shatterverse | (no subject)

Entry tags:

lucy cooper,
tobias

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"Full emergency power to the engines," Jake says. "Ram the Blade ship."

Tobias smiles as Jake gives the final order. At least he smiles as much as a hawk can smile. <Rachel,> he says privately, a habit he never broke himself of, even though she hasn't been there to hear him for years. <I'm coming.>

The blinding flash and deafening bang are impressive, but somehow Tobias had expected something even bigger as the two ships collided.

He also isn't expecting to find himself five hundred feet and plummeting toward the trees. Partially because there aren't a lot of trees in space, but mostly because he was pretty sure death wouldn't be so similar to life.

Instincts kick in and his wings snap, pulling him into a glide.

He banks into a thermal to gain some altitude and begins to circle. What in the world just happened?

[Tobias is a red-tailed hawk. And he's currently flying over the Pacific coast somewhere in Oregon.]

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Perhaps he will find an explanation over here.

Okay, maybe not.

What he will find is a glittering black creature with an improbably large wingspan, flapping into view about fifty feet below him.

It's carrying a brown burlap sack in one clawed hand.

Tobias is acting like a completely unassuming hawk.

Only the slightest twitch betrays his shock at seeing something that clearly doesn't belong in the sky. His first response, still automatic, is to call out to Rachel. <Visser--!>. Then he stops himself. Visser One isn't in an Andalite host, after all.

Which makes it an Andalite tourist...

Except that Tobias is supposed to be dead.

Something is very wrong here.

It's debatable whether the wind is right; it's debatable whether it has to be right.

Lucy lifts her head suddenly, catching the scent of knows Rachel, and starts to climb once she's identified the source.

Just like any real hawk would, Tobias veers away from the bulk of a massive thing which is obviously a predator in his sky. He slips into another thermal which kicks him upward, trying to open the distance.

Lucy would sigh, if this shape were inclined to do that.

Instead she circles left in a wide arc, trying to gain the altitude without transgressing on his personal space.

Birds of prey tend to have very wide definitions of 'personal space', and Tobias is no exception. He circles higher and wider when it becomes obvious that the thing down there isn't just heading in his direction, but is heading toward him instead.

He doesn't have any aerial morphs that can take that thing in a fight. He's not sure he has any morphs at all that can take that thing in a fight.

Her communicative options are limited.

She fishes an apple out of her bag and tosses it at him underhand, aimed to pass under his flight path by a clear ten feet or so.

Tobias flares his wings and pulls back sharply.

That is an unusual thing to see happen.

He slows down and circles around. He's still keeping his distance, but now his human curiosity has him watching the thing below him rather than fleeing.

She looks at the hawk.

Then she looks at the trees below.

Hawk. Trees. Hawk. Trees.

Hoping he got the message, she angles into a slow circle that takes her down towards the forest to land.

Tobias is pretty clever, so he catches on pretty quick. He begins his own circle above her. He's careful to maintain the higher position. Just in case this turns out to be a trap.

Lucy lands as high in a tree as she can manage, hangs her sack of apples from the branch on which she stands, and downshifts.

Then she waves to Tobias.

If he still had a human anatomy, Tobias would blink in wide-eyed confusion. Since he's a hawk, however, he doesn't.

Instead he comes in for a gentle landing a tree away. Plenty of space if he needs it. Because... that was not a morph. It didn't look right at all.

But if it isn't a morph... what is it?

Well, it's faster than a morph, for one.

Lucy fishes a second apple out of her bag, takes a bite, chews, and swallows.

"You know Rachel," she says, and then takes another bite.

Well, that clenches it. He's dead. There's no other thing that makes sense, if Rachel's here.

<I do.> His head cocks slightly and he hops forward a bit on his branch. <Is she here?>

"In Metropolis."

Bite. Crunch crunch.

"I can show you. Long flight, though."

<How long?> he asks unperturbed. He only needs to know so that he can select the appropriate morph for the distance.

"A few hours for me. For you, more."

Tobias bobs his head and steps off of his branch. He stoops and flares at the last second to land on the ground.

Then he morphs.

It's as ugly a process as it ever was, and going from hawk to seagull is rather grotesque.

<:Whenever you're ready,> he says as he shakes out his wings.

She nods, upshifts, and launches herself into the air with the sack of apples dangling from one claw.

The seagull isn't nearly as agile as the hawk, so it takes a bit more work to get off the ground. But once he gets into the air, Tobias relaxes into the simple gliding position that gives his chosen form so much endurance.

Then he slides into the slipstream Lucy is creating. It hasn't occurred to him to ask her name.

She flies pretty quietly; apparently, whatever Lucy is, she has no thought-speech.

Quiet is fine with Tobias. He's got enough on his mind already.

Like... what he's going to say to Rachel. It's not something he's really thought about before.

Lucy really isn't talkative even when she's physically capable of it, so thoughtful silences suit her just fine.

It's a good thing that the seagull part of Tobias is paying attention to flyng and where they're going since the part of him that's human is completely tied up in trying to figure out how he feels about seeing Rachel again.

That was a complicated question.

Time passes.

Lucy doesn't have to worry about a time limit on her shifts, so if the one-hour mark is approaching, she's not going to notice.

Seagulls don't have the best internal clocks, but Tobias has been doing this long enough to have a rough estimate of when 90 minutes has passed. That's as close as he wants to get to be stuck as a seagull forever.

With a quick burst of speed, he pulls ahead so that Lucy can see him slowly spiral back down to the ground.

She circles without landing.

Once, twice, three times. Big wide sweeps.

It doesn't take long. Just a few minutes to morph back to hawk, and then back to seagull. He would normally spend longer, but he's in a hurry.

It's not long before he launches himself back into the air and rises to Lucy's altitude again.

Not much longer now. Certainly not another ninety minutes.

The city of Metropolis has had a year to fall into disrepair, but it's pretty clear that it was once an impressive sight.

Lucy lands well outside the city, downshifts, and starts eating another apple.

Tobias lands, morphs back to hawk, and shakes out his feathers.

<In the city?>

"Yes."

Nom.

"I don't go into cities."

<I don't usually,> Tobias agrees.

He flares his wings out. <Thank you.>

Then he launches himself into the air.

She sits for a few minutes and watches him go, until she loses him in the haze above the city.

Then she upshifts again, picks up her apples, and flies home.

OOOH! OOOOH! He's going to make someone happy with this one, that's for sure.

See that pond Tobias just passed over? Yeah, in what is actually really bizzare, there is a huge reflection of a man in the waves, gesturing for Tobias' attention.

Mort has a problem getting in touch with fliers, cause there's so little reflective in the sky. And most people have issues when you start talking to them from their own eyeballs.

Tobias blinks a couple of times and looks again. He's got to be hallucinating.

The man waves again, and then writes words on the inside of the reflection.

Down here Tobias!

... Tobias says eloquently.

That is weird. After looking around carefully, Tobias begins a long, slow descent toward the lake.

"Hello up there!" Mort sighs, glad the bird is low enough to hear him. " You really shouldn't have come to this world, you know, Rachel is most upset."

Suspiciously narrowing eyes is not a standard hawk gesture. Tobias manages it anyway.

He doesn't answer, but he doesn't take off either.

He gestures Metropolis wise. "She's that way. I'm Mort by the way, I tried to stop you coming here."

Tobias blinks some more and then begins to gain altitude. He's got to be hallucinating or something, because that does not make sense.

He makes a mental note to be careful.

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