2025-02-03 - Finding Strange Mushrooms and a Weird Bunny in the Bushes

After a couple of busy weeks at Spellbound Clinic, Erika finally has a weekday off. Better still, it's a Monday off.

She's decided to spend it exploring the Botanical Garden on Starlight Island and took an early ferry over to the island after having breakfast at Swirlies Sips and Suds on Crescent Island. Today she's decided to go as if she was a wandering performer to see how guests react, so she has her ears "out" and has chosen a vibrant and bright shade of Kelly green for her hair with amber-gold-colored eyes. Her attire is reminiscent of 'Robin Hood' attire with a forest green, long-sleeved tunic which extends to her upper thighs over a pair of mahogany brown tights and brown Wolverine brand hiking boots. Suspended by black strings across her shoulders and hanging down to the middle of her back is a purple Spellbound back-sack with a 'magical sparkle' design worked into it in flat yellow star screen-printing around the park's name in its trademarked and stylized lettering in white screen-print.

She's slowing walking the paths alone, occasionally stopping to enjoy the sights and scents of the gardens, and frequently pausing to allow groups of guests to pass. There's the occasional request by a guest to get a picture with the 'attractive elf' as well.

Any day off is good in Kellin’s opinion. He is fortunate that he gets three a week, in exchange for four, ten hour work days, swing shifts work for him. The ferry captain is cosplaying as a guest today. Civvie clothes instead of anything that would mark him as an employee. Hoodie under a blue striped puffy vest, jeans, and tennis shoes, with sunglasses that hide the heterochromia. He is fortunate that for now both his weirdnesses that be hidden away.

He is nearby when one of those guests requests at picture from Erika “Do you want me to take that for you?” He offers, though looks to Erika to make sure she is okay with the photo and not being harassed.

Erika nods that it's alright to Kellin as she is then surrounded by the family of five for the picture.

As the father of the family recovers his phone from Kellin the elfin nurse kneels down to speak with the youngest member of the family, a little blonde girl who looks to be about three years old and who has been heard complaining about not getting any rides this morning. "Be good for your parents, little one," she says in her accented English and, after glancing in the mother's direction for the nod that quickly comes, she gently boops the girl's nose before standing up again as the family moves down the path.

Erika turns to the ferry captain and says, "Thank you for the assist, Kellin," with a warm and welcoming smile.

“You’re welcome.” he says to the dad when handing back the phone, and is then quick to collect his cane from where he leaned it against a bench to take the picture. Well as quick as he can be considering he walks with a cane.

He watches the family wander off for a few moments before turning his attention to Erika “That’s asking a lot.” He replies to the elvish looking woman “At that age there is a very loose definition of good.” He sounds like he speaks from experience, though he doesn’t really look quite old enough to have a kid that age much less need a cane, but at least the need for latter is obvious. “No problem. The parents have probably been excluded from every photo so far. They should have at least one with everyone in it.”

Erika grins at Kellin's comments about the child.

"But when a magical elf asks you too and boops you on your nose there's something special happening. I likely bought that mom as much as twenty to thirty minutes of lowered stress," she expresses her opinion on the matter. "And you're right, one or the other parent at least are left out of photos frequently."

She doesn't comment on the cane. She's not actively a nurse at the moment and prying into personal information isn't polite.

Before she can say anything else a wordless song comprised of a number of musical tones that are reminiscent of a harpsicord, a harmonica and a handpan. Also, from any phone set up for it, an hourly chime can be heard. Erika's is one of those and it simply lets out a soft beep from where it is tucked into her bra beneath the tunic.

"Thirty minutes is like a year for a mom. Or so my sister says." He gives a gesture in the direction the family disappeared off to. "My oldest nephew is about that age." So he has a little bit of experience with small children. He is fortunate that he gets to give them back when they act up or cranky.

Kellin's phone isn't set up for hourly chimes, but he does hear the musical tones, followed by Erica's phone chiming. He looks confused, his forehead wrinkling slightly since the sounds are coming from different places. "That's weird." He looks in the direction the music came from "Someone drop their phone?" Maybe the first set was someone's ring tone.

Erika's ears perked up with the sound and she turns around looking off the pathway. She lets the ears relax and nods at Kellin's comments. "I have nieblings of various ages myself. Big family so I get what you mean," she explains quickly.

"It sounded like multiple different tones," she says before asking, "Could some animals be collecting lost phones perhaps? and should we look into it while we're here?"

