Sunflower

REWORKING
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INTRODUCTION
What does one do, in a world where not everyone is accepted for who they are? That's a question Sunflower can't stop asking herself. What does one do, when they don't feel like they'll ever truly fit in? She doesn't know. She doesn't know now, and isn't sure she'll know anytime soon. The best she can do is simply try to fit in, hide her differences. That's when she'll finally be happy, right?
But of course, her differences are what make her feel happy. Her ability to keep plants alive after being plucked brings her joy, one of the only things that does so. She's at a crossroads. Do what she loves and be hated, or hide what makes her happy and fit in?
Warning!! Mentions of , , and 
"Beautiful" - Sunflower
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Sunflower 	Sunflower
 	
Artist 	sab, please ignore the subject stuff!
Background 	Background
Creator 	sby
Coding 	☁️
Theme Song 	
Character 	Character
Age 	14 (dy)
Gender 	female
Orientation 	lesbian
Occupation 	dessert shop owner
Tribe 	mud
Residence 	hikari
Relatives 	text
Allies 	tba
Enemies 	tba
likes 	flowers, trees, anything that grows, being alone, beauty, keeping plants alive, doing things alone
dislikes 	being watched, being touched, plants being harmed, harsh words, being offered assistance
Powers 	easily able to identify many types of plants, can keep plants alive after they are picked.
Flaws 	shows signs of having depression, relies heavily on herself and doesn't trust others.
Love Interests	coffee
Quote 	"rise, little flower. spread your roots."
APPEARANCE
Often seen at the dessert shop she owns, this MudWing never strays far from her home or workplace in the beautiful town of Hikari. When she moves around, she uses large, lumbering steps to support her tribal bulk. She’s rather tall, taking up quite a bit of space as compared to even an average MudWing. 
Her posture is often slumped and hunched, because even though she's improving, her bad mental health still affects the way she stands. Unlike some, who seem too happy too be depressed, you can tell she's not okay from the way she chooses to hold herself. Her head hangs low, only looking up to serve a waiting customer. Her back is hunched, as if she's given up on holding herself up.
Her scales are rather normal for a member of her tribe, and if you weren't looking for her, your eyes would probably just skim over her if you passed her in the streets. Her lower mainscales are golden brown, a lighter colour that fits her well. They cover most of her upper jaw and the top layer both her front legs. Her upper mainscales are several shades darker. They're a complementing shade called cafe noir, and they run down her tail, complemented by spines of a dark chocolate like colour.
Her underbelly is a pale yellow-white sort of colour, and continues up the back of her forelegs. Her wing membranes are an orange-gold shade named Indian yellow, and are almost like honey. Around the left of her horns of the same colour, a pink flower is tied. Her odd power within keeps it alive, and it's her most sacred possession, one she simply never wants anyone else to ever touch. Her scales are flecked with goldenrod.
Her expression is almost always a reflection of how she feels inside. She doesn't bother faking a smile, and displays a solemn frown for all to see, her sadness gleaming in her soft blue eyes.
"I'll never fully trust you" - Sunflower
PERSONALITY
When unfortunate things happen to someone, they often go one of a few big ways. Some choose to cover up their sad and angry feelings with a mask of happiness, by being kind and bright with everyone they meet, and hoping they heal themself along the way. Some choose not to hide those feelings, and sometimes it's not a choice, the feelings are just on the surface for everyone to see. And some choose to bury their feelings deep within, not just the negative ones but the positive ones, choosing to be numb. In the beginning, Sunflower was the latter.
"Who even am I?" - Sunflower
HISTORY
Sunflower hatched into a tiny sib group of only three, with one older brother and one younger sister. The belief that this would make them extra tight was true enough, at least at the beginning. Her older brother, Jacal, was the fierce BigWings, and he protected her. He protected her sister, Elk. They felt safe under his wing, despite their lack of a big family.
She loved her siblings, and they loved her back. Their little cave was soft and cozy, and they were cared for by the community, not just Jacal. For a few years, that was how it went. Until the community turned its back on her.
She started to grow up and find herself, and express who she was. She was a dragonet who liked girls, which she figured out pretty quickly. That wasn't what made them averse to her, though. The community was accepting of her sexuality, and her sibs especially. Still, it no one seemed to want her as a partner, which made her upset. Yet she pushed on, happy that they still loved her. She began to discover her talents in making sweet treats, such as pastries and cakes, which made her smile.
The bad things started with something beautiful. A single pink tulip started the domino effect that sent Sunflower into her downward spiral. This pink tulip grew in a small grassy patch near her home, that the kind MudWing stumbled upon one fateful day. She picked that tulip, and she took it home, to show it off to her sibs. She tied it around her horn, and showed it to Jacal.
He seemed happy for her, but told her that eventually the flower would die. He told her not to pick plants, because they couldn't live anymore. She apologized, but kept that flower around her horn.
