was no telling when or if he'd find the next one. There had to be a map or a phone somewhere in this odd town, or at least someone willing to tell him how to get to a real city.
Besides, he thought, easily lifting a heavy beam, it was strangely refreshing to simply be in a place so different from Manhattan. Pottsfield was peaceful. It was nice here.
Alex had seen a lot of weird shit in his short life. He'd lived through (and technically started) a real-life zombie apocalypse, stolen a tank to give a ride to his former self's former girlfriend, and once spotted of member of notorious Blackwatch helping an old lady cross the street. She'd been an amoral research geneticist with less regard for human life than the trooper escorting her, but they'd made an odd couple nonetheless.
Pottsfield, however, was new.
For a normal human the task of digging up the broken fence posts and removing the snapped beams of the ruined fence would have been half a day's work at least. Alex was not human, and the splintered wood weighed close to nothing for a being that regularly tossed tanks at helicopters. It took him an hour, and at least half that time was spent pretending to struggle with the well buried posts.
If Peters was impressed he didn't show it. Instead he immediately set Alex back to work, first gathering the intact pumpkins from the ruined plot, then clearing out the unsalvageable ones and miscellaneous debris.
Among that debris were a respectable number of green ribbons, perhaps the most incriminating casualty of the brief skirmish between himself and Enoch. In open defiance of Peters' disapproving gaze, Alex took the time to tease one apart by its split end. Rough, natural fibers separated without much trouble, leaving him with nothing but a mess of green thread and even more questions. It was a perfectly ordinary cloth ribbon, and yet only a few hours ago it had been capable of lifting his considerable mass by its lonesome.
Slowly the sun rose, burning away the soft shades of dawn with the harsh glare of midmorning. It was uncomfortably hot, but Alex didn't mind much. Peters, ever unceasing in his vigil, didn't seem to either.
When he heard the low rumble of an approaching cart Alex looked up, only to stare in bewilderment as yet another improbable oddity approached. Two turkeys, each as tall as a man, strained in harness against the weight of their burden. In the driver's seat a large black cat urged them on with the occasional flick of the reins. Piled in the back were wooden posts, beams, and a few metal tools; everything needed to rebuild the broken stretch of fence.
As the cart rolled to a halt Peters tipped his hat in greeting to the driver, receiving a curt meow in return.
"Thank you much Enoch," he said, "I was starting to think that committee was holding you hostage back there." The cat purred, and Peters turned back to Alex.
"Now shift those out of the cart and put the good pumpkins in. No good in letting 'em sit and spoil."
Alex obeyed, and while the draft turkeys shifted uneasily in their traces as he drew near the cat ignored him entirely. Once Peters finished talking its posture had changed, shifting from the upright pose it had driven the turkeys in to a more natural sprawl on the seat of the cart.
"So," Alex began, fishing for more information, "Enoch's the maypole with the pumpkin head, right?"
Peters, who stood motionless as Alex unloaded the cart, simply replied, "Yeah, that's him."
"And the cat is also Enoch?"
Peters rotated his head to look at the cat in question. It was at that moment thoroughly licking itself.
"Sometimes, but not right now. He's probably back at the meeting, busy time of year with the harvest coming up and all."
Alex pondered this for a minute as he worked, trying to piece together some sort of explanation that fit. Changing forms for the sake of convenience was, after all, something he was intimately familiar with. How Enoch could accomplish the same was another story.
On a hunch, Alex reached out with his most tenuous of senses. The Infected hivemind had mostly collapsed since he'd consumed Elizabeth Greene, but his connection to the remnants of Redlight's collective madness still had its uses.
Even through red-tinted vision, however, the cat came up clean. It occurred to Alex that he hadn't felt so much as a hint of Infection since he'd found himself in the forest.
"Has he lived here long?" Alex asked, turning to check Peters. The farmer appeared clean as well, so he let his vision slip back to the world of light and color. As blue returned to the sky he was struck by the strangest impression that he felt colder than the moment before.
Peters snorted. "Long? There wouldn't be a Pottsfield without him. I can't say I know of anyone been around longer."
"And what about you?"
At this Peters looked down for a moment, mulling over the question.
"I can't say I know exactly," said Peters finally, "But it's been a good while, at least a dozen years. Pottsfield's a nice place." He looked back up, painted gaze fixed unerringly upon Alex's own. "Gonna stick around once your sentence is served? You do pretty good work for an interloper, son, though I never did catch your name."
Unloading the last of the fence materials and starting on loading the pumpkins, Alex considered. Should he say he was Dr. Alexander J. Mercer, Ph.D. in genetics? DX-1118 C? Blacklight? Zeus? Germ? Killer, monster, terrorist? Any of the hundreds of names floating in his head, whispers bleeding into his own thoughts till he couldn't tell the difference and screaming as he died at his own hands over and over and …
Probably best to keep it simple.
"Alex," he said, "And I'm just passing through."
"Alex," Peters repeated, "Well, if I'm to call you that then you better call me John."
