Sprout

In my hand, I held the first seed my master had given me. From behind, he reached out and wrapped his large hands around mine. I flinched at his gentle touch but forced myself to relax. This would be the first time I would be using my temporal muscles, and I didn't want to make it any harder for Irnoma to guide me.

"Ready? I will give you a small push. It will be simple."

I nodded, and soon, an aura surrounded my hand. I admired the moving colors and watched in amazement as the seed suddenly cracked open, revealing a small sprout coming out. I had no idea it would be this much more spectacular when this phenomenon was presented up close and in my own palms.

"Do you feel my push, Damien?" Irnoma asked from behind. His warm breath snapped me out of my daze.

"Uh– sorry!" I closed my eyes and found a strange sensation in my body. I had felt this before, three months ago, before I arrived in this world. "I think I feel it," I replied.

"Good. I will now return control back to you, okay?"

I nodded, then looked intensely at the seed in concentration. I grabbed onto that sensation I felt and pushed forward. The seedling started to grow. Its roots became longer, and its two leaves grew larger. But right after I thought I had succeeded, it went out of control. The leaves began to yellow and the root shrunk. Even the seed turned into a nasty brown color.

"Wait, what's happening!" I turned to Irnoma, looking for answers. "Why is it wilting?!"

Irnoma released my hands and sighed. "Well, don't think it will be that easy. Moving these seeds requires not strength, but precision." He placed a new seed in my palm, then took my dead seed and carefully buried it in the ground. "They are living beings, so treat them with care."

I took a deep breath and looked back at the new seed cradled in my hands. Irnoma wrapped his hands around mine, and I felt the small feeling again. I held on to that sensation and pushed into the seed, but this time, I tried to control it. That was easier said than done, especially for some feeling I couldn't even see. Before the seed even sprouted, it started to crumple and wither. The shell turned into a charcoal black until suddenly, it fell into my hand in thousands of particles of dust.

I opened up my hands, letting the dust fall into Irnoma's palms, and sighed. As he buried the dead plant into the ground, I turned to ask him a question. "I was wondering this since your demonstration of growing all those trees, but did you plant this entire forest?" I looked into the vast forest that I had been living in for the past few months

Irnoma stood up and smiled. "Oh, yes. One day, I hope to cover the entire planet in trees."

"But with your abilities, wouldn't you be able to do that in an instant?"

He smiled, clearly pleased with my question. "Truth be told, I had already covered this planet in trees or other experimental plant life over three hundred million times. It's a pretty good way to pass the time."

I gazed out into the wasteland. This place had already been covered in trees that many times? It was hard to believe that. "Then why are you teaching me? I doubt I can help you that much."

Irnoma put his hand on my head. "Didn't I tell you earlier? I am just giving you the best natural training program out there." He paused and put another seed into my palm. "Plus, I will have some business to attend to for a few months, so I will be out for a while. It will be a shame to let the forest stay stagnant without growing while I am out."

I looked up at him as he put his hands under mine again. "Wait, when are you leaving? What is this for?"

"Well, I can leave pretty much whenever I want, so it'll be right after you learn the basics of growing these trees."

I waited for him to answer my second question, but he simply nodded for me to look back at the seed in my hands. Well, whether or not it was a private matter, it probably didn't have anything to do with me anyway. I turned back and concentrated on my new seed, hoping to succeed in sprouting it this time.

***

So I went on to continue trying again and again and again. For a month I failed and failed and failed. Each day, I sat at the edge of the forest, facing the vast flat nothingness and looking at seeds in my hand until my muscles started to hurt.

I eventually stopped needing Irnoma's help in finding where my temporal muscles were. Still, the seeds continued to rot, crack, or sometimes even completely disappear from my palm. Whenever the roots did come out of the gaps in the seed, it would merely grow so fast that it would wilt in an instant.

But with all this chronal training, I still kept on to my daily physical training. The first day I had woken up from my new unbuilt home at the edge of the forest, I had immediately gone straight to find more seeds to train on. When Irnoma saw that I had skipped my daily run, well, let's just say I got another week of an abusive drill instructor.

From that week on, however, there hasn't been a day when I had seen Irnoma as a drill sergeant. It was complete bliss, and I was determined to keep it that way.

This chronal precision training, on the other hand, was probably more difficult and even more energy-draining than my physical training. I was glad that I had already built my endurance up. I couldn't imagine how hard it would have been if I had started this training when I just came here three months ago.

Then, finally, the day came. I remember clearly the first time I had successfully shifted a seed to its precise germination point without killing it.

It was simply another trial. I was sitting at the end of a long line of large baskets to my side. Each basket was filled with my failed attempts—wilted seeds, crumpled seeds, disfigured seeds, you name it. But what I loved about these baskets was that they clearly showed my progression through time, giving me my daily boost in confidence. The first basket only contained black beads that didn't resemble seeds at all, but the most recent basket right beside me was the greenest of them all, although the small sprouts inside hadn't been able to survive.

This time was different. When I let go of my push and released my concentration, the seed sat there, its green color retained. I was about to place it into the basket when I realized that it was a success. I stood up suddenly and almost dropped the small seedling. After all those trials, had I really finally succeeded?

Cradling the little newborn, I ran to Irnoma's house at the edge of the forest. I pulled the door wide open, ran in, found him sleeping in a comfortable chair, and showed him my work, proud of it but also seeking approval. "Master! I think I've got it! The sprout's still healthy! Look!"

Irnoma opened his eyes and examined my seedling. Then he stood up from his rocking chair with a look of disapproval on his face. "Why didn't you immediately plant it in? You overshot by way too much! If you don't sow it now, it's gonna go like the others!"

I panicked, watching helplessly as the small seedling started to show faint signs of wilting. "What do we do now? This was the first time I had succeeded in keeping a seedling alive!"

Irnoma came over and placed his hand over the seed. Slowly, the root became smaller, and its first leaves became greener. "Don't worry. I rewound it and placed it in a time freeze. I'm giving you an exception just this once, Damien. Don't make the same mistake again."

Together, we quickly took the seed out and planted it at the edge of where the grass grew. The two small leaves now stood in the dirt firmly. It was the front line of the invasion—the first of the millions of trees I would grow in my own forest.

"Master, I think I want to name it."

Irnoma looked at me curiously. "You want to give a tree a name? What could it be?"

"Lazarus… I'll name it Lazarus." I looked back at my first sprout, the one who was brought back to life by Jesus, the one who God had helped.