Days passed, and the flower looked the same. The dragons in her community were starting to notice. They asked her if she was changing it out, and she told them she didn't. They just called it "one strong flower" and moved on. When a few more days passed, she started to notice the stares. By the next week, the whispered words behind her back. By the next, they weren't even hiding their disgust. They told her to her face she was a 'freak.' A 'weirdo.' Only Jacal and Elk still were kind. She felt like an outcast
Jacal made her take the flower off and throw it to the earth, for her own good, he said. He told her to hide this part of her, because it would cause her only pain. She didn't want to do it, but she did. Yet that night, she took the flower from the earth and hid it by her bed.
Now the words and stares stopped, at least mostly. Dragons started talking to her after a while, and a few weeks later things seemed normal. Yet they weren't. Sunflower felt like she was missing a part of herself, and she only felt complete when she pulled out the hidden flower at night and kept it alive. The dragons liked her again, but she still wasn't happy. The flower tied around her horn had filled a hole she didn't even know she had, and now she felt empty without it.
Jacal had said, though, that fitting in would make her happiest. So she began to feel worse and worse, her brain torn between two options, unsure which was the lesser of two evils. At one point, the simple worries became something more. She started to withdraw from Jacal and Elk, and stopped accepting her brother's help. The townsfolk still saw the happier Sunflower, but her sibs and her all knew something was wrong.
One night she could barely take it, and she ran a claw down her talon until it drew blood. I deserve this, she thought. For being such a freak. Then she realized what she'd done, and gasped. She stopped and hid it, so her sibs wouldn't worry. She told herself she wouldn't do it again.
Except she did. She wrapped furs and cloths around the scars on her wrists and scars in other places. It felt good to hurt herself, because she felt she was doing the world a favour. That was when her depression became clear. It was never professionally diagnosed, but she knew that was what she had. Then, at the moment, she needed her family most, she pulled away from them for good.
She gave tearful goodbyes to her sibs, but didn't say a word to the townsfolk. Then she left, tied her flower around her horn, and set off for a place where she would find peace, if such a place existed. Jacal and Elk tried to stop her, but she left anyway.
She began to travel, by flight and by foot, settling in places alone, not feeling enought motivation to go into the hearts of those places and actually make a life for herself. The longer she went without a home, the deeper she slipped, until she started telling herself she wanted to stop living. She had to, to make the world better. Luckily, she never acted on these thoughts, but she almost did. It was only a soft voice in the back of her head, telling her not to give up, that kept her alive.
Then, after months of trying place after place, and just holding on, she found Hikari, the Town of Light. She stumbled into the town, tired and hungry, as that day she'd found no motivation to feed herself. Yet that voice was telling her she had to eat. So she did. She walked into town and ordered a tiny sandwich from a shop, planning to just take it and leave. Yet the storekeeper seemed to notice something about her, and when she was about to leave, he motioned to her to stay, and she did. They began to talk, and Sunflower responded to his questions. Yes, he was the one asking most of the questions, because she didn't care enough to ask her own. 
He asked her if she wanted help with settling in, after which she stood up quickly and abruptly told him she wouldn't stay. Then she left the shop, and settled in at a cheap motel for the night, fully meaning to leave in the morning.
Yet when she awoke, and went to pack up, she couldn't. Something invisible was keeping her tied to the spot, and she couldn't bring herself to leave Hikari, at least not yet. So she stayed another night. Yet that next morning, she felt the same pull. So that day, she decided to figure out what exactly was drawing her to this town. She wandered out onto the streets, her flower tied around her horn, just how she liked it. She knew the looks she'd get, but it didn't matter. She'd be gone from this place soon, alone with her thoughts again. Except, when she walked down a street filled with rather normal-looking dragons, they didn't seem to care that a living, growing flower was right there around her horn. They didn't laugh or point, didn't whisper behind her back. 
Instead, a NightWing smiled at her and called, "Nice flower!"
The strangest part? He sounded genuine. His words, his smile seemed real, not forced. His tone wasn't sarcastic, it was kind and warm, and that smile actually reached his eyes. It was a fluke, she thought. A lucky break.
Except it wasn't. Everywhere she went in Hikari, she saw kind villagers lifting each other up, everyone treating each other as equals, even the oddities, with missing wings or extra horns or anything else of the sort. She got more compliments, and a small dragon even asked her if she was magic. Sunflower still wasn't sure if this was real. It was too good to be true, but why not give Hikari a try? So she looked, searched, until she found a flyer, hanging off the side of a building. Hikari Homes and Properties, it read.
+++
About a year ago, Sunflower would have no idea where she'd be right at this very moment. She was walking into a home. Not a home shared by her and her sibs, but a home she owned. Not a cave, but a real home, built from wood and stone. It wasn't much, but it was more than she'd ever known. It had been a week or two since she'd set up a dessert stall in the central market. The motel owners were alright with her staying during the time she made enough money for the house, as long as she provided them with some of her delicious treats.
