lostcarnival | ⇨ The Tourist Trap: PROLOGUE

If only the crow was frightened. Then Lambert could tell himself everything is normal. He sighs, leaning his head back against the glass and closing his eyes as he listens to the woman on the other end rattle off a list of dos and don'ts that makes Lambert's ears ring.

"Of course I'm not interested in keeping it, why do you think I'm calling?" His arm aches where the talons dug into him and he reaches up absently to touch at a lightly scabbed set of scratches. "I'm just trying to find out where to drop it off near the university."

Okay, there we go. The second Lambert mentions dropping it off somewhere, that's when the crow starts raising bloody hell. Before he can even finish the sentence, it launches into the same kind of loud, angry cawing, making those scolding sounds common to corvids, as though suddenly pissed off by something.

Are you fucking kidding him? Now is the time it chooses to make a fuss? Lambert tries to raise his voice over the sound of the crow pitching a fit, trying to ignore the other bus riders (luckily, there aren't many) staring at him, but even in Portland an animal making a ruckus is going to cause a fuss. Despite Lambert's attempts to protest while keeping the woman on the line and hold on to the crow at the same time, they get kicked off the bus, and it's only when he looks around that he realizes they're near the campus, automatic instinct leading him to take the same route he normally does for work. By then, the woman from the center's hung up on him believing he's a prank caller.

"You aren't making it easy to help you, you know," he tells the crow sourly, tucking the phone into his back pocket and scanning the sky.

As soon as they're off the bus and he's put the phone away? Right back to being a good crow, nice and quiet again after a quiet crrk sound that couldn't possibly be laughter. Above them, there's no sign of the three other crows. A few other birds here and there, sure, but mostly pigeons and those are far more likely to expect Lambert to feed them than they are to attack him outright.

Lambert has the lingering suspicion he's being laughed at by a bird, but as he can't actually speak bird? He's just going to have to ignore it. There's a suspicion that it's either a werecrow (do such things exist?) or someone cursed into being one, but there's no way to know for sure until he looks it up later. For now, he'll do the only thing that seems sensible: head into the library and sort out what he immediately can.

Luckily for him, he keeps his keys to the staff room next to his house keys, and there isn't really anyone else around when he slips inside, still cradling the bird close, though he'll set him on one of the tables inside while he goes rummaging for a first aid kit and searches for variations on "diagnosing bird injury" on his phone. As soon as he finds a likely-looking reference, he heads back over, putting phone and first aid kit on the table while he ... actually looks at the bird over properly for the first time.

"I need to pick you up to check for injuries," he says out loud, instantly feeling like an idiot, but pushing through anyway. "Don't give me a hard time, all right? I'm trying not to fuck you up." He reaches out to hold the bird, watching it warily for any signs of impending violence.

Once set down, well, the crow isn't much inclined to get up and wander. It stays put, hunkered down in the hoodie wrapped around it until Lambert comes back from his rummaging to take a closer look. It eyes him and clacks its beak, head tilting one way, then the other, but there are no sudden movements, no attempts to strike at the reaching hand.

See? No trouble at all, now that Lambert isn't trying to pawn it off on some random wildlife rescue.

Yeah, well, he'd buy the innocent act if it hadn't already freaked out so suddenly earlier. He picks the bird up -- if nothing else, he's experienced cradling animals of roughly this size carefully, though he never thought he'd be using that experience for this of all things -- and turns the crow in his hands with a surprisingly professional care. The lacerations are obvious (he has some of his own to treat later) but that dangling wing is the biggest obvious problem.

He explores the wing with his fingers, moving gently along the muscles to feel for breaks in delicate bone and determine the extent of the injury, seeing how much the crow will tolerate it being manipulated. It's a break of some kind, and the best he can do is feel that the bones are aligned properly, then use non-sticky tape and bandages to fashion something that will keep it immobilized against the bird's side. He's not sure he's done it right, but it looks like it does in the pictures, so that will have to be good enough.

"Hope you didn't have somewhere else to be," he murmurs when he's finished, pushing his glasses up and moving to the sink to wash his hands -- was he supposed to do that first? Too late now -- so he can clean out his own scratches and dab antiseptic on their wounds.

