Branching Out

Violet cursed her brother quietly the whole way home for yanking her away from the beach so early. What made things worse was that Zach was clearly smug knowing he had interrupted something - even if he did not know what - and she was not about to give him the satisfaction of knowing. When the siblings reached the farmhouse, the weasel quickly retreated to his own house for the night, citing exhaustion from his travels. "It really takes it out of you to drive all the way here and then be an ambassador for good taste in this tiny town," Zach chuckled as he disappeared down the stone trail toward the guest house.

The farmer let out a cry of frustration once she was sure Zach was well out of ear-shot. Violet had too much energy to work off - both frustration and otherwise - so the young woman decided she may as well make use of the rest of the evening.

After quickly hoeing a small plot - perhaps a bit more aggressively than sthe would normally - the farmer rummaged through her wooden boxes to find the star fruit seed that Gunther had given her in exchange for the items she found with the gang on their last trip to the mines. Creating a mound, Violet poked a hole with her forefinger and dropped the content of the seed packet inside, folding another layer of rich soil over it before giving it a good drink of water. The whole process made Violet feel more relaxed, even if her mind was still reeling from what happened at the end of the pier. What would have occurred if Zach had not interrupted?

"I hope that was okay," Violet thought aloud, remembering the glimpse of Sebastian's surprised face she spied before turning the other way out of sheer embarrassment. Sure, the young woman had mentally prepared herself to kiss Sebastian, but not on the lips! Wait did just the corner of his lips count as a kiss?

Sitting on the top stair of her porch, the pastel-haired farmer glanced up at the slither of the moon. "I'm such a mess," she breathed wearily. Her dark blue eyes glanced toward the stone trail that led to the new guest house. "And of course you had to ruin the moment!" she growled in Zach's general direction, thrashing her legs before flopping backward to lie on the porch. Bruno, who sensed something was wrong, quickly took advantage of the situation to lay his head on her stomach to request his human stroke his ears to calm herself. Violet gazed up at the night sky and wondered what Sebastian was thinking right now.

It was late into the evening when Maru realized she had not heard her family member come back from the Luau. She hoped Sebastian was okay, but after the incident with Shane, Maru was not about go back to sleep without checking first-hand. Sitting up in her bed, the young woman grabbed her glasses from the flat top of her headboard and put them on so she could better see. It was a dark night, so it was hard to see at first, but after her eyes adjusted Maru found her way down the hall, passed the lab, and to the door that led to her brother's room below.

The stairs creaked as she descended, but she did not think the sounds would be loud enough to wake her parents. Maru decided she would take a quick peek inside and make sure everything was alright. She hesitated at the door at the bottom of the stairs and pondered for a moment. Perhaps I should knock… she thought to herself quietly. In case the reason he snuck in so quietly was because he had a guest.

Maru rapped on the door gently. "Sebastian, did you get home safely?"

There was a brief pause before her brother answered. "Yeah, I'm home. Why are you bothering me so late?"

"I didn't hear you come in tonight," she replied honestly. "I worried about you." She heard a rustling from the other side of the door and jumped slightly as it swung open to reveal her exhausted older sibling.

"That's the second time you've mentioned that lately..." Sebastian informed his sister, annoyed by the late hour of her interruption. Not that he was sleeping anyway. "And yet I've been here both times." Sebastian sighed exasperatedly. "Quit keeping tabs on when I come and go. It's weird," he ordered her. "And if you want to talk, you're going to have to think of a better excuse."

Maru blinked behind her ruby red frames. "I used to hear when you came in at night and now I don't…" she responded, but she trailed off as something clicked. The young woman grabbed her brother's wrist and pulled him along upstairs. "We need to try something!" she announced excitedly, ignoring Sebastian's grunt of protest.

"What are you doing, Maru?" Sebastian whispered, trying to keep his feet beneath him as she dragged up to the main floor of the house.

"An experiment!"

