daybreakacademy | they meant well

Entry tags:

they meant well

Who: Tobias, confused vets, anyone!
What: Rescue a birb before he's shipped back to the States
Where: ???
When: End of July
Warnings: Will be added as necessary

This summer feels different than the last to one bird-boy, though not in a bad way. His second summer at school. Why, exactly, is not easy to pin down. Maybe it's because he has friends. He belongs. He doesn't feel so out of place these days--he never really was, but the mind is tricky like that. There may not be a next year, that's impossible to entirely forget. He's trying, though. Taking each day as it comes.

Long, lazy afternoons drifting in the wind, on days he's not needed. No classes. Sketching or painting whenever he wants. Goofing around with video games, especially that one where it's all blocks and landscaping and exploring. Reading at night when he can't sleep. A kitty to look after and keep him company. So wonderfully ordinary, for the first time in his life. The best summer he's ever had.

There are finally people to notice when he goes missing, unlike in his own life. (No one from home bothered to search for him. He checked.) It may take a little longer without classes for him to be absent from... but notice they will, when there is no distinctive red-tailed hawk in the sky towards the end of July.

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[Tobias, fighting his way to the waking world and realizing he's still in the cage, begins to shriek. That distinctive red-tailed hawk's call. He knows he shouldn't, that he's not helping the situation, but he can't help himself. The present is blurring with the past. All cages are the same. The hawk and the boy are both terrified, knowing indescribable pain must be coming--

And the man turns at the sound of bottle hitting the floor, but the distraction only lasts for a moment thanks to one bird's screeching. Poor guy, he only wanted five minutes of sunshine and a cigarette! More French: what are you kids doing, please put the bird down, it needs our help, as he steps closer to Puella, reaching for the cage with more desperation this time...]

[The guy was looking away! This was the perfect time to--or not.] --Toby no!

[She tries to hold the cage steady and calm Tobias down, although it is not easy while the guy was reaching for it. Puella had to step away, just enough so the employee couldn't take it.]

You can't send him away, he's our friend! [It was...a pure reactionary response, but, it technically didn't break anything, she thought?]

[Oh, boy. What's she going to do, she has to do something. She begins to scale the building and calls out to try and get the guy's attention away.]

Our apologies!

[Why is this happening to him, he just works here.]

Your 'friend' doesn't belong here. It's illegal to keep him in this country, and even worse to have released--

[Meanwhile, Kokoro is climbing up the side of the building, at the same time other vets hear the bird screaming and come running to check on it. Only to see the window is open and the cage is gone. And when they look out the window... there she is!]

Young lady! Stop! Get down from there!

[Translation: oh god why is this happening, they just work here!]

[What would have been another perfect chance to disappear, failed due to there being people in the window now. Great.]

[Although Puella was given a bit of an option for Plan B. Under all of the commotion Kokoro was making, she can run for it. The trees or bushes would keep her out of view from the people in the window, and hopefully she can loose the guy long enough in there too.]

[Sorry Kokoro, you're on your own for awhile.]

[That's fine, she doesn't have Tobias anyway, so they won't get what they want from her. She looks up at the gathering crowd around the window, pauses, and takes one hand off the wall to awkwardly wave.]

...hello!

[She grabs back onto the wall before she can fall off, gauges her distance, and before anyone can grab at her, springs off into a gym-class-worthy backflip... into the recycle dumpster. At least it wasn't the garbage one right next to it.]

[Cigarette Man gapes behind him at Kokoro backflipping off the roof, then at the bird thief darting away into the woods. Nothing he can do but chase, though he doesn't think he'll catch up. Someone has to think about the poor thing's best interests!

'The poor thing' who is being jostled around in the cage now, still half drugged. And the other half of him is panicking, confused, too groggy to work out what the hell is going on. Tseeeer!

(It could be worse. He could be screaming as a voice inside their heads.)

No one else chases Puella, not after seeing the other girl throw herself off the roof. There aren't that many people in the building, anyway, and the three that are left are racing around to check if Kokoro's okay.]

[It was difficult to outrun, hold on the cage, and keep it steady so Tobias wouldn't freak out as much all at the same time. She might not be seen but there was plenty of noise, especially with a hawk screaming. It'll have to do.]

--Just a little further Toby, hang in there!

[And this probably as far as Puella was going to have in terms of distance. Rather than ducking and hiding she finally just goes for it, using the dense foliage as a cover. Hopefully whatever flash her magic makes it won't be seen, or get confused for something mundane.]

[Suddenly, she was completely gone.]

Worry not, worry not! [She slips on cardboard, grumbles, and drags herself out of the disposal bin without much damage.] I simply wished to see what was causing the commotion. I'll leave you all be, you seem very busy right now!

[She waves nervously, looks around, and runs off. Well, at least she doesn't look injured from that stunt. She starts down the road until she's pretty sure no one's following her, then goes into the trees and begins to look around for the other two.]

[It's daytime and sunny, too, making any weird flashes of light less obvious. Everything is so incredibly confusing for the poor veterinarian, anyway. He was falling behind, not in best of shape, when the hawk's screaming cuts out. And when he does catch up to where she was, there's... nothing. He leans over to catch his breath, wondering if he's completely gone insane. Did she wring the poor thing's neck?? What??

The other three are looking at each other, bewildered, wondering if they should follow... and somewhere else, Tobias is still shrieking madly, flapping bruised wings as if his life depends on it.]

