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Ginkgo shifted quietly on his talons and sighed. He was a Minder, or rather, a Minder with no egg to mind. “Ah, Miss...”

His mind still drifted to the first female he had courted. The only female he had courted, in fact and the only female who had shot him down, as he had never tried for another. Darkleaf had been a beautiful Deep Woods and his dearest friend. While they grew together, he did not seem to notice the same bigoted tendencies that were in her until they were older. My mistake...

He shifted his wings and settled as he watched a group of fledglings in the Minder’s Enclave, only one of these creatures he had tended to. Tinselwind seemed to be having an extraordinarily hard time staying with the shadow, wildtype, two ghosts, and the two deep woods. Ginkgo had raised the shabby little mist and shadow hybrid by himself. Graduation was on its way for these seven fledglings. They were nearly old enough and it wouldn’t be much longer.

My mistake... What we had... I should ah said nothing... His mind was in two places at once. He thought about his fledglinghood friend, Darkleaf, and at the same time sympathized with Tinselwind. Friends forever, Leaf... Until I wanted to take it further. I should ah just kept my lovesick beak shut. “Tin! Why don’t you come back here, sweety.” He called and tried to mask the worry in his light voice as he did so.

Gulfwing just pushed her, little brat. Venom seethed into his thoughts as he watched Tinselwind hopped back towards her minder on legs that seemed to be growing sure of themselves as more time went on. The wildtype male had been giving his Tinny some problems for quite a while, now, but his complaints to Gulfwing’s minder seemed to fall on deaf ears.

“Wh’is it, Gink?” The little aberrant female asked and tilted her head simultaneously.

“Nothing, just wanted you to rest for a minute.” And let that little musbeak calm down, before he hurts you. He thought the last bit with quiet, subdued anger. There was little hope for aberrants in the current world they lived in.

Some have done well for themselves...But most, no. Most are like myself or worse. At graduation, I chose to be a minder. They all laughed. Even Darkleaf, my dearest Darkleaf, laughed. The warden would of refused, but who would want to mind an aberrant egg? I am to do that. Even when there are too many eggs, no one seems to want to relinquish a wildtype or deep woods. No mist or shadow for me. Maybe a ghost now and again, but none of the other four.

“Aww, but I wanna play, Gink!” Tinselwind challenged, though it was obvious she was upset and winded. She had a hard time, sometimes, keeping up with others. She easily ran out of breath and stamina, while other fledglings hopped and flew circles about the behind aberrant.

“You need to rest, or you might get sick.” Or hurt... “You don’t want to have to see the medics for that again, right?”

Poor thing... No parents... Poor health... I was luckier, I daresay. Mother minded me, my father was a Hunter. I was lucky enough to have my parents and my health. Not like my poor little Tin...

The deep woods and mist hybrid found himself wholly devoted to his little hybrid charge. Her lineage was not her fault, just like his was not his own fault. He felt kinship with this particular young sentinel and wanted so badly to be her father figure. So far, he seemed to be succeeding, but when it came to why the other minders and fledglings seemed to look down on her, he found himself tongue-tied. He was unsure of how to respond to her drilling questions.

“But I wanna play! I wanna move and get stronger. Rest’in doesn’t seem t’be working.” The aberrant female complained between raspy breaths, but quieted after a sharp glance from her minder.

“Tin, I’m just trying to look out for your best interest. You sound like you are having trouble breathing again. You now how sad it would make me if you grew ill?”

She sat quietly, with her eartufts down. “Very...”

“That’s right. I don’t want you to fall ill again, Tinselwind. That was a trying time for both of us. You need to rest some, until your body is ready for play.” And the little creep Gulfwing goes away.

Oh, Leaf... Why? Why did you string me along all those seasons? I would of flown the Above to bring you the stars...

“Remember, too, whenever they pick on you... Come back to me. Always. No matter your age.”

“Why’d they do that?” Tinselwind’s breathing was sounding more regulated as she stood with him and listened to his well thought out words.

“Because... We, you and I, are different. We look different because of our feathers and because of our parents. Honestly, sometimes I think they are jealous of us and our unique and interesting patterns. Aberrant, that is the name for us and the others like us.” He patted her on the head gently with his feathered wing.

