[ He needn't the prompting to remember Akira's failures to coax plants to thrive. Like all childhood experiments, they'd taken singular soybeans and let them grow roots in their makeshift greenhouse bags. Placed up on the window ledges, they'd let them grow pale roots across dampened paper towels before transplanting them. No matter how little mind Ryo paid his, his plants always flourished under his hands. They were hungry, uncertainty things. They grew tall and delicate, but he'd always tell Akira that he could take his. He knew, no matter how hardy it might have had the chance to have been, it would eventually die without a stable place to live. ]
You over-watered them, [ he says, the syllables rounding in fainter fondness at their ends. ] The roots always rotted.
[ The tips of Ryo's fingers hone in on a singular end to his data collection. There's suggestions laid bare there, in terms that are more succinct than academic. But, he'd anticipated too that trepidation. Akira, no matter the impulsivity that Amon had granted him, held fast to his considering core. It was a warm and weighty thing, something that made Ryo's chest ache in presence of it. He pushes on around the sensation, the faint glimmer of certainty perhaps inherent in the way Ryo now looks at him. ]
That's why we shouldn't rely on anyone else to do it for us. [ For all he cared, everyone else could remain as long as they wanted. ] No one else has come to us with a plan and there aren't enough suits to protect everyone. We're at risk in either direction. [ He pauses, scrolls down to a few embedded photos. The controls, to say the least, are complicated. Even Ryo can't make much sense of them, though he hasn't quite kicked one of those things on. ] I thought of seeking out someone who has some familiarity with these, now that the hydroponics have had time to produce something to take with us. [ But, it all really boils down to one thing: ] Transplanting will be easier.
[ He has no idea of the nutritional levels in the soil, but there's sunflowers and sprouts. He's run some limited tests he's with the replicators, but he isn't confident that that would be enough to subsist off of long-term if they really want off the station. Besides that, he has no idea if anything below is remotely edible. ]
In the meantime, testing it out is our best option. [ He pulls his hand back from his communicator, if only to rest it for a brief moment against the crook of Akira's arm. He knows Akira's worries, in that way. They're the inverse of his own. For all that Akira worries for Ryo, Ryo too looks out for him. He lets his hand settle in his lap. ] If they turn us down, we won't have to worry about it, [ he continues. ] I've never seen anyone else in the hangar. They won't bother us.
[He hadn't — and perhaps still doesn't — understand that concept, that something could suffer equally under the brunt of too much attention than under stringent neglect. It had been natural in his eyes that the ones that Ryo had looked after would flourish; in such matters it seemed impossible for him to err, the shape of the world naturally shifting to make up for anything amiss. But Akira's attention and care (and over-attention and over-care) had inevitably cut short the lives of the plants under his care, and so slowly he'd stopped trying, always falling into familiar pitfalls despite being aware of them.]
Yeah. [His answer is soft, his gaze falling under his eyelashes as he looked down for a moment.] Yeah, that was always the problem, huh.
[The images of the controls to the various ships cause his expression to crease in confusion and concern once more, though he's distracted by it by what was brought up afterward.] You really think stuff from Earth might be able to grow down there? Isn't that stuff kinda... sensitive to a whole bunch'a things that change, depending on the planet.
[He's just thinking that all of the planets he'd seen in sci-fi stuff had looked so different than Earth, and the planet they were in orbit of seemed similar.]
Might be better off seein' if there's anything already down there that wouldn't kill us if we tried eating it.
[But that would involve getting down there, and Akira's attention is tugged back up to Ryo's face when his hand comes to rest in the bend of his elbow, a gesture that always seemed simultaneously soothing and bracing.
He exhales.]
If you think that's the best way to go from here, okay. ...Even still, that's just keepin' us alive out here. [He pauses for a moment.] Doesn't really seem like it's gonna get us any closer to home.
[ Akira had always balanced Ryo, as much as Ryo had balanced him. For all the softness that Akira held beneath his skin, Ryo was the shield that protected him. And so, when Ryo could no longer hold the heft of his facade, Akira had tended to the absence of warmth in him like the plants they'd over-watered in their youth. And just as Ryo cannot comprehend (or tells himself he cannot comprehend) the sorrow for each and every rot brought on by consideration, Ryo too cannot comprehend entirely that he is one of the very things that needed an excess of love. ]
It's possible. While plants are incredibly sensitive, many are also incredibly adaptable. [ The decay in the past hardly mattered now. ] The species they have on board isn't an accident. [ He lifts a hand again, makes a gesture more expansive than absent. It's a dismissal of worry, but a confirmation that he's done the homework they needed. ] At worst, they fail and we test. [ His mouth bows, considering and soft. ] I have a plan for that too.
[ He always does. That's what he's here for. He's gone through the library to reaffirm what he'd assumed. They'd have to take to trying what could be edible like every predecessor. But, they'd be safer than they'd ever hoped. The strategies laid were incontrovertible. As long as he had that, there was nothing below that could harm them for long.