While Sebastian originally was irked that Maru felt the need to test her hypothesis immediately, the two siblings did make an interesting discovery. Sebastian did not make any noise when he entered the house through the front door. The squeaky hinges did not grind in their usual protest, the bell to announce customers did not chime, even when Maru observed it physically being triggered as Sebastian entered and exited the house. After about a dozen times, the scientist was satisfied her hypothesis was confirmed – at least for now.

Even in the dark, Sebastian could see the bright sparkle in his sister's umber eyes. If he were not so fascinated in this newly discovered ability himself, he might think Maru was more excited about it than him. "I was already intrigued when you froze my pencil to demonstrate your ability…" the apprentice researcher admitted, "but this is something entirely different."

"Well, yeah…" Sebastian shrugged. "Ice is something physical."

Maru shook her head to correct him. "No, the bell should produce a sound wave that interacts with your ear to alert your brain of the auditory stimulus. It's a still physical phenomenon, but in this case caused by air pressure," she explained. "With this ability, you are somehow negating the process or masking it in some manner." She pointed the eraser of her pencil toward her older brother. "Whereas with the ice, you were creating something both tangible and observable to the human eye."

Sebastian smirked, leaning against the wall. "You're really geeking out over this, aren't you?"

A small smile crept onto Maru's face. "When I am not 'geeking out?'" she countered, still furiously scribbling notes on her writing pad.

Her brother had to laugh at that comment. "Fine," he conceded, "but you seem especially excited by all this."

Pausing for a moment, Maru considered Sebastian's statement. "This is something completely unexplained by science as we know it and I'm the first to get a chance to crack it," she informed her sibling enthusiastically. "And as far as we know, it's something only you can do. My brother has a unique ability that no one else does and I couldn't be more proud." Maru flipped the cover back onto her notebook and grinned at him. "Besides, it gives us a chance to bond."

Sebastian feigned disgust. "Ugh, you're just thrilled you get a human guinea pig who might actually consent to some of your weirder and morally questionable research trials."

Maru returned the teasing with her own. "I'll make sure to limit the potential risks to maiming."

Surprisingly, Sebastian chuckled at this before excusing himself to return to bed. "Night, Maru," he yawned, stretching his arms over his head. "This actually helped me feel sleepy, so thanks," he added before disappearing down the stairs. Maru beamed happily as she watched him go. While circumstances were odd, Maru admitted that it was moments like these that finally made her feel like she had a big brother and not a moody roommate who happened to share some DNA. She sincerely hoped Sebastian felt they were getting closer, too.

Zach awoke the next morning bright and early, ready to start the business day. Normally, he would go for a run before work, but the visitor to the valley did not know the best pathways through town and he may as well wait for that trainer girl's route to do his timed run anyway. And while he would never admit it, Zach had slept in a bit this morning compared to his normal schedule in the city. All the trees around here made for especially restful sleeping. Once he got used to the sounds of crickets over city traffic, the blond slept like the dead.

Tightening the silk argyle tie around his neck, Zach opted to wear his glasses over contacts today. They made him look more mature and his clients were on the elderly side today, so anything he could use to his advantage would be worthwhile. If his clients did not respect his authority as a legal professional, he may as well not show up.

The lawyer was glad he brought his own mini electric kettle and coffee press. Otherwise, he would not be able to function this morning. How did Violet live without a kitchen for so long before he intervened? Zach shivered at the thought of the barbaric manner in which his little sister lived in this ridiculously small town. It didn't even have a stop sign, let alone a real road upon which to drive.

However, his little sister's inheritance did have one thing going for it: quiet. Zach pulled his kitchen chair out onto the porch to enjoy his coffee in the early morning sunshine. The enormous trees filtered most of the light, but the lawyer could feel his tense body relaxing itself as he closed his eyes and listened to the birdsong and inhaled the sweet smell of pine in the air. Zach was almost alarmed by how refreshed he felt even after just a night on the farm. "Maybe a trip or two a year to check on Vi wouldn't be so terrible," he mused to himself. He did have his own place, after all.

