M for adult language

Azure only woke when she felt something thud against her side. Groggy, she managed a half-asleep mutter of "Wha--" and a closely-following realization that her breath stank as though she'd been asleep for weeks. She winced, and rolled upright--and felt a tumble of shifting stone around her, crystalline and light.

Speaking of light...

She squinted. Everything seemed too damn bright. She didn't know what was going on--but after a moment, and a few glances around, she had gathered a few bits of information. Those bits, though, still seemed rather fragmented and nonsensical to her sleepy mind. So she went over them, slowly, bit by bit.

Okay... 's'bright. Same cave I was in... before. Tired... sore... 'S'this my gemstone? Sure looks like it... all 'round me, too... Did I sleep? She started to push up to stand, gradually--and nearly fell over, and suddenly she was wide awake, fear spiking through her.

"What the FUCK," she hissed, and it only wasn't a shriek because her voice was not all-there yet, and because she feared being overheard when she had no idea what her situation was. "I've got new legs?"

She croaked this in alarm, in awe, twisting her head to stare downward. She had a new pair of forelimbs--at least, she certainly didn't remember having those before, though she quickly racked her brain looking for stray memories of them. They were birdlike, sleek and black. Cautiously she stood, pulling her way from the scattered shards of sapphire, and this time, she kept her feet.

Joy flooded through Azure, then, as she realized how much easier this was. "Holy shit, I can walk," she whispered in awe. So THIS was how everyone else balanced when they moved! One after the other--one in front of the oth--oops--there we go--yeah!

Fascinated, the hybrid turned, eyeing herself over in the sapphire shards. Her reflection was dimmed by rich color, but she could see other changes, too, and she was shocked--her mouth was now a beak, for one thing. ...That explains why talking felt stiff. Wonder if it's got anything to do with my breath? -That's probably just from sleeping. At length she turned, dipping her head. She had a white cheek-patch, now, like mother had had (Eugh, fucking great, now I'm marked even MORE clearly. Shit, shit, shit.), and... ...Wait.

What are those?

Azure tilted her head to and fro, examining herself closely. Are those fucking antlers? For a short, breath-frozen moment, she tried to do the math.

Bird, plus bird, is bird. Why the fuck do I have antlers? Wait... WAIT. Why have I got HOOVES? Why haven't I ever QUESTIONED THIS before?! Azure's mind railed against her own stupidity as she whirled, looking down at her hind hooves. She'd always had those--she'd just never really thought about it before.

What did this mean..? She'd obviously been missing something her entire life. Had Blueberry been her father, too? Had he been the one to raise the stone of--no, that couldn't be; she had Blackberry's cheek-patch, too. Huckleberry? She shuddered. "I sure as hell hope not," she muttered, with quiet venom. She hadn't been able to stand her brother (but was he her brother..?) for quite a long time, now.

"Okay, so. I wake up with new legs. And antlers, and--a fucking beak. And I have no idea how long I've been asleep or how this happened," she murmured to herself. Another look around, her eyes finally adjusting to Monoceros' bright heat, told her nothing new.

For a moment the hybrid simply stood there, alone in the quiet roar of the Twister far overhead, cradled by the depths of the Gorge as she tried to remember.

Azure remembered... she remembered... Wind. And...

She paused, for another long moment, but nothing came.

Nope, just wind. Had she gotten caught in it? Or maybe just gone to sleep..? No urgent memories jumped out at her; she shrugged it off. Gembound went to sleep all the time.

She supposed she'd just slipped into rest, for awhile.

From the ground, the big ball of white and blue fluff could easily be mistaken for a very colorful cloud lazily drifting through Monoceros, although clouds weren't exactly a common thing in the caves. As it was, Wyvern was looking for someone. Her mother, actually. She'd come back to the nest one day to find it all but deserted. She'd waited, since it was fairly common for Asimona to leave - to hunt and such, but when she didn't come back in a couple of days, Wyvern had grown worried. Her mom didn't usually leave for very long.

