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

[all_the_gifts]

"Different." She hesitates, then lifts her shoulders in a little shrug. "Broken." At least it was compared to this one. She fit in there - she and the other hungry children would have been close enough to human to keep things going, art and culture and learning - but it's different here. Here, all she could do is start the Breakdown over from the beginning.

She can't just leave it at that, though. He'll ask questions. "There was a sort of... disease. It killed a lot of people. Almost everyone. The worst of it happened before I was born, so there wasn't much left by the time I..." What, finished everyone off? She can't tell him that. "By the time I came along."

[singthesong]

The Balladeer's brow furrows as he listens. "I'm...sorry." It's all he can think to say. He's hardly ever had to comfort anyone after a loss before - but then again, she doesn't seem particularly grieved. That's fair enough. She wasn't born until after everything happened, so she wouldn't know any different. She wouldn't feel it the way someone would who remembered personally what had been lost.

That's probably better.

God, though. That's enough to stop his flow of questions, curious as he still is about how such a world must function. Surely it is functioning to some degree; he never would have known she was from a post-apocalypse if she hadn't told him, or maybe he'd listened to a little bit of her song. She even knows Greek mythology! But he doesn't need to know. She's not one of his, and while her refusal to give her name is a little odd, he doubts she's dangerous to anybody.

"How long have you been here?" he asks, in a completely unsubtle bid to change the subject. It's not that he's uncomfortable talking about death and disaster - clearly not - but for God's sake, it's such a nice dream tonight. "I just showed up at the beginning of the month."

[all_the_gifts]

"It's all right," Melanie says agreeably. She never knew it pre-Breakdown - not until she arrived here, anyway. Regardless, there's nothing for her to mourn except her own displacement. It had been worse there - worse for people like the Balladeer - but it had been perfect for her and the other hungry children.

But the change in subject is welcome. "A few months," she says. "But I have someone very nice taking care of me." It hadn't always been that way, but that's how it is, now, and that's all that matters. "It's not so bad if you meet good people."

[singthesong]

"That's good! It really isn't so bad," the Balladeer agrees. There's a few questionable types running around New York, but most of the rifties he's met are perfectly nice. "I actually like it here! It's like a free vacation."

Most people are at least ambivalent, he knows. No matter how good things get here, it'll never be their home. But that's exactly why he enjoys it! He's not going to bother going into detail about all that, though, not right now. "And these dream things are interesting too. The ones I've seen have mostly been fine." That thing in the kitchen was the worst of it, and he can sorta see what it was going for. Slapstick comedy is just not his genre.