As if awakening for the first time, the weight of her surroundings crashed upon her so drastically she nearly toppled over.
To be perfectly honest, who wouldn't?
The haze that had shrouded her mind for so long wavered ever so slightly, causing her inactive consciousness to slowly start whirling back into motion.
Where was she?
What was she?
Who was she?
Unanswered questions seemed to swirl around her still sluggish mind, as if they were leaves, lazily cascading to the ground. Her gizzard clenched at the inference as if the relation somehow pained her.
Yet how could she know, when the only thing she knew for certain was that the brightness bathing her face in a harsh glow was making it increasingly more difficult to see properly?
Opening her eyes a fraction, she was greeted by a massive moon, brighter than the sun itself, or so it seemed. She blinked slowly and looked around when a harsh shreik reverbated around the strange stone dome that she stood in, alongside numerous other owls. The ones around her started mechanically moving their talons, propelling their ridgid bodies forward without a second thought.
She decided to follow suit, trying to imitate their lifeless motions. She had not the faintest clue as to why she did, but a horrible squeeze of her gizzard told her this was not a place she wanted to be in.
She kept on moving forward until she was sheltered under some sort of arch that shield her and other owls from the moons bright glare.
Under further inspection it dawned on her that in fact the majority of the owls around her were actually owlets. She leaned gradually to the left, trying to get the attention of a small elf owlet beside her, but when the owl ignored her slight nudges she risked a glance to the side and swallowed a gasp.
Instead of pale yellow orbs that should have gazed back at her, she saw empty silver pools, blankly looking at the ceiling.
Her gizzard started to have a spasm within her.
Moonblinked. The owlet was moonblinked.
She looked forward and examined every owlet that was in eyesight, and she noticed every single one of them had the same round and emotionless eyes. Not only that, but they all seemed to be chanting some sound.
She strained her excellent ears to catch what the owlet beside her was chanting, and she faintly heard, "Dindo, Dindo, Dindo. . ."
What was a 'dindo'? And why was every other owlet saying something different? Should she have been saying something as well?
It was too late anyway.
A large owl who was missing an ear and a ridiculous amount of feathers pushed aside the other unresponsive owlets and firmly grabbed her wing, leaving her powerless in his grasp.
She knew struggling was useless, and she also knew that she was too frozen with shock to do anything but follow anyway.
The owl angrily muttered insults towards her well being under his breath and she tried to ignore his seering words, but they didn't matter anyway. How could he insult her when she didn't know where she was or who she was?
He abruptly stopped, shoving her ruffly into a cell like room that was a billion times brighter than the dome she was in before. She saw through blurry eyes marble white walls all reflecting the moons light in a more intense way than she could have ever dreamed.
After a few moments of struggle her willpower ran out and she tilted her head back to let the moon bathe her pure white heart shaped face feathers once more, and the haze once again dominated her mind.
Many years later.
The door could have broke down and still it would have taken Soren a few moments to realize something was wrong.
Ironically, the small hatch door that separated the tranquil library from the outside world landed on the floor with a loud thump, and in fluttered a rather disgruntled looking Pelli.
"Soren!" She sounded breathless and her chest was heaving. He looked up quickly, concern in his eyes. "It's Twilight! Come quick!"
His gizzard turned over as fear settled upon him. He placed the book gently on the table and followed his mate through the many corridors of the tree, until he could go no further, due to a large cluster of owls, murmuring to one another.
Soren impatiently flew over the mob, then landed at the center of all the commotion, only to find his friend was completely fine, but was leaning over a small, unmoving owlet.
"Twilight-" Soren struggled to make sense of the situation. "Twilight, what's this all about?"
"Soren! Thank Glaux." The great gray looked up for a second, observing his friend with something along the lines of fear, very uncharacteristic for his rather boisterious friend.
Soren looked at the owlet more carefully. Were they dead?
He used his talon to slowly touch the small creature, feathers dull and wings limp. He cringed slightly, the small owlet reminding him of his own small owlets. The owlets eyes were empty and wide open, as if not getting enough of the sight that they could not see. It had no heartbeat.
Soren tore his eyes away, unable to stand looking at the dead owlet for a second longer. Instead he asked the question that was drifting from the surrounding crowd. "What did this?"
"I don't know, Soren." Twilight's voice shook slightly, but he instantly cleared his throat and continued, his tone grim. "All I know is that there were drag marks nearby, which meant whoever did, certainly did not just settle for one, but by the looks of it dozens. And I am no tracker, but anyone could see that this was not a simple fall out of the nest incident."
Soren briefly looked down at the still body before looking to the sky, where the sunset shone like spilt blood over the horizon, almost as if it had anticipated this and was mocking them.
"Where did you find them?" Soren asked, looking at his friend, who returned it with unfathomable reluctance, as if the answer would wound someone.
"Soren. . ."
Soren waited expectantly, and despite himself started to grow slightly annoyed. "Twilight, we must send our trackers. Whoever did this must be caught."
Twilight's words were almost inaudible. "The remains of St. Aggies, Soren."
Soren looked at him with disbelief, but there was more.
"Except they aren't just remains anymore."