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As much as everyone reassured them, Second didn’t really like being different.
This was an unfortunate dislike, when it came to everything going on around them. From the beginning, they were an outsider to their friends. Yes, they had all become closer, but Second always retained the simple information that they were the least like the rest of them just from origin itself. And it just kept stacking from the start.
There had been a reason their first concern when learning about their avian side had to do with the fact that it made them even more different from the gang.
They didn’t have an issue with individuality, no, that wasn’t the issue at all. Their favorite thing about all of their friends was how different they were from each other, and yet how well they all worked together.
It really had more to do with just how much set them apart from the rest. Their origin was different, so was their appearance. Purple might also have joined the group later, but at least she looked more like them! When they were all in a group, Second was just struck at how much like them she looked, even with the wings and she shared the experience of with Second.
They would never actually wish to change aspects of themselves to fit in better, nor did they believe anyone wanted them to. But it was noticeable.
They were even different from other avians. For a while, they hadn’t really recognized it, but Second had seen Purple’s raised eyebrow and mild confusion when she spotted them with their ear feathers and retractable talons. It wasn’t normal. They did some of their own research and couldn’t even find a single other avian that had those traits. Even Chosen didn’t have those traits, and they were the most closely related!
It was just…Second was an anxious person, they knew that about themselves. They had always been that way, before and after they emerged. They hesitated to voice it, but as life went on and dynamics changed, improved, reacted to life, they worried that some day there would be something about then that would pop up that would properly brand them as just too different.
It was really their worst nightmare. The idea that something would happen or something would be discovered that made them incompatible with the life they loved so much.
It was just anxious thinking, that was all. But that didn’t change the fact that some days they woke up with the crushing weight of impending doom coming from nowhere. They would hang around others more, re-establish routine, draw something from a dream, just do something to keep their mind off it.
And the powers…that made them the most different. Seeing themselves on that screen, they had forgotten everything about where they were in that moment. It was terrifying. That was the kind of thing they had feared for forever. They held inside the fact that they hadn’t immediately considered how to use them to escape, to get themself and Chosen out of there, to do something productive, even the fact that it seemed they had killed another person with them. The first thing they felt was dread that this was the exact kind of thing that made them too different.
They switched to trying to figure it out quickly enough, given that they needed every resource they could get then, and especially so when Yellow got brought in.
It hadn’t turned out that way. They had all made it out and Second still had their happy life with their friends, and now they even had a new and upcoming member of the flock in their formerly estranged brother. But it had rattled them to their core. They felt like they had come so close to their worst fears coming true, even if they didn’t. It was why they needed more time to recover than usual.
They had been feeling better since taking the time to recollect themselves and relax, but sometimes they still had off days.
They were having an off day again. Purple and Green were out on a date, Red and Blue were off doing something and Yellow was working on some project somewhere.
It seemed like a good time to go visit Chosen independently, Second was much more comfortable being around him since they did that project together and Chosen was less associated with world ending shenanigans. It had been months since Chosen had been moved into Minecraft, and they felt like it had done him a world of good.
Chosen was actually starting to come out of his shell with Second, though he hadn’t quite gotten there with the rest of the gang. That was fine, Second didn’t expect him to, but they hoped he would be more comfortable with them eventually, if only because Chosen was actually…kind of sweet?
It seemed like an unexpected descriptor for the stoic and powerful stick, but with all that power and heaviness that came with his whole life, little bits of quirkiness and personality had finally started shining through after months of what felt like nothing but recovery.
But they hadn’t heard anything from Chosen in a few days. It worried them. It wasn’t really like Chosen reached out much in general, but Red mentioned that he was “unusually quiet,” last time he was over, and Chosen was already quiet. Not to mention, Chosen had gotten a little fidgety last time Second bid him farewell for the evening, so it did seem like the best move.
Second would get to spend time with someone else on an anxious day, and maybe they could check in to make sure Chosen was doing alright.
Second climbed into the loft of the house, admiring theirs and Chosen’s work on the space. It really was easily one of Second's favorite projects to work on. A few sun catchers scattered little rainbows all over the room and it smelled slightly of earthiness and a natural floral scent, mixed with Chosen’s signature campfire scent that just followed him everywhere. Second was just glad it didn’t smell like a smoker’s house.
