Warm. It was so warm.
Emma stood still in the small clearing, the tall uncut grass around her released a sweet clean scent into the air.
She closed her eyes and was surprised that the sun's light shone through her eyelids and making her world bright a red.
Cathy sat next to her, and running her hands through the soft grass she softly whispered about the how the plants grew next to each other and not in neat rows.
James had taken out his hair band causing his near white blond hair to dance in the wind in a way Emma never thought could be possible, what wouldn't be possible in air currents of Dissimulare.
Beside her Logan shook, not throughout his body but in his hands. She watched silently as he squeezed and relaxed his chestnut brown hands in an attempt to stop the shaking.
Emma looked up to the sun again and had to squint against it's harsh glare.
Who knew that the sun could be so bright?
They had come running out of the mountain, racing each other to see who could get to the middle of the clearing first. The whole class was in on it. Someone had screamed that they were first, but by that time the race was long forgotten. And the full gravity of the situation hit them.
They were above ground.
Since their city was self sustaining as all of the great cities many of its inhabitants didn’t bother to leave.
Then again who would?
Who would leave the regulated warmth of the city to live in unpredictable weather of the surface? Why leave a place with an abundance of food and opportunity to live off the unforgiving land? What sense was there to leave a place where family and friends are close by to live in total isolation?
Many have lived and died underground and never once saw the sun in all its glory.
Zachary didn't want her to live like that. He had told her what was outside of Dissimular and about the people that lived in the valley. Her brother had told her about the different islands that made up the archipelago of Standing Refuge. About islands that were covered in trees that were big enough to blocked out the sun and islands that had rolling fields of green that went on forever. He had told her as much as he could.
But Zachary never said how absolutely warm it was.
Somewhere her teacher was calling them, but as she took in her surroundings, she knew that something more important was happening.
She heard the wind blow through the nearby trees.
She smelt hundreds of plants, all of them unknown.
She tasted the the fresh early summer air, air that wasn’t recycled by watchful mages and technicians.
She saw how the how the sun brighten and casted shadows on the tall grass around her, and how the wind moved the flexible blades making a rolling sea around her.
She felt...
She felt!
She felt Cathy tug impatiently on her sleeve.
"We should get going,' Cathy said heaving her large backpack over her shoulder, 'The class is already moving on to the campsite."
Emma followed the class's suddenly tired movements as they went into the thick undergrowth of the forest. However, she had a smile on her face for even the ground, which was always a solid block in the city, was different.
She felt the soft soil move under her feet as she walked to the campsite.
The campsite that they arrived at was a small shaded place that had a few old logs spotting the area. The only instructions that they got was where to put there bags, where not to go, and to be back before dark.
With no supervision holding her back Emma led her small group of friends to the edge of the safe border. She smiled widely as she saw what Zachary had told about many times before.
"So what are we looking at exactly?" James asked.
"Only the most amazing thing out here, isn't it glorious?" Emma sad running her hands across the flat surface.
"It's a rock." Logan said looking at the huge gray stone.
"Its not just a rock. It's a big rock." Emma said around her large grin.
"So, it's a big rock," Logan retorted, "I's don't see what's so greats about."
"What's great about it, oh yea of little faith, is that if one was to stand on top of this rock only this rock in the right breeze, one can hear and smell the ocean." Emma grin grew wider as she revealed in her friends shocked faces, before climbing the large stone. Her friends quickly climbed after her.
The Western sea was the only place since the Great Escape that was still forbidden by the high counsel. No one, not even the highest commanders or richest nobles, could touch the Western sea.
The stood side by side toward where they were told where the ocean was, the last untouchable place.
"Emma, are ya' sure that this is possible?" Cathy said straining to hear anything through the gap in the trees.
"Zachary said that he found this place we he went on this trip." Emma said, "when a breeze comes the air will smell like the sea. We just have to..."
Beside her Cathy sneezed.
And strong wind washed over them whipping their hair back. On it came the overpowering scent of salt. The air stung their eyes as leftover salt water flew around them. Following the gust came a loud crash of water hitting and breaking against something solid.