Along the pathway there are signs present stating that guests are to remain on the paths at all times. Stealing a glance at one nearby, Erika asks, "Since we aren't guests?" implying that maybe the sign doesn't pertain to them.

Kellin nods at the big family "Same." though things like that can be subjective, he thinks he has a big family, and we wouldn't be completely wrong.

Some people would look at Erika like she was crazy about animals collecting phones, but Kellin doesn't "I have seen stranger things." he's been here plenty long enough to know that nothing is always what it seems.

He pats his pockets before pulling out his employee badge from one, before slipping it back in. "You aren't wrong." he says he a bit of a grin. He doesn't always have the RBF, just most of the time. "Maybe in the flower bed? The bushes?" he points with his cane "Whatever that topiary is supposed to be?"

Erika grins and extracts a similar badge (showing her name is Erika Y and that her position is Nurse Practitioner) and clips it to her tunic.

"That's a good idea," she says as she climbs over the low railing and pushes aside the bushes. She then gasps and asks, "Have you ever seen mushrooms like these, Kellin?" as she tries to position herself so that her companion can look past her at the cluster of pastel fungi with expressive smiling faces looking upwards at the woman towering over them.

Kellin has a harder time getting over the railing than Erika does but he manages. If it were higher we would have had to go around the long way. He follows her over to the bushes, keeping a look out for groundskeepers. They may be staff, but they aren't garden staff, so they could technically get yelled at.

"Mushrooms?" he sounds perplexed "I know its unseasonably warm here, but still late in the year for mushrooms." or way early. We won't crowd her, but can easily look over her shoulder and past her to see the smiling fungi "Are those mushrooms smiling?" he isn't sure if he find that adorable or creepy. "This is a first."

"Ja," Erika replies to the affirmative reflexively answering in Norwegian.

She was about to say something else when, from a few yards off, another bush seems to break off into a simple little cooling song of five notes that is repeated a few times. The song sounds like it is coming from a small creature cooing out the elementary melody.

As the second repetition of the melody the colorful little mushrooms - musicelium although it is unlikely that either Erika or Kellin are familiar with the term - begin mimicking the song, singing along, each one joining one at a time as a round so long after the original singer has stopped the fungi are still performing the music in their various instrumental tones.

Speaking softly, Erika says, "I think we found the source of the first sounds." She indicates the musicalium with a nod of her head. "Now I'm curious about the other sound though," she states before asking, "Do you think it's safe to explore further?"

"Huh." Is Kellin's monosyllabic response to the confirmation. "This place gets stranger by the day." He isn't complaining, it keeps in interesting.

The singing from the mushrooms and then from the bushes has him taking a step back and looking towards the second sound source. "More mushrooms?" That's his guess "Safe as it was coming this far."

With a pensive frown, Erika says, "It sounded... much more like it was an animal."

She takes a moment to remove her bag from her back and pulls a sandwich out of it. "This was going to be my lunch but maybe..." she half explains her actions as she approaches the bush that the newer singing came from.

She pauses as the source of the music becomes visible huddled under the low hanging branches of the bush. It is a creature about the size of a large ground squirrel, cotton candy pink and just as fluffy as the confection. It has rabbit like ears and solid black, almond-sharped eyes that are perfect matches to the traditional pop culture depiction of gray aliens.

Erika's own pointy ears jerk upwards in surprise as she says, "Jøss," in a tone of voice that makes it clear to mean exactly what it is: an expression of shock and wonderment (like the British Blimey).

She holds the sandwich, containing deli meat and lettuce between the two slices of rye bread and says, "Would you like any of this," in that soft, higher pitched tone of voice that people tend to use with little children and animals. Speaking aside to Kellin in a less talking-to-a-child tone but just as soft so as not to scare the animal, Erika says, "Hopefully the spicy mustard doesn't turn it off."

"Could be a bird I guess." Kellin muses as they both head over to the bushes. "There are quite a few birds that are great at mimicry. I saw a video about a starling that could mimic R2D2 perfectly."

Well that is not a bird at all and Kellin pushes his sunglasses on top of his head "Damn..." He says in a surprised low tone. Erika has pointy ears, Kellin has mismatched eyes, one a normal brown, the other a stony grey with a blue miasma over the whole eye.

