WHO: Stephanie Brown
WHERE: Various Outdoors
WHEN: After Take Two Part 1
OPEN TO: All
WARNINGS: None anticipated

The first thing Steph does when she gets home is take a long, hot shower. Definitely top priority. The second thing she does is head down into the bunker. She’s heard about people using the vending machine and nothing terrible seemed to happen as a result. She deserves a treat, she figures, and she knows exactly what power she wants.

She waits until she’s out in the open again to try it out, and isn’t disappointed. She’s small, yes, but whatever she is, she has wings.

HOUSES

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One of the advantages to being small is that you attract less attention. The same holds true for being a bird. As a robin she can glide into her friend’s houses, moving quickly and then staying still to be sure she wasn’t noticed. From there she has all sorts of fun options. She can perch on top of refrigerators, swoop down and startle someone, or steal food when they aren’t looking. A little more difficult is moving small objects around, but that’s just as fun.

Her favorite, though, is waiting until the person is distracted and landing in their hair. With hollow bones and proper timing they might never notice she’s there.

WOODS

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Being a bird isn't all sunshine and rainbows, of course, and not just because it's early March. Her first real, open-air flight comes to an inelegant end as, failing to out-maneuver a hawk, she changes suddenly back to human shape to foil the poor creature.

She falls with a yelp into the foliage below.

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OTA

When she tires of flying and trolling her friends (which takes a good while, to be sure) Steph decides to wander around both villages, gaining an appreciation of what everything looks like when you're a small handful of inches tall. She also takes the opportunity to unnerve people as much as possible.

Getting some food from the inn? Did you notice that there's a bird on top of the fridge, or the ceiling lamp in the common area?

Sitting outside to soak up what sun there is? Don't look now, but a bird's joined you on the bench, and it looks like it's bird-watching too.

Or maybe you're just going about your business, in the dojo, one of the farms, even the library. Wherever you are, a small bird has taken great interest in your doings.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

There is not supposed to be a bird in the library.

That may seem a bit hypocritical coming from someone who appears as out of place in the library as Maine. The space marine is seven-feet-tall and four hundred pounds of muscle; he looks like he should be bench-pressing bookshelves, not reading their contents. But here he is, reading away.

At least he was reading, until he noticed a bird sitting nearby.

Puzzled, the big man frowns and looks around to see if there's an open window nearby. Maybe he can shoo it back outside.

The bird stares quite calmly back at him, as though waiting for him to get back to the book. The book isn't really that interesting. It's also very difficult to read from this angle, with this particular range of color vision. She's seeing a lot of color that humans can't.

It's a little weird being stared at so calmly by a bird. Especially one that's so out of place. Maine doesn't even have any food that it might be attracted to. Besides, aren't birds supposed to be afraid of people? The hell is it looking at?

Maine eyes the bird for a moment, then he waves a big hand in a half-hearted attempt to shoo it towards a window.

She fluffs out, resettling her wings and feathers before settling down in a more comfortable seat. It’s kind of funny, most of the people she’s messed with try to talk to her, bird or not. If he’s gonna play charades this is going to be fun.

Maine is a laconic individual even when faced with another person, much less a bird. He's not going to speak to it; he doesn't think it would understand, and it would be a waste of words. (As though there's some finite amount he can use.)

What the bird does get to see is a far more expressive face than Maine shows most. The usual stoicism he displays for strangers is absent, replaced by something torn between confusion and amusement.

It's a determined bird, he'll give it that.

With a little sigh, Maine pushes himself to his feet, abandoning his book as he walks to a window and opens it. Then he turns back, intending to circle around and usher the bird towards the open window.

Steph takes advantage of the opportunity to hop down from her perch onto the book, positioning herself so that it’s clear she’s trying to read it. If only the page wasn’t such a distracting gradient...

She makes sure to flip her tail up at him, hoping it looks as sassy as it feels.

It does indeed look sassy. Maine cocks his head to the side, mildly bemused by the bird's interest in his book. If he didn't know better, he might think that the bird's trying to read it as well.

But birds can't read. Maine's sure of that. So he walks back to his book, intending to pick up the edge and just sort of ... flip the bird off of it towards the window.

Well she can’t have that. She hops instead onto his hand, laughing in a twitter. She definitely doesn’t want to change back now... though it might be awkward if she doesn’t. To try to dispel some of that she flies up to try to land on his head then back towards the nearest empty chair to make the change.

Maine doesn't expect the bird to hop onto his hand. He twitches in surprise and manages to duck before it lands on his shaved head, then he turns to see where it went. The book that he'd intended to both read and shake now has a new purpose: he's gripping it like he means to throw it at the bird.

Overreaction? Probably. But Maine doesn't respond well to sudden invasions of his personal space, even by birds.

Thankfully, the bird changes before Maine can hurl the book. And then the space marine is staring at a young woman where a bird used to be, and he's utterly fucking baffled.

After a moment, Maine holds his hands out in a wordless sort of 'what the fuck' at her ... everything.

She shrugs sheepishly.

"I was curious?"

There's... not really a good explanation for this, is there. Welp. That's what happens, she guesses.

"I, uh... should go." She rises to beat a discreet retreat.

Yeah, that doesn't explain much of anything to Maine. The behavior, maybe, but certainly not the shapeshifting. Maine keeps staring, waiting for more, even as the strange woman retreats. And then?

Well, then he's left with a book in his hand and absolutely no idea what the fuck just happened.

Maybe he ate something weird. Maybe he's hallucinating. That makes far more sense to him than the idea that a bird just turned into a person. Mutely, he scrubs a hand over his face and resolves to take his book elsewhere to read.

[open] This is all we got now, scream until your heart stops

HOUSES

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VILLAGES

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