In an alcove sat an orange chrysalis-- or it may have been orange. It was hard to tell as an assortment of lights, blue, yellow and red, glittered across it. Inside, a bird lay comfortably. When he opened his eyes, he only saw darkness at first, but within time he began to make out vague shapes and colours.

He could never tell what they were or where they came from; he only knew the inside of his chrysalis. The things-from-the-outside intrigued him for a long time-- but it was unclear even to him if it were minutes, days or weeks.

As time passed he began to feel a little restrained. He could hear voices sometimes, on the other side, but he could never tell what they were saying. He wanted to engage; he wanted to learn and he wanted to speak-- but each time he lifted his head the voices seemed to stop and move elsewhere, away from him.

Now, it was quiet. The eagle watched faint lights dance in the darkness as he tried to stretch, though found himself unable to. There was just no room. Hesitant, he reached out, his beak touching something solid. He paused, briefly, and then moved his head back as far as it would go before roughly pecking the wall of his chrysalis.

He didn't quite know how it happened, but his beak hit nothing and, instead, his head went colliding into the wall of the chrysalis with a soft bonk that was audible even from the outside. If the eagle knew any curse words, he likely would have used them then and there.

He felt frustration boiling inside him. He attempted to flail, angrily, in the little space he had. Which was not much to begin with-- tiny wings battering against the chrysalis with a soft, rapid thump, thump, thump audible from within the orange rock.

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Some flailing later and Fawkes heard something roar out beyond the darkness of his chrysalis. Alarmed, the baby eagle stopped moving completely, wide-eyed, staring out into the dark for a moment. He tried to twist his head around to preen his feathers, but he found that there wasn't enough room to do so.

Dissappointing, he thought briefly.

He hissed out another sigh, trying to ignore both the threatening roar and his own curiosity as to what it came from. He braced himself before moving to knock his beak against the wall of his chrysalis again, trying to break out.

Crack. His beak had hit, this time, as opposed to his head. He reared his head back and pecked into the chrysalis once more. Crack.

A third peck and Fawkes had come tumbling out, head-first, of his chrysalis. It was cold, and suddenly very bright and loud. He could recognize the lights of Polaris as the faint lights he had seen for the last long while, though he didn't feel much comfort knowing this.

The harpy eagle pushed himself upright, looking around briefly before setting his eyes on a bear cub, sitting among the remains of his own chrysalis. A glance down at himself-- realising that he was in the same position --and then a glance back to the bear proved one thing to Fawkes, in his own mind.

"Brother!" He called out once coming to this obviously-logical-conclusion, pushing himself up on shaking legs to pace over. "Are you alright?"


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Fawkes continued half-stumbling over until he was by Zeus' side, nodding sombrely at him. He was, at present, not sure of many things. Who he was, where he was, what he was supposed to be doing-- but of this, he was very, very certain of. It did not cross his mind that they could have looked completely different, though it was fairly obvious to him that he was much smaller than the bear.

Did it matter? Not particularly.

"Zeus," he repeated quizzically, taking a step backwards (and very nearly falling over) as the bear began flailing, avoiding being smacked away by a massive bear paw. "Is that.. who you are?"

If a bird could frown, he would. Instead, he ruffled his down-feathers thoughtfully. Who was he supposed to be? Did this come very simply to the bear or had he made it up on the spot? He wasn't sure.

A moment of thought later, however, and a word tumbled out of the eagle's beak. "Fawkes," he said. "Hello, Zeus. I'm Fawkes."

He nodded, albeit more to himself, and turned his head to stare out towards Polaris again. "What are we to do here, brother?" He asked half-hesitantly, the words sounding strange coming out of his own beak.

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Fawkes considered for a moment, then nodded. Zeus is Zeus. Yes, this made perfect sense to him. Very little else did currently, at least. "Zeus is Zeus," he repeated briefly, then added-- "Fawkes is Fawkes."

"We're brothers," he added thirdly, in case Zeus had for some reason forgotten already.

The fletching eagle hobbled over, briefly preening over the cub's brown fur. His eyes flicked upwards briefly as he saw the bear shrug, though he was more than content to continue for the time being.

Zeus' feathers, Fawkes came to realise, were quite strange. They didn't seem to set this way or that and something told him that they weren't necessarily made to be preened the way that he would clean himself up, but regardless he continued for the time being.

"I'll protect you, too," he said-- even if he wasn't necessarily sure how. "How do you thwap--"

Fawkes' question was quickly answered as Zeus began swinging and flailing, leaping back (and almost falling over again) to once more avoid getting himself mauled. He blinked, then broke into gentle, hearty laughter.

"I see!" He said good-naturedly, approaching once more when Zeus stopped. "We'll do fine together, my brother."

A little more content, the harpy eagle looked around Polaris again. "Maybe we should take a look around?" He suggested, turning his head back to his not-at-all-a-bird brother.

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Fawkes nodded a few times, half to himself and half to his new-found brother. As he came closer to the bear cub-- once he stopped flailing, of course --he gave his shoulder a final, quick preen before turning and stepping off with a slight stumble.

"Onwards! We will see what--" The eagle paused and half-turned with some concern, plodding towards Zeus' paw to peer over it briefly. "Are you hurt? Does that hurt?"

Glancing over the gem, Fawkes' brow furrowed a bit. He looked between Zeus' paw and his own talon, then back to Zeus' paw. He did not have nails that looked like that, nor was his legs covered in feathers.

That alone did not matter, however-- though the bear did seem more than fine. Zeus was pointing at something in no time at all and the fletching blinked and hobbled unevenly towards it.

... Mushrooms? The word sprang into Fawkes' mind but he was quite unaware how. "They're quite pretty!" He agreed enthusiatically, reaching out briefly to gently tap at one with his beak. It was soft, and it shifted under the movement.

"What do you think it is?" He asked, scooting unevenly around the cluster of fungus. "It doesn't speak." He then offered, as if this had been some great realisation.

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