They lightly knocked on the floor to announce their presence.
Chosen’s head poked over the high wall of blankets and pillows that made up his nest like a meerkat. Second almost laughed, but kept it inside knowing Chosen didn’t like to be laughed at.
Second was about to give a casual greeting, but were quickly interrupted by a flurry of chirps coming from Chosen’s side of the room.
He was happy to see them, that was for sure. Really happy.
Hi! Hi! Happy to see you! Hi, flock member! Missed you!
Oh, Second didn’t realize he had imprinted on them! They would have questioned why Chosen hadn’t tried to reach out to them more, as he would have had to imprint on them last time they were over, but knowing how Chosen was, they weren’t that surprised.
When he had imprinted on Red, Red had literally been there and was already watching for it. And it was during a time Chosen was still wary of getting into his instincts. Chosen hadn’t really needed to reach out or identify that he was imprinting with Red, but this wasn’t that. So if Second had to guess, Chosen was feeling the full effects of a fresh imprint. They hoped being away hadn’t messed with it too much.
Hi! Second chirped back, and navigated the intentionally cluttered room over to where Chosen was bundled up in his nest. How are you?
Chosen was still making small warbles that mostly just communicated that he was happy to see Second with little answer to their question. When Second got closer to him, they could see that he probably hadn’t left the nest in a little while. His hair was ruffled and pushed around, and he had some stray feathers lying around him in the nest that had probably been plucked.
For as pleased as Chosen was to see Second, Second knew how unsettling it was to not be close to a recent imprint.
Chosen reached forward like he was about to pull Second into the nest, but paused and aborted the action. He shifted and withdrew his hand to fiddle with one of the shiny ornaments that was clipped on his feathers with a frustrated expression.
He’s nervous, Second observed. They could come up with any one of what was probably several reasons for this, but what came to mind first was the last time Chosen had grabbed him suddenly.
“You want me to come in?” Second asked politely, doing their best to put both of them in a position of authority in their given perspectives. Chosen nodded quickly. He was deep in his instincts. Second was glad to see it, given how hard it had been to get Chosen able to connect with them in the first place.
Second climbed into the nest with Chosen. His wings were fluffing and shaking with excitement, and his pupils were massive. He was making excited little chirps while Second got settled in the nest. It was a tighter fit, as Chosen hadn’t made it to fit really anyone else, but it could work.
Second grabbed their phone and sent a message to their friends.
Chosen imprinted on me, gonna be at his for a bit.
Cringe Nerd: I’m in the area, you want me to drop off some food for you guys?
Yes please!
As soon as Second put away their phone, Chosen carefully reached forward and pulled Second against his chest while making coos. Second just let him. He was in the clingy stage.
They felt bad they hadn’t been here earlier. It wasn’t like they had known they should be here, but they still felt bad. It was fairly obvious to Second that Chosen had been in a fair bit of stress prior to their visit. That made two of them. Second worried this could be something of a setback for Chosen. Every last one of his instincts had been messed up badly for the past few years, and the gang was just trying as hard as possible to make it a pleasant thing instead of a painful one. They didn’t want to go backward.
Chosen slightly messed with their hair while making little warbling noises. He seemed better now, but Second figured he would just let him do his thing and assist if he was needing it. He was getting better at indulging without needing to be prompted.
One of Chosen’s hands drifted town to the top of one of Second’s wings, just at the bend and hesitantly started messing with some of their smaller feathers.
Oh no, he’s wanting to preen me, Second thought.
Chosen had never actually preened Second before, and from the state of his wings, they worried about his ability to preen himself. They quietly theorized that the feather pulling had started as an internal poor attempt to self-preen without actually knowing what to do. Second was already feeling anxious. It wasn’t really fair that they were worried about it.
Well, it was kind of fair, but Second still felt bad. They could tell their muscles in their wings had tensed up a little when Chosen touched their wings, and they could tell Chosen had noticed too, because he moved his hand away and back up to their hair with a dejected warble.
He wasn’t really in his full mind, Second knew it wasn’t any kind of attempt to make them feel bad. They could get the same way at times.
You can preen, Second chirped. Just be careful.
