TRANSCENDENCE 13

Savannah knelt down to stare at it. It was her that had killed it in the first place, and now, here it stood, held by the unnatural bindings of her mana. She had brought it back from her own destruction.

And even after the years, it had yet to bloom fully.

"Strange," she murmured under her breath, cupping the flower's petals within her hand. They were flimsy and disformed, holding an uncanny resemblance to it's naturally born cousins nearby.
(Savannah)

Savannah knelt down to stare at it. It was her that had killed it in the first place, and now, here it stood, held by the unnatural bindings of her mana. She had brought it back from her own destruction.

And even after the years, it had yet to bloom fully.

"Strange," she murmured under her breath, cupping the flower's petals within her hand. They were flimsy and disformed, holding an uncanny resemblance to it's naturally born cousins nearby.
(Savannah)
Flowers didn't have souls, so what kept this one from growing properly? Her 'necromancy' of the flowerbed hadn't formed any depravity, hadn't gone aganist the lifestream. It was nature, it was not life. They were plants, not souls.

So what went wrong?

Savannah's kneel gave way to a crouch.

Maybe she could try again...

Her hands cupped the edges of the flower, and slowly, the water began to drain out of its leaves... It began to wither, twisting and shuddering under the painful thrall of her mana. It was dying quicker than it would naturally, but still, it was a slow, agonizing process...

And when all the water was gone, the flower was barely alive. Its leaves held a dull orange and the yet-to-bloom petals began to twist even further inwards, as if cowering under Savannah's watchful eye.
(Savannah)
There was no soul. She couldn't feel it leave the frame of the flower, she couldn't see it depart upwards towards the stars. It just was. The flower was defined as alive by the process of photosynthesis and the production of pollen once matured - it fed, and it reproduced.

It didn't, however, have a soul - something Savannah thought was necessary for life until now.

It was still alive. Barely. It was clinging on - the last bits of glucose were being formed within the thylakoids of its remaining chloroplasts - the amounts were small because the pigment had faded, leaving it to rely on orange light instead. It was almost there, so close to death...

And Savannah would stop it. The processes within its leaves ceased, the gradual decay ceased, everything ceased - it was as if time in that single point in space had come to a halt. Savannah had created a small blip in the timeline, but it was enormous for the artificial life of this soulless plant.

And then it reversed. Water flowed back in through the leaves, which unfurled and stretched upwards towards the light shining into the clearing. The petals unfolded and the stem shot upwards, reaching with the leaves.
(Savannah)