He should probably tell Violet she would need to find someone to live here most of the year in case the agricultural society decided to check that their funds were in fact being used as intended. Zach shrugged. "Eh, she'll figure it out," he grinned to himself. "If she goes to jail for tax fraud, I suppose I could bail her out. It'll be worth the laugh."

Finishing the last dregs of his black coffee, Zach returned inside with his chair and refilled his thermos with the last of the brew. The sandy blond decided to leave it on the table for later. Besides, little old ladies always offered their guests something to eat. It would be rude of him not to indulge her.

The smell of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies wafted from the kitchen into the living room, tempting George away from the television for a moment. Maneuvering his wheelchair, the bald man entered the kitchen to find his wife pulling the first batch out of the oven. "It's too early for sweets!" he chided Evelyn, but the woman only smiled.

"We're expecting a guest this morning, remember dear?" the elderly woman reminded her spouse, adding another tray of raw cookie dough into the open maw of the oven.

George eyed the cooling cookies and went to snatch one for himself, despite his insistence that it was too early in the day for such treats. "Eh, that lawyer kid," he grumbled. His asbestos fingers did not feel the heat, but his tongue did as he took a bite. The man flailed slightly, huffing air through his mouth to cool the steaming cookie.

Evelyn pretended not to notice for the sake of her husband's dignity. "We haven't updated our will since Clara died," the grandmother stated solemnly. "So we may as well take the opportunity when it presents itself, George."

"These 'professionals' just keep getting younger and younger," George complained, blowing on the molten chocolate chips before daring to take another bite.

"I believe that's just us getting old, dear," Evelyn chuckling quietly, wiping her hands on her apron. A rapping came at the door and her lips drew back toward her hears. "Oh, that must be him now!" she asserted, heading for the front door. "I suppose I ought to let him in."

Zach milled through the pile of paperwork that Evelyn presented to him, trying to discern what files from the mound were necessary for their purpose. "So, Evelyn… Herschel was your first husband and George initially inherited this house from him?" the sandy blond inquired to the elderly woman across the table. "I have to say I've never seen a will in which a man implores his best friend to move into his house and marry his wife," the well-dressed man confessed, scanning the aged, hand-written testament.

"We never actually got to the wedding before poor Buck succumbed to illness," Evelyn informed the lawyer. "Some kind of bird flu…" She reached her hand out to rest on her husband's, "But Buck was so thoughtful and had already prepared for the worst in a will of his own before passing."

"Herschel was a good man," George added with a thoughtful nod. "And a man couldn't have asked for a more loyal friend…"

Zach did his best to tread carefully. Geezers loved to reminisce, but they did have business to finish if they were going to stick to their agreed upon compensation. While the man did not intend to charge the elderly couple what he would his city clients, he had to make sure not to undersell his services.

"Alright, so Herschel left his beautiful young fiancée Evelyn some money after his untimely demise," Zach clarified, shuffling the stack of documents until he found what he wanted. "But since you could not inherit without a spouse, the two of you married." Zach's brow furrowed, "Property laws at the time were still rather sexist," he noted out loud. The women always loved to hear the acknowledgement that the law treated them unfairly.

His green eyes scanned the table, surveying the tabletop for the next version of the deed. "But I see you rectified that some decades later," Zach said, plucking the most current version of the deed and adding it to his organized stack.

"Now as for Alex's situation. Was that a full adoption or legal guardianship after your daughter…" he glanced down at the death certificate to double-check himself, "Clara passed?"

George frowned deeply, emphasizing the creases in his weathered face, "Alex is our grandson whether or not a damn sheet of legalese says. We don't need the government to tell us."

Zach grimaced and leaned back in his chair as he held up his arm defensively. "I meant no offense Mr. Mullner, I just want to make sure we're on the same page here when I draft your will."

Evelyn smiled at their guest. "Don't mind George," she assured him. "He scalded his tongue so he's a bit grumpy this morning."