As suddenly as the came it disappeared, and silence surrounded the rock again. Only broken by soft breathing and fluttering heart beats.
"Tomorrow," Emma said softly still breathing in salt, "lets go to the sea."
"We're gonna get into soo much trouble for this." Cathy replied rubbing the salt air from her nose.
"We could probably say it was for research." James said.
"We won't 'ave to. Not if we go at night," Logan muttered, "after everyone's asleep."
Emma dragged in one last breath of salted air before leaping of the rock, "Okay then, tonight we destroy Michelle's story with ours and tomorrow night we shall swim in the ocean."
"Emma," James said following her off of the rock, "none of us knows how to swim."
"We can learn." Emma said confidently as they walked back to camp.
"In the ocean?" Cathy interjected.
"Just like our how our ancestors did." Emma commented as she started to skip over thick tree roots and around small patches of sunlight that shone through the forest's thick canopy.
"They crossed the ocean on boats." James argue as Emma abandoned the ground to climb onto a low hanging branch.
Emma thought quietly to herself before flipping upside down and answering with the same cheerful confidence, "The people who settled in Pelagia swam through both oceans."
Logan give her a look, "The people in Pelagia descended from a group of people that got the power to breath underwater froms a dying pod of vengeful sea monsters. How in the king's rule do you think you can follow them?"
Emma flipped off the branch and landed in front of them smiling widely, "I have good a feeling."
"Youse are full of shite." Logan snorted before rubbing his protesting stomach. "Speaking of shity situations, I's didn’t get to have breakfast today. Cathy, I yours mom wouldn't let ya leave withouts bread and some of that freaking amazing peach jam she makes." Logan brown eyes regarded Cathy expectantly.
"I don't have any," Cathy apologized, "We opened up a couple of jars and found that a lot of them were hosting a whole family's worth of worms, we checked the jars and found that sealing was broken." She shrugged and to Logan's horror said, "Nothing could be done about it, we had to compost the jam and toss jars."
Cathy then smirked, "You should have seen what happened next, John ended up burning a hand print into the table and Dustin actually coughed up fire. I thought they had stopped making mistakes like that but then again they really did like jam." She laughed to herself before continuing, "For the past couple of the days they held the jars up into the light like if they knew the worms were there."
With a grunt Ashen dropped his ship's anchor overboard. He had taken his ship as close to the islands and the surrounding whirlpools as he dared. The only thing that was left to do was to fly the rest of the way to the first island.
His dark feathers bristle at the thought.
He needed to fly above the cloud line, going any closer would be death, to the closest and largest eastern island. Then he had to find a least one human that would listen to him and let him leave the island quick enough to get back to sea and up the Griffin cost, before anyfeather started to question were he went.
Ashen held in a deep sigh.
He was tired. The disappearing sunlight marked the third night, including the night he left, that he spent on dark isolated water.
And now he had to fly for who knows long how over said water. He wanted to give up but...
'a large Griffin that seemed unstoppable, unmovable, immortal, gently give him an old map passed on from Griffin to Griffin through countless generations...'
Ashen dragged his prepared bag over his shoulder.
He had to go. He needed to go. For an old feather that entrusted his family's job to his youngest grandchild.
He had to do his family's job even if nofeather believed in them or his grandfather's stories.
Ashen leaped into the rapidly darkness sky and flew eastward, black and grey feathers invisible in the night sky.
"You know it wasn't that bad." Cathy said.
Silence.
Logan shrugged, "It could have happened to anyone."
Silence.
"I'm sorry." James said barely above a whisper.
"Well you should be," Emma spun at him, anger blazing in her eyes causing James to flinch, "Why didn’t you check if the story was actually real? Not some story made up by people who were too stupid to know that hurricanes and droughts are not caused by monsters created by magic? Are you really too soaked to read a Three Damned Title?" She spat.
