“Flinshkie. Why don't you tell any of the good stories?” The children asked.

Patrick Wu had dropped off the kids earlier that morning at Flinshkie’s feet, almost a prayer on his lips as he begged the bird for some sort of relief.

This was the same look that Patrick had used to beg Flinshkie’s pardon since he was a kitten, stealing treats out of the cupboard and clogging the toilet with his toys. Despite the years that rendered this tactic stale, it was hard for Flinshkie to say no. 

Patrick's own parents were a disaster of a family, and if Flinshkie weren’t a bird, Patrick would have legally changed his parents long ago to the bird who actually raised him.

“Well, well, I didn’t think you children were even listening.” Flinshkie answered with a coo.

The Sugarbird pulled out a book from the shelves of the Public Library while his tiny audience sat at his feet, all ears pointing towards him like satellites. They were far too old for children’s stories, but cats didn’t seem to understand age anyway. One minute they were adults flashing claws, and the next they were infantile, wrapped completely around a warm patch of light.

With a few coordinated flaps of his wings, he positioned the book on a little reading stand. It was a proper stand for a Sugarbird that came with an ornate perch to rest his razor talons.

“No no, not one of those books. We don't like the stories in those books.” Pookie sighed, a deep yawn as she leaned into her classmate, Percy, who didn’t seem to appreciate this as much as she did. “We don’t like the stories in any of these books.”

“Of course you don't.” Flinshkie sighed. “Those other stories are scary, children.”

“Tell us a bird story. A really scary one.” Percy piped, a blink in one of his mismatched eyes.

“No not a bird story, not a book story either, How about our story? And we'll start at the very, very end.” Flinshkie twittered devilishly.

“Ah! I don’t know this story. Can we just read like ‘Little Women’ or something?” Clovis begged, looking out at the people milling around the 1^st floor lobby below them.

He was the only one that didn’t know the story, the rest were well acquainted. But Clovis was always a little bit foreign, despite the years he had spent here since he was captured as a child. He didn’t join with the cuddle puddle of the other kids, and instead sat a few feet away, like he were a little embarrassed to be associated with them.

“We’re in a Library, you dumbass!” Percy hissed. “You learn things in it!”

“In the End, there was Deepness!” Flinshkie bellowed, distracting Percy and Clovis from their spat before it would be guaranteed to escalate. Pookie clapped her white furry palms in glee.

“From that Deepness came the Deep Things. They were things that are not like you and me; we can feel, we can breathe, but the Deep Things—they only were. And they were power!

“They gained with it, they destroyed with it, but they never lived and they never died. Their power crystallized them so nothing could cut through their skins, but in return it left their minds empty and pliable like members of a hive-mind.”

Clovis groaned, trying to seem unperturbed, but his eyes said otherwise. He had seen too many strange things in Avurn. If his childhood nightmares about Laquems came true, then why not some ancient prophecy about Deep Heebie-jeebies? It was just yet another problem to dance around.

“And that hivemind completely devoured them. It completely devoured our truest fears and our worst enemies. The hivemind was a voice of drones which became a nation of slaughter.” Flinskie continued, who really liked this part.

Sugarbirds were a large specie native to Avurn who revelled in the warmongering powers that they rarely had a chance to use. Instead, most Sugarbirds ended up as babysitters like Flinshkie. 

This was probably for the best. Not just because cats felt the next generation of children needed a much stronger upper lip, but because so many people wanted to kill these particular children.

Despite their cute looks, these were the menace children: an omen that the Kingdom was in it’s final death throws. But during story time, they could just disappear and let someone else control their life for a little while.

Pookie was all smiles, Percy was starting to nod off in the cozy light of the warm lamps, and Clovis was completely horrified. Despite being twice the size of everyone else, half because of white billowing fur, he seemed a little sick. His tail bristled in short twitches under his large overcoat.

Clovis spent too many years living on Earth, unlike the other children, he actually knew the feeling of predators lurking around the corner. He knew the smell of being watched. He understood exactly how much danger he was in, and that danger was only slightly less under Flinshkie’s care.

“Yet, we're not completely finished.” Flinshkie smiled, hopping out of his scary voice and back to ‘Uncle Flinshkie’ voice. “Otherwise, stuff would be pretty terrifying right now and right now things aren't so bad.

“So what happened to the Deep things?” He asked, finding an opportunity for a teaching moment.

“There was another hivemind!” Pookie shouted happily.

