Entry tags:

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

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

established cr

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

OTA

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.

VILLAGES

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.

Threaded | Flat

It's just meant to be a walk with the dog, letting the pup range and have fun and chase after whatever he finds in the brush. Taking his time, laughing at the Australian Shepard rushes ahead. The fight above catches his gaze though, and as he's looking, suddenly there is a person there, plummeting to the Earth.

Whistling for the dog, he rushes to where she fell.

"Don't try movin," he calls. "Don't risk hurtin' yourself."

It had been a long week, and as it was, there were a few things he had done before going home. First had been a trip by the hot springs to soak his injured leg in the hot water. The fight with the Wendigo had not been easy at all, and while he had Anne had managed in the end, that didn't mean they came back unharmed. Quite the opposite, with the long scratches down his leg that had made walking difficult after a while. But once the long soak was done he had gone home, and home was where he stayed, mostly sitting at his desk in the office he had made for himself, frowning in frustration at the papers before him. So much work to be done and he couldn't move around enough to manage it to his taste. At least, though, he had found some boxes by his door when he'd come in, and while it had taken some trips, he'd gotten them here onto the desk with him.

Which was better than working on plans that seemed utterly pointless when he considered the dangers he was now aware of outside of the villages.

But that wasn't here or there. What was here were the boxes he was focusing on, far away from the kitchen where he'd accidentally left a window open days ago. Not that he or either of his frequent visitors to the house had been around to check to have it closed. Oh well. Just meant a little feathered visitor could get in easier while Reeve pulled a beautiful red silk tie with a very subtle recurring cat motif worked into the material.

"Minerva bless. A suit," he coos, not noticing the bird alighting in his hair.

There were reasons he was out here, of course. First thing he'd done after coming back, before even a shower, was heading down into the bunker. Power just seemed like a logical next step. This had been the final straw on the back of the mythical camel ~~yes, mythical, they didn't exist on his world anymore, and hadn't in centuries~~, and so Nida had gone to get his own little soup up from the machine he had heard of. Indecision had held him there, so many choices that seemed right, but it was probably better not to go for too many at once. Get used to two, then get the other two he wanted.

Of course practice was needed, magic had never been his strong point and even if he had been handy with aero and tornado spells back home, that didn't mean he could handle the variations here as easily. So with that he had headed into the woods to practice while he waited for news that his other people were back at last, safe and ready for him to check in on them. Better not to waste the time, right?

He hears the noise before it really processes what is going on. Well, he hears a few noises. A pained, human noise, tree tops being disturbed, and the crack of a smaller branch giving as she fell. He moved before he thought, and it felt good to finally move properly again, with all the enhanced speed and stamina he'd lived his life with for years. He's quick off the mark, reacting up to proper scale with old reflexes, there below Steph to catch her just before the ground.

Sure, his arms sting for it, but he still smirks at the blonde in his arms. Not using a one-liner would be criminal here.

"Well, wasn't expecting you to drop in."

Or maybe the line itself was criminal.

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.

With a book about herbs, one about furniture making and a third on basic woodworking stacked in a pile, maybe it isn't a surprise that the book Foggy's actually reading right now is a medical text. It's not a complete starter level, but it still fairly simple.

He looks up at the bird, smiling with a genuine fondness. "Hey... what are you? A robin? There's gotta be a book on birds around here somewhere."

Jason's folded himself into the living room couch, absorbed with reading one of the scandalous romance novels he's borrowed from Natasha. It's apparently a pretty engrossing read, because he'd usually be observant enough to notice something like even a small bird landing to nest on top of his head. Instead, he continues steadily absorbing the words on page after page, maybe a little redder in the face than normal.

Good thing no one else is around to see him like this, right? That sure would be embarrassing.

Threaded | Flat

HOUSES

WOODS

VILLAGES

Woods

Houses

Woods

library

Library