Last night they had told James's story and had got most people from the class to hide in their sleeping bags. They would have won the competition if Michelle hadn't broken their spell of words.
'If you actually knew what you were talking about, you would have known that Alicorns are fake.' Michelle had sneered.
Emma was so confident that she grabbed the textbook that James took to prove her wrong. The whole class gathered around her as she read the chapter title out loud.
Historical Fiction.
Michelle had mocked them ruthlessly all night and throughout the next day. To be able to finally sneak away from the campsite was like a blessing.
"Hey stop beating up on him," Cathy said getting in front of Emma, glaring defiance, "Emma you know how much it hurts James when you act like this."
Emma stepped back from Cathy in confusion and and turned to look at James.
He wouldn't look at her. He kept his head lowered, and seemed to trying to collapse into himself as if he was being crushed under an invisible force. A quick flash of teal flicked toward her then quickly flicker away.
'Shit I forgot he's Empathic class.' Emma silently cursed.
"James, I'm so sorry", Emma said as she forced herself to whisper, "It isn't your fault that the information wasn't completely true. I'm then one that pushed you like that then bragged like an idiot."
'Calm emotions,' she reminded herself as James began to look at her, 'He's a Empathic class that's close to you, and you just buried him under a ton of negative feelings.' She pushed away self loathing. 'You have to make him see that you don't hate him, and give him something to hold onto.'
Emma breathed in steadily and let it out, "What I did was wrong and I shouldn't have taken my anger out on you." She turned her eyes to his, trying to put all her regret into her gaze, "Can you ever forgive me?"
She did not expect to be tackled into the ground.
"James, what the hell?" Her eyes widened as she felt his nose press against her face, "What the fuck, are you nuzzling me? Get off of me ya freak. Logan, Cathy help me!"
Some tugging and an awkward almost purr later, they were once again on their way to the ocean under the soft light of the moon.
"I think we're close," Cathy said sometime later sniffing the air, "It smells like that breeze yesterday, but stronger."
"Ya think that we can see the Griffin Coast from here?" Logan wondered out loud, "I mean the ocean can't be that big, right?"
"Probably not," Emma mused, "It's too dark, maybe in the morning when it's bright out."
Timidly James raised his hand, "Can I speak now?"
"No," Logan retorted angrily, "You know the rules, you don't get to speak until tomorrow or unless something stupid happens."
"I just wanted to say that I think I see a clearing ahead." James replied softly.
They stood still before moving again through the underbrush at a quicker and quieter pace.
The four of them broke free from the thick underbrush and onto a cliff face.
They never thought anything could be so big.
The pulsing midnight blue ocean raced the sky forever, into the horizon and into all directions. Hundreds of meters down, dark waves crashed relentlessly against the pale salt washed cliff they stood on. The moon's sleepy glow casted itself around them lightly kissing everything it touched with it's cool light. The heavily salted air sank into them, each crash from waves far below them promised that the water below them, the very same water that rivaled the sky in vastness, was just as salty.
"I don't think you can see the Griffin Coast from here." Cathy said, "Maybe if you fly up..."
"With dis draft?" Logan said feeling how strongly the air pulled at him, "It would be safer to drop a toddler of a mountain platform in Aria." He turned to Emma, "Do ya think da water's enough good for a swim?"
Emma shook with the rest of them as a particularly large wave shook the cliff, "I think I'll take my chances with Dustin's cooking."
They all nodded in agreement.
"Well if we're not going to fly or swim what do we do?" Cathy said kicking a small rock over the edge.
Logan scratch his head, "Toss shite into the ocean?"
"Sure why not, I don't want to go back to camp yet" Emma said, "James help me roll this log."
They continued to throw whatever objects they could get loose over the edge until the moon had risen high above their heads.
Logan sat heavily down and dusted his hands off his pants, "Ok now what, we've been tossing shite o'er the edge for hours now."
Emma flop down beside him, "I don't know," she said as she looked into star encrusted sky, "I thought this was going to be more, I don't know, exciting. Like what happens to Zachary when he's in Aria or something." Emma closed her eyes and sighed, ''This is just boring."
