Chapter 785

A short time later the wheelbarrow stopped and Lily could hear it as the gardener grabbed on of the bags of fertiliser. She waited, listening to the environment for a few moments until she heard a soft thump off to the side. Taking that as the place they were depositing it, she waited a few moments for a second back to be grabbed, waited a moment more, and leapt from her hiding place before getting a quick look at things.

She was currently next to what looked to be a cornfield, a small one considering she could see the edges on the left and right, but it was a good hiding place. So she dashed off into the stalks, letting her soft paws do much of the work of keeping her silent. The slight brushes against the corn easily chalked up to the wind. She was small and easily able to make use of such a thing.

Back in her mind, Kat was messing around. She was now in what could be best described as ‘sexy librarian’. She had a pair of fake square shaped glasses that didn’t so much sit on her face as perch on her nose in the perfect way to make it seem she was constantly looking down at people. Her pencil skirt ended halfway down her thighs that were covered by black stockings. Her top was a close cut grey suite with no tie.

Lily wasn’t actually paying what Kat was doing all that much. She managed to change her ‘internal view’ and shifted it so that it was ‘behind’ the wall. All she could see was a wall with a door on it and was considering it mental energy well spent. Now she could hide away when Kat was teasing her as she was currently doing.

Kat was looking for something similar. As this was Lily’s mind she had much less direct control. Kat was attempting to figure out if there was a way to see through Lily’s eyes while she was inside her girlfriend’s mind. Her first test involved staring really hard at a wall and praying. As dumb as the idea might sound on paper, it was the mental world. Simply believing a thing would happen usually got you closer to making it happen in truth. For a given value of truth inside someone else’s head.

The next attempt at seeing through Lily’s eyes were the books laying around. Many of them were from Lily’s memories and they certainly gave some perspective at least. Sadly that wasn’t quite good enough either. These books all had a purpose already and they didn’t seem terribly keen to change. *Hmm... If I could find a blank book then I might be able to get this to work...*

And thus the quest for a blank book started. It involved checking everywhere twice, the closet an extra four times, the underside of the bed an extra three, and opening and closing the door to the abyss enough times for Lily to question what was going on. Something Kat was happy to reveal. [I’ll see what I can do when I’m not sneaking around...]

.....

Back with Lily she was making her way around and really wishing she felt safe flying. She’d gone through a cornfield, a cabbage patch, two fields for tomatoes, one for normal sizes and one for cherry tomatoes as well as the carrot patch and what seemed to be rose fruit. How or why they managed to get roses to bear fruit Lily didn’t know, but that was the best descriptor of them. They were trees that looked like giant roses and instead of thorns they had eggplant like growths in the corresponding colour that looked like they had rose petals carved into them. Pretty? Yes very. Thorny? Also very. Lily didn’t imagine picking them was safe at all.

The issue Lily currently had was that she was clearly in the farming section and she didn’t know how to leave. None of the fields could really be called fields. They were at best planter boxes with delusions of grandeur. Lily was really wondering what the point was. It wasn’t really enough food to feed anyone let alone a noble household. It seemed a bit inefficient to her.

Of course, Lily wasn’t taking into account just how ridiculous the magical water was. She was looking at no more than a week’s worth of crop growth. Each small patch was enough to feed all of the 6th of the 10’s household and still have some left at the end of the day. The fertiliser wasn’t even strictly necessary. It helped certainly, but the water was enough to produce ‘good’ crops all by itself with minimal working of the ground as long as you weren’t drowning the plants. The fertiliser just helped them get closer to ‘the best’ food in the city.

That’s what they used this greenhouse for. It was attempting to find the best balance of fertiliser to fountain water. It didn’t really matter if the crops were the best of their species because the 6th of the 10 had always been involved in feeding the masses. They were the old researchers and quartermasters back when the place was just a camp, and then a small village. Now it was much larger they still had people clambering for information about all kinds of crops.

Some, like the potato, didn’t really get better with fertiliser. The water from the spring contributed everything they needed and more. What fertilising did for them, was make them larger and more numerous, but no better tasting. Others like the rose trees didn’t grow at all without at least some spring water. It didn’t matter how much fertiliser or what kind; the water was necessary. Yet, it only truly needed a few drops. It wouldn’t grow well without spring water in large quantities, but it could survive on a teardrop’s worth a day as long as it was given other water alongside the fertiliser.

Still, Lily didn’t know any of this. To her it was an annoying maze of crops that didn’t have an obvious exit. She also hadn’t really been paying attention when the wheelbarrow was moving so didn’t know what direction the 6th’s house was in. If she did, she’d head that way... but she did not and currently flying was still considered too big a risk.

She did keep her ear out for gardeners though as she dashed from patch to patch, making sure not to damage any of the plants. They were clearly checked over regularly and scratch marks were the last thing she wanted them to find on their plants. Her feet were leaving pawprints in the soft dirt though so she was taking care to step as close to the plants as she dared, hoping the shadows would distract any gardeners. There wasn’t really much she could do about that issue unless she wanted to fly, but she could hear at least three workers from where she was, and one of them was bound to have her in view if she just took off.

For Kat’s part. She was now laying on the bed and staring up at the ceiling. It was both an attempt to see outside and a way for her to try and calm down and think of more options. The first is that looking up and out was a tried and true method, at least according to Kat’s mental gymnastics. Many people had ideas that going upwards would lead to an escape. From caves, from troubles, from whatever was chasing them. So, the idea that looking up at the ceiling would reveal the real world wasn’t all that far-fetched. It wasn’t working but it was a reasonable guess.

*Hmm. So no paper... the ceiling isn’t working. None of the walls revealed anything hidden. The clothes in the closet, while fun, are not a window to the outside. Hmm... if only there was like a TV in here or something. Hmm... maybe if I can convince Lily to add a TV or a laptop to this room I might be able to use that...

The real question is how hard is it to change this room with conscious effort. Lily clearly isn’t trying to keep it this shape. It just looks like my room. Which sure, is quite telling when you considering it’s MY room and not HER room back at her house. If it wasn’t for the books I’d be real worried that this is what’s in Lily’s mind. Of course, there could be an element of the fact that while this is Lily’s mind, it’s where I sit in Lily’s mind.

Which would mean that finding me in my room that happens to be in Lily’s heart really does make sense. I just wish I knew which way it went. Well, that and if putting a computer, or just a computer screen in my room would help. Aw well. Better not distract her while she’s sneaking around.*