Swooped | ✓

Chapter 45: For Our Birds

I didn't sleep at all that night, and considering how Geoff and Gia looked as well, I was sure they didn't either. The siblings had stayed at my house over night, the three of us falling asleep in my room, not wanting to be alone, especially not when I had broken down seeing my room, so full of Milo's things that only reminded me of how he wasn't here.

I'm sure the siblings heard me crying throughout the night, but I was grateful that neither of them said anything. What happened had hit them hard as well, because Milo and Lark were their friends too, but it was different for me and they knew it. 

Lark and I were birds of a feather, supposed to stick together.

Milo and I were dual Atlantic puffins, bald eagles, laysan albatrosses. We chose each other for life.

What happens when one loses their mate?

They mourn for years, and then look for another.

I'd rather die than find another. Milo is it for me. He's everything, and without him I have nothing. I am nothing.

"Culver, eat," Gia said, pushing a plate of eggs and bacon in front of me. I stared at the food, having no appetite at all. Gia and Geoff had similar plates of food in front of them, but they, too, just looked at their plates and pushed the food around with their forks. There was a weight in the air around us, pulling my wings down until they slumped against the floor, defeated.

It was only six in the morning, and since none of us could sleep we decided to go downstairs to do something other than lie prone and drowning in grief. Now, at least, we were drowning in our grief and bacon and eggs.

It was just as I watched Gia grimace and force a spoonful of scrambled eggs into her mouth that we heard the alarm in the Nest go off. The sound hadn't been heard in a while, not since Olivia gave up on trying to find Black Dove, and the staccato screech made us all jump. 

I quickly darted up from my chair, Geoff right behind me. Gia wasn't as fast to respond, cursing as she tripped on the leg of her chair, entering the room a little behind us. 

"How do you answer this thing?" I asked, staring at the numerous screens that just displayed the scrolling words 'Bird Call Activated'. 

"I dunno, this was Milo's-" Geoff said, eyes widening to saucers as he realised what he said, hand slapping over his mouth, making me flinch. Geoff looked mortified, murmuring a quiet sorry that I shook my head at. Everyone needed Milo, it seemed.

Gia ignored her brother's words, gently nudging me aside to fiddle with the keyboard. 

"You were never in this room since you were out flying, but when you were in missions, I picked up a thing or two," Gia said, managing a tired smile as her long nails clacked on the keyboard, connecting to the crisis call. "Mi...lo rigged this so she won't see us, but we'll see her. It'll also modulate your voice." Seconds after Gia spoke, the screen blinked with Olivia's image, and we could observe that she was sitting at her desk at the station. 

She honestly looked like shit, much like the three of us. She was wearing the same clothes as yesterday, and coffee cups were strewn over her desk as well as wrappers for some protein bars.  

Olivia seemed surprised when the call connected, her body freezing for a few moments before she collected herself.

"It seems that you're not dead," Olivia said carefully, peering into the camera despite being unable to see us. Even so, it felt like she was piercing right into my chest, her unsaid questions burning. Where have you been? Where were you when we needed you? Why did my daughter get involved with you? Why, why, why?