The pink fluffy rabbit looking creature eyes Erika its nose twitching as it tries to catch her scent. It doesn't hop away, but is certainly wary. The sandwich offering is sniffed at as the animal stretches forward. The smell has it quickly retreating and turning sideways in profile and giving the sandwich an offended side eye.

"I think it did worse than turn it off." Kellin almost sounds amused. "Do you have anything else, veggies? Fruit?"

Erika nods and says, "Yeah, I do," as she re-wraps the sandwich and stows it back in the bag. Instead, she extracts a banana from the bag.

The motion seems to get the alienesque bunny's attention in a way the human speech from Kellin and Erika did not because it glances towards the leathery yellow fruit with faint brown spots, but it isn't until the Norwegian opens the peel at the end opposite the stem - she's using the so-called 'monkey method' of peeling a banana - that it shows any excitement. The pale flesh of the fruit exudes the pleasant, slightly floral scent expected from a well ripened Cavendish banana.

"Well, that was a good suggestion," she says to Kellin with a smile as she kneels down and breaks off the small tip of the fruit and holds it out in the open palm of her hand extending it slowly towards the creature but stopping with a few of its body lengths between it and her finger tips.

"Well rabbits are herbivores right. Makes sense that they aren't going to dig lunch meat." Or spicy mustard. Makes sense to Kellin.

The pink ball of fur's head lifts, sniffing the air as the banana is peeled. It's little nose flaring and twitching at high speed as it turns back to face the woman with the treat. There are a few excited bounces in place before moving forward a few inches and stretching out to snatch to morsel from her hand with it's mouth. It retreats immediately to chew the piece of sweet fruit.

The bunny trills a note, which is echoed by the mushrooms behind them. This causes the buns ears to perk and twitch toward the sound. But then after no more mushrooms songs comes the creature looks up at Erika expectantly and begins to hop circles around her.

He takes a step back, not wanting to scare the small bun or loom over Erika. He can't easily crouch down, so he doesn't try but he can at least to look intimidating to the tiny thing. "Looks like the banana is the winner."

Possibly to Kellin's amusement at this point, the bunny's ear twitch is mirrored by the tips of Erika's long pointed ears which had by this time returned to their horizontal to the ground position sticking straight out of her head.

"Sure does," she says. "Want a bite of it yourself?" she offers politely before breaking off a bite for herself and then another one being held out to the pink fluffball, still held in the palm of her hand so that as it takes the offered fruit it cannot help but also get a whiff of her scent as well.

If Kellin is amused by the mirroring twitch of Ericka's ears, he does a passable job of hiding it. A twitch of his lips as he looks between woman and bun. "No thanks. I think it likes it a lot better than we do."

The bun is a hopping all around Erika, stopping only to periscope up on hindlegs to sniff at her, before hopping around her again. All the while making soft trilling noises.

When another peice of the banana is offered, the pink fluff attacks it with gusto, eating it right there, and sniffing at her hand as if another peice was ready and waiting.

"The only time I have seen an animal that excited about something is when I get the catnip out for my cat." Kellin over here being a mash up of surprised and amused at the creature.

"Ja," Erika replies and then suggests, "Perhaps we should get back on the path and see if the little guy will follow us?"

After Kellin gets back onto the path and she knows he's not behind her to trip either of them up and still in a crouching position, Erika begins to move back towards the railing. With quick glances she makes sure not to step on the cluster of musicelium or any of the other display plants while also breaking off another piece of the banana and putting it into her palm.

She comes to a stop with her back to the low railing and says, "Here's another piece for you if you'd like it," to the snugglebunny in that talking-to-a-pet vocal tone.

Kellin doesn't want to be tripped or be a tripping hazard so moving to the path so neither of this can happen is what he does.

When the pink bunny like creature doesn't get immediate gratification it lets out a sour note, and thumps it's foot in the ground. Watching as Erika backs away with what it thinks is its banana.

More sniffing the air and it hops forward as another banana is placed on the hand for it. The singing mushrooms give it pause, and it sniffs at them a moment. The banana is to much of a temptation to resist and it covers the remaining distance in a bonding leap. Between one breath and the next the pink fuzz all has gobbled up the peice and is looking at her for more.

Erika stands up from her couch while she makes sure to keep the banana in full view for the little pink fluff-bunny as she takes the wide step over the low rail onto the path. She then breaks off another piece of the fruit and holds it out over the railing with one hand while she sets her bag down with the other.