But, still — he resettles his hand back in his lap. He reconsiders in the next breath, his fingers unfurling to brush against the edge of Akira's knee. ]
It's a solution only in the short term, [ he starts, his gaze flickering downward. Ryo has known no real home, outside of the one he has lost in another life. An far-flung outpost, green and beautiful. The only one he has now is the one he's anchored in Akira. Where he goes, Ryo follows. It does not matter that he does not allow himself to know.
He shifts his hand, curves his palm to the crown of Akira's knee. There's a small pause, before he drags his attention back up. ] I'll find a way bring us home, no matter what. [ His fingers curl, firm and measured. ] I won't be able to do it unless we're safer first.
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You over-watered them, [ he says, the syllables rounding in fainter fondness at their ends. ] The roots always rotted.
[ The tips of Ryo's fingers hone in on a singular end to his data collection. There's suggestions laid bare there, in terms that are more succinct than academic. But, he'd anticipated too that trepidation. Akira, no matter the impulsivity that Amon had granted him, held fast to his considering core. It was a warm and weighty thing, something that made Ryo's chest ache in presence of it. He pushes on around the sensation, the faint glimmer of certainty perhaps inherent in the way Ryo now looks at him. ]
That's why we shouldn't rely on anyone else to do it for us. [ For all he cared, everyone else could remain as long as they wanted. ] No one else has come to us with a plan and there aren't enough suits to protect everyone. We're at risk in either direction. [ He pauses, scrolls down to a few embedded photos. The controls, to say the least, are complicated. Even Ryo can't make much sense of them, though he hasn't quite kicked one of those things on. ] I thought of seeking out someone who has some familiarity with these, now that the hydroponics have had time to produce something to take with us. [ But, it all really boils down to one thing: ] Transplanting will be easier.
[ He has no idea of the nutritional levels in the soil, but there's sunflowers and sprouts. He's run some limited tests he's with the replicators, but he isn't confident that that would be enough to subsist off of long-term if they really want off the station. Besides that, he has no idea if anything below is remotely edible. ]
In the meantime, testing it out is our best option. [ He pulls his hand back from his communicator, if only to rest it for a brief moment against the crook of Akira's arm. He knows Akira's worries, in that way. They're the inverse of his own. For all that Akira worries for Ryo, Ryo too looks out for him. He lets his hand settle in his lap. ] If they turn us down, we won't have to worry about it, [ he continues. ] I've never seen anyone else in the hangar. They won't bother us.
[ Well, he can be certain of that at least. ]
no subject
Yeah. [His answer is soft, his gaze falling under his eyelashes as he looked down for a moment.] Yeah, that was always the problem, huh.
[The images of the controls to the various ships cause his expression to crease in confusion and concern once more, though he's distracted by it by what was brought up afterward.] You really think stuff from Earth might be able to grow down there? Isn't that stuff kinda... sensitive to a whole bunch'a things that change, depending on the planet.
[He's just thinking that all of the planets he'd seen in sci-fi stuff had looked so different than Earth, and the planet they were in orbit of seemed similar.]
Might be better off seein' if there's anything already down there that wouldn't kill us if we tried eating it.
[But that would involve getting down there, and Akira's attention is tugged back up to Ryo's face when his hand comes to rest in the bend of his elbow, a gesture that always seemed simultaneously soothing and bracing.
He exhales.]
If you think that's the best way to go from here, okay. ...Even still, that's just keepin' us alive out here. [He pauses for a moment.] Doesn't really seem like it's gonna get us any closer to home.
no subject
It's possible. While plants are incredibly sensitive, many are also incredibly adaptable. [ The decay in the past hardly mattered now. ] The species they have on board isn't an accident. [ He lifts a hand again, makes a gesture more expansive than absent. It's a dismissal of worry, but a confirmation that he's done the homework they needed. ] At worst, they fail and we test. [ His mouth bows, considering and soft. ] I have a plan for that too.
[ He always does. That's what he's here for. He's gone through the library to reaffirm what he'd assumed. They'd have to take to trying what could be edible like every predecessor. But, they'd be safer than they'd ever hoped. The strategies laid were incontrovertible. As long as he had that, there was nothing below that could harm them for long.
But, still — he resettles his hand back in his lap. He reconsiders in the next breath, his fingers unfurling to brush against the edge of Akira's knee. ]
It's a solution only in the short term, [ he starts, his gaze flickering downward. Ryo has known no real home, outside of the one he has lost in another life. An far-flung outpost, green and beautiful. The only one he has now is the one he's anchored in Akira. Where he goes, Ryo follows. It does not matter that he does not allow himself to know.
He shifts his hand, curves his palm to the crown of Akira's knee. There's a small pause, before he drags his attention back up. ] I'll find a way bring us home, no matter what. [ His fingers curl, firm and measured. ] I won't be able to do it unless we're safer first.