Between the Roots and Branches [Open to All]

[applesaucemod]

Don't worry, dreamers of Manhattan. There will be no humiliating episodes of sudden-onset-clumsiness tonight - at least, nothing more severe than what you might experience naturally. Your physical and mental faculties will be left perfectly intact. What a treat! And what luck, because if you do lose your footing, it's a long way down to the forest floor.

But hey, who wants to be on the boring old ground when there are so many wonderful treehouses to explore? There are dozens of them spread throughout the surrounding forest, connected by a series of bridges and catwalks (some, admittedly, a bit more stable than others). It's easy to forget - or fail to notice - that there really is no easy or conventional way down to the ground when you're surrounded by such splendor.

The houses' styles range from charming and rustic to modern and sleek, with many falling somewhere in between. There are viewing platforms for bird-watching or simply taking in the scenery (trees, mostly, though if you venture high enough, you'll be treated the sight of the forest canopy stretched across a valley far below). But the insides of the treehouses are comfortably furnished to varying degrees as well, so there's no need to immerse yourself in nature if you'd really rather not. Some are complete houses in their own right, with all the amenities of a Manhattan apartment and then some.

Go for a climb, or kick back and relax. The only enemies you'll find here are other dreamers... and, potentially, gravity.

Comments

[insectreflection]

Tara probably doesn't know just how lucky she is to have her first dream party be this nice.

She's sitting in the middle of a sturdy rope bridge, her legs dangling over the edge, arms leaning one of the lower rungs of rope. There's enough ropes that she's not in danger of falling off, and the bridge itself seems to be proper craftsmanship, as safe as can be. She's far enough down that it's almost dark, most of the sunlight blocked by the leaves above her.

The setting makes it impossible to resist doing some magic, and for some reason it feels safe enough to do so here. So she makes several little tinkerbell lights in various colours, then sits there watching them dance around the foliage, smiling to herself.

[rae_of_sun]

Gods, she needs to get to higher ground. Or higher platform. She's missing all the nice sunlight, and it's dark enough down here that her light-web twinkles reassuringly obnoxiously whenever she passes through a particularly shaded bit. And she's never really learned to talk to the light-web, or at the light-web, like it's still too young to compete with the necklace-scar's comparative abundance of personality. Which means she doesn't know how to tell it to tone it down in a way it'll understand.

Well, whatever. Once she's higher in the canopy of this interminable Ewok village she's been consigned to, it won't be an issue.

She's about to step onto a rope bridge that looks a hell of a lot sturdier than the last one she picked her way across, when she notices it's already occupied. Someone's sitting right in the middle of it, legs dangling like a kid in a swing, and she's... magic-handling. Huh. Either that, or consorting with something that feels like taking the form of a little cluster of rogue solstice lights, but magic-handling seems more likely.

For a few seconds, she just stands there, wondering how in the hell to talk to a fellow magic-handler on potentially equal footing. Her only previous experiences consisted of pretending utter normalcy when other kids showed off on the playground, and being desperately outclassed by her landlady.

Well, she can announce her presence in a way that doesn't involve tromping on the bridge and jostling the woman. "Hey," she says, lifting her hand in a wave.

[insectreflection]

The lights disappear immediately as Tara realises another person is present, though in hindsight she realises it probably would've looked less suspicious if she made it look like they ran away or something instead. Would've been easier to pretend they weren't her doing. But given their surroundings, she's not entirely sure it matters.

"Oh, hi," she answers as she locates the source of the voice. A young woman. Pretty too, though Tara can't help but feel a twinge of guilt as she thinks so. Which is silly, considering she wouldn't feel any guilt for making such an innocent observation back home, but when she's so far away from Willow it just seems wrong somehow.

"S-sorry, am I blocking your way?" she adds, hurriedly getting to her feet, though by doing so she realises the bridge is wide enough for them both.

[rae_of_sun]

It's actually reassuring to see the lights snuff out so quickly. If they'd gone zooming off into the trees, Sunshine would've been left wondering what the hell they were and looking over her shoulder for the duration of her time here. Instead, she's pretty confident that they were a product of a bored magic-handler with some small-scale light illusory skills, which sounds a lot less potentially awful.

Make that a flustered magic-handler, which... actually could be a problem, depending on how nervous she gets and what else she might have up her sleeve. "Uh, no," Sunshine hurries to reassure her. "I just didn't want to..." she steps onto the bridge demonstrably, wincing a little at the structure's resulting bob. It's not that bad in the grand scheme of things, but it probably wouldn't have been a pleasant surprise for someone sitting right in the middle, where the motion is most pronounced. "... startle you," she finishes apologetically. "Or... interrupt." Have a pointed glance toward the area where the lights were a second ago.

She ventures forward, one hand on the heavy rope that serves as a railing and the other lifted slightly for balance, just in case this thing decides to start swaying sideways on her. "I'm Sunshine," she says, her smile friendly, if a little tight-lipped (because she'd prefer more solid ground beneath her feet and more sunlight up above). "Was that magic-handling?" Yes, it almost certainly was. She's only asking so the woman will know she's on the metaphorical level.

[insectreflection]

Tara lets out a soft 'oh' and smiles at the explanation. Yes, she probably would've been more startled by the rocking of the bridge than the voice. She's got her feet firmly planted and is holding onto the rope railings though, so jiggling of the bridge doesn't cause much trouble now she's prepared for it.

And then she lets out another 'oh' at the question, not answering immediately, glancing over at where she'd conjured the lights. ...Well, given the fact this woman's first assumption was magic, that would presumably be someone at least passably familiar with magic as a real thing rather than just something from fairy tales. So, probably not someone Tara particularly needs to hide it from.

"Um, yes," she answers finally, and returns the smile. "Nice to meet you. I'm Tara." She gives a little wave.

[rae_of_sun]

"Likewise," Sunshine says, coming to a halt a few feet away.

So, talking shop can't be so bad, right? It'd be a hell of a lot easier if the topic was baking (she can expound at length about flour quality without feeling like she's constantly toeing a line between bragging and downplaying), but at least there's common ground, here. Which isn't actually all that common, since literally all of her relationships are inter-universal anymore.

"I know some small-scale transmutation," she says humbly, as if it's a mildly embarrassing family secret (which isn't too far off target, considering how she was raised). She'd add 'warding' to the list, but that still feels like some kind of miraculous fluke and not a learned skill.

And there's no way she's bringing up her counteraffinity, even if that is the more impressive skillset. 'I can help vampires' isn't going to get her a standing ovation, and 'I can also kill them really efficiently' isn't something she wants to even think about, let alone talk about. Yeesh.

Instead, she says, "But I'm not, um... professional. I'm a baker."

There. Both shops covered.

"Are you new?" she asks. The fact that she's never met Tara might not mean anything; Sunshine's pretty settled into a routine that doesn't often include Getting Out There or Mingling With Randos.