Shiro loved the outdoors; there was just something that was exhilarating about it. Maybe it was the cleaner fresh air, or the feeling of warm rays of sunlight kissing at your skin. Perhaps it was just the sounds of nature. Of birds and animals, of insects and reptiles of the like. Knowing that you were in a place full of life, of plants. Of thing that are in their natural order; the way Mother Nature and God intended them to be. It was nice, plain and simple. So when Shiro got a break off of college to 'recover'. He spent a lot of his time in the woods. Call it whatever you like, but this was one of his favorite places to be. He was use to hiking from an early age, and being the animal lover he is, spending time outside the city was a near necessity. Here, he could let loose and ease his way into a thoughtless rest. Just to let him close his eyes and clear his mind. It was one way to go to help a troubled mind.

Flutter flutter flutter

Something was moving around in the shrubbery below him. "Huh?" Shrio was hiking pretty deep in the woods after following a deer trail that he happened to stumbled upon. There could be anything in there. The noises continued, the sounds and rusting and fluttering lead Shiro to believe there may be a bird in the shrubs. If it was a baby, he shouldn't help it get back into its nest. The bird would smell like a human and the parents would ignore it. Leaving it to starve while they fed and tended to its siblings. On the other hand, if was an adult, it could be hurt from an attack, or have a broken wing from a fall.

Flutter flutter flutter "Chirp."

Screw it, he had to help it. He heard it chirp. He couldn't turn his back on it now. Shiro slowly inched towards the shrubbery, making sure to be cautious as not to startle the poor bird. It quitted as he neared closer. Shit, it must have heard me. How couldn't it? Shiro wasn't small by any means. "Shhhhh-" he shoosed it, hoping it would help. When Shiro finally reached the bush, he let out a breath he didn't know he was holding in. "There you are." He pulled back a part of the bush to revel a brown frail bird. "How are you?" He cooed. He was right. There was an injured bird; its wing seemed to be bending at bit too downwards. "You poor thing." It stilled as he talked to it, it must've been very frighten. Shrio slipped off his backpack, undid the zipper, and pulled out a soft towel to move the animal. "I'll take good care of you." He promised and took the creature in his arms. It squirmed and fidgeted. He hummed a slow tune to pacify it as he got his bag and started to trail back to his truck.

It had been a two whole months since Shiro had first found the bird. To be honest, he wasn't sure what species it was. But he later concluded it was probably part of the Columbidae family. It was male, most likely in its adolescence, and had a dull brown 'coat', which led to Shiro too first believed that it was female. Matthew was his name. Shiro sometimes wonder why he named it that. He just felt the need to call it such. Like, something was telling him to. Actually he found it creepy at first and attempted on trying to name him James. Alas, something felt off and he decided to dub him Matthew.

Today, Shiro felt it was finally time to release him back into the wild. His wing was already healed, and could fly quite well. Its bones didn't seem to take too much damage. So Shiro placed Matthew's cage onto the passenger seat and turned on his truck. Time to make a trip back into those woods.

Not saying that he hasn't been back there in his time of taking care of Matthew, he did go back every so offend, but he just didn't dare to trail as far in as he did that day. He knew it was dangerous and only did it that time because he was spacing out and not paying attention. Which is something you should never do in a forest, especially when you're by yourself.

"Tweet, twee, teet!"

Matthew made a few bird calls, and Shiro could of sworn he could he could feel the excitement and enthusiasm radiating from the bird. He chuckled; it was just his imagination running while. At least it's running in a good direction. His grip on the steering wheel tightened, causing his knuckles to slightly turn white. He looked back at the bird, it seeming to stare back at him. Despite only knowing this thing for two months, it felt like the look you would get from a concerned friend of many years. Nervous laughter left his lips. All in his head, he's just making it all up. He repeated this mantra in his head a few times. His muscles relaxed as he continued to drive. Shying his focus over to the road.

The car parked and Shiro steeped out. He ran over to the other side to open the door and take the cage out, and slipped on his backpack. It was time to go hiking. Into the woods. Pretty darn deep. He took a breath of fresh air. Listening in on the calls of birds and animals, he trailed off into the wood. Matthew being relatively quiet for most of the journey and only making noise when Shiro fumbled or stumbled. And there was that one time where he actually tripped. At least he didn't drop the bird cage when he went down to meet the forest floor. Surprisingly, no animals bothered them, or at least no wild life dared to get to close. It was odd, but Shiro ignored it. It wasn't like the forest suddenly went quite or anything; that would be worrisome.

After about an hour or so, (he wasn't really keeping time at the moment) something in his gut told him this was the perfect place to release his feathered friend. "Alright," he unlocked the latched and watched as the bird teetered towards the exit, but never going out. He simply looked up at Shiro with those small beady eyes. Shiro repressed to urge to aww, instead he opted for cooing at the thing, trying to coaxes it out. Matthew looked at the forest, then back to him for a second before slowly descending out of the cage and into the trees. He watch his little friend go, muttering a quite but sincere "Goodbye." to it. His eyes followed it as well as he could, watching before Matthew was so small that he vanished from his line of slight. A bitter-sweet smile graced his face and with that, he picked up the cage and left from their departure site.

It was time to go home.