ORIGIN

Azure puzzled over this question, with a strange sense of frantic pressure. She should know what sisters would make for one another. She should, for some reason, despite having no true decent family, have an answer for this.

Of course, she did not. Instead of her first impulse of blurting "uhh, stuff," though, she took a moment to actually think about her answer. "...I don't know, for sure. Maybe we can think about it? And in like... a week or two bring each other sister... gifts. Whatever you wanna make. Something... representative, you know?"

Then, Dip was wincing, and Azure took a concerned step forward, a quiet and questioning chirp escaping her. "Are you okay? --NO don't cut it! My feathers bleed if I cut them and it hurts," she said, urgently. Feathers were obviously the same as hair--right? "I mean, accidentally obviously but--don't do it, anyway. I mean I didn't--on purpose--sometimes they just fall out, though? Like dead? Maybe your hairs will fall out too, like that. Maybe they're tiny, tiny feathers," she added, padding closer to peer curiously at them.

The hairs had no real secrets that jumped out at her--they still, in fact, looked like hairs--and so Azure turned and went back to pushing rock from the building. At length she paused, taking a few resting breaths. She eyed over the rock, and wondered how it might be easier to move all this crap out of there.

"When I made that rock into stone," she said--thinking aloud, but hoping to bounce ideas off Dip as well--"I was thinking how it'd be good if the stairs were like... solid gemstone. And they turned into it. Is that how all magic works? Like--if I wanted to just... get rocks out--" She stared at the rocks, but they didn't budge.

Azure immediately felt kind of like an idiot. "...I was thinking maybe they'd just move themselves," she muttered in embarrassment.

Serendipity considered this for a moment. If she was going to have a week or two to find a sister-gift, then she'd have to find the best. She furrowed her brow, thinking-- trying to formulate what kind of thing Azure would want. Something for the house would be useful for her, but it wouldn't be for her. It had to be something that she could keep with her, like the ring.

She crinkled her nose thoughtfully. "Yeah, I'm fine," she said. "I'll get you something really good. Like, uh, the best thing ever." But Caves knows what that'll be.

Siren glanced over a little quizzically as Azure started rambling about feathers and blood. This raised a new revelation for her: people might intentionally cut their feathers even though it bleeds. Why they'd ever do that, and why Azure seemed to think she thought she would, was beyond her, however. "Some of my hair falls out," she confirmed. "Usually when I sleep, so there's little strands on my nest and stuff?"

It never really bothered her, and her hair was dense enough that she wouldn't have noticed if her hair was falling out by the occasional single strand. She remained still for Azure to look at the mess of curls on her head, before she turned back towards the wall, to try again.

This time, thankfully, when she started to cast with a furrowed brow, a thin line of blue labradorite-- dark, inlaid with thin, black lines that reminded Serendipity of trees --crawled up the wall and to the hole in the roof. It filled it in smoothly, leaving a trail of silky-smooth stone where it touched. For a moment she inspected it, running her fingers where they could reach the stone, and then she looked back towards Azure.

"You could try again?" She suggested. "Sometimes magic doesn't, like-- work. And it doesn't really seem like there's any other limits on what you could do?"

Thinking about it-- what could they do if they put their minds to it? If they really, really tried? Pride could read minds and memories, apparently, and Laurel could make nice noises without opening her mouth. Serendipity crinkled her nose thoughtfully, before moving to watch Azure and the staircase.

"I'll make something good, too," Azure assured quietly. Really, in her mind, she was already worrying she'd make something awful--but she was excited, too, and running over ideas in her head. She snuck a glance at Dip, thinking.

Something pink, to match her hair? -Maybe. Put that on the maybe pile. Gold! Maybe, to match her--well. Gold stuff? And her freckles? Uhh. And eyes. But --maybe. Maybe something with junk-armor like she wants to make, all symbolic and shit. Or maybe something with two things on it, like sisters. She turned back to the rubble she'd been focusing on. Her embarrassment had by now (mostly) faded, so she did as Dip suggested, and she gave it another shot.

She stared at the rocks, focusing really hard on just how much she wanted them gone. She gave a thought to the house itself, too, just in case that was magic, asking it to help her out. For a long moment, nothing happened. "I don't think it's--" Azure interrupted herself as one of the rocks gave a short jerk, and she startled, dropping it again. "Oh!"

