Chapter 6: Pest Control

Chapter 6: Pest Control

The harmonious song of the nursery had been violently silenced, replaced by a jagged, buzzing dissonance that grated on Eddie’s nerves. It was the sound of corrupted life, of growth twisted into a weapon. The acrid scent of toxic pollen, sharp and chemical, rolled in on the night breeze, a declaration of war.

"They are the Purifiers," Elara said, her voice low and steady, though her hands were clenched tight on her trowel. "Zealots who have taken the Mother's gift and turned it into a cancer. They see you as a holy vessel that needs to be cleansed of its free will."

"Pest control," Eddie muttered, the irony not lost on him. He felt the heat of the Heartwood in his pocket, a beacon in the encroaching darkness. His brief lesson with the marigold felt like a child’s game in the face of this. That was a whisper; this was a scream.

His goal was immediate and absolute: defend this place. Defend this woman who had offered him a moment of peace. The obstacle was the monstrous force gathering at the gate.

Three figures emerged from the desert gloom. They were barely human anymore. Their skin was a mottled green-brown, like bark, and thick, black thorns jutted from their shoulders and forearms, forming a crude exoskeleton. They moved with a twitching, insect-like gait, and a faint cloud of shimmering yellow pollen drifted from them, killing the small desert flowers it touched. They were a perversion of everything Eddie had just learned, a living embodiment of the rage he had felt in the alleyway.

"Stay in the house," Eddie ordered Elara, his old field agent authority surfacing. "Lock the door."

"This is my garden, Reaper," she countered, her eyes flashing. "It knows me. It will not listen to you if you treat it like a battlefield. Don't fight them. Fight with the garden. Remind it of its nature."

She retreated toward the house but left the door open a crack, a silent act of faith or defiance.

The Purifiers breached the gate, the old wood splintering under their unnatural strength. They fanned out, their movements synchronized, their heads twitching as they scanned the nursery. They weren't looking for him; they were sensing him, drawn to the powerful thrum of the Heartwood.

Eddie ducked behind a large terracotta planter filled with a sprawling bougainvillea. He took a deep breath, trying to silence the frantic hammering of his own heart and listen to the garden instead. He reached out with his senses, feeling the network of life around him. The patient cacti, the thirsty roses, the deep-rooted mesquite tree at the center of the yard. Elara was right. This wasn't just cover; it was an arsenal.

Action. He had to act, not just react.

The first Purifier stalked past a row of prickly pear cacti. Eddie focused on them, not with a command of rage, but with a simple, urgent suggestion. Danger. Threat. Defend.

The cacti responded instantly. In a motion far too fast for a normal plant, they whipped their paddle-like leaves forward, launching a volley of fine, hair-like needles called glochids. The cloud of tiny thorns struck the Purifier in the face. He roared, a sound like grinding stone, and clawed at his eyes, temporarily blinded. It didn't stop him, but it broke their formation.

The second Purifier identified Eddie's position and charged, its thorny arms extended like battering rams. Eddie scrambled back, diving into one of the greenhouses. The air was warm and humid, thick with the smell of tomatoes and damp earth. He could feel the Purifier right outside, its angry presence a spike in the green symphony.

He pushed his will into the floor of the greenhouse. It was a chaotic tangle of roots from dozens of different plants, all competing for space and water. Bind him. Hold him.

The ground at the greenhouse entrance erupted. Tomato vines, suddenly thick as pythons and unnaturally strong, burst from the soil. They coiled around the Purifier's legs, their fuzzy stems digging in with surprising tenacity. The creature thrashed, tearing at the vines, but more erupted, wrapping around its torso and arms, a green straitjacket born from the earth.

Two down, one to go. But his small victories were costing him. A cold sweat beaded on his forehead. This took a toll, a drain of will that left him feeling hollowed out, disturbingly similar to how he felt after wrestling a powerful spirit in his old life.

The third Purifier was smarter. It didn't charge. It stood in the center of the yard, took a deep, rattling breath, and exhaled. A dense, yellow cloud of its toxic pollen billowed outwards, covering the nursery in a choking fog.

Eddie, still in the greenhouse, slammed the door shut, but the fine powder seeped through the cracks. The moment he breathed it in, his lungs burned. His vision swam, and the connection to the garden wavered, dissolving into nauseating static. The pollen wasn't just a physical weapon; it was a psychic one, designed to sever the Green Tongue.

He stumbled out the back of the greenhouse, coughing, his eyes streaming. Through the yellow haze, he saw the third Purifier stalking toward the house, toward Elara. The other two were beginning to tear themselves free of his makeshift traps.

He was losing. His rudimentary skills were no match for their corrupted power. He was about to fail, to watch the only sanctuary he'd found be destroyed. This was the turning point. He was out of tricks. He needed power.

He leaned against the gnarled trunk of the old mesquite tree that dominated the center of the property. And through the haze of the pollen, through his own panic, he felt it. The tree wasn't just a plant. It was an ancient, silent consciousness. It had been here for centuries, its roots plunging deeper into the earth than the house's foundation. It had tasted droughts and flash floods, life and death. It possessed a slow, implacable, and immense strength.

He placed his palm flat against the rough bark, pressing the Heartwood between his hand and the tree. He didn't just ask for help. He merged with it.

For a heartbeat, Eddie Morales was gone. He was the tree. He felt the vast, dark network of his own roots, a subterranean nervous system spread beneath the entire property. He felt the two lesser, corrupted abominations tearing at his smaller brethren and the third approaching his caretaker. A slow, deep, geologic rage filled him. This was his soil. These pests were an infestation.

He let that rage surge through the Heartwood.

The ground of the nursery didn't just tremble. It tore open.

Massive, woody roots, thick as a man's body, exploded from the earth with the force of a detonation. One wrapped around the pollen-spewing Purifier, not with the gentle binding of the tomato vines, but with the crushing finality of a colossal serpent. There was a sickening series of cracks as its thorny exoskeleton shattered, and it was dragged silently beneath the soil.

The other two, now free, turned to face the new threat. Before they could react, more roots burst from the ground beneath them, impaling one and whipping the other through the air, sending it crashing into the wall of a greenhouse with enough force to shatter wood and glass.

The yellow pollen dissipated. The angry buzzing vanished. The fight was over.

Silence returned to the garden, broken only by Eddie's ragged gasps as his consciousness untangled from the ancient tree. He slid down the trunk, his body shaking, his mind reeling from the sheer, brutal power he had just unleashed. He hadn't just commanded the garden; he had become its wrath. The nursery, once a sanctuary, was now scarred and broken, a testament to the violence he had brought here.

Elara emerged from the house, her calm facade finally broken by a look of profound awe and terror. She surveyed the wreckage—the shattered greenhouse, the torn earth, the places where the Purifiers had vanished.

"You are learning faster than I thought possible," she said, her voice barely a whisper. "But that… that was the Mother's rage. Unfiltered. It is a dangerous tool to wield."

Eddie looked at his trembling hands, no longer sure if they were his own. He had saved them, but he had unleashed something truly monstrous to do it.

"That was just their scouts," Elara continued, her gaze turning toward the dark road beyond the gate. "They know the Heartwood is awake now. They will send more than just pest control next time. And the others… the cold ones you ran from… they felt that, too. I promise you."

He had survived, but his sanctuary was a ruin, and he had just lit a bonfire in the dark, signaling his exact location to every monster, human and otherwise, that was hunting him.