Rayne Talbot, independent citizen of the Affini Compact, will soon find herself in a rather awkward situation on an otherwise unremarkable day. She is returning home from an afternoon stroll, wondering about dinner, and idly pondering a slight, but nonetheless ongoing sense of vague incompleteness which has been making itself increasingly known of late. Of course, her mood is hardly sour, but the concern is there. She rounds the corner onto her street, and, approaching the door to her hab unit, sees a most perplexing sight. Someone has left a bush on her front doorstep, a rather disheveled, unkempt bush at that. Try as she may, Rayne cannot remember ever placing any order for a bush, or any other sort of shrubbery to decorate her garden. Even if she had, leaving it unattended and askew before her front door isn’t typically how things are done by the affini. 

It is only as she draws near, walking up the path to her front door to get a better look at the out of place bit of greenery, that the bush moves, and begins to take something resembling shape. After a brief moment of shock, Rayne realizes this is no mere bush, but rather, an affini. Arms and legs form… more or less, along with a face. At first, the face is on the wrong side, but with a bit of awkward shuffling, the plant fixes itself up, and gives Rayne a polite, though slightly perplexed smile. 

“Oh, hello little one.” Rayne is fairly certain that’s what the affini said. Her accent is… thick to say the least. Not hard on the ears though, Rayne must admit. “Are you the one they sent?” the plant asks. Each word has a distinct sense of feeling, on the whole, quite lost, a bit confused as well, maybe a tad hopeful. 

“Sent?” Rayne asks. 

“Oh no, you can’t understand me. Uhh… affini.” She begins, gesturing to herself. “I live here,” she points to Rayne’s hab unit. “I no get inside. Door no open. Need help. You help?”

Despite herself, Rayne can’t keep a giggle from bubbling up in her throat. Normally she would feel, on the whole, unflatteringly condescended to. But there was something entirely earnest about this plant’s attempt that Rayne couldn’t quite place. “Miss, I’m the one who’s the native speaker here, simplifying won’t do much.”

“Huh?” The affini scratches her head.

“You said you’re locked out?” Rayne cocks her head, amusement twinkling in her eyes. 

“Locked out…” She seems to chew on the word a bit. Repeating it to herself a few times, dragging out the l sound and crashing hard into the ck sound, the d sound and the t sound, before understanding twinkles in her prismatic eyes. “Ah, yes, I’m ‘locked out.’” She nods, smiling big and extends her middle finger. Again, Rayne giggles, and gently corrects the gesture. 

“I think you wanted to do this,” she explains, giving a thumbs up. 

“Little one! That sort of gesture is absolutely—nevermind that, can you help me get inside?” She deflates. 

“Well, technically yes,” Rayne begins, giggling again as the affini swells up, full of hope once again. “But, I’m sorry, I think there’s been a mixup, this is my hab unit, not yours.”

“By the Everbloom,” She gasps. “They gave us the same hab.”

“No they didn’t—”

“Oh stars, what if there’s only one bed?”

“There isn’t, there’s two spare rooms and I’ve been living here for months.” Rayne’s explanation seems lost on the plant. 

“You mean to tell me they assigned you to be my ward months in advance? And didn’t tell me anything?” 

“Miss uhh…” Rayne’s pause, weighty and expectant went unanswered. “Miss. I think you might simply have the wrong address."

“Hmm,” the affini pauses in thought. A contemplative vine raises to scratch her chin as she looks from her tablet, to Rayne’s front door, and back again a few times. Finally, she shakes her head. “I don’t think so,” she says flatly. “Look,” she says, turning her tablet around. “The number,” she taps the top of the screen. “It says right here: 3255. The same house number as this hab.” 

Rayne stares at the screen for a few moments, then sighs. Somehow, it’s a rather endeared sigh. “Miss, this is Residentiary Ecostation Pulmonaria Virens Requisition Form #3255. That’s the same form number as my house number. And it just so happens to be the form this particular station uses to request a hab. It’s also blank.” A smile is pulling at the edges of Rayne’s lips. She doesn’t want to laugh at the poor affini, but it’s hard not to find the situation amusing. One thing is for certain, Rayne has never met an affini like this one before.

“Soo….?” The affini tilts her head in confusion. 

“So I’m starting to think you never officially requested a hab unit, which means you’ll need to fill that out and… I guess wait for them to prep your hab.” To Rayne, the notion that she understands how things worked in the Compact more than a literal affini is quite amusing. Though, this one does seem to be a newcomer to the station. Perhaps things work differently here. 

“But that could take… hours? Maybe days? I’m not actually sure. Where am I supposed to go until then?” That look: Rayne knows that look. She’s seen it before, typically not from an affini, but she knows that sort of hopeful, slightly bashful look, the sort which begs an unspoken question. The kind of look a sad, wet puppy would give a passer by. And it isn't going to work. It isn’t. It is—

“Stars, fine.” The words tumble from her lips before she has the chance to stop them. “You can stay with me until you get your living situation sorted.”

The plant’s face lights up with joy. She whoops with happiness, and runs headlong into the door. Suppressing another giggle, Rayne helps her up, and finds herself instinctively dusting her new affini friend off. “I’m still the only one who can open the door, silly. And I never caught your name.”

Embarrassment touches the plant's cheeks, then an abashed chuckle. “Oh how silly of me. My name is—” the sound which follows is not one any human can produce. It’s sort of a cross between the sound of dragging one’s nails across a xylophone, and a lawnmower failing to start. ”First bloom.”

“I uh, I can’t pronounce that.” 

“Oh,” she replies. “Well uh, what’s that called?” She asks, making a flailing gesture toward Rayne’s garden. 

“Those are Daisies,” Rayne says.

“I see,” she says, nodding sagely. “How about Azalea Dendra?” .

At this point, Rayne is half-convinced this plant is fucking with her. She’s amused either way. “Sure thing, Azalea Dendra. Now let’s get inside. And you’d better fill out that hab request form the second you’re settled.” 

“Will do!” Azalea cheers. She doesn’t.