She put her mind right back to it, now exhilarated by the idea that it might just be working. And a moment later, a heavy, broken brick rose--hovering, trembling, in the air. She turned, eyeing Dip with wide, excited eyes. "It works!" she exclaimed--and nearly dropped the rock again as her focus faltered. "Oh--let me-... just get it outside."

Carefully she moved it along, taking note with a sort of vague foreboding at the thrumming throb that lurked somewhere behind her head. It sort of felt like an impending headache, really, but whether it was already triggered, or would only arrive if she kept swinging rocks around with her mind, she couldn't tell.

Once the big stone was safely deposited out the window, she let out a breath of relief and turned to Dip. "...I dunno what limits magic. If anything. If-... Hey, Dip? If we can do anything--anything at all with our magic... what do you wanna do?" Her blue eyes were wide.

If magic were limitless... then so were the possibilities.

Serendipity nodded along thoughtfully, trying desperately-- and half-failing --to think of gift ideas. She could find out how to grow plants and get some kind of garden for her? Or show her how to grow them? That much didn't seem right, however. She crinkled her nose, furrowing her brow.

She was fairly quickly distracted as a rock started floating in the air. "Oh!" She blinked, shuffling right out of the way to let Azure carry the rock off without complication. "You did it!"

That was exciting. She looked around, spied a rock and tried to do the same-- but she didn't even feel the faint pulse of an attempt, no matter how hard she thought about it. She was unsure if it just wasn't working or if this house really did hate her.

She moved over to start hauling the remainders out, looking over as Azure spoke. It was an interesting question but it wasn't one she even had to think about. "The Collector had a robe," she said. "Like, uhhh, this big drapey one. I really want one, so I'd want to like-- make cloth outta nothing and stuff, and just always have cloth so I can make a robe-- but there's even more than just that, that you can make? Obviously? I could make stuff to make the floor softer, or things to put over the windows, and stuff."

She paused, for a split few seconds, before adding; "You'd have to be able to choose the colour and stuff, like how you do for stones." This much only made sense.

"What about you? What would you do?"

Azure thought about this.

She turned her gaze to a rock, and willed it to become cloth.

It did not.

"...The rock doesn't wanna become cloth," she said at last, with a little shrug of her many-winged shoulders. She focused on magicking up a banana, instead, intending it to be a snack they could both share.

"I don't know what I'd do," she responded thoughtfully. "I guess be really powerful, for one thing, so nobody could push me around or push you around. And I'd wanna be able to make cloth, too," she decided. "Ropes and cords and things, and--like what you wear."

As she spoke, a small, black, smelly and withered thing appeared in the air before her. It fell to the ground with a disgusting squelch, and a putrescent odor immediately filled the room. "Oh what the--! SHIT!" Azure blurted, turning, head down, to scurry for the open door before she vomitted.

Once outside she turned quickly back, brow furrowed. "I tried to make a fruit! A food! That's not a fruit!" she cried, her tone one of betrayal. She looked to Dip, as if the other might have an explanation--as if she, herself, had forgotten her many backfired magic casts.

"It's rotten!"

Serendipity, when hearing that Azure was giving it a try, turned her head to also try to will a rock to become cloth. It didn't work, either. She at least had the idea that she could get something for Azure to wear, or at least a reliable recipe for making ropes and chords.

"I think you can just get more powerful by practicing and stuff? So what we're doing here with all the magic and stuff might be good. Uhh, helpful. But I get it? Maybe one day-- when I'm bigger, I mean --we could practice like, defense and stuff? So no one could push us around."

It was a bit of a nice thought, at least. It was all part of being a guardian, right? Defense and stuff, training not for power or to be feared, but to stop people from getting pushed around.

She didn't have very long to think about it further, however, before something hit the roof of her mouth. A rat she'd eaten earlier was suddenly at the back of her throat as she darted outside after Azure with her hands over her mouth. It wasn't like her-- not yet, at least --to start shouting and swearing, but she couldn't help but feel like Azure nailed it with SHIT.

"What IS that?!" She squawked in alarm. "It doesn't even LOOK like a fruit?" It sure as hell didn't smell like one. She sneaked a glance into the room, frowning and covering her mouth and nose still.

"Is it-- is it gonna keep us out of there? What do we do? I can try to burn it?"