Yeah, because a bird is going to have such a busy schedule to keep. Admittedly, Childermass actually did have to be somewhere, but it's hardly his fault he got attacked and he doesn't exactly have any way of telling Lambert all that. As long as the wing is broken, transforming back isn't going to happen.

As it is, actually handling the crow and figuring out how to fix up the wing meets no resistance. He holds still when he has to, offers up the damaged wing without a fight. Overall, he has to wonder if this guy already realizes there's something weird going on here, but again, it's not really his problem.

So long as he doesn't try to dump him into an animal rehabilitation center again...

That, he won't stand for. This? He'll live.

So in reply to Lambert's murmuring, he just croaks, as crows oft do.

With the bird's injury dealt with, Lambert checks his watch -- it's just about the time of day when he can expect some of the other library workers to start coming in, so he needs to decide what to do next, if he doesn't want to have to any awkward questions and deal with more gossip than he already has to. Besides, he isn't even supposed to be in today.

"I know you can understand me." No shit. Whether the not talking is a choice or it physically can't, well, that's a different matter. If he's cursed into this form, like Lambert's guessing, he won't be able to and he'll barely be able to think around the animal instincts; if it's like his sisters but only feigning being a dumb animal, well ... it has no real reason to reveal itself to Lambert either, or believe he's someone to be trusted.

Lambert runs a hand through his hair, exhales. His life is a joke. "Are those birds going to keep going after you?"

A good question, but one that just gets another croak out of the crow and then a long, long, long stare. The bird can't talk, Lambert. They've already established this fact, so now all he can do is sit there and expectantly wait for Lambert to either give up or figure out a system for communication.

Though that he seriously went the 'you can understand me' route is... interesting. Was his unexpected hero something other than just a normal human? The crow squints some as he stares, trying to see through or pick up on any magic that might linger around the man. Another changeling? Something else?

There aren't really any words for how much Lambert wants a drink right now, and it's barely, what, eight in the morning. The crow's scrutiny, unfortunately, won't get him any insights: Lambert's about as non-magical as a human can be.

After a moment, he sighs, closing his hands into fists and resting them on the tabletop, close enough for the crow to reach both with minimal turning of its head. "Are they going to keep looking for you. Tap yes," he raises his right fist, then sets it back down on the table. "Or no." And repeats the motion, this time with his left.

The crow tilts his head as if actually taking the time to consider his answer. He is, mostly. Typically his sisters would leave him be after a failed attempt, but this time they know he's injured. This time he's still fairly sure they followed the bus, too. It wouldn't have been difficult to do. What he doesn't know is what Lambert will do if he taps "no". Leave him outside to fend for himself? Seems likely, but—

Of course he taps the right fist, of course the answer is a "yes". Or he kind of taps it, but he's tired and it ends up being more like resting his beak and therefore head on the top of the right fist, beady little eyes lidding partway. It's not entirely an act to garner pity, but if it'll help, hey.

Given the university's really only twenty minutes from waterfront at best, yeah, it's not all that hard to imagine they managed to follow Lambert. His frown deepens at the affirmative answer, deepens more when the bird rests its head on his knuckles, scowling in a way that twists up the scar over his eye in an unpleasant way.

"You're not nearly cute enough for that to work," he tells the crow. It's tired -- and who wouldn't be, Lambert's tired, too -- and that pathetic staring shouldn't be a factor in this decision, damn it.

And yet.

He resists the urge to drag his hand over his face again, but only just. Instead, he pulls away from the table and the crow to put the first aid kit back and get one of the lockers open, pulling out a black gym bag. Most of the contents -- tape for his hands, a couple of extra shirts and a water bottle -- get dumped back into the locker. He leaves the towel inside, though, and walks back to the table, fiddling with his phone another moment, before slipping it back into his pocket. If he second guesses himself now, they could be here all day.

"You owe me for this," he mutters, looking the crow in the eyes as he lifts him again, into the nest of towel he's made of the bag.

