Viola continued to glare at the plant she had ripped from its roots, stalking over to it and kicking dirt and dust over it. Childlike behavior. But she at least listened to Azure' advice and began searching the ground with her eyes. Tiny black things were darting to and from cracks. Her head tilted as she aimed and began pecking at the ground, trying to grab them with her beak. She got a few of the ants, although they didn't taste like plants at all. She grimace as she swallowed, but she continued to peck at the parade of ants for a couple of moments.

It suddenly occured to her that Azure's voice sounded different. She'd been so caught up in her anger towards the plant that she hadn't noticed it. But now she jerked up, looking at her carefully. She didn't seem any different, but the tone of her voice had grown still and lifeless. "What's wrong," she asked, quite bluntly, without any hint of sympathy. "Acting weird. Tell me." It wasn't even a request. It was a demand. And she expected Azure to answer her in some regard. After all, Azure was in her territory. She would abide by her rules, her demands.

@Azure

"Wrong?" It was a blank question, emptily asked. She didn't know anything was wrong-?

Azure turned, peering about at the sky, the rocks, before glancing back to Viola. It didn't even register in her mind that the ostrich meant her. Without much thought, she--sort of--repeated a prior question.

"Did you want to hear about the safe places?" she asked, this time indifferently. She cast her eyes again over the sky, the rocks-... Who knew who might be nearby? She hadn't spent this much time out in the open in a long while.

Or, well-... Could this even be considered "the open?" And were they in danger, anyway? Fleeting thoughts of faceless predators flicked through her mind. Or one of those Eridanus monsters coming after or. Or, worse, her family finding her--a prospect that struck her with both hope and dread, in equal measure.

"...Good to know where safe places are," she added, as an afterthought. She looked back to Viola.

The chick seemed fearless, in the way that ignorant children often do. For a moment--just a moment--Azure envied her, a bitter, spiteful jealousy, which for an even briefer instant gave way to admiration. Then it passed, and they were just two birds (...ish) in a hot cave.

@Viola

Viola couldn't help but be annoyed when Azure passed her question off. Her beak snapped again angrily but it wasn't quite enough to set her off. Azure was just weird. She didn't think too deeply about it, she just came to the conclusion. Everything she saw and heard, the sudden change from gentle to indifferent, and the way she kept talking about safe places was very weird.

She gestured around the area. "My place is safe. I'll make it safe." It wasn't clear if she meant this as a warning to Azure or a general statement. She certainly didn't put any hidden meaning beneath it, but the talons she scraped against the ground displayed her meaning well enough - she'd fight if anyone tried to stir up trouble.

The way Azure was looking around seemed distracted. Viola huffed. She didn't like being ignored like this. "Are you scared?" Once again, no sympathy, just a demanding question that was expected to be answered.

@Azure

Azure snorted immediately at the question, though not really insulted by it.

"No," she answered. "But no, this place isn't safe. You can't 'make' it safe. Scared and 'not stupid' are two different things." She paused. She had been on the verge of calling Viola stupid for thinking herself safe, but (though the childish impulse lingered) she stopped herself when realizing that hey, this was a newly-hatched baby. Of course the ostrich had no idea what dangers lay out there.

And, Azure realized, she herself didn't really care.

There wasn't much reason to hang around, really. The other chick wasn't interested in the advice she had to offer, nor was she very certain, herself, that her information was worth anything regardless. She'd also been wanting to... reach out? Somehow, to others. But this one was just as emotionless, it seemed--just as blunt and angry and empty of feeling--as her family had been.

Viola, and talking to Viola, would gain her nothing--and apparently the ostrich wanted nothing from her.

Well, at least the fuzzy thing now knew to watch out for thorns.

"I live close. You need help, you shout. Maybe I'll come help," she went on, still indifferently, and turned away. Wings spread, but she waited to see if the chick wanted to add anything before Azure took off.

@Viola

Finally, something that riled her up. The ostrich's feathers puffed and her beak clacked angrily. "I can do anything I want!" It made perfect sense to her - if she was alive and she had a free will, she could, literally, do anything she wanted to do. If she wanted to make this place safe, she would make it safe. She would fight anyone that tried to tell her otherwise until nobody dared to come anywhere near her. She pawed at the ground with her feet and her neck arched forward again.

She didn't like Azure anymore. Obviously, she didn't care. She didn't think that Viola was capable of anything she was saying. She let out a hissing sound interspersed with a clicking beak. "Leave my territory. I don't want you in it." She shuffled forward, in a position that threatened an attack. She would drive Azure away if she had to.

@Azure

"Ain't yours, thunderbutt," she answered absently as she took to the air. She wasn't really sure where the half-hearted, rather indifferent insult had come from.

If the kid ended up getting mauled by something, she was sure she'd overhear. She could decide then whether she felt like helping. The ostrich just struck her as her mother all over again, in the making--emotionless, aggressive, territorial, and just generally a bitch.

She didn't want any part of that.

Azure circled off, out of sight, taking a quick look over the area nearby. It looked safe enough, and she saw no sign of anyone else, at the moment--Monoceros was often an empty-ish place, at least. So she left Viola behind, and kept her most important advice to herself. Let the chick figure it out on her own time. She, herself, had better things to do.

Like eating, sleeping, and breathing, away from the other bird.

Within a few minutes Viola was mostly forgotten--Azure would remember that she was there, of course, but her concern no longer lay with her.

It seemed this "socializing" thing wasn't such a good idea, after all.

exit Azure

@Viola

The insult kind of came out of nowhere and Viola was confused for a moment. She didn't know what those three words meant and by the time she figured out they were meant to insult her, it was too late to do anything. Azure was already taking off but that wasn't going to keep her from trying.

Her anger exploded outwards and she burst forward with a hissing sound and kicked out where Azure had been moments before but her talon pushed through thin air. She was gone already. Viola looked up, her feathers ruffling angrily. "Don't come back!" She watched Azure flying away for a moment before she turned back and stepped over to the place where she had found those bugs before. All this anger was making her hungry. She wouldn't forget Azure, but the hybrid creature was being pushed to the back of her mind now. She was alone again without an annoying, rude creature watching over her now. This was better.

*exit