Chosen brightened up and reached back for Second’s wing, this time reaching for some of their secondaries. He was terribly unpracticed. His movements were clumsy and lacked the smoothness rest of their friends had developed over the years of learning and refining the skill. There was little pattern to it. Chosen was switching from picking at tiny pieces of lint unsuccessfully to trying to mess with them, which really did more to just ruffle them than straighten them out.
It wasn’t good, not bad enough to call it a bad preen, but Second could tell he was running completely on instinct while trying to preen, and instinct didn’t always do a good job with technique, especially at Chosen’s stage. And with Chosen’s history, Second doubted instinct was going to do much lifting here.
Second waited for a minute to see if he might figure it out. Then Chosen accidentally gave a harsher pull that wasn’t enough to pull the feather out, but was enough that Second winced from the movement and got a small ow chip from them. Chosen gave a nervous and apologetic warble and withdrew his hands.
Second sighed quietly and fluffed their feathers to try and soothe the tugged feather and reached back to grab Chosen’s hand.
I’ll teach, Second trilled kindly, and placed his hand back on their wing. Watch. Copy.
They brushed through their own feathers slowly and in the most basic pattern they could. Just through their secondaries. They stopped and moved Chosen’s hand over to where they started.
Your turn.
Slowly, Chosen worked to imitate what Second had just done. It was much smoother. His hands were still shaky, and lacked confidence in movement, but it was much better. Second gave an encouraging chirp and followed it up with an again one. Chosen went back over the path again in the same pattern a few times while Second whistled at him encouragingly.
Switch pattern, Second instructed and Chosen gave him a nervous look. They returned it with a kind one, and shifted their wing to further emphasize what they were trying to get him to do. He slowly inverted the previous zig-zag pattern from before and switched to moving in more circles and swirls to change from what Second had initially shown him.
He was getting better. Chosen was a quick learner. After going over the spot a few times, Chosen cautiously strayed out of the spot to start working on other areas.
Second’s wings were immaculate already. The only bit of uncleanliness in them were some tiny leaves they had picked up on the way to Chosen’s house.
Once he got going in a good rhythm, Chosen picked it up quickly, just like Second thought he would. Preening was almost always relaxing. It wasn’t always the answer to a stressful situation, and there had been a couple occasions in which Second needed to spend more active quality time than just a preen to calm down, but it was very frequently a stape of when Second was having a bad day.
He was feeling better. Chosen was still a point of uncertainty, but he did share one of Second’s differences, and that was a comfort. As Chosen steadily improved his technique, Second relaxed more. Chosen’s technique was interesting, now that it had a better direction and point of reference.
All of their friends had a different technique, unique to them to the point Second could tell who was preening without looking. Chosen’s was incredibly instinctive, more so than Purple’s. Purple had a good feel for what did and didn’t feel nice from her own point of reference, and was lightning quick with perceiving when to switch spots or movements, but she was still very methodical. Chosen seemed to be able to tell exactly when to switch up or move, even before Second did.
His movements were the least self-assured, but easily the most certain when it came to where he wanted to focus on.
Chosen seemed more calm as well, probably just because Second was there. Still, this was a first Second had seen when it came to how a fresh imprint manifested. So far, the routine had something to do with the imprinting avian getting “pampered,” for lack of a better word, because it truly wasn’t an obligation or chore (as much as Second still worried it was at times). Chosen, on the other hand, was the one giving affection, rather than receiving it.
Second shouldn’t be surprised his imprint took on a more helpful role. Both Chosen and Second had taken on a slightly protective streak for the other since becoming closer, and Chosen was already more primed to being a giver than he was to being receiver. While coming from an unfortunate origin, it was still where he was most familiar, and Second wasn’t going to try to alter how his imprint manifested.
Chosen wasn’t acting like this was an obligation of any kind, he was being extremely cautious, so Second didn’t feel like anything unhealthy was going on.
Second heard the front door downstairs open, and their ear feathers flicked down to track the movement. It sounded like Yellow, there to drop off food like she said she would. They heard her climb the stairs and felt Chosen slow and the subtle movement of him turning his head toward the sound.
Second was about to greet her, but heard Chosen make a quiet, almost imperceptible chittering noise that signaled an anxious sort of attentiveness that prepared for the need to go on the defense.