“Correct! The other voice, the other hivemind from the Deepness. We call it the red voice, desperate for revenge and lost in the waves of the sea!”

“The...what?” Clovis asked “Now there’s two demon voices! I don’t really understand why you like this awful story. It’s cryptic enough around here without-”

“It was that red voice that found the Exile!" Flinshkie said, cutting Clovis off. "A woman who’s life was already taken. So, though the red voice tried, it couldn't control her with a hivemind. Perhaps, that is why she won that first war so, so long ago against the armies of the Deepness and freed our entire world.”

“OK I’m done!” Clovis stood up quickly, a shake to his voice. “I just want to have a nice story time with stories that I like and I think are really cool! But all you want to do, Flinshkie, is be a mean birdie! You’re all so mean to me!”

“Wow, you baby.” Pookie sighed, one of her golden ears twitching a little bit. “You’re like this every single time!”

“Like would you stop bringing up “Little Women” every five seconds, Clovis?” Percy asked, from the depths of the cuddle puddle. “It’s just getting nice and comfy. Just get over here and join the cuddle pile once in your damn life.”

“Nice and comfy!?” Clovis stammered. “I’ll have you know that when Jo cut off her hair for her little sister, that was the sweetest thing that has Ever Happened in Literature!”

“...Clovis, your book sounds boring as hell.” Pookie said with her tongue a-mlem.

“How DARE you.”

“Then the years passed!” Flinshkie cawed, interrupting their spat again. “The exile became soft, bitter, and she became lost. That great life-giver who vanquished the terror of the Deep had become a small, frail, barren animal.”

“Damn it, Flinshkie! I don’t want the ooold stories like this! I wanted something NICE because this place is such a Mchrow Mrea pile of Mrrow Fft!” Clovis spat, completely ignoring the rule to not yell in a library.

“And one day, the hive she once vanquished will return from the Deepness!” Flinshkie said, displaying his wings in a fearsome spread, “and we will all be lost unless she tears him down with her small claws and her small teeth.

“One day, the Deepness will open it's jaws, and some think…” Flinshkie continued, giving each sentence a spooky air.

“Flinskie, I swear to god, if you don’t get Little Women into this library, I’m going to scream.” Clovis said, standing up fully so he was eye level with the bird.

“...I think…” Flinshkie continued.

“It’s a freakin American classic, Flinshkie.” Clovis insisted.

“...that we won't know it until it has already swallowed us whole…” Flinshkie lowered his wings, a smile on his beak and an emerald fire in his green eyes. Clovis growled from deep in his throat.

“I hate you all.” He hissed.

“Bye.” Percy muttered.

“Love you.” Pookie chimed.

Clovis clamored down the stairwell, making sure each angry step shook the railing a little bit.

“Well, I liked it, Flinshkie.” Pookie smiled. “I liked the dancing thing with the wings you’re bringing in. Nice and smooth.”

“Oh, thank you.”

They then heard the clamor of feet back up the stairwell, Clovis jumping to the top. “Sorry, I love you guys, I’m sorry.” He then walked back down the stairwell to funnel out his energy. “Sorry.” He said from the floor below.

“Why is he like this?” Pookie wondered absently, starting to get very sleepy.

“Maybe because he didn’t grow up every day thinking he’d get assassinated like we do? I dunno, he’s always been a spoiled jerk.” Percy sighed.

“He’s doing his best!” Pookie insisted. “He’s got all those Earth problems, you know how it is, right?”

“Doesn’t mean we have to allow it.” Flinshkie reminded her. “We all suffer in some way. He can’t use that as an excuse.”

“Speaking of "excuse," is Patrick going to be here today?” Percy asked. “Where is he? Is he coming back?”

Flinshkie sighed, unsure of how to answer.

“Patrick will come back soon.”

Percy nodded, knowing that his teacher would probably not show up that day at all, just like how Patrick hadn’t shown up to class that entire week.

“It doesn’t matter.” Percy said, leaning back onto a floor pillow, “We’ll all die when we’re legal age anyway, won’t we? Even Clovis. Why even waste time on us huh? Why get close? Even if you’re our teacher.”

“You won’t die. Not if we can do anything about it,” Flinshkie said, cracking his knuckles. “And I’m pretty strong, for a bird, I’ll have you know.”

Percy looked up at Flinshkie, feeling the heat of the lamps pull him into an afternoon nap.

“It’s just not fair.” He mumbled, falling asleep safely under the care of the bird, while Clovis paced the floor below, rifling madly through books and looking for any words he could recognize from home.