003 | Video

[walksonrooftops]

[It's not very often that Asato makes a post to the network, preferring to read and hear what others have to say, offering bits of awkwardly-worded input when he thinks it could be useful. He's not one to draw attention to himself, and though it might seem difficult for a relatively big guy with cat ears and a tail, he tends to manage it too.

He's just a quiet guy minding his own cat business, part of which he's spent in the gardens, carefully tending to something each and every day. The result of nearly a year of watering, trimming, checking and double-checking, is what he moves the video feed to quickly after he sees the feed is on, offering only a quick glimpse of his face.]

I have--these.

["These" being a little pile of some kind of fruit. They're somewhere between a peach, an apple, and a currant, the size of a baseball at their largest, ranging from magenta to purple in color. He can't show it through the feed (much as he wishes he could!), but the scent that's coming from them is a strong mix of sweet, sour, and spicy.]

Kuims. Is what they're called. I planted them. I can't eat all of them, but I don't want them to go bad. [Which is why he's happy to offer some to whoever wants to stop by in the gardens and try them out.]

They're really good. In my world, lots of people like these the best. [A great advertiser he is not, but he's trying, and his enthusiasm is genuine.]

Please come have some. I don't need anything in return for them. Um... They're good in cakes, too. [That...should wrap things up, he figures, so the feed gives a shake, comes back to his face one more time, and clicks off.]

Comments

[handelaar]

Uh. [Blink. He glances back and forth from the cube to Asato, not sure if he wants to bother explaining it.] No. Guess not.

[Anyway. Rather than explain that it's something about how it's made - he's not sure if it's the same here and really it's not that important - he clears his throat and tilts the cube to show off the little indention in the middle.]

All ya have to do is put the seed in there and put it back in the tray. There's a place where we start everything, keeps them warm an' moist until they sprout. After that we put 'em in the right row.

[walksonrooftops]

[Human things are so strange. It's no wonder there were so many of them once.

But he's gotta learn how to use this sooner or later if he wants to grow a sizable, healthy batch of kuims and not have to wait a whole year for more, so he'll put aside his wonder at just how odd some of these things are and pay attention to how it's all supposed to be done. After hearing that explanation, he still can't fully make sense of the whole procedure, but he doesn't really have to. It's not the mechanics he wants to concern himself with, it's the eventual pile of sweet, delicious fruit they'll end up with.]

And then we just grow them like normal? After they're in their row.

[handelaar]

[He opens his mouth to say "yes", then closes it, tries again because the answer is actually "we grow them in hydroponics", then has to stop and wonder what normal would be to Asato. What is normal where the sky is never blue?]

Depends. What's normal, for you.

[What usually happens on the ship is that they're planted in the community gardens and the department keeps an eye on things, but if Asato wants to know how to work down here it wouldn't hurt to explain it more thoroughly.]

[walksonrooftops]

[Yeah, the hydroponics thing has been the most difficult part of growing his kuims, even a whole year later. Asato's just watched the way other plants grew and tried to treat his the same way, fingers crossed, and it's been nothing but a relief that everything seemed to have gone more or less okay.]

Plant them. And water them. And look at them every day to make sure they're healthy. [Watering them (and giving them food, it's no secret to any cat that the earth nourishes a plant) is covered by the hydroponics, but he doesn't think of it as normal. The way he's described isn't normal either, at least from his experience, but he knows that it should work something like that. After a moment's thought and a glance around the gardens, his lips purse a little and he gives his head a shake.]

No. I mean...the way the others grow here.

[handelaar]

Don't need to check every day.

[It's hard to keep a small smile from twitching up the corners of his lips, at that. So careful. And he's pretty sure the same care will be focused on his explanations, too, but showing is probably easier than telling - though he thinks that some of it might still need to be left to the department. Explaining pH to Asato would be a lot more difficult than explaining it to Strider, he thinks.]

Most people let the department take care of the nutrients.

[walksonrooftops]

[His attention stays on the plant and the fruit with that explanation. Even if he doesn't need to check every day, and he could leave it to the department, neither of that really feels right, so after a moment he shakes his head before looking back to Netherlands.]

I want to take care of them. And look at them every day.

[Or whenever he's able; he's in here pretty often regardless, so there's no reason he can't.] That's my responsibility. I can handle this many.