"Tell me about." Cathy snorted releasing a small cloud of steam, "At least the sky's nice, right James?"
No answer.
"...James?" Standing stock still teal eyes impossibly wide, James pointed toward the horizon.
"Guys," he whispered, "Why is a piece of the sky coming toward us?"
They whipped their heads to where he pointed.
Blocking out the stars as it flew through the sky, a large black object honed in on them.
"Logan, what the hell is that?" Emma voice shook.
Logan squinted, making out the shapes that his friends couldn't. Large black wings and a four legged structure that would have been impossible for any human to mimic. Flying in from an direction that no human had came from in thousands of years.
Logan screamed an issue to run, his dark brown eyes wide in terror.
It wasn't until the black shape broke the silent sky open with a ear splitting cry did they followed the command and ran back into the forest.
"Wait!" Ashen called out again to the group of humans that disappear into the island's underbrush.
He had just flown for hours over open water and had almost been sucked underwater by the island's whirlpools, before he smartened up and flew farther above the cloud line.
He was cold, damp and so very close to turning around, when he saw the first island.
And got his second wind when he saw a group that couldn't be anything but humans.
His grandfather was right.
His grandfather, was right.
Ashen opened his beak wide and called out happily to them.
They spun on their heels and darted into the forest.
"No! Come back!" Ashen shouted reaching out for them.
He had to bank out over the forest, the trees were too close together for his to fly through them.
Above the thick canopy he got glimpses of them.
A flash of pale skin there, a dark wave of black hair here, and everything else in between. However, the canopy was getting thicker and they where running farther apart from each other. The only reason that he knew that he was still on their trail was the loud high pitch yells them made to each other.
He was losing them.
"Stop, damn it! I'm trying to save you!" Ashen roared over their shrieks.
Why the hell were they making all that noise anyways? Aren't they trying to hid from him?
Ashen got his answer when he was stopped by a wall of countless wings, feathers, and shrieks.
He was forced to land by the seer force that the swarm made. He clamped his talons over his ears when the swarm started to make the most bone scraping sound he had ever heard. It drilled into his head causing him to clench his beak, destroying any thoughts pass instincts that shouted 'protect your ears now'.
Then, there was silence.
He slowly looked up and saw that the swarm had left, taking every human that was in it away.
'I failed.' Ashen looked up into the empty air as if he could see his family's purpose flying away. 'I failed you grandfather.'
He screamed his failure into the sky.
I didn’t make it.
Hands on her head, Emma crouched low under a brush, as the creature screamed.
They left me.
She had tried to get into the swarm. She really did.
But the swarm maneuver was meant to keep new comers out. And only worked if a person could fly on feathered wings.
All her efforts only got her a punch to the face, and bent insect wings.
I'm going to die here. I'm going to die because I can't fly away. Just like Dad.
That thought played through head as she ran from the ocean.
The thought got louder each time she saw the thing fly near her.
The thought slithered in her ear with each screamed creature made.
Now the thought changed as it whispered silently.
It will find you. You will die. Just like the useless, flightless human you are.
Something tugged her leg.
Her panicked screams was cut short by a rough, chestnut hand.
"Emma, on all the pains of the demon kings rule. Shut the fuck up and get ya's shite together."
Emma stared at Logan, then she pulled his hand away.
"Why are you still here?" Emma whispered angrily trying hard not to grab him and not let go.
"I's couldn't get into the swarm." He looked away and rubbed his chin, "Sum sonofabitch kicked me into a tree. What happened to you?"
"Wind current was too strong, and some bitch socked me." Emma said firmly replacing silent fear with angry words at her burning face and her aching wing-less back.
Logan moved next to her, his black hair hid his face as he gripped the ground.
"Emma, what are we going go do?" He whispered.
She bit her lips organizing her scattered mind, "We have to get away."
"How?"
"I don't know, but first we have to find Cathy and James." Emma started to crawl out of the shrub. "If we couldn't get in there's no way that they could."