"I don't know!" Azure replied, staring wide-eyed back at their ruined house. Obviously it was ruined, all their work for nothing, because how could they possibly ever go back in when it smelled like that?

The hybrid stood on her hind legs, trying to pinpoint the location of the small, black object in the large, relatively dark ruin. She remembered what she'd done before--moving the rocks with only magic, without having to touch them--and extended this magic in. She grabbed at the spot she thought she'd left it; she could even see black, there, but she wasn't sure it was the right thing until she saw the rotten fruit lifted up into the air.

Quickly Azure backed away, taking the fruit out through the window and hurling it some twenty feet further into Orion. "CAN you burn it?!" she asked worriedly, rapidly clicking her beak in instinctive concern. Never mind that she'd only gotten a beak a cycle or two ago. "But only if you don't have to go close!" She cast a worried glance to Azure. "I don't want you getting hurt."

She remained well back, staring, in fear, at the small, dead banana.

Serendipity ducked her head down as the banana went hurling out of the house and into Orion. She stared off in it's direction, then peered back into the house, sniffing cautiously. The scent still... lingered, like some kind of toxin.

"... I'd also like a spell that makes things smell nice," she added towards Azure, picking herself up and scooting cautiously towards the forbidden fruit. She was still about ten feet away, but she could still smell it.

"I don't think it can hurt me," she said. "Uhh, not if I... not unless I like, eat it or something. But I think I can reach it from here?" She glanced back, and then forward, and then shook herself out, readying herself.

Fire was the easiest thing for Serendipity to do-- although it was something of a nasty business. Even as she started casting she could feel the pain rising in her throat as the bile rose and heated until she couldn't keep it back anymore.

She had to scoot even closer to make sure she didn't miss, but eventually when she was in range she spat out a huge globule-- too big to reasonably out of the mouth of a child, it seemed --of red-hot, almost white gunk.

Her mouth and throat and lips were burning even after it left, and she made an effort to try to cool the pain by planting her hands against her mouth. The banana, meanwhile, was consumed in burning-hot bile and slowly began to disintegrate, smoking into the air.

Serendipity quickly skittered back towards the doorway, slumping down against the outside wall. For a moment, she was silent before she lowered her hands from her burnt lips. "It's, like, super dead now," she rasped, looking towards Azure.

Azure stared from the smoldering banana, to Dip, back to the banana, back to Dip...

"Did you just spit fire?" she asked, incredulous, her eyes wide. She sounded impressed--she was impressed, greatly so--but she could see the way Dip was slumped against the building, the way she held her lips as if to stifle pain.

"--Shit, are you okay?" Though worried, Azure noted that Dip didn't seem to be crying or screaming or anything. A little bit of mischief took her, and with another attempt--thankfully, this one working--a new banana made a sudden appearance just by Dip's feet.

"...Would a banana help?" she asked in a half-apologetic, half-humorous voice. She knew this joke was terrible, but she had to make it anyway.

And who knew; maybe the banana would help. Maybe it'd feel cool on a burned mouth and throat... assuming the memory of rancid banana stench didn't make Dip puke, first.

The pain was fading from sharp and biting to a dull throbbing, at least. Serendipity had the advantage that her hands and mouth were calloused, at least-- but it didn't quite stop it from hurting. It just didn't make it hurt as much.

"... yeah," she said meekly, a little hoarsely. "It's, uh, kinda what I'm best at? I can make myself start smoking, and I can breathe really hot air. There's this one spell I know, where I drool a lot, but if fire hits the drool it'll like-- explode."

A pause. "It's kinda sick," she admitted.

She pat her mouth down a little further, though Siren was shaking her head. "I'm fine. It's just, uhh-- it's fire, you know? Fire hurts," she said, imparting with some Ancient Wisdom. She at least identified this humour, snerking amusedly.

"As long as it's alive," she said-- and thankfully, this time, it was. She picked up the good banana and took the skin off with her fingers. She offered one half towards Azure, and stuck the rest into her mouth.

Eating directly after spewing fire wasn't the best idea in the world, but the banana was refreshing enough to cool it down a bit further, as long as she didn't move it around too much in her mouth. Unfortunately, this meant she was sitting with her mouth full for a good, solid thirty seconds.

Eventually, when she chewed and swallowed, she looked back into the house. "Maybe we should take a break? We've cleaned a lot of it out," she suggested.