Aaron

[poison_isley]

This little life was actually kind of nice. Restorative. She had her estate and its sprawling gardens. She had anything she wanted- because she took it. And from time o time there were the strangest industrial accidents. That put a smile on her face.

Every other day Ivy went to Klaus's little church. He was losing interest, she could tell, but the church fed the needy and Ivy had opinions about nutrition. The least she could do was coax the church garden to grow.

She didn't think anyone was here as she worked. Dressed in a pair of denim overalls and a plaid flannel shirt, she looked every bit the part of a farmer. She was encouraging the tomatoes to ripen when she heard a noise and whipped her head around, a dozen thick vines springing from her hair to protect her.

What she had to be nervous about in London of all places was was a mystery, but a girl didn't just let her guard down.

When she saw it was Aaron, the vines slowly, slowly retreated.

"Oh. Hey."

Comments

[poison_isley]

"I tapped into their heirloom properties. The old genes were better," she said. "Sometimes selective breeding gets you watery, unripe fruit."

She could talk plants forever, but she was braced for the inevitable dogma.

[quitollis]

"I know next to nothing about plants," Aaron admitted, kindly. "I've always left the garden to others. To varying degrees of success, but well. I'm glad I didn't pave over it."

[poison_isley]

"Oh, don't pave it," she insisted. "This city needs all the green it can support."

[quitollis]

"Oh, I won't," Aaron assured her. "I just didn't know what to do with it when I first got here. Now I wouldn't know what to do without it. And the view... It's very nice."

[poison_isley]

It was so fucking weird to talk to a genuinely nice, totally not psycho person. Weird as fuck.

"Uh...sure," she said. Then- "I didn't know you could just buy a church."

[quitollis]

"Well, you should have seen it when I bought it," Aaron replied. "I'm sure they were happy to get rid of it." Much like they had been happy to get rid of Aaron. "It was in such a state. I spent the first year just trying to make it habitable."

[poison_isley]

"And you're cool with me doing the plants even though I don't buy the religious stuff?" she asked. Not that she'd have cared either way, but it was nice to know where she stood with people.

[quitollis]

"Well, you're here for a reason," Aaron replied as he blew on his tea before taking a sip. "There are far bigger and more interesting gardens than this one and yet you choose to come here. Something drew you - and not for selfish reasons. I'll take that."

[poison_isley]

"It's important to Klaus," she said. Or...it had been. She could see him drifting a bit.

[quitollis]

"You're a very good friend to Klaus," he observed. Personally, Aaron was growing increasingly annoyed by number Four and his penchant to value money over humility, but he was aware that this was mostly due to his personal and selfish interest in the man.

[poison_isley]

"He's like my brother. I'd fucking kill for that boy," she said. That boy...he was older than she was. "Like...he's the most normal person I know, so that should tell you something."

[quitollis]

Aaron smiled to that, but sympathetically. It was a sad fact if Klaus was the normal one in her life. "I suppose it does. I think you've helped him. Quite a bit. With his...powers."

[poison_isley]

"I haven't done shit about that," she laughed. "That's all him."

[quitollis]

"You sell yourself short," Aaron replied. He couldn't say everything here, of course, a lot of what Klaus told him had been in confidence, but he could provide some of what he'd shared. "You give him confidence."

[poison_isley]

"Maybe," she shrugged. "I'm not sure he's ever had anyone hype him, which is a fucking shame. No cap, he's amazing."

[quitollis]

"It's an unsettling power," Aaron offered as explanation. "I can imagine mixed responses."

[poison_isley]

Ivy shrugged. Klaus would have definitely been in her cell block, that was true.

"Fuck whatever people think. Scared bitches. He could do so much more, but he's a good person."

[quitollis]

Aaron, while always looking for the good in man, was inclined to believe that Klaus could do much more, but didn't because he was not a good person. Or, at least, because he put himself before others. But, then again, Aaron was not a good person either, for wanting to use that power for a personal goal. Klaus was scared and scarred. Living with that power was brave in and of itself. That should be the focus. Not Aaron's past sins.

"I would argue he can do much more, because he is a good person."

[poison_isley]

"Yeah. Probably."

She sipped her tea, then laughed softly.

"But who has fuckin' time for that?"

[quitollis]

"Is it hard to be good?" Aaron wondered out loud.

[poison_isley]

"Good is completely subjective," she said with absolute certainty

[quitollis]

"In the larger scheme of things perhaps, yes," Aaron could agree. "But 'Do no harm' is less subjective. To a neighbour or a friend."

[poison_isley]

"But, see, I'm of the 'eye for an eye philosophy. There are people who absolutely deserve what they get."

Herself very much included.

"Maybe I'm justifying, but given what I've done...which I'm absolutely right to try to save the planet...I won't cry when I get what I 'deserve'," she said, curling her fingers in air quotes.

[quitollis]

In conversation with what some media outlets described as a zealous eco-terrorist, Aaron very much preferred to keep it small. Besides, he'd done plenty of things that followed 'an eye for an eye' in the name of the Church. So, who was he to cast a stone?

"A place at the table during our volunteers' Christmas lunch? If you'd like to join, you'd be welcome. You certainly deserve it; you're a valued - I hesitate to use the term - member of this little society."

[poison_isley]

Ivy had been set to take another sip when the cup froze. She looked at him in disbelief which slowly morphed to genuine confusion.

"...Really?"