“Oh... B’it doesn’t make sense t’me.” She sighed and her body seemed to sag with her sadness. It pained him to watch, but to watch her was his purpose in life. If he was not meant to raise this little one with every ounce of love and devotion he could muster, then Darkleaf would have taken him. She would have chosen him over the Deep Woods male that she went with.

He would be in his own nest, with his own mate, raising his own chick.

That existence never occurred, though. His Leaf shot him down. He was not meant for happiness with her. This truth was blatantly clear to the aberrant male and he was slowly changing over time. Tinslewind cheered him up, despite the persecution the two faced. She was his hope for a better future for aberrants as a whole.

He was finding happiness without the help of a snooty, egotistical, bigoted female named Darkleaf.

I don’t need her... Not anymore... Not with my current charge and future charges needing me. A faint smile played over his beak as the shadow fledgling waddled towards them. The little shadow male hailed them with a wing and called out. “Mist’a Ginkgo? Can Tinsel come back an’ play with me n Silvertalon?” A little gray female plodded along behind him.

“Wellllll....”

“Pleeeeeease, Gink?” Tinselwind begged and looked up at her minder with large blue, pleading eyes. She shifted anxiously on her two taloned paws and pressed her little wings tight against her frame.

“It is alright with me... Stay close, though, alright you three?” He could see the glares of other minders already. They must have been appalled by the fact that their charges had gone to see him. They had gone to see him and play with his Tinselwind. There was little doubt in his mind that Silvertalon and Dustbark would receive a lecture or two later.

“Yes sir...” Dustbark agreed bashfully.

“Yes sir...” Silvertalon echoed softly from behind her shadow friend.

“Awright, Gink!” Tinselwind hooted cheerfully. She lingered just long enough for the aberrant minder to briefly preen the top of her head.

They want to play with her. Those two, a shadow and a ghost, want to play with little Tinselwind. She might have more of a chance, after all. We all might have more of a chance...

The fledgelings were noisy today, not that Christobel minded, but his forays into personal reflection would occasionally be shattered by a series of high-pitched hoots from the rough-housing youngsters. He clacked his beak in annoyance and fluttered up to a higher branch, eartufts pricked. The ruckus was only slightly better than the flirting couples that seemed to be everywhere in the forest, what with the start of mating season, and while the noise was about the same level, it was at least of an different kind. He'd retreated here, close to the Minders' enclave, for some relative peace and quiet.

"Soon they'll grow up and fall into the same foolishness their parents did," he muttered to himself, watching a pair of little males wrestle, "Their parents, hah! I knew them when!" Mating season was always a trying time for Christobel. It wasn't that he yearned for a mate of his own--far from it--but the infatuated behavior of young couples in love both disgusted and amused him. The twittering and the presentation of gifts and the preening were so... superfluous. The Minders had at last noticed his presence and were starting to herd their charges away from him, out of earshot.

"Prejudiced idiots!" Christobel hooted derisively, and fluffed up his feathers. He always thought that others avoided him because he was an Aberrant, and gave it not a thought that it could be because he was nearly constantly talking to himself. Perhaps a Companion would have helped by giving the illusion that he was speaking to it instead of thin air, but he had eaten so many stray creatures that no right-minded Keeper would dare give him one. In fact, he remembered last mating season, when an Aberrant female had foolishly courted him, ignoring his stranger personality quirks until he showed up with the gift of her pet Skurri, which had wandered away the night before and had since been missing. When she had flapped off in disgust after shrieking at him, he had eaten it anyways. No use wasting such a nice meal.

One of the bolder Minders was trying to ward him off now, scolding him that he didn't have anything better to do than hang around to scare the chicks. More like he was scaring the Minders! Young Sentinels were not as frightened of Christobel's odd behavior as the adults; he noticed that a few of the curious little ones were peeking out at him from behind their Minder's ruffled tail-feathers. "How cute they are, and so blissfully... stupid," he murmured to himself, shifting on his branch. Those fledgelings would lose their cuteness soon, come next Graduation. He knew the new adults were always so tediously cocky, thinking that in their youth, they were immortal.