"Yeah abouts that there's something I 'ave to tells ya..."
Emma looked up into the tree.
Well at least we know where Cathy is.
"How did that happen?" Emma whispered.
"Girly tried to dive into the swarm." Logan said from his position on the ground. "I can't climb up there, well I could, but our friend over there will hear me." Logan pointed to the creature standing in the clearing.
"So I have to get up there and bring her down?"
"Youse are the only ones that could," Logan smirked darkly, "Who said Breeds are useless."
"Logan, that's fucked up." Emma grunted pulling almost impossibly dark brown hair back with an ghostly pale hand. "You know my parents didn’t know about their ancestors lineage. Who the hell checks the tenth generation anyways?"
"Doesn't change the fact that your natural stealth can get youse up there faster then me," Logan winced, "Youse might want to hurry I think Cathy's loosing it."
Up in the tree the air around Cathy was starting to simmer with heat.
Emma swore, quickly crawled through the darkness, clutched the large tree deeply with her nails, and slowly pulled herself up the bark.
She started to sweat heavily the higher she got.
'Damn it Cathy, your going to set the whole place on fire!'
She finally got to the thicker branches and had to avoid a dirty blonde wing that absolutely burned.
"Cathy!" Emma whispered harshly, "Cathy, calm down!"
Cathy eyes were shut tight her hands gripping blackened bark, air, and fear.
'Great I'm here, now how do I get her down.' Emma thought.
Emma eyes lit up and she grabbed the nearest greenest branch closest to the Fire Starters head.
'Sorry Cathy, but I have to stop you somehow.'
Emma pulled the branch back and let it fly.
Smack.
Wide hazel eyes looked at her.
"Cathy calm down and kill your fire or I swear I will leave you here." Emma's harsh whisper directly contradicted her worry filled eyes.
Cathy looked at her, her inner heat slowly dying down, "You came back for me."
Emma smirked, "I never left, now come on we have to get you down and find James."
"Find James?" Cathy asked in quiet confusion.
"Yah, Logan found you but couldn't get to you, so he got me to get you. Now we have to find James, wherever the kings rule he is." Emma whispered as she help cut the brittle branches holding Cathy down.
"Wait," Cathy said, "Isn't James the distraction?"
"No, he is not the distraction." Emma said suddenly wary.
"Then why is he walking to the creature?"
It was the sound of a loud shriek that caused Ashen to raise his head.
It was figure of a human walking toward him that caused him to stay still.
The human froze when Ashen looked at him. Then started to slowly advance again.
Five yards away from him the human stopped.
Wide eyed, Ashen stood still. Right in front of him was a creature of legend that his family was tasked thousands of years ago to protect, a creature whose very existence proved every story that his grandfather told true.
'What the hell I'm I suppose to do?' Ashen thought.
That last time he chased them they ran away, and when he called to them they screamed and ran faster.
Chasing and calling them did not work, so what will he do now?
Slowly he sat down.
The human inched closer.
He deliberately closed his beak.
A couple of feet closer.
He tucked his wings close to his sides.
The human was now close enough for Ashen to make out the colour of his eyes.
...And they were back to staring at each other.
Well here goes nothing
Ashen carefully raise a talon and pointed it to himself, then he spoke slowly.
"Ashen."
The human tilted his head in confusion.
Ashen repeated his name again using the same slow pronunciation.
"A-shen."
The human blinked.
Shit! What if they don't speak?
Before Ashen could follow that train of thought the human in front of him smiled widely, forcefully putting him on a new train of thought.
Ancestors! His mouth is like a sharks!
Well that wasn’t entirely true, but the wicked curve of his fangs didn't exactly instilled confidence.
The human then pointed at himself and said something.
Seeing his confused look the human said the same word again slowly.
'Okay. So a short weird bark followed by a sigh then a hiss is his name. Ashen sigh internally. At least he isn't running from me.
Ashen looked at the still smiling human who continued to point at himself and say his name. Encouraging the Griffin to try to say his name.