The blond beamed charmingly toward the lady of the house. "And your cookies are to die for, Evelyn," he complimented the elderly woman as he took a bite. They were so warm and chewy. Yoba, he missed having a grandmother. When he finished, he wiped his hand on a napkin and pulled his ink pen from his front pocket. "So you want everything to go to your grandson, correct?"

The couple nodded in confirmation. "We'll also need to discuss care for you, Mr. Mullner, should your wife pass on first," the blond added seriously. "Will Alex be your caretaker?"

Shaking his head, George spoke up. "No, we've discussed some… options with Doctor Harvey," the old man explained. "I don't want the kid to spend his best years caring for his old grandpap." Zach bobbed his head and made a notation to get the official plan from either Evelyn or with their permission – Doctor Harvey himself – before he left.

"And who do you want to be the executor of your will?"

George scratched the thinning grey hair on the side of his head. "We were… hoping we could get you to agree to it, ki-" Evelyn's bony elbow connected with George's ribcage and the man immediately took the hint, "young man."

Zach's eyebrows rose in surprise. "You didn't have anyone else in mind prior to this?"

Evelyn exhaled deliberately. "Well, dear, we originally wanted to appoint Mayor Lewis, but…" she paused, tapping her gums together as she searched for a diplomatic way of expressing herself. "We have reason to suspect he does not use the town's funds properly," she explained. "So we worry that Alex might not see all the money we leave him."

Now this caught Zach's interest. "I won't decline if that's what you really want," he promised George and Evelyn. "But I would feel much better knowing if I could have cleared up any misunderstandings between you and the Mayor…"

George rolled his eyes. "The town hasn't seen any improvements for at least a decade - maybe even two!" he told the lawyer. "So where the hell do all our taxes go? It sure doesn't all go toward the town festivals."

Evelyn chimed in with a complaint of her own. "And then there are those gaudy gold statues." She shook her head. "While the community center was left to rot and the local bridges have fallen to bits."

Zach threaded his fingers and rested his chin upon them as leaned in closer over the kitchen table. "Tell me more…"

Alex sighed heavily, facing the birch shelf in his room filled with books. He planned on going to the beach to work out like he did most morning, but today he found himself questioning things. He wanted to impress Maru for once – and not just with his athletic ability or level of improvement. But it was so difficult to look smart in front of someone who already seemed to know everything.

A knock at the door alerted Alex to a guest in the house. "Oh, hi Zach…" Alex greeted the blond as man poked his head inside. The frown on the jock's face remained unchanged.

The lawyer sauntered into the room, eyeing Alex's choice of bedroom décor. "Why the long face, kid?"

Bristling only slightly at being called "kid," Alex gestured hopelessly at the shelves in front of him. "Look at all these books," he ordered the farmer's relative. "I haven't read a single one." His mouth twisted in anguish. "Just the thought of cracking one open makes me nervous."

Zach did not laugh at him for saying that, so the brunet went on. "But you can't make a decent living in this world without a brain…" he conveyed to the lawyer, who undoubtedly was incredibly smart to have such an important job. "I'm worthless…"

There was a pause before Zach finally said something. "Do you want advice or comfort?"

Alex blinked in surprise and simply stared at the man standing in his room. Sighing, the blond waved a hand in his general direction. "We all have our strengths and weaknesses," Zach began. "Now, I don't disagree that you're going to need a back-up to fall on once you're gridball career is over – even the best can't play the game forever," the suited man admitted. "But I've seen plenty of people without a brain make more than a decent living through some combination of celebrity, charisma, and nepotism."

"Yeah, I guess you're right…" Alex acknowledged, at least in part. He did not feel better about his future just yet.

The blond's emerald eyes focused on the brunet. "Trust me, I can tell you're not a Neanderthal. Give yourself some more credit," Zach insisted. "You've definitely got the discipline to keep up a training regimen, so you'll be able to take that and apply it to whatever the hell you want in the future. Books or no books."