Unfortunately, he does, more seriously than Lambert even knows. He'll never be able to say 'thank you', but this is, at least, one debt he doesn't plan on minding. If he'd been left in that bush, the other three crows would have eventually come after him. It might have been the end right there and then and not even in a way Lambert can imagine.

Death would be the good outcome of that, it's safe to say. Maybe someday he'll tell him that, but that's a very slim maybe.

In any case, he does make a disgruntled sound at being told he's not nearly cute enough — rude! True, but rude! — but that'll be it. Just as before, the crow won't fight being lifted and tucked away in the bag. If he's made it this far in one piece, now isn't the time to start misjudging this guy.

“Get comfy,” he tells the bird, simply. “Things might get a little bumpy.”

Lambert zips the bag shut, not worried about any problems with ventilation, dropping the crow in darkness save for the pinpricks of light that shine through the small holes in the cloth. It’s also a dude’s gym bag, cleared of its usual contents or not, so it’s probably lucky crows have a poor sense of smell. Reclaiming his hoodie, he tugs the hood up over his head, then stops by the unsorted lost and found bin, liberating a promisingly pointy umbrella before he heads out.

If he’s about to be attacked again, he’d rather not head out there unarmed, and he slings his gym bag over his shoulder carefully, gripping the umbrella tight. A couple of years navigating this campus means he’s figured out the more efficient ways to get from building to building while being outside as little as possible, and he takes advantage of that now, keeping an eye on his surroundings for anything that might be trailing him as he goes. Twenty minutes of ducking in and out of buildings and wandering out of exits later, he emerges on the other side of campus, stepping to another bus that will take him closer to the apartment just in time for the clouds above the city to crack open and begin to shower Portland with unseasonal rain

Whatever the crow does after that, hidden away in the bag, is a mystery, but 'get comfy' very likely sums it up. He'll just chill, huddle down deep into the towel and hope this doesn't lead to a wild chase across the campus, because he knows they're out there, somewhere, and that's a fact that will become apparent to Lambert as he goes, too. When he steps out of the library, there's a caw caw caw from above.

Could be a regular crow. The place has enough, that's true, but the timing is nerve-wracking. After a few more caws, that crow takes off, fluttering out of sight. It'll be like that the entire route that Lambert takes. A few times he'll lose them, but in the end, there's always a crow making a fuss at some point. He may duck them for a few buildings, only to have another turn up at the end of that, all the way across the campus. They won't attack. If the umbrella makes a difference, he'll never really know.

It isn't until he gets on another bus that it stops since they aren't about to follow him into a bus. From there on, no crows, no caws or croaks or screeches. Lambert will make it to the apartment without seeing claw nor feather of another bird, although the lack of sparrows and pigeons as well may be an entirely different kind of tip off...

But for now, it's peaceful. Nothing dives out of the blue at the last minute, allowing him to get home safely with his new feathery friend.

Lambert doesn't run, even with the cawing, even if it makes his skin crawl imagining -- or maybe not imagining-- being watched. If he can endure the disdain of more than ten pairs of feline eyes without twitching in front of the customers, he can deal with this now that he isn't being divebombed. The umbrella ends up being used for its actual purpose, as the heavy mist that passes for rain in Portland descends -- he'd normally just pull up his hood and endure, but he does have an invalid to think about. It's another ten minutes of walking after getting off that they'll finally duck into an apartment complex. Lambert pushes the door open. The time means they're alone at home for now, and he heads up to his room, setting his bag down on his desk carefully. That's all, before he moves downstairs again, leaving the bird alone.

Not for long. There's some bustling around downstairs, and when he returns he lifts the crow and the towel out and puts them into a bigger box that hit's already equipped with a shallow bowl filled with water, and another one that's heaped with what looks like cut up scrambled egg leftovers (slightly too crispy), fruit, dog kibble, and the torn up pieces of a bread slice: the everything and the kitchen sink approach to feeding a wild animal.

It's all done with a vaguely vexed expression, hair still slightly tousled from his hood being pulled over his head. From the vantage point of the box on the bed, it's obvious the room has few personal possessions; the sidetable and the single desk are occupied only by a laptop, stacks of books, and piles of paper. One wall is haphazardly covered in post it notes. The twin-sized bed has a comforter that seems far too heavy for the current weather, and there are blackout curtains drawn over the room's single window, making it impossible to identify where it's facing.