So Ashen did. Then frowned.
He was sure human did not need to laugh at him like that. However, seeing the off white haired human giggle happily into his hand did bring a new greater fear into him.
How am I going to warn him if I can't even speak to him?
Oblivious to the on coming danger, the human continued to laugh.
Then he turned behind him and started to wave.
"What da hell does that idiot think he's doing?" Logan hissed, he had finally climbed the tree and joined them.
"I think he wants to introduce us to the creature." Cathy said.
"He's going to get us killed." Logan grumbled under his breath.
Emma watched as James began to wave more wildly. "I think we should go."
They stared at her.
"Hear me out would you? Think about, it right now we have the disadvantage." Emma deduced, "What do you think would happen if that creature over there attacked us. Both of us, Logan and I, would try to quickly get down then get stuck. And while we're swearing and trying to untangle ourselves, Cathy would panic, set the tree on fire and kill us all."
Emma stared down at the creature who was still sitting down trying to look innocent, never mind the wicked looking claws. "If we're on flat ground, equal ground, we will have the advantage if we end up fighting. Four against one are very good odds."
"And if it's trained to fight with unfair odds?" Logan supplied.
"They we die as heros." Emma ran her tongue around her mouth. When had it gotten so dry? "Come on nothing ever got done by hiding in a tree." Then with a light tug she jumped from the tree.
Chaos, he was surrounded by chaos.
All around him was the flurry of wings, the hair raising screeching of parents looking for children, the shouts of disgruntled farmers trying to figure out what went wrong...
And in the middle of all the finger pointing and screaming was Mr. Doe.
The teacher in charge. The one at fault.
The one with no answers.
"What happened?"
"I don't know."
"Why did you swarm?"
"There was something out there, I don't know."
"My little Molly is hurt who is to blame?"
"I don't know."
'Please,' he begged silently, 'Someone just Make. It. Stop!'
"My boy said that, that a pony attacked the campsite!"
Finally, there was silence. Mr. Doe hated this silence, this many people shouldn't be this silent.
"What did you say?" By the Three, Mr. Doe thought, was that really his voice?
"That's what my boy said he saw!" The dad was starting to shake, "He said he heard the call to swarm and then saw a large black four legged creature fly with feathered wings into the clearing were they camped!"
Before any action could be taken to calm the man down the first voice screamed.
"A pony attacked our children!"
Followed by a second.
"The ponies found Standing Refuge!"
Then a third.
"They found us!"
Then a fourth. A choked sob.
"They are going to kill us all!"
And then once again chaos.
And through the chaos of terrified, confused, panicking humans fleeing the Fare and into the lower levels, Mr. Doe stood. They left a mess of stress fallen feathers and broken branches in their wake as they dragged their families to safety.
Leaving the teacher alone.
Well, almost alone.
A large calloused hand picked him up by the collar and held him off the ground.
Bright brown eyes burned into his.
"Where's my sister." The behemoth holding him sneered hate.
"Your sister?" The teacher choked out around tightly pulled cloth.
"Cathy!" The behemoth shook him hard, fire at his fingertips burning cloth. "Where is Catherine?"
"I don't know!"
"What da' hell do you mean 'you don't you know'?"
"The class was panicked! And then they started to swarm. I had to lead them out!"
The man's eyes were wide with dawning horror, "You left mah sister." He whispered.
"The swarm was too chaotic, I couldn't count them!" Mr. Doe shouted.
"You left her!"
"I'm so sorry," The young teacher swung in his grasp, and cried, tears staining his face, "I...I couldn't help her."
"You asshole!"
Fire exploded around them.
Grass burned. Filling the small circle of fire around them with thick smoke.
And Mr. Doe suffocated.
"I'll kill you!"
Flames drew in closer, vengeful, hateful and wanting balance for life lost.
"John!"
A hand passed through unforgiving flame and pulled.
Mr. Doe fell on the too warm ground and gasped in fresh air. He could hear a violent struggle close by, and the shouts of other concerned family members the ones that didn't have a child to drag away, but he couldn't think pass air, and breathing.