She'd gone drifting from cave to cave, flying around for a bit before leaving when she didn't see the familiar silver dragon. Monoceros was next on her list. But she couldn't help but admit that she quite enjoyed being on her own for a change, doing whatever she wanted to do, not having to ask her mom for permission. She was old enough now! She could probably leave the caves if she wanted to!

She was getting closer to the ground now, growing a little weary of flying, alighting herself on the edge of the gorge. She looked down, not really looking for anything, but just...looking. Because she could. And oh! something down there. "Hellooooo" she called out in her song-like voice. She gazed down fondly at the thing down there. What an interesting find! It would be a friend, no doubt. She hadn't, after all, experienced otherwise.

@Azure

Azure didn't notice a damn thing until the voice gently shocked her from her reveries--a melodic, wavering "HELLOOOO" drifting down to her past the storm's roar.

She twisted back to peer up toward it, blinking. Her first impression was that it was large, and pale, and for a moment she briefly debated whether it was likely to be dangerous. It was certainly large enough to be, though its demeanor--floating, staring down, calling with its open and seemingly-harmless tone--suggested otherwise.

Azure shrugged, internally; she had no real reason to distrust the thing, and anyway, it'd obviously already seen her.

"YEAH," she called back, as loudly as she could--but her long rest had left her hoarse, and almost at once her voice cracked, dissolving into a few brief coughs. "Fuck," she muttered.

Something about embracing previously-repressed emotions had left "copious swearing" as her favorite coping mechanism--a way of freely expressing herself, and her displeasure.

Warily, Azure spread her wings, testing them. They felt sore, and weak, and she knew at once--folding all four back against her body again--that she'd need to stretch and exercise them for a time before making the attempt. "Come down, if you want," she called back up, though she wasn't sure her hoarse voice was quite carrying.

Well, hopefully the thing'd get the idea, anyway--and preferably not eat her.

@Wyvern

Wyvern watched curiously, a little cluelessly, as the creature stretched and coughed and just kinda stood them. She blinked slowly, her head tilting this way and that until they invited her to come down. Or, at least, it seemed like an invitation to her. "Okay," she sang. She crawled over the cliff and hopped off, opening her wings and fanning out her tail to slowly drift down towards the hybrid...thing. Her claws came out first, grabing at the rocks before her wings folded and she lurched down, her head falling level with them.

They looked weird. All black with white and blue and antlers too. Were they like horns? Asimona had horns, big horns. She had little ones. Jotun did too, but they were tiny and many. She wanted to reach out and touch them but her mind had quickly traced over a different part of the creature. Weird legs! Like a bird. It had wings too, did that make it bird? But a bird didn't have horns! She did, but she was not a bird. But she also had wings and was not a bird. Her thoughts went around in a circle, only confusing her further until she broke her silence with a smooth humming sound. A thoughtful or confused noise, it was hard to tell which one.

She realized a moment later that she didn't have to wonder. She could just ask. Asimona had taught her to ask questions, but only to people she trusted. People she didn't trust would lie. But she hadn't met anyone yet that she didn't trust so, immediately, and quite foolishly, she decided that she trusted this thing. "What are you?" She reached her wing-claw forward to gently touch its wings, more out of impulse then anything. She wanted to know if the feathers felt the same as hers or if they felt like rock. For some reason.

@Azure

Azure's thoughts weren't entirely unlike Wyvern's. She was looking over the other's body, once they were really visible down in the Gorge--and she had a few impressions of her own. Ha! Only two legs, she thought, with a sort of smug triumph. She knew what it was like to have to balance on legs-and-wings, and the other Gembound's appearance only reminded her of her new, wonderful feet. Azure still wasn't a good, or reformed, enough creature to temper that joy with pity, or at least sympathy; it just didn't occur to her.

Her other impression was that thing was huge. She had the same question, too: what the hell was it?