Thinking of fledgelings made him drift back to his own chickhood, when he too was being watched by a Minder. As a chick, he'd been teased mercilessly by the more properly colored fledgelings, and his first manifestation of Will was to pick up a smattering of pebbles and hurl them at his attackers, who of course had fled in confusion and the incident had earned him a tongue-lashing from his Minder and a visit from one of the Mystics. Unsure of what it meant to be called upon by one of those, he had just sat dumbly in place while the Mystic had implored him to demonstrate his Will, and after a good hour of inefficient coaxing he had been left alone. To this day, the event was his most prominent memory of his youth and also a complete mystery.

"Leave!" shrilled the Minder, and at last Christobel seemed to get the message, jolted out of his reminiscing. He launched from the branch he was perched on with the same force and startled expression as one who had been given a harsh kick.

"I remember looking after that one... Always somethin' a bit wrong about 'im," commented one of the older Minders, and the others swept their fledgelings back into the hollowed tree. Christobel flapped away, dodging trees with little thought, and wondered if he had anything else to do that would also involve the courting couples as little as possible.

The sky was just beginning to take on the orange hues of sunset when the Gatherer finally arrived as his destination.

Dusthorn flew into the dimly lit enclave of the Minders, downy feathers fluttering about as the aberrant landed amongst the interlocking branches of a particularly large nest. Nearby, three nesting Minders kept watch as their hatchlings wandered about the spacious roost.

One of them, an elderly looking female deep woods, hobbled towards him.

“Good evening, Dusthorn” she called to him.

Dusthorn bowed his head slightly “Indeed it is... I've plenty for you all today.”

“You are thinner... mind you take care of yourself properly.” she scolded gently.

“Yes, thank you.” he replied, slightly embarrassed by the scrutiny.

Ever since he had first met her, she had always seemed to dote on him so... as though he was still another hatchling of hers. His own mother had passed away from an illness when he was small. His father had cared for him as best as he could on his own, but an injury would eventually force him to send his little son into the care of a Minder. This very one, in fact. Her name was Flaxwing.

“Shall we see what Dusthorn has brought us tonight?...” Flaxwing called to a pair of hatchlings hiding behind her as she trundled up to Dusthorn's side and willed open his haversack. Eagerly, the two bundles of fluff scampered underneath the bag, an expectant look in their bright eyes, as though willing their elder to spill its contents everywhere... It was not to be.

As Flaxwing distributed the pack's contents among the enclave's various hungry beaks, Dusthorn found himself drifting into memory.

As far as could be assumed for a fostered aberrant, he had had a fairly modest youth. The bigotry usually associated with those of his lineage was mercifully less then expected for him. It had been decided early on that he should be sheltered away from the other residents of the enclave while in the Minder's care. Consequentially, he had little memory of his time as a hatchling... save for those of Flaxwing and faint images of his father.

Upon reaching adolescence, Flaxwing did her best to present him as a child of her own... another deep woods Sentinel. While many of the other Minders were not to be taken in, those who may have known, seemed to have remained silent about any misgivings, at least, out of respect for Flaxwing. Regardless, Dusthorn had been blissfully unaware of any of this at the time. He was introduced to fledglings his own age, and much to Flaxwing relief, was accepted.

The other young Sentinels, in turn, introduced him to hunting. His first quarry had been a particularly elusive moth. By the end of the fierce chase, it was clutched tightly in his talons; very squished and battered, mind you, but it was a hard fought prize none the less.

It would come to pass that it would be hunting that would eventually introduce him to his first love interest. He'd been watching a rather fat mouse clumsily working it's way through the thick foliage on the Ground, until it finally ventured out of cover. Instantly, he lighted from his perch and swooped towards his prey... only to have the most beautiful deep woods Sentinel he had ever seen cut him off, snatch the mouse firmly in her talons, fly back up to the safety of her Forest perch and begin to devour HIS prey.
Momentarily flustered- and clearly captivated by her, he flew headlong into a fern.

Quickly realizing he was yet to reach safety himself, he righted himself and- with as much dignity as he could- landed on a tree neighboring hers. Now to introduce himself...