That was convincing enough for Alex. "Well, I'm not going to give up!" he proclaimed, turning back to the book shelf and picking one up at random. "If I work hard, I can do anything!"

"That's the spirit," Zach praised the athlete, examining the book in Alex's hands. He winced. "Eh, maybe not that one, though," the man hissed.

One of Alex's eyebrows rose curiously. "What the hell was that about?"

"Machiavelli leaves a bad taste in my mouth," Zach responded with a look of disgust on his face. "Ambition and competition are good up to a point…" his words drifted off, as if he were lost in thought.

Alex wondered what was on his mind, but also did not want to pry into a practical stranger's personal life. "Hey, maybe one day soon we'll have dinner and discuss… phil-lo-so-phy," the brunet suggested. "Isn't that what you smart people talk about?"

Zach scoffed. "Well, that's true enough. Even if it's not discussed directly, you can tell a lot about a person's beliefs from the way they act and treat those around them." The farmer's brother eyes Alex curiously. "Why the sudden interest in what 'smart people' do?"

"I… want to be able to talk to Maru on her level," Alex hesitated to admit. "I want her to see me as more than just the guy she's helping out." The jock groaned, trying to better articulate his feelings. "Maru's so different from the girls I've hung out with before," Alex clarified. "And even though she's way smarter than me, she doesn't make fun of me for it." He glanced back toward the bookshelf. "I wanna try to get somewhere where we can both talk about gridball and space, or robots, or philosophy or whatever the hell else she wants."

"Sounds like you're really making an effort for this girl," Zach observed aloud. "You must really like her."

Alex grinned as he chuckled in response. "Yeah. Who would've thought?" He placed the discarded book back on the upper shelf.

The blond exhaled theatrically. "You're too young for me anyway," Zach stated, feigning a lack of interest. "What are you, like eighteen?"

The brunet took offense, "I'm not a teenager!" he spat. "And what are you, like forty?"

Zach was legitimately offended by the extra decade tacked on. "I'm thirty, you punk. And I can outrun you any day of the week."

"Bring it on, old man!"

"For the last time, thirty is not old. And you are acting like a child!"

Evelyn smiled as she washed the last dish from breakfast. George sat at the table, enjoying the last of his oatmeal. "Oh, they sound like you and Buck when you used to fight," she cackled quietly, placing the dish on the rack to dry.

George smirked. "Those were the good old days…"

Violet finished her morning chores and still Zach had not returned to the farm. Figuring her older sibling was more than capable of entertaining himself should he return before she did, the farmer added her crops to her pack and headed toward town to sell them.

Business with Pierre went about as well as usual and with the relative success of the starfruit Violet bought from him for the communal soup, the bespectacled man was more intolerably smug than usual. Violet sold all but one each of the crops the Junimos requested and bought a few replacement seeds. On a Friday, she thought it was best to save the majority of her money until she was sure Talla did not have anything exceptional in her inventory this weekend.

So, once she was finished at the General Store, Violet headed north toward the dilapidated Community Center to see the local forest spirits. Whipping her head around to make sure no one was watching, the farmer opened the door and was immediately greeted by a swarm of smaller Junimos. "Flower Lady!" they cried happily as they climbed all over her.

Their slender limbs tickled her skin. "Stop it!" she giggled. "I don't want to drop you."

Obediently, the forest spirits hopped off and held up their twiggy arm to accept the goods she brought. The smallest apple-like creatures cheered with excitement when one of the larger Junimos pointed toward the hut and said something too quickly for Violet to comprehend.

Moments later, the bushel returned with what appeared to be a sprinkler and several stood on one another's shoulders to hand it off to Violet. "Thank you!" Violet articulated appreciatively as she admired the tool. The farmer would have to play around with this one to see how it worked and once she had enough of them, her morning chores would not take nearly so long. The thought of more free time thrilled her.

