[Open] One day you think we'll wake up

[espigeonage]

Who: Julien and OPEN
What: Morose giant bird lets himself be approached.
Where: Various non-crowded places in Locke, Vegas, and Neuschwainstein; in the air, in parks, in large yards. Your character may have gotten in contact with him and arranged to meet, or just encountered him.
When: Vague points in the last few days of January.


Two weeks in the mountains and Julien was coordinated and more or less used to how his body worked now. He still felt fragile and hated the way he looked, the way people looked at him, the new list of limitations. Part of him wanted to go back to the alm and the isolation that came with it. It had been grueling up there and, in its way, peaceful. It had also been hard to bear. He couldn't stay there, he'd known it even before he'd been found. He thrived on people.

...but he couldn't bear to jump back into turmoil and chatter, either. So, compromise. He hovered at the edges of the world he had known and talked to people sometimes, and wondered if he'd ever feel like himself again.

At least the flying was good.

Comments

[espigeonage]

It's good to see that. Julien removes himself from the couch and finds a place to stand and cautiously, gingerly stretches his right wing and leg, then his left, then raises up his folded wings and stretches his tail, and yawns. He comes very close to knocking many things over before he's done and resettled.

"Sure. I reserve the right to get you to say it again or translate. Or ask for a pause. And I'm staying the night." Julien removes the seat cushion from the other half of the couch and settles his chest on it as he assumes a loaf-shape on the floor. Oh, that's nice. He sighs comfortably, then looks back up at Aaron. "You can come sit here and use me as a backrest, but fair warning, do that later without asking and I will be very displeased."

[elfstoned]

Aaron bursts into a laugh. "Is that how it's going to be?" he asks, good-naturedly. "In return for the privilege of using you as a backrest and the opportunity to recite poetry, I'm expected to put you up for the night?" he teases. "All right, all right, I'll follow the rules."

He gets up and makes his way to the floor, settling his back against Julien's side, keeping his legs bent at the knee.

[espigeonage]

Julien fluffs comfortably and tucks his chin. He's soft, and his side heaves slowly with the rhythm of breathing. Try not to think of the triceratops breathing scene in Jurassic Park, Aaron. "That's right."

"Say you got to present this poem like you wrote it or discovered it in like ancient storage. Your audience doesn't know it, but they'll be fascinated. How would you introduce it?"

[elfstoned]

"You and your never-ending what-ifs!" He digs an elbow into Julien's side, playfully -- not hard. "That would depend entirely on the audience! If it were historians or anthropologists, I would discuss the Lay's epic qualities and the insight it gives into the culture that wrote it. If it were an audience of medievalists, I'd discuss the poem's similarities to fairy romances, like Sir Orfeo. And if it were one ornery modern poet sitting on my living room floor, I would tell him to shut up and let me get on with it."

[espigeonage]

"I should hit you," he says contentedly, neck curved enough to regard Aaron with one round eye. "I do hope that's not off the top of your head. You should fantasize about presenting it, like the super dweeb you are. But, very well, you may continue."

[elfstoned]

The categorization is; the analysis is not. But he'll let Julien wonder, answering with nothing but a cocked eyebrow.

"And prove me right," he shoots back, referring to the accusation of orneriness. But he takes a deep breath, shuts his eyes, and tries to remember where they were.

"Hmm...the last one I had you translate was Seventeen, wasn't it?" he mutters. "Right, right -- Beren had just woken up."

And he continues the story, from Beren's awakening and being named One-hand, all the way to the end, if he's not told to stop for good. It'll take a good hour to tell the rest of the story.

[espigeonage]

Julien decides to keep commentary to a minimum for the recitation, though he does make appropriate sounds at the pauses. The "Mmhmms" and so on devolve sometimes into sub-bass noises, deep enough that they may be felt rather than heard, like grunts or short deep trills, but mostly like a couple seconds of purring. The first time he does that Julien raises his head up, dismayed, but he isn't randomly losing the ability to talk, so he settles again. This is nice. He doesn't want to ruin it by freaking out over yet another stupid thing his body is doing.

"Well," he says when Aaron wraps up, and yawns. It's necessarily a big yawn, his beak open about ninety degrees, the mandibles of his lower jaw flexing to spread farther apart. He fluffs his feathers way out just to see how they half-cover his friend. "Well! I thought that was ending like four times before it ended. Nice touch with the actual ending, though."

With having to reflect himself on mortality, with sudden sour resentment of people who know they may have a long time ahead, it's kind of nice to hear of someone giving it up.

[elfstoned]

Aaron yawns himself, catching it from Julien. "I'm glad you liked it," he says, the words catching the tail end of the yawn. "I think it's -- Julien, are you trying to smother me?" He reaches over his shoulder and tries to pat some of the feathers back down.

[espigeonage]

"You look like you're backing into a bush," Julien informs him with interest, but he subsides. "Well, I'm glad you finally got to tell it. So, if there's this ring of yours, that means the poem's based on real events, right. I guess crystal balls aren't that weird, then." He sighs. "I so had the Adventures of Aragorn and Company pegged as like semi-realistic fantasy. Elves and dwarves and dragons yes, not a lot of magic trinkets and collectibles, and people actually get dirty hiking around."