... he had just convinced himself to speak for the third time when, having finished her meal, she turned her back and flew away with a hoot. While he'd hoped to steal her affections, instead, she stole his meal. He'd been too shy to say anything, let alone protest.

He'd learned her name since then, Nettle. Though he had yet to announce himself to her to this day.

Dusthorn's moment of recollection was brought to an abrupt halt with the return of Flaxwing and her two trailing hatchlings/shadows. Having finished the task of unloading, Flaxwing cast a questioning glance over Dusthorn. “You'll greet that father of yours for me, will you?” she said

“Yes, I will.” he replied.

The two Hatchlings were made to thank the Gatherer for his troubles. Dusthorn hooted in appreciation, bowed in respect to Flaxwing and took flight.

On the flight home, his thoughts once again drift back to Nettle.

Maybe it was about time he paid her a visit. The local mice would make a perfect gift, they were looking particularly fat and lazy this season...

By all rights, it should have been a perfectly clear night with a full moon shining heavily in the sky as if ready to drip silver down on the trees below, which would have been utterly unshaken by any wind, and there certainly wouldn’t have been any rain. But, as the saying goes, where there’s a will, there’s a way, and the weather certainly had both of those things. None but the Mystics could really be sure about the weather’s will. If any of them knew, they certainly weren’t telling Campion about it. The clouds rained down on the forest, oblivious or uncaring to the mating season that they were disrupting.

Clacking his beak slightly, he carefully settled his feathers, trying to get rid of all the water that had soaked him all the way to the bone. It was a pointless activity; there was no way that he could get rid of all the water by merely picking at it like this. What he really needed to do was to fluff out, but he didn’t dare do that, not with all the little hatchlings around. For some of them, this was the first time they had seen a storm, while others nearing graduation had seen them many times before. Ha. First storms of love… now that had been a wild time… but, misguided in the end. He was what he was, and there was certainly no changing that. He should have known that Silvernight would sooner take another Ghost than an Aberrant. Others had followed her, each one taking a place in Campion’s heart, but, alas, he was now growing… tired of it. Ah well… he wasn’t missing much, by the sounds of it. Romance only brought drama and drama only brought sadness.

Lots of sounds, actually. A particularly discordant squawk made Campion wince and then smile at the little balls of fluff known as hatchlings. Sooner or later, they would begin to fly. Ha. Hopefully they would be better at it than him! He had to wonder if that tree still had broken branches from that debacle. That had been when he first met Silvernight, when she was in training to become a Healer. He had certainly needed her then. She never needed him. Well, at least not until he had begun hunting; then she had certainly taken more notice in the young Aberrant. Foolish, foolish Campion had been so eager to impress, to prove that Aberrants weren’t any better---or any worse---than anyone else. He had so proudly displayed his first kill---a Mus---and had received little to no praise for it. All the praise had gone to the killer of a Skurri.

Other hatchlings squeaked loudly, pestering a Minder. Campion couldn’t help but overhear their words…

“Who is that?”

“He looks funny!”

“You idiot, that’s just feather dye!”

“Tesil, don’t call Zell an idiot! Apologize right now!” That last voice was slightly older, a Minder by the sound of it. Probably the one that the hatchlings had recently been pestering. “And don’t stare at poor Campion. It’s rude.” Her voice dropped a little on the last words, trying to avoid being heard.

“But whhhhy? He looks funny! If he looks that funny, then he deserves to be looked at!” One of the hatchlings cheeped, clearly not at all put off by the Minder’s words. Campion couldn’t resist a flinch at the hatchling’s words. Yeah, like it had been his fault that he had born an Aberrant, the result of a mating between a Mist and a Deep Woods.

The Minder spoke again, and her voice dropped even lower. “He… that’s not feather-paint… he was born like that… and it’s not nice to talk about it.”

“But whhhhy?” like most hatchlings, this particular one was rather stubborn when it came to things like this. “He looks funny!”

There might have been more, but Campion didn’t want to listen to it. With a flurry of water, wings, and feathers, he took off into the night, eager to avoid any other Sentinels for the remainder of the mating season.