Forty Days of Flash Fic: Day Seven
Jun. 26th, 2012 04:44 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jeriendhalStepping away from Tez and Maria for a second.
* * *
Hiring the xeno-botanist to consult had been expensive, but well worth it, the couple had agreed. They'd spent so much already purchasing and shipping their plants from offworld, never mind setting up the biosecure greenhouse, it would have been madness to let it all go to waste now.
"And you have been feeding them prrroperly?" the little botanist asked, his snout the only thing peeking out from his robes. Behind him, his muzzled and leashed servitor followed. The couple ignored it. It would have been the height of rudeness to acknowledge its existence.
"Yes," the woman told the botanist. She waved her her hand over the eager mouths of the smaller plants. "Just a few drops every day. We don't over feed."
"Frrrom what sourrrce?"
The woman blushed slightly, squeezing her husband's hand. "Personally. It seemed the best way to establish a... bond... I suppose you could say."
The botanist nodded. "That is common. The differrrences in chemistry are minorrr enough between our worrrlds that it would not harrrm them."
"The main problem is with Gerty here," the man said. He gestured to centerpiece of the greenhouse, a large plant sitting low in its own bed of dirt, its folded petals as large across as a prize pumpkin. The petals were now not a healthy purple but a sickly pink, and the botanist's nose twitched in distress to see it so.
"We fed it ground beef at first, then rabbits from the pet store," the woman said, "and it seemed to be doing all right."
"But now it just spits them back up," the man added. "The poor thing is starving."
The botanist nodded. "As it maturrres, it rrrequires morrre... maturrre... food, though much less often. Small animals would be insufficient."
The couple glanced at each other uneasily. "Getting anything larger would be difficult," the woman said carefully.
"Not to worrrry," the botanist said. He gestured to the servitor, who began to quietly strip down. "I came prrreparrred."
* * *
Hiring the xeno-botanist to consult had been expensive, but well worth it, the couple had agreed. They'd spent so much already purchasing and shipping their plants from offworld, never mind setting up the biosecure greenhouse, it would have been madness to let it all go to waste now.
"And you have been feeding them prrroperly?" the little botanist asked, his snout the only thing peeking out from his robes. Behind him, his muzzled and leashed servitor followed. The couple ignored it. It would have been the height of rudeness to acknowledge its existence.
"Yes," the woman told the botanist. She waved her her hand over the eager mouths of the smaller plants. "Just a few drops every day. We don't over feed."
"Frrrom what sourrrce?"
The woman blushed slightly, squeezing her husband's hand. "Personally. It seemed the best way to establish a... bond... I suppose you could say."
The botanist nodded. "That is common. The differrrences in chemistry are minorrr enough between our worrrlds that it would not harrrm them."
"The main problem is with Gerty here," the man said. He gestured to centerpiece of the greenhouse, a large plant sitting low in its own bed of dirt, its folded petals as large across as a prize pumpkin. The petals were now not a healthy purple but a sickly pink, and the botanist's nose twitched in distress to see it so.
"We fed it ground beef at first, then rabbits from the pet store," the woman said, "and it seemed to be doing all right."
"But now it just spits them back up," the man added. "The poor thing is starving."
The botanist nodded. "As it maturrres, it rrrequires morrre... maturrre... food, though much less often. Small animals would be insufficient."
The couple glanced at each other uneasily. "Getting anything larger would be difficult," the woman said carefully.
"Not to worrrry," the botanist said. He gestured to the servitor, who began to quietly strip down. "I came prrreparrred."
