Work Text:
The road runner is many things, but human is not one of them.
It does not understand the city it's speeding through. It does not understand the bright lights or the screeching of bicycle and car tires. It does not understand why the air smells so strange and feels so heavy.
It does not understand many things.
But it understands that the coyote is gone.
It understands that every day, practically since it was hatched, it has played a game. The game is push and pull. The game is run, run, run. The road runner likes the game. The road runner doesn't know what to do with itself without the game.
The road runner understands that the game requires the coyote and the coyote is gone.
But the road runner knows where to find the coyote.
Distantly, it hears, "Is there anyone in the whole wide world who cares about what happens to the coyote at all?"
The road runner does not understand much, but it understands that.
The road runner understands that entering the building is leaving the road. It knows the road - in many ways, it was made for the road. The road is its home. The road is its playground.
But its playmate is gone, and the road does not feel like home without the coyote to play the game.
The road runner leaves the road.
Whoosh.
The road runner arrives in the building.
It does not force its will on its environment - that is the coyote's job. It does not attempt to make what is unmade.
It answers the questions truthfully.
And it does not make - that is the coyote's job.
It can only ask the simple question.
Because the road runner does not understand much. It does not understand the yelling. It does not understand the law. It does not understand these weird things that this bigger bird seems angry about.
But it doesn't need to understand those things. Right now, there is only one thing it needs to understand.
So it asks the only question it cares about. The most important question in the world.
Are you coming back?
And it waits for the answer.