"Ehhh. I'm not sure," she answered, honestly. But then she closed off a little, a little sketchy, uncertain, unsure of how much she should reveal. "My parents always told me I was bird, and bird, but I don't think birds have hooves, or antlers. So I think there's something else in there," she went on, and her gaze slipped aside to avoid eye contact, for a moment. She was ashamed of her family, of that there was no doubt, but moreso uncertain of her ancestry, and what that might imply. For a moment, she forgot to be either proud of her legs, or worried about Wyvern's intentions, or the fact that the other's parrot-like beak could snap her neck in an instant.

After a moment, though, she did look back to the stranger. "And you? You're a--bird, I guess? Giant... bird?"

@Wyvern

The feathers looked similar in composition, but Wyvern's were far more fluffy then this person's and hers were all white while theirs were all black and a bit of blue. And a bit of white. She leaned forward curiously to take a look at the antlers. She hadn't seen those before, besides on some of the deer she found, but they weren't like this. Maybe these were a special type of bird antler. "Hmmmm....I don't know. I once met a bird with four legs and horns. Maybe some birds are just like that." Yeah, that sounded right. She, of course, completely forgot that she'd figured that Eythan wasn't just a bird, but that wasn't important, she didn't know what parts was bird and what wasn't so obviously just all bird was easier.

And her? A bird? Silly! Of course, she had feathers and she was, in fact, part bird, but she'd never met her other parent. Asimona hadn't either. The only parent she knew was Asimona which told her exactly what she was. She stepped back, shaking her head out a bit and suddenly reared, opening her wings, showing off the thick scales on her underbelly and the full magnificence of her form. "I'm Wyvern." She reached forward again, settling herself back down on the ground and tilting her head so that she could look at Azure properly through one of her eyes. "My mother called me a dragon, a wyvern. So that's what I called myself. What did your mother call you?"

@Azure

Azure listened quietly. A wyvern? I don't know what the fuck that is. And a dragon..?

Some faint flicker of recognition ran through her, at this, but a moment later she looked skyward. She remembered shapes in the sky--she had seen the black dragon that sometimes swept overhead, hunting its prey. Naturally, she'd avoided that one--but this bird, this white parrot-thing, was half dragon..? ...Huh.

"Half dragon, huh? That's pretty cool, I guess," she admitted, after a moment, almost begrudgingly. As for what her mother called her... Azure let out a short, grim laugh.

"Yeah let's not get into that. My mother was an asshole," she answered. And it wasn't a flippant, dismissive answer; the hybrid's blue eyes grew clouded, seeking the ground and lingering there, one new-taloned-leg absently scratching at the stone.

After a moment--probably eager to change the topic, or maybe just curious--Azure again lifted her head, peering at Wyvern. "My name's Azure now, anyway. What do you eat?" she asked, bluntly, her curiosity evident in her tone and in her voice. "Your beak looks wicked." No "good to meet you" or anything like that; but then, her family hadn't exactly been good at teaching manners.

@Wyvern

A smile appeared in Wyvern's eyes at the meager compliment. It was pretty cool, wasn't it? Although, she didn't know that there were so few actual dragons in the caves, but she still liked how she looked. She liked being able to fly. She was the only of the kids that could fly, after all. It made her feel pretty special. "Yes," she agreed, lightly. "I think so too!"

She noticed the shift in tone when Azure looked down at her claws. Wyvern blinked, a little confused. In her experience, mothers were nice. Mothers should protect and look after their young. For a mother to be, as Azure said it, an asshole, was completely unknown to her and for a moment she wondered if Azure was lying. But why would she do that? She'd been nice so far. Why just lie like that? Maybe her mom didn't hunt for her. Or didn't stay with her all the time. To be honest, Wyvern would prefer if Asimona wasn't so protective, but she tried to understand Azure's plight in her own childish, ignorant way. "I'm sorry." And it was genuine, at least, even if she didn't fully understand.