“I got food!” Yellow said when she came into view, and while Second was happy to see her, Chosen was less so.
Chosen wrapped his arms and wings around Second and gave a few warning chips at Yellow. She paused at the top of the stairs, not really expecting to be met with that sort of reaction from Chosen. She had never really been on bad terms with him, this was just the most territorial any of the avians in their circle had been during an imprint..
“Um, you both okay?” She asked.
I’m fine! Second whistled at her from beneath the coverage of black feathers, and cooed a few notes at Chosen. Flock member, friend, safe.
Chosen relaxed slightly, but their feathers were still puffed out in a way that was reminiscent of a cat’s tail fluffing up, and Second shot Yellow a sheepish look that told her she probably shouldn’t come much closer. Chosen would be much more pleasant when he wasn’t as deep in his instincts.
“Okay, I brought you both some soup and some pasta that’s easy enough to re-heat. I also picked up the projector and some of Second’s ghibli DVDs for you guys if you wanted something to do.”
Second perked up and an excited trill escaped them. They decided Chosen would really like Princess Mononoke from the list. Then again, who wouldn’t?
Yellow smiled at their reaction.
“You need anything else?” The two of them shook their heads. “Alright, text if you end up with something you need. Have fun.”
Yellow left, and Chosen was happy to return to preening Second while making quiet chirps and whistles. He was singing a quiet and simple song that was nice to listen to. It was nothing too complicated, nothing that really communicated much outside of the fact that Chosen was more comfortable than Second would have expected, but it was a nice song.
Chosen’s hand then moved over to cover some of their ear feathers, and Second wasn’t really ever a fan of those getting preened.
It wasn’t really that it didn’t feel nice, it just…came back to the whole difference thing. It felt like calling attention to it more than already. They just preferred to do that themselves.
They flicked the ear feathers and gently brushed Chosen’s hand back into their wings to re-direct him as gently as possible.
Chosen interrupted his own song with a concerned warble that Second responded to with a kind trill. He hadn’t done anything wrong, it was just one of their preferences. Chosen stayed away from Second’s ear feathers for the rest of the preen though, and they were glad for it.
Eventually, after a nice preen and a good amount of time spend in Chosen’s presence, Chosen came back to. He loosened his grip on Second and shook his head a few times to clear out the fog Second knew he was experiencing. They blinked a few times to clear it themselves, after the preen.
“Sorry,” he mumbled, even though he didn’t make a move to get away.
“You don’t need to be,” Second said.
Chosen grimaced. “I pulled on your feathers, got all clingy, and I threatened Yellow. Yes I do.”
“You’re imprinting. You’re just being more territorial, that’s all there is. You’re learning. You should be allowed to learn about this part of yourself without policing yourself about how we’re going to take it. It’s supposed to be about you. It’s fine, we all understand.”
They were being truthful. The fact that Chosen was letting his instincts out more, and letting himself be more bird-like was a good thing. They didn’t want to reprimand him when some of the trickier, more possessive and what could be considered “negative” qualities were also making an appearance. That wouldn’t do any good, and was generally unreasonable anyway.
“Still. She said she got us food? Why?”
Second gave a concerned expression. “Because I’m going to be sticking around for a few days?” They said it like it was obvious, but they know they were about to need to explain why that was as well, even as they caught the small excited shine in Chosen’s eye that he masked quickly.
“You don’t need to do that,” he said. “I’ll be fine.”
“Were you feeling fine between now and the last time I visited?”
Chosen shifted and looked down and away. A while ago, Second might have taken that as a reason to back off and drop the subject, but they had since learned that Chosen was just unused to having these kinds of conversations. From what Second could tell, discussions and arguments with The Dark Lord had a tendency to spiral out of where Chosen might have preferred them, and just avoided disagreement for the life of him. He was just learning how to have serious conversations, not necessarily pushing them away.
“It’s manageable. I’ve dealt with worse.”
“You don’t have to ‘manage’ it though, you could have just called me. We did tell you about imprinting, right?” Chosen nodded. “Okay, so you know it’s important we spend time together during the initial phase?”
Chosen shrugged a silent ‘I guess’ in response. Second nudged him with a wing to get his attention off of the corner of a blanket so he could see their face.