The farmer offered his straw covered hand and Alex shook it carefully. The straw covered it so completely there wasn't any skin contact at all, though it did feel awful boney.
"It's nice to meet you proper, Alex," John Peters said, and though he didn't reply Alex couldn't help but feel the sentiment as well.
Alex finished loading the cart, and a few minutes later Enoch returned to the cat. With a jaunty wave goodbye he drove back towards town, while Alex and John started on rebuilding the fence. They didn't talk, but somehow Alex felt the silence was friendlier than before.
Pottsfield was definitely the strangest place he'd ever been.
The rest of the day passed quickly. With the fence finished Peters handed Alex off to a new minder, a pattern that continued as the day wore on. He fixed leaky roofs, harvested corn, glared draft turkeys into submission, and even acted as a temporary scarecrow keeping the red eyed crows with a talent for reproducing sounds of human suffering from the crops for an eventful four hours. It was tedious work for a being more accustomed to racing atop city skylines than staring threateningly at birds, but the strange peace he felt in Pottsfield made it just bearable.
His final task of the day was repainting the shutters of one Miss Lulilly. Unlike her fellow townsfolk, most of whom preferred to simply stare in silence as he worked, Miss Lulilly made a point to greet him as 'Mister Alex' and made rapid conversation about what must have been every snatch of small town gossip from the course of the last year.
Most of it went right over Alex's head, but by drawing upon his meager set of social skills he managed to nod and mutter at what seemed appropriate intervals. He did take note, however, that no piece of technology more advanced than an oil lamp came up at all. It was certainly odd, but even a vegetable clad cult of Luddites wouldn't explain the existence of the creature that led them. Alex still wasn't sure what exactly was going on here, but he was pretty sure who he'd be going to for answers.
By the time he finished the shutters it was nearly dusk, and Miss Lulilly gladly took the responsibility of leading him to the town barn where he'd spend the night.
"Now don't you worry, dear, the barn should be nice and warm with the weather we're having. Enoch spends most nights there, so it should be plenty safe too." Alex glanced up at the name, and Miss Lulilly patted his shoulder reassuringly before continuing, "Oh don't you mind Enoch either, he's just worried for us is all. Terrible business with the last stranger to come around, caused the worst sort of ruckus. Even stole an old keepsake of Enoch's when he ran off, some trinket to remember a friend by. Terrible, terrible business."
They walked in silence the rest of the way to the barn. Upon reaching its heavy doors Miss Lulilly knocked daintily twice, then waited. The doors creaked about halfway open and she motioned for him to enter. He took a last glance at the red curve of her painted smile and the small wave she gave him, then the doors were shut tight.
With the doors closed it was terribly dark, the only light a faint flickering amongst the upper rafters of the barn. To compensate his eyes changed, rods replacing cones and a catlike reflective membrane growing to make the most of the dim light. Pale blue eyes glowing faintly, Alex confirmed the location of his quarry. Now that he could see them, the ribbons hanging from above were a dead giveaway.
For half a second he tensed, red black tendrils licking up his legs and muscles shifting, then launched upwards just high enough to land with deliberate care upon the beam above. It creaked dangerously in protest, but held. By all accounts of physics a being of his mass landing should have cracked it in two, but he didn't especially want to be held responsible for even more property damage, so it didn't.
No sooner than he'd assured that footing was it immediately upset. A single green ribbon wrapped along the beam reared up, and Alex nearly jumped away on reflex. Moving slow, clearly not seeking to startle him again, it gently tapped his foot. It tapped again, still gentle but with more force than it should have been capable, then withdrew completely.
With the distinct impression he was being beckoned, Alex followed.
The beam and several of its fellows ended in a large hayloft faintly lit by a hanging oil lantern, and upon its boards rested the head of Enoch. The bright orange fabric was unmarred now, no doubt repaired by his faithful citizens, but Alex doubted the tear had been forgotten. Or forgiven.
The green ribbons were everywhere, stretched along rafters, curling complex spirals through the air, and even simply hanging down till the longest brushed the wooden floor below. Enoch filled the barn like a king lounged upon his throne, and all around him the faint scent of burnt sugar and that damn sense of peace that saturated the town clung like a miasma.
Enoch shifted at Alex's approach, massive head turning to look at him. Alex shifted as well, adjusting his eyes again for better vision in the light. On a whim he kept the reflective membrane. Maybe it was a bit vain, but he liked the way people startled at the glow from beneath the darkness of his hood. Maybe this Enoch would be similarly unsettled.
"Well, now if it isn't the talk of the town. Mister Alex, was it?" Enoch drawled, pale grin stretched wide across his fixed features. "Is there something you need?"
Alex frowned, but replied bluntly. "It's just Alex, and I have some questions."
"Oh?" A single ribbon unfurled lazily in the space between them. "Then what would you like to know?"
"What are you?" Alex asked with the precise subtlety of a hammerfist to the face.
There was a beat of silence, followed by a chuckle deep enough to feel in his bones.
