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Stephen was a proud bird. His mother had told him so even when he was just a chick in the nest and attempting to fly much sooner than he was eventually able to. He was suitably proud of his nest just bordering a human farm. There was food and entertainment and his flock was in the bordering pine trees but none had a nest as fine as his. The shiny bits and bobs had been carefully traded with the female human chick he had trained. She was small but learned quickly to give Stephen what pretty things he desired.
Well, at least until her flock discovered what illicit deals their chick was getting into. The human flock called it a ‘scare crow’ which was rather ridiculous. He was a crow and it certainly didn’t scare him. It also did not scare Wong, Cloak, Christine, or the Ancient One. Then again, the Ancient One had been around for many, many moons and not much scared or bothered the old bird.
Either way, the human flock did not want Stephen to interact with the human chick or to eat the seeds that were rightfully there for Stephen and his flock. Didn’t humans understand that if they did not gather the food they did not get to eat the food?
The Scare Crow was a rather ugly human. It didn’t move, it didn’t share shiny things, and it didn’t make noise when Stephen yelled at it. It was rather boring, truthfully. He would often sit on the Scare Crow’s head as proof that the Scare Crow was not named adequately. He would have to inform the human chick that her flock needed to create better names.
It took the moon disappearing and reappearing again for Stephen to learn that the human chick called the Scare Crow “Iron Man’. He supposed it was slightly better than Scare Crow but that must have been Iron Man’s job. Clearly he wasn’t good at it. It better news, he found out that the human chick was named Morgan. Her sire was not happy that Stephen would sit and taunt him for hours while he worked outside and would call for Morgan chick to distract Stephen.
Stephen was rather offended that Morgan chick’s sire thought he could be so easily distracted. But then again, Morgan chick had brought out some things she called fabric and had made something for Stephen to wear. It was red and kind of shiny but he could wear it around his wings! She called it a cape and had apparently made it herself. Stephen preened as he flew around wearing the cape. It was just the right length so as to not be in the way of his wings. Cloak seemed to be jealous and by the end of week each of his flock had appeared to the Morgan chick to be given their own cape in different colors. Each were shiny, but Stephen’s was the shiniest. Morgan was his human chick and he would receive the best presents.
He made sure to give her his best hammer he had crafted over three moons out of a rock at the base of his pine tree as a thank you for the wonderful cape.
Stephen made sure to give it to the human chick by dropping it on her sire’s head before he picked it up off the ground and hopped over to give it to her then flew back up to the Scare Crow. As her sire shouted angrily, Stephen laughed and laughed as his human chick radiated happiness.
Stephen was a proud crow and he would never leave this place for anything.