“Hey, I mean it. Let yourself have something good for a change.”
Chosen just nodded and a small smile flashed on his face, even if he did retain his typical worried expression. Second cooed and gently reached for one of his wings, letting him back out if he wanted to. He adjusted slightly so Second could take the wing into their lap and brush through his feathers.
Every so often, Second would take off one of the clips that held the sparkly pieces of jewelry on his wings to have better access to the feather before clipping it back on. Chosen seemed relaxed, not really fully in his instincts, but he usually didn’t like to fall into them during preening anyway. He had already indulged earlier, so this was just meant to be a relaxing and reciprocal thing.
“Can I ask you a question?” Chosen asked as they both eased into Chosen’s turn being preened, though he had already asked a question.
“Shoot.”
“Why don’t you like your ear feathers preened?”
Second paused and sighed.
“Nobody else has them,” they said quietly and Chosen narrowed his eyes slightly in mild confusion while Second shifted to another section. “I mean, not even you or Purple have them. I looked on the internet for anything about sticks who have ear feathers or talons. There’s nothing. I’m the only one.”
Chosen tilted his head a little and Second wondered what he was thinking about that. It felt weird to complain about feeling different to The Chosen One, but he had asked, so Second would answer.
“That bothers you?” Second nodded in response to his words while resetting several small, twisted feathers near the base of his wing. “Why?”
They shot him a look. Why? Chosen ought to know how feeling different felt. He caught their look.
“Seriously, they seem useful. I like being able to see what you’re listening to. You react to noises I worry aren’t real, and then I don’t have to worry about it anymore. And they make you easier to read.”
They supposed that made sense. Chosen did tend to ask more questions about how their friends were feeling than he asked about Second, and had mentioned offhandedly that he wished their friends had wings so he could know what they were thinking like he could with Second. The sound thing also made a good amount of sense just from a practical standpoint. They didn’t know Chosen worried about auditory hallucinations. Still, the utility of them didn’t quite seem enough to squash the frustration they had about them.
“It’s not that I don’t like it,” they explained through a bit of difficulty. “I love them, my friends I mean. And I know I am so different from them. Sometimes it’s just hard to be so fundamentally different.
Chosen shifted. “What’s hard about it? Surely you aren’t truly that different from them?”
“It’s true,” Second murmured. “It’s true that I’m different from everyone I know and love. I know they love me, that’s not an issue. They’re all a pre-determined set, I’m just not like them like they’re like each other.”
“You’re like me,” Chosen said quietly after a satisfied sigh from Second’s practiced preening as they passed over a spot Chosen usually liked. “We’re like each other. Honestly, I think you are what I could have become under better circumstances. I know you want to be more like them, but really, I want to be more like you.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, who wouldn’t? Cursors, I’m unbelievably jealous of you, you know that?”
“You are?” Second shouldn’t be so surprised. Chosen’s life had objectively sucked for a long time just from what was going on with his avian traits alone. Mixing that with the enslavement that his life had begun with and the torture Second hadn’t known they could protect him from at the time, their life was so much better in comparison. Except, they got the feeling that Chosen might be referring to what made them different, and they weren’t sure why that was.
“Not jealous in an angry way, I would never will anything bad to happen to you. It’s more like…you’re kind of the better one, among the two of us, right? At least in perception. Let’s be real, you are exactly what Alan wanted even if he didn’t know it. There’s probably a lot I’m not seeing, and I know you’ve had your stuff with him, there’s no way you haven’t. But you’re an artist, you can talk to him, you show care and interest in what he makes, you play in a way he likes, and with your friends you’re—” Chosen’s voice cut a little and Second slowed his hands slightly. “What makes you different; it also makes you so much easier to love for everyone who loves you. They don’t have to try very hard.”
“I’m—I’m sorry?” Second tried. They could pick up on some of how Chosen felt about himself as he spoke, and it was something they wanted to refute. Chosen wasn’t hard to love. They really did feel a certain amount of guilt that Chosen had been through hell, and they had just gotten to exist peacefully in comparison.