Someone pulled him up before he slipped into unconsciousness and placed a haze of soft green magic over his eyes.
Through the haze a soft voice reached him, "Don't fall asleep yet we need you awake."
He opened his eyes and looked past dark green eyes to a brown and green uniform, and to the brown and green uniforms that was worn by the many people now flooding into the Fare.
"Mr. Doe?" The soldier called for his attention, "I know you had rough night, but I need to know about everything that happen, now."
"Guys I want you to meet my friend."
James beamed happily beside the creature who sat down next to him.
"James..." Cathy said carefully a safe distance from black grey feathers, "What is that?"
"I don't know," James trailed off, "but I think he wants to be friends."
Emma ignored the sound of Logan slapping his face and muttering darkly to ask, "James, what in the king's rule made you think that it wants to be friends?"
James smiled again before surprising everyone and patting the creature on its shoulder, "He felt sad when we left and felt happy when I talked to him."
"James ya idiot," Logan snarled holding the bridge of his nose, "Did ya ever think it could be sad 'cause it's meal left then happy when it's meal decided to waltz up ta its mouth?"
"He doesn't want to eat me, well I don't think he does..." James then turned the creature and asked, "Do you want to eat me Mr. Bird?"
The creature chirped.
"See he wants to be friends!" James smiled.
"Bullshit!" Emma snap, "Wait, how do you know that it's a he?"
"He feels like a he."
"Bullshit!"
"Emma stop swearing." Cathy said.
"I'll stop swearing when he stops saying bullshit!" Emma pointed angrily at the creature, "I don't care if he's dangerous now or not! He's still a wild animal! We all know not to poke at wild creatures especially unknown creatures, what if he's venomous or something?"
"He's not a wild creature Emma, he's smart," James said, "I even got him to say my name."
James turned to the creature then pointed to himself, "J-am-es."
"James I's don't think..." Logan started.
The creature spoke. He's voice was rough and tinted with an accent that sounded like a mix between a birds chirp and a cats mewl.
"Ja-hahm-zes."
"See I told you he is smart," James said happily, his smile was then wiped off his face when he saw his friend's looks, "What's wrong, why are you looking at me like that? Stop it please!"
"James," Emma said slowly, "Do you even know what this is? That's not just a smart creature, it's a being. This is incredible! We should bring it back or something," Emma started to bounce, "We found another being, maybe there's like a settlement somewhere with other creatures. The government would probably reward us or something." She got closer to the creature.
"Hey," Emma said pointing to herself, "I'm Emma, sorry for calling you a creature Mr..."
"Bird, his name is Mr. Bird." James supplied.
"Why Mr. Bird?" Cathy asked.
"Well we can't keep on calling him creature that's just rude, also he looks like a bird." James pointed out.
Logan stared at James, "How da king's rule does he look like a bird? What kind of bird do ya's know dat's has four legs?"
"Well I don't see you making up any names."
"Aren't ya supposed ta be silent?"
"I think this counts as something stupid happening."
"Okay guys focus," Emma interrupted, "We found a being that is capable of speech what do we do?"
"We should tell someone." Cathy said.
"Um who? Our class left us and none of us really know the way back." James pointed out.
"Okay then, how's about we find some food tah feed us and him? I think da class took our packs with's them." Logan said surveying the area.
"In the middle of the night in a forest that none of us knows about?" Emma said one eyebrow raised.
"Point, then what are we supposed to do?" Cathy said exhausted.
"Maybe we should wait for someone to find us. We're still in the original camp ground and someone's bound to figure out we're not with the rest of the class." Logan said before sitting down.
"So we're just going to sit down and do nothing?" Emma asked.
"Not nothing,' James said, 'we can teach Mr. Bird to say our names properly and then we can learn his."
Logan shrugged, "I'm game." Then he sat down followed closely by Cathy.
Emma sighed deeply before plopping down, "Okay, but I go first."