[This was probably far enough. At any rate, she couldn't put up with the screeching for much longer, so she set the cage down.]

You gotta stay still..! [She can open the cage now, but only if he stops flailing around like that. She needed a second to figure out how the lock actually works.]

[But finally, the door swings open. He's free to go. But a thought occurred if he even was able to fly right now... They were all about to find out soon.]

[Kokoro keeps on moving, though trying to balance "be quiet so the vet staff won't follow you" with "make noise to find Puella and Tobias and also so bears go away" is... a bit of a struggle. Are there even bears around here? She grumbles and starts climbing up the side of a tree, keeping a look out as she does.]

[He can't fly very well at all under the influence. A lot of 'influence', enough to blur the lines between the boy and the hawk mind, and he hasn't morphed any of it away. On the other hand, it may have been the only reason he didn't think out loud and make the whole situation worse.

He flutters out of the cage weakly, disorientated and not able to make it off the ground. He stops a few feet away from the cage, huddling down. The screaming has stopped, at least.

Kokoro won't be able to spot Puella. Nothing out there but one confused man, shouting for the kid to come back.]

[He's not screaming anymore, that's a relief.]

...Toby? [She gives the bird some space. He was frazzled, so it made sense that he wouldn't fly extremely well but it good to know he didn't completely take off.] How do you feel?

[Tobias hasn't said a word yet either, which was a little concerning. Puella did not travel extremely far under the time stop so she did perk up a bit when she could hear faint voices calling. It was the man, no doubt.]

[Great, can't spot them. Well, she'll make her way up anyway, at least to a solid-looking branch to hide from the vet calling around for Puella. Her clothes are covered in rips, grass stains, and pieces of mulch. Kokoro sighs as she settles on the branch and pulls out her phone.]

I presume you've found your way somewhere safer than this. Unfortunately, we're too far from the school for me to call my Rune Armour, and it would be very easily noticed besides. I shall await the staff member giving up the chase, which he appears understandably reluctant to do.

[The man wouldn't be in the career he's in if he didn't care about animals, and yes, it doesn't seem he'll give up anytime soon. There will be another one of them searching in a few minutes--weird as things are, they can't all run off and leave the other animals alone.

Tobias stays hunkered down, eyes half lidded in a sleepy way. He's out of the cage, and without the panic driving him... he's very, very sleepy.]

< Tired. Five more minutes. >

[Phone buzzes and Puella frowns a bit as she checks it. It likely won't be long till they had to move again. The shouting was getting slightly louder. She felt bad for them.]

...We better go meet with Kokoro somewhere and get out of here.

[Which might mean figuring where she hid too... Someplace well, no doubt.]

You can sit on me if that helps.

[Taps on phone.] i was gonna fly back with toby but hes too tired right now. where are you?

Edited 2020-08-21 03:03 (UTC)

[Kokoro moves a little to get a shot of where the animal tech is wandering, in case it's anywhere near where Puella is, and quickly pulls back in hopes that he won't see her. She nearly slips --]

Whoa --

[-- and clings onto the tree, managing to neither plummet herself nor drop her phone. Send. Now Puella should know where she is and where her pursuer is. She figures she'll come up with a plan to avoid one and reach the other.]

< What... >

[He stretches his aching wings, blinking and scanning the area, groggy as hell. He had to be, it was the only way they could keep him calm.]

< Oh. Wow. > [Worst rescue ever!!] < ...That could have gone better. >

[Not far away, Kokoro is heard, but not seen. At this point, he may be muttering some inappropriate French words under his breath... free vocabulary lessons!]

[We're doing our best!!] It was going fine for awhile!

If we could tell them you're not a normal bird...

[Well, then none of this wouldn't need to happen at all.]

[Puella checks her phone again. She wasn't exactly sure where it is but that was the guy who was yelling earlier. Kokoro must be very close to him.]

We better hurry soon...

[Kokoro clings to the tree. She holds her breath, hoping the branch won't start to crack. Isn't there anything else she can do... She climbs a little higher to a branch that's further to the side, clambers up to that, and looks over the side to see if she can spot the others or be spotted by them... and hopefully not the guy.]

< If I didn't have to pretend to be a normal bird, I would have escaped days ago. > [He grumbles to himself, grump grump.] < I'll... be something else. They won't be looking for a deer. And I guess you should get back to school. >

[He does not, in fact, know Kokoro's involved too. Kokoro, who can see the man by now. He's looking for a girl on the ground with a cage, not a weirdo up in a tree.]

Can you even transform right now? [Seeing how he was having trouble flying... There was plenty of other questions she had too, but unfortunately, they needed to come up with something soon.]

...I think they're still looking for me so I was gonna fly back. But we can wait for you.

[Kokoro frowns, yanks a piece of bark off the tree with a crack, and hurls it off somewhere else to clatter. Maybe the guy will follow the noise, and she can look out again to see if she can spot the kids.]

Come on...

< Yeah. I've done it when I was... uh, tired before. > [Not from being sedated, mind. For another reason he'll take to his grave, ha. He lowers his head and starts to think deer.

The man, feeling like he's completely lost control of his life in the last half hour, does follow the sound for lack of any other direction to go in...]

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hattersgonnahat - 2020-09-13 20:40 (UTC) - Expand

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