“Don’t be, I’m not upset with you for it. It’s just true and I wish it weren't so hard for me. I guess what I mean by all of this is; your differences that you wish you didn’t have, some of them gave you the life you have. Red mentioned it, the speech thing? The hollowhead thing? Even the powers, especially that living drawing one you’ve got, are the reason you got to live on the PC with any of them. You introduced them to a whole new world because of your differences. And your extra avian traits, they help me get to understand you better. It’s hard to understand the others sometimes, but when you flick your ears a certain way or use your talons to scratch an itch on my wings, it lets me focus more on you and less on all the uncertainty.”
“I’m not perfect,” Second mumbled shyly. It felt unusual for someone to just be verbally laying out all the things they liked about them, not because no one ever made them feel liked, but because of how forward it was. Their friends showed their love. Chosen spoke it. “Did Red also tell you about our fight?”
“Yeah, he did,” Chosen said. “I was asking about—anyway. But you’re still close. One fight didn’t ruin everything. One thing didn’t cause it to crumble. And I didn’t say you were perfect, the fact that you aren’t perfect makes being more like you attainable. You have your stuff. It seems like you’re the only one thinking about all of this.” Chosen sighed and leaned into some of Second’s pets through his wings. “From what I’ve felt from Red, I think they would be perfectly happy with any difference about you because it’s still you. They want to love you, not who you might wish you were. And the more of you you let them see, the more of you they get to love.”
Second’s ear feathers flicked a couple times as they gave Chosen a thoughtful look.
“When did you get all wise?” They teased with a hint of humor in their voice while they picked through Chosen’s wings and smoothed a larger and more isolated feather.
“I’ve been around since 2007,” Chosen said. “Don’t forget that I’m older than you. I’ve had a lot of time to think as well. I wish you had seen more of me outside of a crisis.”
“Is this how you think you normally are?”
Chosen tilted his head and his wing that wasn’t being held by Second made its own avian gesture of mild uncertainty that held a similar meaning as a shrug, but with a mild disagreement.
“I think I’m learning how I actually am,” Chosen murmured. “This whole avian thing has really cleared my head since learning how it works, and now that there isn’t really anything directly looming over me, I’m figuring out who I am outside of what people want of me.” He smiled. “Turns out I’m more protective than I thought I was, and I’ve found out I really value truth? Not just honesty, but truth and the pursuit of it, and not even in a personal sense! Some of those books I think your friend Yellow put on the shelves are really interesting just because it’s the truth of the world!”
Chosen’s eyes sparked just a little up as he was thinking about it and his feathers shook slightly with a veiled excitement. He had started doing this more recently, and it put Second at ease seeing him just be…normal. Well, normal in the sense that he was comfortable easing into a more natural thing about him, rather than going through an internal battle all the time. And as it turned out, Chosen had a few things he just liked to talk about, which was unexpected because Chosen didn’t usually talk that much.
“I’ve always liked stars, but they’re so interesting! They’re so big, and I think that’s supposed to freak me out, but I think it’s just cool. They’re these massive balls of power and energy that burn and attract other bodies of mass around them. And just the way they work too, their mass makes their core so dense and the gravity is so strong that it’s fusing elements together to make heavier ones, and it’s releasing energy that’s keeping it from collapsing from that cycle and it’s a perfect balance of pressure and power. Up until it dies anyway, which takes millions of years. Longer even. That’s when the star starts compressing the new elements into even heavier elements until it can’t fuse them anymore, and it collapses inward and explodes.”
Second smiled and nodded to show interest. Red had mentioned that Chosen had started combing through the books and seemed to have gained a genuine interest in the information contained within them. They would have to tell Chosen about that physics dream they had once, it seemed like he might really enjoy that conversation.
Chosen was still going about stars, quietly rambling on about how fascinating they were and how small they looked from afar. Second asked a couple questions, and ended up in a light discussion about the world-breaking physics of black holes, planets, gravity, and just interesting stuff. Second mentioned that understanding movement physics was important for their animation work, and that seemed to remind Chosen of something else.
“Do you ever think about…it?” Chosen asked, tense statements hiding in his tone.
Second frowned.
“I’m gonna have to ask you to be more specific. What’s ‘it?’” The ‘it’ in question could be a number of things. Was Chosen talking about his own past, the kidnapping thing, the powers thing, the showdown thing, the avian thing, what was it?
“Alan took your wings,” he said quietly and Second was surprised. They hadn’t told him that.
