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"Grian, Jim?"
Joel was walking around the mansion which, unsurprisingly, was much harder to traverse now that half of it had been burnt down. The three of them had managed to clear out some of the rooms and get a bedroom and a cookie area going but actually moving between these places was always a roll of the dice to see if the floorboard you were standing on would give up (something that had happened enough times that any other team would consider moving out).
But they were the bad boys! The more the house was breaking around them the more stubborn they got about it.
"Where the bloody hell did these two go?"
He checked his communicator for what must have been the a hundredth time just to make sure he hadn't missed a message from the two of them or, God forbid, a death message.
But the communication lines were just as empty as they had been the last time he checked them. There were still thankfully no reds so everyone was at a standstill. It was a stressful as hell standstill but still better than knowing that there were reds running around.
Even knowing that his teammates were as safe as one can be in a game like this, Joel was getting more and more worried with every empty room he walked into.
"Stupid mansion," he muttered, kicking away a burnt plank of wood that had fallen from who knows where. "Those stupid bloody idiots, they are gonna get themselves killed!"
He continued going through the mansion, yelling after his teammates but never getting a response back.
The last room he had to check was the bedroom. The reason he left it for last is because he couldn't imagine that Jim and Grian would just be sleeping away in the middle of the day instead of helping him gather materials. They were in a death game for goodness sake! Who could possibly be sleeping around at a time like this?
But as he got closer, he started to hear some quite murmurs. He almost thought that another team had infiltrated into their base, planning to either steal something or to set up a trap.
With a movement that by now was second nature, Joel reached for his sword and started venturing closer and closer until he could start to make out some words.
"Stop…. fusing…"
"…make…. larger-"
He wasn't about to let some unruly yellows have their way in his base so without preparing any further, he opened the door and was ready to have a showdown with however many enemies had made their way into his home.
But what he found wasn't the bloodthirsty fiends that he had imagined. Instead, he saw Grian and Jimmy, sitting on the makeshift bed they had made surrounded by blankets and pillows.
The two avians had their shirts off, letting Joel get a full view of their wings. Grian's were mostly red with blue and yellow ends and were almost as big as his entire body, his feathers were luscious and abundant and some of them laid scattered across the fort the two of them in what looked at either an attempt at offering the place even more comfort or to simply act as decoration.
Jimmy's wings on the other hand looked nothing like the parrot's. There were a golden yellow all over and they were much, much smaller, being just about a quarter of the size of the other's. The feather's themselves were also much smaller and in same places they seemed to have not fully grown, looking more like fluff than anything else. The yellow fluff was also everywhere on the pillows and blankets but in a manner that looked much less deliberate.
The three man started at each other in silence for what felt like years. Jimmy looked absolutely terrified but also deeply embarrassed, a deep blush covering his face. Grian for his part seemed to be holding it together much better than the other, though shock could clearly be seen in his eyes.
"What in the world are you two doing here?!" Joel finally broke the silence, putting his sword next to the door. "I've been looking for you for hours! And you two were just here having a bloody slumber party?"
"Yeah well, you've found us now," Grian snapped back, with an aggression the man didn't expect. "You can take you stupid comments and leave us be."
Joel was now fully beyond confused. The situation itself was already weird but having Grian speak to him with such anger was only making all this make less sense. He looked back at Jimmy who was now trying to hide his wings from him, placing a pillow in front of his face to avoid Joel's face.
"I- I didn't-?" he mumbled and then, in a much softer tone. "I was just worried about you idiots. I didn't know where you were or what you were doing…"
"Well what does it look like!?" The parrot yelled again, his wings extending in a threatening manner as his feathers fluffed up.
Once again, Joel was silent, his brain almost overheating from trying to come up with a good answer. "So I'm guessing you're not having a slumber party then?"
Grian looked ready to start yelling again but Jimmy intervened, placing a hand on his shoulder. "G, I don't think he knows."
"How could he not-!" he started to say, before looking back at Joel who still had the same confused look on his face. "Oh God he actually doesn't know."
"Ok well excuse me for being worried for you two and for not knowing this weird tradition you two have!"
"It's not-"
"It's an avian thing," Jimmy sheepishly said, interrupting the parrot from going on another tirade. "We… we sometimes get this-this urge to build a nest and me and Grian's nesting time kinda synced up so that's why we are doing it together. It's just… an avian instinct I guess."
The parrot crossed his arms, looking at Joel with suspicion but he didn't interject and the man hoped that that was a good sign.
"And it's- ahh, a rather private manner?" He was blushing harder and harder with every word he spoke, not daring to meet the other's eyes anymore. "And it's always easier to nest with friend or, eh, mate."
The blush that had infected the canary's whole face made it's was onto Joel who had kept switching from one avian to the other. "Oh…oh. W-well then, I- I'm really sorry for interrupting the two of you." As he spoke he started retreating toward the door but he did manage to catch Grian looking at Jimmy with an expecting gaze, his eyebrow raised and his arms still crossed tightly to his chest.
"Wait a sec!" the canary spoke right before Joel was about to touch the door handle. When he turned to look back at the avian his face was as red as Grian's feathers. "I- we, ah wanted to ask- to see if, maybe…" he was stammering over his words and almost looked like he was about to stop talking but once the parrot gave him a sharp push with his elbow he eventually spat out what he had been meaning to say.
"Would you like to help us nest?" His voice was much more high-pitched than he hd intended to come across. "Please?" he added, in a much smaller tone.
"You just said this is a personal thing and I didn't mean to intrude or-"
Grian let out a lout and overly exaggerated groan. "I suggested getting you to help but Tim was scared that you'd make fun of him and think this whole thing is silly because he's stupid like that-"
"Hey!" Jimmy protested, but the other continued on.
"But he does want you here, he's just embarrassed to ask. We…" There was a small moment in which a small blush appeared on Grian's face and he seemed to have lost his words, something which rarely ever happened. "We'd both like you here."
"Are you guys sure?" Joel asked, looking at the two avians.
The parrot gave a confident nod while the canary whispered a shaky 'yes', the man quickly hurried over to his boys, making sure not to ruin the nest the two had crafted as he sat down in the middle of the two.
"Well then, what do I gotta do?"
He spend the rest of the day learning how to groom their wings which was much harder than he had anticipated (he might have accidentally ripped one of Grian's feathers which landed him with a long and heated talk to from the avian which he finally resolved by offering to go find more wool to help them make the nest comfier as an apology).
By the end of the day, the two birds had beautifully groomed wings, a more than comfortable nest and a Joel that they were now using as a pillow.
And despite the fact that his arms were killing him and he could barely breath with the two on top of him, the man was more than glad that his bad boys felt safe enough around him to let him be a part of this.
After all, bad boys always help each other, even if that means inhaling an unhealthy amount of feather fluff.