Sunflower's stall was an even bigger hit than she'd hoped. Dragons had started coming slowly, then more and more came. Now, she was busy almost all day. Yet Sunflower couldn't seem to accept it. They couldn't actually like that stuff, right? They just bought it to make her feel good. Except she wouldn't stop, couldn't stop. She needed the cash, to live in this place.
Weeks passed, and her stall was too busy to just be a stall. Eventually, she decided she needed to make it bigger. Better. Unfortunately, Sunflower's motivation was still not good in the least, and she gave up quickly. She had nearly forgotten about it when a young gentleman approached her stall and offered her the property his business had taken up. The conversation was mostly one-sided, Sunflower a bit turned off by his huge amount of enthusiasm. Still, after a few minutes, she learned he was to move out of town, and needed to sell the property. So she bought it, and with some help, made her stall into a shop. 
On opening day, almost no one showed. Sunflower, heartbroken, closed the shop down early. She rushed home, and buried her snout into her pillow. Then, a tear slipped down her cheek. Then another, and another. Now, the tears rushed down into her pillow, her sobs almost impossible to hear, but still very much real. That day, Sunflower almost gave up. She grabbed a kitchen knife from a drawer and cut lines on her talon until she drew blood, which only made her cry more.
Sunflower didn't get out of bed the next morning. She spent the day lying there, angry and sad at the same time. It was a day of no motivation, and not even the tiny voice in her head could get her to leave that bed.
The next day, though, the voice won. She forced herself out of bed, but barely cared about fixing her sleepy eyes. She stumbled to work, and entered the shop, mumbling apologies to her small staff. Half an hour later, the store opened. At first, almost no one came again. Sunflower almost closed up early a second time. Then, suddenly, a group came in, then another. Finally, her old customers were finding the place. Sunflower spent that day making and serving, with some help of course. It made her happier, but she had yet to find the spark that would really change things. Really help her.
Then, one day, over half a year later, that spark sat down at one of her dessert shop's tables. A dragoness entered the shop, a pale-coloured MudWing dragoness. Sunflower always looked up when she heard the little bell ring at her shops door, but this time she kept looking. She felt a pull, dragging her to the table where she had just sat down. An employee went to take the dragoness's order, but Sunflower stopped her. She inexplicably but completely knew she had to serve that dragoness.
So she walked over to the table, where she looked at the dragon who sat in front of her. Sunflower knew what sadness looked like, and she saw it in that MudWing's eyes. The rings of red she had clearly tried to hide, and that feeling hidden in the back of her expression. She didn't talk much to the MudWing, in fact only to take her order. What she didn't know was how much talking they would really do.
The dragoness, who Sunflower had never seen step foot in the shop before, started to show up more and more. Sunflower's colleagues seemed to notice the way Sunflower looked at her, and always left the MudWing open for her. At first, the dragoness, who was named Coffee, was the only one talking, with Sunflower occasionally giving one-word answers. Yet as time went on, she actually began to speak to Coffee, and she would greet her with a tiny smile and a few words, the greatest effort she had ever made with someone since she left home. As she gave Coffee her order she'd occasionally tell her stories, until Coffee one day asked if they could meet after closing. Sunflower refused, hesitant to speak with her without a proper escape, afraid to fully trust her.
After weeks of talking and asking, Sunflower finally caved. She agreed to meet with Coffee after closing, provided they met inside the shop so it would feel familiar. She smiled at Coffee as she left the shop the morning before their meeting, sending her off with a free cookie as a parting gift. She could already feel the butterflies flapping in her stomach, but she pushed them down, deciding to focus on the shop for now.
Then closing came, and she locked the door, just to make sure no one would come in uninvited, and she leaned against the counter as she waited for Coffee to walk through the door. She was shaking from nerves, and she wasn't sure why they were so bad. Then, it came to her. The reason she was so jittery every time she was near Coffee, but also felt safer than she ever had. The reason she felt so pulled to her, the reason she had always wanted to speak to her whenever she came into the shop.
Sunflower was falling in love with her.
"I just don't like myself" - Sunflower
ABILITIES
tba
"Cakes and cookies. That's about it." - Sunflower
RELATIONSHIPS
coffee:
"I wish I could make you all grow faster" - Sunflower
TRIVIA
"What's even the point of living?" - Sunflower
GALLERY
AsdfgDEME.jpeg|Image drawn by Sab
Sunflower.jpeg|Aesthetics by me
SunflowerNeonn.png|A neon sunflower by MoonlightFantasy
Category:Females
Category:Content (Sbyman)
Category:Characters
Category:Work in Progress
Category:MudWings
Category:LGBT+
Category:Mature Content