“How did you—”
“You didn’t have them when we first met,” Chosen explained. “That thing you did when you saw your friends after they, uh, came back, was your birdsong trying to come out? Right?” Second nodded and let Chosen continue his statement, a little impressed he remembered that. “Okay. So I’ve been thinking how your powers—” Second grimaced. Just because Chosen gave them an admittedly comforting talk about their differences and how valuable they actually were, it was still something they remained worried about. It would probably just have to go away in its own time. “Activated both of our avian stuff. I was just—I wondered if you think about what Alan did to you sometimes, that’s all.”
This was a loaded topic of conversation. Second had exactly one (1) memory in which Alan intentionally acted as a treat to his life, even if there were plenty of unintentional slights in the beginning. Chosen on the other hand, had 4 years of that experience. There was no way Second could responsibly compare their relationships.
In fact, Second had gone on a very passionate, very angry and indignant rant at Alan when they found out what he did to their predecessor.
“You leave him alone,” they had warned when Chosen had passed through the PC and was ushered into Minecraft by the others and Second had stayed behind to talk with Alan. “If he’s on the PC, leave him be. If he’s messing something up on the PC, flag me or one of the others and we’ll intervene. But don’t go near him unless he approaches you.”
Alan had agreed easily, and as far as Second knew, there had been no issues, not that Chosen had been on the PC for more than a few minutes without leaving.
Second wondered if this was Chosen’s way to check on if there was anything going on between Alan and Second that needed intervention.
“Sometimes,” Second said honestly. “He’s not a present threat to me. I haven’t been afraid of him in a long time. I actually don’t consider that he’ll actually hurt any of us when we spar anymore. We’ve come a long way, but yeah. Sometimes I wonder what it would take for it to go backward. I mean, those years when I didn’t have my traits were really rough on me, and he did cause that, intentional or not.”
“It sucks,” Chosen said simply. “It just does. Nothing to do about it. He’s the one with the power, he gets final say on how much peace I—you have on the PC.”
Second truly hadn’t felt unsafe on the PC in a long time because of Alan. It still seemed to worry Chosen that they lived there, and they were sure he was also worried about Red living there, as well as the rest of them. He asked constantly if there had been any trouble, if Alan had them doing any chores, if they were unreasonable, if Second actually liked their animation projects they worked with Alan on for commissions, all kinds of things Second knew Chosen was thinking about his own time living on the PC. Living wasn’t a very good word for what Chosen was actually doing there.
“I’m not saying you should, or you have to or anything. I just wanted to let you know Alan said he would like to have a positive relationship with you, if you’re up for it of course. He wants to give you an actual apology.”
“He already said sorry,” Chosen said bitterly.
Yeah, Alan had said sorry. But that was it, it was a quick text blurb that said “sorry for what happened.” That wasn’t nearly enough. Sorry for what? Second knew Alan knew what he was sorry for, but there were years of actions and behaviors summed up in four words, and that was far too few.
Second finished preening Chosen’s wings and made sure all the jewelry was back in place as it should be. They leaned back and Chosen shook out his wings with a satisfied ruffle and a few coos escaped him easily.
“We all know that wasn’t a sufficient one. I just thought you should know there’s an opportunity there for a dynamic that isn’t just the worst.”
“I’ll think about it,” Chosen said, which was far more than what Second was expecting. “You said you’ll be hanging around for the next few days?”
Second wasn’t at all surprised Chosen changed the subject. It was a sensitive one for sure, and now that they felt they had done their diligence to pass on the message, they were happy to drop it. Second had a good relationship with Alan. Chosen didn’t, and it was an odd spot for them to be in for sure.
“Yep, you’re imprinting. These are supposed to be good times with good memories. It’s normal for imprinting avians even in the outernet to get to spend a lot of time with loved ones.”
Chosen relaxed into the nest and started pushing some blankets around to make the nest a better fit for the both of them. Second helped a little, but stopped when Chosen side-eyed their work and their wings slightly fluffed in a rippled pattern. Cursors, he was so much more territorial than any avian Second had met or read about. But that was fine.
“Strange to think of it as normal,” Chosen murmured while working on expanding. “I’m sure not.”
“Neither am I.”
And that was okay.