"Well then," said Enoch finally, "It seems we've gotten off on the wrong foot, so to speak. I suppose I never did introduce myself properly. I am Enoch, magistrate of the Pottsfield Chamber of Com-"
"No," Alex cut in impatiently, "Not who are you, what are you? Maypoles don't move on their own."
"Neither do men grow claws, yet here we are." Enoch's sewn smile remained unchanged, but there was a tightness to the expression that hadn't been there before. "Tell me, how would you answer if asked the same question?"
Alex hesitated. That was a fair point, but it also wasn't something he was willing to share. As both a fugitive and abomination of science telling people the details of his 'condition' had never ended well. No one liked to learn they were talking to a dead man.
Probably best to keep it simple.
"I'm something you don't want as an enemy."
"Really?" said Enoch, a touch of amusement to his tone Alex didn't appreciate. "And why would we be enemies?"
"You attacked me," Alex said flatly.
"I arrested you," Enoch corrected, "And if what I've heard from my citizens is true you've been doing quite well since then. You made a rather good impression on Mister Peters. You know, the farmer."
"Yes, I know," snapped Alex. He wanted to pace, but perched on the beam it wasn't an option. He wanted to stop talking, to simply take the information he wanted straight from the source, but he had a feeling that wasn't an option either. Whatever Enoch was, it didn't seem like something of flesh and blood.
"You still haven't answered my question," Alex continued, "There's something wrong with this whole town, it's too ... it feels …" He trailed off, trying to pin down the right words. "It's nice here," he said finally, thoughts clicking together like puzzle pieces. "You're doing something to this town, to its people. Controlling them. Hurting them. This is all some twisted experiment."
Because that was the only thing that made sense, really. A small town in the middle of nowhere with strange people and a clearly inhuman leader rang plenty of alarm bells all by itself, but Alex's spontaneous appearance in walking distance of the place cinched it.
It was nice in Pottsfield. It had been nice once in Hope, too.
Enoch pulled himself higher, looming over Alex and head tilted so his sewn smile became a frown.
"Now I was pretty clear the first time, Mister Alex, but if you insist I will repeat myself. I am Enoch, lord of Pottsfield, and all I do is for my citizens. It is my duty to care for them, and for you, a trespasser, to stand here and accuse me of otherwise … do not misunderstand, if you had greeted one of them so violently your sentence would have been rather more final."
The ribbon tendrils were writhing now, moving more like angry serpents than strips of cloth, but Alex wasn't backing down.
Someone had got the drop on him, that was clear, but they'd made the mistake of trying to control him. It wasn't Blackwatch, they knew him well enough to just kill him if they ever got the chance, but someone wanted him to play along with this strange experiment. He didn't know what sort it was, maybe advanced robotics and combat AI if Enoch was anything to go by, maybe some sort of brainwashing program with the citizens, but he was more than happy to wreck it.
"I'll ask you one more time," he said, arms replaced by black chitin and wicked claws, red and black tendrils flickering across his form. "What are you?"
There was a beat, and for a moment it seemed Enoch had simply not responded, but then Alex felt it. It was that same feeling, the sense of safety and peace he'd noted ever since entering the town, but far stronger than before. It was everywhere and nowhere, and every cell in his body was screaming it was wrong.
Alex adapted on the fly, sensory organs growing and changing myriad configurations to find the feeling's source, its meaning, anything at all to tell him what the hell was going on, but nothing worked. He stopped breathing, hoping maybe it was something in the air, but to no effect.
Desperate, Alex reached for the hivemind. There were no Infected here to answer, of course, but before he could withdraw completely and pursue a more manual approach to destroying the feeling's likely source, something other eclipsed it entirely.
Feelings not his own coursed through him, peace/rest/satisfaction overwhelming him. The emotion triggered the stolen memories within him in turn, and
/-the lake was so beautiful, why couldn't he sit here forev-/
he couldn't
/-just a lazy day at home sitting on the front porch, waving at passing neighbors until the sun set in a gl-/
stop
/-leaned down to kiss the child goodbye, smiling as they ran for the bus sto-/
them.
He didn't know how long it lasted, kept from falling to the floor far below only by the cloud of ribbons supporting him on either side, but even when the onslaught of memories began to subside he could hardly move. He should have been frightened, angry, furious at how helpless he was, but he couldn't manage anything more than a flicker of concern as he was lifted bodily and gently deposited in the hayloft.
Orange fabric floated into his field of vision, and blinking away the peace of an old man watching his grandchildren play he managed to recognize Enoch.
"Well, now that was interesting. You sure you're not from around these parts, Alex? You certainly could blend in." Unable to muster the will to turn away, Alex watched as the green left eye of the creature was for an instant pulled concave into its frame, then smoothed flat. Was that a wink? "Get some rest, you'll need it for tomorrow."
Once Enoch left Alex lay there for a few minutes more. Then he slept.
AN: I do not own Over the Garden Wall, Prototype, or the characters in them. Tons of inspiration and the Pottsfielders Ms. Elizabelle and Ms. Lulilly are from Incurablenecromantic of Ao3 and Tumblr, without whom this fic would not have happened. If you enjoyed this story please review, feedback is always welcome. :)