Overgrowth

I lead the young lady through the neutral environment corridor, through a cursed moment of a sterilizer, and into the living bulb which keeps the desert balance. The moisture is kept down through thirsty fibrous vines that suck it from the air, and, it being day, the sunlight is concentrated making the place warm. It will drop to near-freezing come the night, forcing the water suckers to retreat until the morning.

With her help we coax her cistern-cactus, which filters and stores water, from the loose, rocky soil. It is healthy now. I place it on a wooden wheelbarrow and we walk it out of my gardens and into her barge on the wide canal, one that cuts through every part of the city.

I hand her a pack of seed-stuffed soil.

“Spread them well, be sure to prune them the moment they stop being fearful of the sun. Call me if you have any trouble.”

“Thanks, Rose!” She waves as she poles her boat away. She will call me, of course, and one of my assistants will remind her. Most of our clients come to us because they don’t understand how their plants work. They see them as tools, as purely functional, rather than living, spirit-filled things that care for us and need care in return.

I pat the wood of my gardens, living wood, active wood, chimerical and multi-faceted. On the one hand, she requires a lot of care herself, but for everything she receives, she gives back twice as much. Few living woods could house this many different growing environments. The next client is waiting in a neutral environment, on mossy wood. The neutral part is a misnomer. Diversity of life has a diversity of needs. There is no such thing as neutral, but rather a place that is not deadly to most, nor is it a place where many can thrive.

In his lap, he holds a pot with a wilting broad-leafed plant. A common night-glimmer. He looks up from beneath long dark curls as I approach. His eyes are full of worry.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with him. I’ve tried everything,” he pleads.

I am touched. Many would have recycled such a common plant, gotten a new one, grumbled about the cost. Certainly it would be cheaper. I tell him as much, knowing some would be upset if I haven’t. He doesn’t mind the added price.

“Follow me,” I say. I lead him to my lab, and a high counter, flattened for convenience. I indicate for him to place the night-glimmer on it. I rip a clipping off on a dead leaf. Examine it under concentrated sunlight. It has somehow been choked out, moisture cut off, discoloured, but not in any of the common neglect ways.

“Hmmm, hmmm, you’ve never spoken like this to me before,” I whisper under my breath. I put my ripping beneath a microscope. Find the culprit. Thin, charcoal grey, netted tendrils creep across its stem. But they are not merely spreading across the surface. They dig into just below the surface of the leaf, clinging to the veins. A fungal infection, most likely. Not one I’m familiar with though. I tear the piece into three, and put it into three contained test environments, small goldfish bowls with lids and varying levels of humidity, soil types, and even air pressures. Not all fungal infections can outlive their hosts in sub-optimal environments. I know in this case, we humans choose a survivor. In the meantime, I search fungal databases for a descriptive match. I explain what I’m doing to the man, who remains stoic. I have no answers for him yet. This fungus is not catalogued, or hasn’t parasitically consumed a night-glimmer before. Not all of them are, so I will likely have to add it to the database. But plants of this size tend to go through time quickly. Where the wood that houses my gardens takes time for everything, waits patiently for times of growth, blooming, seeding, plants of this size can be accelerated into full reproductive cycles up to five times a year. Some fungus move more quickly. I keep his plant in its own little quarantine tank with its own ideal environment, hoping it will be nurtured enough to survive its parasite.

The next morning I am shocked to find that this fungal infection moves faster still. Rather than thriving in some environments, and weakening in others, this fungus has taken over all three. All other test plants, cuttings, some still living, are now showing the same signs as the night-glimmer. Choked out but microscopic webbing, digging into their veins.

No matter what I do, the fungus outlives its hosts. I find it also consuming insects that contribute to the soil health. Some fungus can infect insects. Some can infect humans, such as athlete’s foot. As an afterthought, I examine my dirty, calloused finger under the microscope.

A charcoal grey lace spreads across my skin, digging in, searching for veins. I call the man, insist on him getting his fingers examined, struggling to keep my own voice calm through my heavily beating heart, my own head feeling lighter and airier than it should. I quarantine my little lab room. Locking the door, hoping that the fungus will not spread to the motherwood that holds my gardens.

I call colleagues, my teachers, professors, floropaths. None of them have heard of this before. By now, three fingers on my left hand have turned red. The lace, has reached my capillaries and joined them. I should have used gloves, but I cannot bear the sterile vinyl. I’ve always preferred the feeling of damp, soft humus and soil.

I keep working. Perhaps things will go badly for me, but perhaps I will cure myself. I am putting the fungus through every test I can think of, as well as any means of destroying it, including killing its host. Fire successfully kills the host and the fungus. Drying it out seems to put it into hibernation. Drowning it just seems to encourage it.

Calls come in, from increasing levels of experts and contamination authorities. They have questions, and suggestions for other types of tests, but are unwilling to break my self-imposed quarantine. The infection is isolated to myself and my lab. The poor boy--the one whom I now realize could have prevented this by burning the plant and buying a new one--he is lucky enough to be uninfected. I conclude that wood samples from the mother tree are not vulnerable to infection, which is a major relief. Leafy plants, with capillaries near the surface, not so lucky.

The Contamination Authority sets up camp outside my gardens. As a precaution, they seal my bulbous gardens in a layer of transparent sheet-plastic. Enough to let in the life-giving sun, the one that is setting. Any novel infection that can quickly take over entire plant populations is a danger to a flora-tech society. They call in suggestions.

Night falls. I fall asleep quickly after a long day. I wake, feeling thirsty. My entire left hand is covered, red. I know I will see that greedy lace if I check the microscope. I drink water. Blood is not an environment where fungus can survive, but this one seems to be taking in mine anyway. I notice, in its contained environment, the night-glimmer is glowing away happily, healthily; the soft pale blue lights up. I rip a piece off and examine it beneath the microscope. The lace is still there, but it too is now glowing. I examine the other test plants. They are all looking sickly, and greyer than they should be, but they’re also a day behind the night-glimmer on their infection.

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