She perked up again, though, only a moment later. "Oh! That is a pretty name. You should be proud." Again, genuine happiness for Azure's name, even if she had given it to herself. Her tail wiggled a bit, happy to know her new friend's name. The change in subject was abrupt, but Wyvern didn't mind, or even really notice. "I eat lots of things! I like cave deer, though. And birds! I'm a very good hunter!" She smiled again, oblivious to any implications of her favorite diet. But the description of her beak confused her a little and one of her claws came up to rub against the tip. "Huh? My beak is not wicked! I'm a nice dragon."

@Azure

Azure felt something she had little experience with, at the compliment of her name--warmth, gratitude. It was unexpected, and though she felt a little shame, too, with Wyvern's condolences regarding Blackberry, she at the same time overall was a little unsure how to act. Wyvern was nice.

That was new. Completely new.

...Which, when Azure thought about it, seemed pretty sad. How many nice Gembound were there, out there? Wyvern might be one-of-a-kind, for all she knew. "Thanks," she murmured, anyway--an answer to both remarks.

At the mention of Wyvern being a good hunter, and liking birds, Azure looked her over with amusement. "You like eating birds? You got a beak and feathers, I mean, me too--I think we're both half bird. But I guess birds can eat other birds," she added, thoughtfully. Nothing stopped a hawk from eating sparrows, she supposed.

"And, uhh--wicked. Like... it could do a lotta damage, you know? I know you're nice--that's uhh--nice, by the way--but I mean. You know. Tell the cave deer that," she added. Azure wasn't really aware that her dark humor might be lost on the seemingly-younger Gembound.

"Anyway, this canyon we're in--it's got water, and there's some cave deer around, too, if you're hungry. I can eat little stuff sometimes--you know, mice, fish, uhh--lots of bugs, whatever. But I eat plants, mostly. Seeds and shit. Kinda boring, compared, I guess," she added, firing a half-admiring glance up at the larger apparent-predator. Though--cool as being a hunter was, Azure couldn't really complain that she wasn't one. After the kind of shit she'd seen, the violence didn't really appeal.

She realized, at the mention of water, that she was thirsty. The broad river wasn't too far off in the gorges, and she started toward it, albeit on foot. "I'm gonna head to the water now, actually. I'm thirsty. Just woke up--I was in my stone, again, but I don't remember why," she went on, her tone musing. "Anyway, you can come with me, if you want? You might find some deer drinking up and down the river--it's like, the only place to get water in this shithole."

@Wyvern

Wyvern looked back at herself, as if to reaffirm that she did, in fact, still have feathers. But Azure was starting to confuse her. Half bird? But Asimona said she was a dragon. Dragons had wings! And maybe some dragons had feathers! "Maybe that's what a wyvern is - a bird-dragon. But I'm not a bird!" Her tone grew higher pitched, almost whiny at the last part. She wasn't a bird! And Azure wasn't going to suddenly make her a bird just by saying it. Thinking about birds eating other birds just didn't seem right to her so she pushed it off - not bird, only dragon. And dragons ate whatever they want. Just not other dragons.

She stared at Azure for a moment, her half-formed claws coming up again to rub at her beak and poke at the tip. "Ohhh, I think I get it. I don't try, though, I just hunt." The humor of Azure's little joke was lost on her, giving her a sense of confusion and her brain scrambled around trying to chase the meaning. "I don't think they'd understand me. I tried talking to them before..."

But then Azure was continuing and Wyvern didn't really mind dropping the thought and thinking of something else. She nodded slowly, a continuous bob of her head as Azure spoke. "Seeds...and shit? What is...shit?" Was it some kind of other food she hadn't heard of? Asimona had not told her about it before. Maybe she could eat it too!

As Azure turned away, Wyvern stepped after her, her slow, but far larger paces matching Azure's smaller, quicker steps. "I am thirsty," she replied, but perhaps not to the same degree as her friend. "But not hungry. I ate before I left home."

@Azure