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The fires faded. Good sign.

The bird sat still. Good sign.

The bird approached. ...... less good sign, but... you know. No fire?

So, was it going to agree to a truce? It was reaching out - oh no.

Aiden didn't quite clue into the stupid rabid bird's plan before pain, and worst of all, heat, rushed through his hands. It really was a pity all around, because his reaction was to wrench his hands away. The fire extinguisher might attempt to pull a Wile. E. Coyote, but gravity would take hold eventually. It was, after all, the supreme god present, no matter what the stupid bird seemed to think.

And then the heat made it past Aiden's hands, the room shattered into those little tiny colourfully rainbow bits of noise like on a staticy TV injected with neon glitter, and his descent was finalized by the wall politely catching his skull and slowing his initial fall.

Oh no oh no oh no the bird was coming CLOSER. It had to be rabid. Normal birds DID NOT COME CLOSER TO THE PEOPLE SPRAYING THEM WITH FIRE EXTINGUISHERS.

Ooooooohhhhh no. No, this was all wrong. Was it a dream? That was a much better suggestion. Dream. Yes. Aiden would have loved to poke and prod and pinch himself, except his hands were full of fire extinguisher. CEILING ON FIRE! SCCCHHHPLLLLFFFFFTTTTT. CARPET ON FIRE! SCCCHHHHHHPPFFFFLLLLPPFFFTTT.

.... Was the bird... egging him on?

This was a perfect time to wake up. Aiden tried biting the inside of his mouth, since there was no freaking way he was letting go of the disturbingly light fire extinguisher. Owowowowowowowownothat didn't work. So he wasn't dreaming? Uh oh. Um. Bird. Egging him on. Logic, please.

Bird wasn't a bird?



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Well, he was in a mansion dedicated to mutants. He tried lowering the extinguisher a little. "Truce?" he offered warily, pretty sure he was talking to a psychotic figmentatious rabid bird thing but not willing to risk the alternative.

Urgh. Aiden shook his head, trying to clear away the fuzziness playing at the edges of his vision. Blasted... heat. Another shake of his head and a few breaths of disturbingly ineffective air (at least, it would be disturbing if he had time to notice and wasn't busy trying to deal with -

The window was on fire. WHY WAS THE WINDOW ON FIRE?

Oh right, the crazy freak peacock had been on fire too.

... WHY WAS A BIRD ON FIRE?

Either way, one could only get by in society for so long without knowing precisely what to do in case of fires. Aiden even happened to remember where to go at this particular, incredibly helpful instant. He bolted into the hallway (yes, succeeding in opening the door before he went through it), grabbed the conveniently located fire extinguisher, and bravely battled his way against the heat to spray the window (and, incidentally, bird) with anti-fire foam.

Aiden liked mornings like this. A brisk, blustery (if sunny) day outside, cool enough temperatures inside (but not so cold that Persi could start complaining and trying to jack the heat up), and nothing specific to do. No homework, no class, no training, no getting dragged off through mirrors without warning.

Yeah. This was a pretty good morning, and he was spending it working on the book he had sorely neglected over the past few months. He'd finally had an idea to continue it, so he was taking advantage of the quiet time.

He had roughed out several pages when he started having to blot his hand more than once a page to keep it from dripping. He had finished the outline of the scene to his satisfaction when the drying-frequency crept up to something more like every few seconds. There was something wrong. Aiden paused to take stock of the environment. It was way too hot in here. Oh, come on! Did Persi really mess with the thermostat? Aiden hauled himself over to check. Nope. It was still set as low as he could get away with. Then what....

He saw the bird as he turned around. A bright red bird. Perched on the outside of his windowsill. He had no clue what it was, but it probably shouldn't be there. Looked like some kind of freak peacock. Either way, it shouldn't be there.

... It also shouldn't be getting this hot the closer he got to the window. Sweat was straight-up running down his face and neck now, and when he touched the window frame, he left a damp smear behind. This was not fair. Summer was supposed to finally be over! So he shoved the window open, with absolutely no care to the bird's well-being or balance, and tried to get some proper air into the room.

Ohshtthebirdwasonfire.

Stumbling back into the room was probably a good idea, even if the exertion did leave him lightheaded and panting.

"Blame myself? I tried that. Made myself sick trying it. Been trying real hard not to since then." No thanks to Cafas. Cafas just floated around and made him work whenever the aussie felt like it, and occasionally broke things but never stuck around to deal with the wreckage. Nah, he just floated on his merry way.

Sure, insist that he saw loathing and blame. Sure, there might be traces left. Aiden was pretty confident that the remains were nothing like what they had been in past months, though. He'd been rather proud of his progress, at least up until people like Cafas started coming around, questioning him and assuming they knew absolutely everything just because life had kicked them in the face a few times too, see how it wasn't really all that unusual to get hurt and have to move past it? Yeah, real comforting. It was always swell to know that people thought you were doing horrible at managing things on your own, and of course you'd appreciate a helping hand shoved right in the middle of your business with no care for what damage they did in the process.

Aiden't didn't quite snatch the picture out of Cafas's hand the moment it was offered, but then he didn't even look at it before he slid it (carefully) into a pocket. He knew what his brother had looked like, but he wasn't going to ruin one of the few things he had left of him.

He didn't have to look at Cafas for the next thing, though. At least the wrenching his gut was currently attempting didn't have any way to compete with the flat dullness of his voice. "He's dead." Kind of hard to be on good terms with corpses, though Aiden figured he could probably get along better with Conri in his current state than he could with anyone who wasn't worm-feast in the summer-baked ground. And he refused to think of how sad and pathetic some people might consider that; he preferred to view it as how sad and pathetic everyone else was, that Aiden would still rather find out just what his brother currently looked like. Not that he wanted to. His imagination was more than vivid enough and those were thoughts he really didn't want to get into. But still. It was easier to get along with someone dead and gone than anyone around here.