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"Oh my gosh, are you okay?"
Ugh...what the hell...where is he...and why does his head feel so...full and empty at the same time?
"Aw don't worry little guy, I'll get you inside where it's warm."
He's so tired...and his heart is pounding so much, why can't he turn it down? Where are the others anyway?
"You tried your best okay? Everything's gonna be fine."
What is that...chirpy voice? Who's speaking? It's not one of them, certainly, no voice in this particular body has a voice anywhere near that high...
"There there...get some sleep, my gallant knight."
----
He jolts awake, mouth opening in a gasp and feathers fluffing up instantly.
Quick! Make sure everything's working.
Heart, check.
Lungs, check.
Muscles, check.
Digestive system, hardly relevant but check.
Eyes.
Those should be open. Right right, he doesn't have the strong sense of smell that that other voice has, he relies on his vision.
Their vision.
Why is everything so quiet?
Hello? Is anyone else here? Heroic one? Really really mopey one?
Silence, except for his own racing thoughts. Not even a pretentious Narrator describing everything around him.
What the-
He finally gets the body to sit up, he feels the face and the beak and...no wait that's different. Looking at the hands...they're definitely skinnier than they should be.
He's not in that body anymore. He's on his own.
How did he get separated?
No, not important now. Now he needs to assess his surroundings and try and figure out what sort of danger he's in.
Which he should have been doing from minute one, what an idiot.
He ignores his own body for now, scanning the inside of the...room? Basement? Strangely well-lit for a basement, and decently warm too. One might even call it cozy.
Too cozy. Suspiciously so. The plush bedding he's wrapped up in does little to soothe his worries, he knows when something is put there to lower his guard, and he's not falling for it.
"Oh yay, you're awake!" comes a sonorous voice, almost like birdsong, drifting down from the stairwell.
He damn near jumps out of his feathers, throwing himself back against the wall with a thud.
"Ah! What-" he squawks, his voice coming out rough and scratchy from having never actually spoken aloud before.
From around the corner prances a cheery woman with a soft face, billowing gown and long silky hair, and eyes almost as big as her entire head. Like something out of a book.
Uh oh.
"AH! PRINCESS!" he bleats in alarm, frantically casting around for some kind of weapon he can use for self defense.
The Princess just giggles.
"Yes! That's me! How are you my dashing hero?" she beams, bright enough to light up the entire dim basement.
Dashing hero? What?
"Wh-why am I here? What are you planning?" he hisses frantically, shaking from head to foot.
She tilts her head in seeming confusion.
"Oh...hmm...I dunno. What are you planning?" she asks, throwing the question right back at him. She tiptoes forwards and sits right next to him, either oblivious to his fear of her or delighting in it.
Her face shows nothing but naive innocence but there's definitely something sinister underneath that smile.
There's obviously a right answer here...just figure out what she wants and stall her until there's an opening.
He tries his best to mimic her smile, the effort cramping his face into a strained grimace, and glances at the stairs she came from.
"J-just...you know...staying down here and...uh...appreciating...the blanket," he squeezes out, clearing his throat about three times per word. It's a horrible lie, but if she sees through it then she's not showing any obvious signs.
No, she giggles again.
"I'm so happy you like it! I just found it lying around...like I found you passed out upstairs. It was really brave of you to come and rescue me," she chirps, staring at him with those unsettlingly huge eyes. Like great shimmering puddles.
Him? Brave?
That's loaded language right there.
"Uh..."
He has no idea what to respond to that.
"Are you g-going to keep me here?" he whispers, more to himself than her, but she hears anyway.
"If you want me to," she smiles, leaning her whole damn body against his. "I can do something else if you want though. Anything at all. Whatever makes you happy."
His heart stops dead in his chest, he fully expects her to pull a knife at any moment. Or try and eat him.
What is her angle? He can't figure her out and that is the scariest thing of all.
Could he just ask to leave? At least to get her mask off, right? But there's no guarantee asking that would even be enough to reveal anything. One thing's for certain, he's not going to be allowed out of here without a struggle...he needs to be smart about this.
"What...makes me happy..." he begins carefully, "I like not having knives in the room."
It's an attempt. The Princess barely even seems to comprehend.
"Okay, there's no knives in here," she smiles, without so much as pretending to check. She just says it, like it's what she thinks he wants to hear.
And now he's back at square one.
Fantastic. Just great.
"Get off me," he mutters, almost anxiously, bracing himself for a negative reaction-
"Okay."
Huh?
She pulls away, lifting her head off his shoulder with a soft, slightly disappointed sigh, but her smile remains ever present.
Is this person even real?
"What?" he half-laughs in bewilderment.
She quietly watched him, as if waiting for him to continue.
"What are you playing at? What's your angle?" he hisses, back to accusatory.
She blinks her big, innocent eyes that have to be a lie they just have to.
"I dunno, but I think you're acute angle!" she beams, so proudly, booping him playfully on the beak with her dainty finger.
He squawks at that, pulling back even further and maybe starting to panic a little.
"Get it? Acute? A cute, angle?" she reiterates hopefully.
"No- yes, I get that it's a math joke but-" he sputters.
"Yayyyy! You liked it!" she cheers, clapping her hands together in excitement. "Okay, um, your turn!"
He can't believe her. He can't believe this. His heart is racing and he can hardly tell at this point if it's panic or...or something else. Probably the same source as his face heating up for some reason.
"M-my turn for what?" he stammers.
"For...telling a joke?" she prompts, her eyebrows quirked in fond intrigue.
"My life."
"Huh?"
"My life right now is a fucking joke," he groans.
She giggles, because of course she does.
"I get it! Because you're so funny!" she smiles, and it's radiant enough to nearly blind him.
Maybe she really is just clueless and innocent...