"Here we are. Make yourself at home, just don't shit on my notes," he waves a hand around and dropping into the slightly squeaky computer chair at the desk. A swipe of his fingers across the keyboard brings the dimmed screen to life.

Edited 2017-06-02 23:09 (UTC)

Even when Lambert first deposits him in the box, the crow doesn't move. He carries on being still save for a quick, small cock of his head, beady eyes following where Lambert goes after he steps away. Once it's apparent he's going to occupy himself with the computer rather than, say, poking or prodding at his new house guest, then he'll stand on his spindly little bird legs and go to investigate the dish of water and the food.

The first inclination is to pounce on it all, though the inclusion of the dog kibble strikes him as offensive. If the man knows he can understand him, why offer dog food? But the greedy bird part of his brain doesn't care, finding the urge to eat around those stupid. It's a struggle (and also a reason why staying in one form too long is generally bad). In the end, he fights through the bird-brained idea and picks a piece of kibble up, tossing it out of the box and onto the floor with a little clatter of noise.

He doesn't have the strength to send it bouncing off of Lambert's head, which is probably for the best. One kibble, two, three, yeah, he's removing those, no thanks. If Lambert turns to look, he'll just puff up and croak back at him, looking as offended as an injured crow can. It's kind of silly, to be quite honest.

The first clatter doesn't catch Lambert's attention, sucked in by his computer as he is, but by the third one, he's turning around to scowl, arm over the back of the chair. The bird's offense doesn't seem to matter to him at all, and he raises his brows before he sighs and bends to pick them up.

"Believe it or not, that's the most nutritious thing in the house right now," he says dryly. "I don't think you're going to make your recovery on bagel bites, so quit being such a picky bastard."

That picky bastard apparently takes enough offense at that to make scolding crow noises in response, feathers fluffing up slightly as if to refute the claim. Technically, he's right, but he's also pretty sure Lambert wouldn't eat dog food himself if that's all there was. Humans just don't do that.

Lambert stares at the bird, jaw tightening, but it's not (only) in irritation as it is with the air of someone with something to say, but trying to figure out how much to say. The good news is with the bird being so persnickety at him, it feels more like a person and less like his memory of sometime-dinner.

"I've been where you are," he says, finally. If his first assumption that this bird is a cursed human like he was is true, or in more general terms, trapped in a form he doesn't want to be in. "Stuck." He picks up a piece of kibble between two fingers, turning it over absently.

"This can't be any worse than cat food." Its tempting to go into more detail than that, remind it that he's already saved it, he doesn't need to be its damn personal chef either, but negotiations are something this iteration Lambert is pretty used to, dealing with younger siblings.

"Come on, when's the last time you ate?" he coaxes, tentatively extending the piece of kibble to it. "Trying it isn't going to hurt, and if you don't like it, you can just eat around it. I'll get you something better later." After he does the groceries, anyway, and possibly gets more of a handle on what the hell he's gotten himself into.

Edited 2017-06-03 10:39 (UTC)

The crow squints, head bobbing as he looks from Lambert to the offered piece of kibble, then back again. He makes another, quieter croaking sound, though what that means, who the fuck even knows. On his own end, he's considering it. It's been hours, so it's not like he should be starving, but the amount of energy a bird extends on flight alone is massive.

The amount for a high-speed aerial chase, probably ten times that.

As such, a few hours for regular him wouldn't be enough to count as starving, but stuck in this form? It's different. He still doesn't like it and he'll make that known by nipping at Lambert's fingers first, though not hard enough to cause harm. The next bob of his beak is him snapping up the kibble, then throwing his head back to swallow it. Ultimately, it's not like he's really going to taste it much in the first place, so...

What the hell he'd meant about 'cat food' and 'being here before' is something he wishes he could ask about. Maybe someday, just not now. Probably not for days. Instead, he'll note it for later.

Nipping or not, Lambert looks pretty pleased the crow has decided to play along, at least for the moment. He'll return the favor by reaching out to run a finger up along the ruffled feathers at the crow's neck as soon as he's done gulping the food, then smoothing the feathers down.