She pulls the sandwich out of the bag again and holds it out towards Kellin. "Would you hold this for me?" she asks before explaining, "I'm going to see if it wants to come with me and want the bag empty for it to ride in."

As Erika steps over the rail Kellin will offer a hand in case she needs it, but it's no big thing if she doesn't. He was just taught to be polite.

He takes the sandwich from the nurse"s hand as he steps back to give her room to try to catch whatever the bunny looking creature is. "Good luck." The bunny looks like it could be happy going with Erika, but bananas are yummy, so who knows.

The bun of pink continues to follow the banana welding woman, but stops short of the railing, bopping it's body up and down as it trills its five note song. There is more hesitation from the creature as the woman is now big, instead of littler like when she was crouching. It does its stretching thing again to get the banana. It's amazing how something that little can stretch SO much. It's like it has no bones. Once it has gobbled that down, it hops forward to squeeze under the railing to sniff at the bag where it saw the fruit came from.

Erika had accepted the offered hand, perhaps why she was so willing to ask Kellin to hold the sandwich. (Gentlemen being gentlemen earns trust quickly.)

After the last offered piece of banana is taken from her hand Erika says, "This may be a tricky bit here," to her companion and peels the banana fully.

She places the last third of the banana, after tearing a bite off for herself with her fingers, into the bottom of the bag - the back from the bunny's current perspective. She holds the bag open and says, "I'll take you to my apartment where I have other fruit you can try if you'd like to join me." Then, remembering the plaintive and hopeful sounding song and noises it was making before the banana offers began, she adds, "I could also try to help you find whatever it is you have lost if you'll trust me." Nursing is half interpretation even with humans, she could be wrong but its worth saying incase the creature is more than just an animal.

Not wanting to spook the creature, though if he hasn't yet he probably won't, Kellin stays as still and silent as he can, he does make a hmn in agreement at getting the animal in bag being tricky.

Some people say that bunnies don't have facial expressions. Those people have never been around a bunny, let alone a magic one. The bunny watches the banana be broken and when it goes into the bag instead of it's mouth it lets out a short shrill tone, giving the bag a most disgruntled side eye, as if it ate the peice.

When Erika starts to talk though, its ears twitch in her direction and it looks from bag to woman. Can it understand what she is saying? No clue, but it does sniff at the bag and sticks its head in to go after the peice. It's up to Erika now to scoop the bag up to capture the bun in it.

With the bag ever so slightly deeper than the bunny seems to be long it has to do that odd stretchy thing to reach into the back. Smiling and cooing softly in a way that she hopes will be comforting, Erika uses the hand not holding the bag open to gently scooch the bunny into the bag as she gently lifts it.

There's a momentary sound of distress from within the bag but Erika immediately says, "It's okay. I'm going to take you somewhere warm with more fruit for you to eat little one," in that soft, pet-talk voice as she gently holds the bag against her abdomen to start sharing her warmth as well. A momentary struggle ends with a coo and the creature singing its song once only to be repeated by the musicalium. The bunny makes a momentary dismissive sound at the fungi's sounds and then begins eating the fruit in the bag while Erika rocks side to side.

"Thank you again for your help, Kellin," the Norwegian says to the ferry captain, "Both with the tourists and the search that lead to this little guy. I can't take a picture of the fungi we found; do you think we need to report them?"

She pauses and adds, "I think my visit to the gardens is over for the day but if you want to contact me, I can give my number to you?" When her offer is met with a nod from Kellin, Erika gives him her number and says, "Message me please so I can add your number to my contacts also. I can't do much else than hold him right now and get to the ferry for Crescent Island," she nods down at the bag from which soft, moist gnawing noises are heard along with a content sounding, purr-like coo. "Maybe he'll be asleep by the time I get to Fox Run so I can get into my apartment with him," she adds with a little laugh.

With the little creature safely ensconced in the bag Kellin gives a smile to the woman. It's not rare to see him smile, but certainly uncommon. This deserves one though. "I'll get pics and report the mushrooms." He offers since she has a bag full of bun.

He inputs the number into his phone and immediately texts it. It's Kellin, bunny catching assistant. Not that he did much but give moral support and hold a sandwich, which he hands back to her. "Good luck with it. Let me know what you name him... her." He has no idea. He has total confidence that it's her pet now. The noises from the bag has him grinning again. With a nod to her, he doesn't impede her any further and heads on his way to take pictures and report the singing fungi.