Violet knelt down on the old creaky board of the building and requested a favor from the Junimos. "Talla told me that I could give you commands, but I don't know what you can do," she paused briefly, "Or… what I can do." She beamed as the Junimos' beady black eyes gazed up at her. "Can you teach me?"

Several of their mouths immediately squealed with delight as they pulled her by the pinky toward the front door. "Oh, okay! We're going outside to do whatever it is forest spirits do," Violet laughed, trying to keep up without falling over from leaning so far forward as she walked.

Eshra Talla stood, or more accurately, sat in a barrel full of sea water in her cart, staring up at the blue sky as she sang a sea shanty of which her father was particularly fond. Supposedly his singing it as homage to her mother is what drew her to him in the first place, but she never confirmed the tale. She would only smile coyly in response and expressed that her daughters might someday understand when they were older. The syren doubted it.

Lost in thought, the demigoddess was caught off-guard when she caught the scent of two men close by. Though her father forbade her from eating any of the men in town that did not mean she could not scope out potential meals should she happen upon them elsewhere.

And so, Talla sang. It was the first melody she intoned after her hatching. About a love lost to the battlefield of war and the widow's tears flooding the local lake so that it then connected to the sea. It was meant to teach the audience to seek her Mother for comfort. She always speculated where the tune originated, and if she was the first to perform it or if the song was older than syrens themselves.

Soon, the sea monster in disguise noticed a pair of men approach her cart. One was far bolder than the other and began with a flirtatious statement. "Well, I see we've stumbled upon the most beautiful woman in the world," the sandy-haired male cooed with a flash of his white teeth.

Eshra did everything she could to restrain herself. Even in the air, where her sense of smell and taste were dulled, the syren knew that this man had broken many hearts – both female and male – and would taste absolutely exquisite. She dug her claws into her scaled thigh with one seemingly human hand and reached the other out to greet the newcomer.

"I am Talla, the traveling merchant," the syren introduced herself tilting her head to one side so that her curly hair fell to one side, exposing her neck. "What might I call you?"

The emerald-eyed man grinned foolishly and she knew then that he took the bait. "You can call me whatever it is you want, miss," he answered with a wink and a firm handshake. Eshra tasted his flesh from the contact of their skin and it was indeed the most decadent flavor she had sampled in at least a century.

"Well, then. Aren't you delicious?" she crooned, biting her lips suggestively. She had this man's attention. She did not need the other male that accompanied him. If only she could lure the blond inside her cart, away from the other humans long enough to –

"Talla, no eating Zach!" her distant relation's voice shouted from across the clearing.

Eshra withheld a growl when Violet approached and smacked the man's hand away from hers. The brunet behind him also appeared confused at the farmer's outburst.

"Vi, there's no need to get between a man and a woman at a time like this," the lean man called Zach complained, though he did his best to tone down his annoyance in front of others. This man clearly cared about appearances.

Eshra looked down at Violet disdainfully. "Hello, cousin," he smiled through her teeth.

It was this comment that broke the spell, much to the syren's lament. "C-Cousin?" the blond coughed, taking a step back from the beautiful teal-haired woman and her cart.

Violet spoke sweetly to her sibling, "Yes, Zach. This is our cousin, Talla."

The sea creature did her best to salvage the situation. "A very distant cousin, little flower," Eshra shot back, but she could tell now that there was no going back. The male was already repulsed by the very idea that he found himself physically attracted to one of his own kin.

"Well, damn," Zach huffed. "My apologies, Talla. I had no idea." He glanced back at the brunet who came with him and made a hasty retreat. "I have some things to do, but it was nice to meet you," he uttered before turning and making a run for it.

"You totally hit on your cousin," the spiky-haired one snickered as the two jogged back toward town. Zach pushed him, but the bulkier of the two manage to keep his balance as they disappeared through the trees.

Eshra exhaled deeply. "You cost me a meal," she accused the farmer bitterly. "You had better buy something to make up for the loss."

Violet laughed nervously, "Uh, sure, Talla. Let's see what you've got…"