open post: pollen science

[peaklordshen]

After his conversation with Sagramore, Shen Qingqiu had taken a long, hot shower, mainly for the novelty of it, and then gotten dressed again in his robes—although he wore fewer layers than were truly proper for a peak lord, and he'd forgone his guan in favor of just braiding his hair in a thick coil against his neck. He leaves the two looser loops at the front—he still can't find his fan, and it felt wrong to not have any frame to his face at all. He's not thinking about why he feels loath to fully don his Shen Qingqiu persona. He's not thinking about much, about the last few days. Instead, he's thinking about pollen.

He's in the greenhouse, carefully laying out a sample cut from every plant in the place, as well as every plant he can imagine producing pollen of any kind from the grounds. Grasses, flowers, buds, leaves, even a few species of harmless-looking mushroom. He's using a pair of tweezers he found to gentle separate them so he can examine the internal structures. Some he recognizes as entirely harmless - Earth flora; others are stranger, more alien. Some even look similar to plants from Proud Immortal Demon Way, though thankfully none are obviously aphrodisiac in nature. Shen Qingqiu is wearing his gloves and mask again anyway—he doesn't want to breathe in the wrong pollen; normal sex pollen would just increase his normal desires and make him hyper-straight, totally defeating the purpose.

He has his notebook open to a fresh page, and is making meticulous lists.

Comments

[onthewillowsthere]

"I think so." He lifts it and places it on his wild halo of hair, and tilts his head at Shen Qingqiu.

[peaklordshen]

Shen Qingqiu beams at him. He looks adorable -- the crown slightly clumsy, one of the larger flowers hanging over one eye; he reminds Shen Qingqiu of a sweet and sad-faced dog someone would post on weibo for hundreds of thousands of likes. "Lovely."

[onthewillowsthere]

In spite of himself, he smiles again -- he thinks Shen Qingqiu means it. "Worthy of vanity?"

[peaklordshen]

Shen Qingqiu absolutely does mean it, comparisons to cute online dogs notwithstanding. The crown looks right, somehow, on Galahad's head, suiting his coloring and his understated style of dress. He reaches up to turn it, slightly, so the larger bloom lays over his ear, rather than his eye, which does a lot to reduce the ridiculousness in favor of the beautiful, and then rummages around in his sleeve again, coming out with a small hand mirror. "Here. See for yourself."

[onthewillowsthere]

"You have everything," with another soft laugh. Then he looks in the mirror, and summarily freezes.

He's vaguely aware that he spent a considerable amount of time looking at himself as Damien, but that memory has been well buried under a considerable number of other, more pressing memories, and he barely remembers what he saw there. It feels entirely different to see himself now. He hadn't realized how pale he is, or how untamed his hair, and his features look ill-married to his critical eyes, his mouth too thin and his cheeks too hollow and the line of his jaw too severe. But the flowers do look pretty in his hair all the same, and he reaches up to touch the crown carefully.

[peaklordshen]

"I like to be prepared," Shen Qingqiu blusters, to cover for the real answer, which is that he's maybe a little bit of a hoarder and enabled by having basically a bag of holding in his sleeves at all times. He just—tends to pick up things that could be interesting, or useful later, and stow them away. Call it an instinct, born in PIDW, of gathering anything that could be considered a scenario-pusher. Which—

He suddenly remembers a true scenario-pusher, something stowed in his sleeve on Qing Jing mountain after watching A Formative Luo Binghe Bullying Experience. As soon as he remembers it, it seems to weigh down his sleeve dramatically, far too dramatically for counterfeit jade. He flicks his wrist, annoyed, and concentrates again on Galahad. "Like I said," he says firmly. "Lovely."