[elfstoned]

"I can speak for the dirt," Aaron says, remembering just how filthy those traveling clothes were. "But I also remember some of the ring's factual history. When Aragorn was alive, it was one of the oldest things in the world." He takes a deep breath, and sighs it out. Finishing that poem has left him really relaxed.

"It was a world with dirt and gods."

[espigeonage]

"That's poetic. I should see about homaging your turns of phrase."

And that is a world where mines can remain intact after being deserted for a thousand years, Julien remembers, but he doesn't mention Moria. Aaron seems at peace and he isn't, often. Might as well let him enjoy the moment. "Let me look at it again. Must not rub down or tarnish with wear - or was it kept safe somewhere?"

[elfstoned]

Aaron obligingly takes it out and hands it over. "It was worn for thousands of years," he says, "by the kings of an island, and then by their descendants who were not kings. They went to the mainland and became kings, until their kingdom was destroyed and what was left of that people became wanderers. The last king gave it to another people as thanks for their help, but eventually it was ransomed back and brought to Rivendell. It was given to Aragorn a full thousand years after the last king to own it died."

[espigeonage]

Now Julien handles it in a more leisurely manner, turning it over more, trying to fit his knobby clawed thumb into it, exploring the thing.

"It looks old, but nothing like that kind of old. Fantasyland builds things with magic everlast coatings, I see. Bet if you ground it against bricks it's the bricks which would be worse for wear. I like it."

Then he folds his allula feathers over it, favors Aaron with one eye and drawls, "Ransom, huh?" Don't fear, even as he finishes the question he's handing it back. "I bet a lot of that stuff under the mountain in Vegas has stories too. Kinda makes me wonder... people like going with the 'past lives' thing, and I guess reincarnation could explain looking and acting like these people. But how's all their stuff get here? Is it vanishing there?"

[elfstoned]

"Damned if I know," says Aaron, accepting it back, already half-ready to have a snark-off with Julien for it, because oh no you don't--

But he tucks it away again. "I wish we understood more of what's been happening to us and why. I still can't believe we know so little. It's been nearly two years."

[espigeonage]

He's judged the ring's too important to Aaron to make a longer joke of stealing it. At least for now. Besides, magpie comparisons.

"I know. We've just got a lot more questions, really. Every new discovery just adds to them."

[elfstoned]

"I've got a question," Aaron says, shooting a look over his shoulder. "When are you going to bed?"

[espigeonage]

"Hmm? It's late enough, I could settle down fine now." He makes a little gesture with his head, indicating the living room. "In here works if you can bring me like a blanket. You are too old to get exiled to the couch."

Julien can't sleep on a couch like that himself, not in more than a doze. He could bring down the other cushion and stick his head on one of the chairs, though.

[elfstoned]

"You're damn right I am," grumbles Aaron as he climbs to his feet. "I'll get you something to curl up under." He heads out of the room and down the hall to the closet where all the sheets and towels and things like that are kept. It won't take long.

[espigeonage]

Julien gets up and stretches again, letting the sense of Aaron leaned against him linger, and starts moving the couch pieces to his liking. "And leave the bathroom door open, and be sure you'll close yours," he calls.

He won't have any trouble there, but he's really too big to maneuver easily in the tiny bathroom. With an open door he has more space. Besides, doorknobs are so difficult he's resorted to unscrewing them once or twice.

[elfstoned]

"Got it," he calls from the hallway. Aaron's back a minute later with a thick blanket broad enough to cover Julien completely. Not particularly soft, but warm. "Anything else I ought to know?"

[espigeonage]

Softness is mostly wasted on Julien now, anyway. "Nah, you can leave me here. I'll read for a bit, drink some water." He accepts the blanket, claws snagging in the fabric, and tilts his head. "Wait, wait, I have a last bit of sappiness. This is your chance to back out!"

He's not super tall anymore, but he can easily stretch up, tuck his chin so his beak is out of the way, and be high enough to try for a light headbutt. The Thorsson dwarves had done that (though not lightly), and unhappy feelings towards Thorir aside, Julien had always liked the gesture.

[elfstoned]

He realizes what Julien is doing about a half-second before their foreheads bump.

A smile breaks across his face, and his hand comes up to pat the side of Julien's jaw, fondly, affectionately.

"You sap," he accuses.

[espigeonage]

"Like you haven't known that," he says easily. From Aaron, right now, he's not going to second-guess every bit of contact. "Guilty! Every bit as guilty as you, you mega nerd. Good night, then."

[elfstoned]

"Good night," is the good-natured reply.

He'll leave Julien to it, and go to sleep himself.

[espigeonage]

It does take Julien a little longer. Bathroom, snarfing up the dry granola bars he carries in his bag and holding them in his crop, drinking from the kitchen sink to soften them and wash residue off his beak, leafing through the translation of Anghel's story. Then if he can get the lights out with a switch he'll do that, if any of the lamps instead require twisting a tiny fiddly bit he'll just pull out the cord, and then it's slow fumbling in the dark time until he can get settled.

Maybe this time when he wakes up he won't try to sit up, or rub his face.