"There you go," he murmurs. In some way, it's lucky the bird isn't more frightened or distressed, or showing more visible signs of being out of his element than he has. If he was (and Lambert doesn't even know if it's a boy or a girl at this point -- would it be a reasonable assumption to make on size? The internet tells him no, not really, so he's going to just have to put it aside) he'd be treating it differently, but its quiet nature is a change of pace from the hectic whirlwind of this househould, and it's not ... bad. It'd be great if this dingy bird turned out to be a hot babe, possibly even worth the trouble he went through just bringing it here, but with his luck the odds of that are vanishingly small.

For the most part, over the next few days, he'll let it recover in peace, keeping him in his room and checking on how his injuries and his makeshift splint are holding up in the mornings and evenings. Better food eventually comes in the form of spaghetti (with only a little sauce, because apparently salt is bad for birds) and pizza (when Lambert brings up his own dinner so he can work quietly at his desk, fingers flying on the keyboard) though the fruit remains. As long as the crow isn't making noise, it seems it's surprisingly easy for Lambert to forget it's even there, though he'll shuffle the box absently between the bed and the table and the floor depending on what space he needs.

Lambert's routine is a simple one. He gets up early, gets showered, and depending on the day he's either off to the library, off to the cafe, or off to meet his thesis adviser. The last seems to be a particular source of stress for him, days when he comes back muttering under his breath and giving up on modesty as he slams around his room to pull on clean clothes before collapsing into bed to sleep like hte dead. At least for the first week, he'll keep the door closed and won't let him out into the apartment proper; the bird will hear voices beyond it, both female, and the excited yapping of dogs. As the crow regains strength, eventually it's going to get set on the desk next to the laptop, the keyboard poised under its beak and a blank document on the screen.

"I'm Lambert. Sorry, I never properly introduced myself." Though the bird has likely figured out as much from just being around here, so he doesn't sound that sorry at all. "Who are you?" God, he hopes its literate.

Edited 2017-06-04 05:21 (UTC)

Which earns Lambert a second nip, when that errant finger strays to pet him, of all things. But aside from that? The rest of the first week, the crow proves to be a decent enough house guest. He doesn't cause trouble, since most of the time he only sleeps. He wakes up to eat, watches Lambert work from time to time — among other things — and then, unsurprisingly, even more sleep. He may not have thrown a huge fuss when letting Lambert handle the injured wing, but it had caused quite a bit of pain. Fussing would have made it worse, hence, no fuss. Hence all the sleep, too, since the less time spent moving and awake meant easier pain management.

It may have been alarming the first day or so, how lethargic the crow became after the initial rescue, but week two shows much more unnecessary movement, more time spent awake, and a lot more chatter, nonsensical cawing that it is. As curious as he is to see what else is out in the apartment, hearing a dog keeps him in Lambert's room, even when he does start hopping out of the box to poke around...

There may have been at least one time Lambert will have found the bird standing over his papers, staring down at them, but for what purpose, who knows. Perhaps that's what brought about the idea he might be literate and, truly, he is, but having the keyboard set down before him just gets a long stare.

The crow bobs his head up, turning it to one side to eye Lambert. Otherwise, nothing.

The notes are mostly a lot of Latin translations -- a frustrating one, judging by the number of scratched-out lines of text -- and he's in the habit of quietly talking to himself while he works. It's a tedious process, apparently some book of stories he's re-translating, apparently, and it's slow going. Some nights he'll simply let the bird perch on his shoulder while feeding it scraps and petting it absently while he retreats to less mentally taxing territory: skimming books of poems and myths, which he'll read out loud line by line in the original then translate into English for practice.

Not tonight, though. Tonight is for answers, with the bird not returned to its previous self, and Lambert's determined to get some.

"You were perfectly capable of answering a yes or no question when you were half-dead," he reminds it, raising a brow and leaning back in his chair. "Your name shouldn't be that hard. Otherwise, I'm happy to call you 'Fatass' as long as you're here."

Edited 2017-06-05 00:50 (UTC)

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