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Abelina recoiled as the water lapped at her feathers. "Mama, it's cold!"
"No it's not," Javier said as he surfaced. "Stop being such a baby."
Jewel, lying in the sand a few feet away from her children, kept her eyes closed. "Javier, don't call your sister a baby. And Abelina, honey, if it's cold, don't go in."
"But I want to…"
"Then go in."
"But it's cold."
"Then don't."
"But—"
"I'm not going through that logic again."
Abelina frowned. Even Rey, usually the nervous one, was calmly floating on his back in the water. She didn't like not partaking in her brothers' revelry. If she wasn't so upset that Rey had chosen to be normal and playful while she stayed stuck on the sidelines, she might have warned him about Javier's rapid approach.
But she didn't, and Javier surfaced violently next to a startled Rey, who lost his balance and somersaulted underwater.
She giggled. Cold water or not, she had to be a part of this. Abelina dove into the shallow waters, pretty deep for her little birdie size, and paddled furiously out to join her brothers.
Jewel cracked an eye open and smiled at the sight of her children splashing wildly. Blu landed next to her. "Look how cute they are."
The female Blue Macaw nodded in agreement. "We're pretty good at procreating."
"Pretty good? They should give us an award."
"Don't I know it," she cooed as she snuggled up next to her mate.
"BLU! JEWEL!"
The high-pitched shriek practically stopped their hearts, ruining any chance of a romantic moment the Blue Macaw pair might have had. Turning around, they saw Pedro flying rapidly towards them, as if determined to beat the wind at its own game.
He landed next to them and held up a finger so the pair would give him a minute as he tried to catch his breath. Blu and Jewel shared an amused glance.
"Are you okay?" Jewel asked, noticing bits of leaves and thorns sticking at awkward angles from Pedro's feathers.
"Yeah…I'm fine…" Pedro huffed. Then he shook his head violently. "No, I am NOT fine!"
"Oh…what's wrong?"
"Have you seen Nico?"
"No," Blu said. "He's usually with you."
Pedro's face went from concerned to distressed.
"Okay, I think something bad went down last night, but I have no idea what it was."
Blu and Jewel raised their eyebrows. "You'll have to be more specific," Blu said.
"All right, well, see, Nico and I went to The Branch, and I was…um…having a good time," he said cryptically.
"Having a good time?" Blu questioned.
"Oh my God, Pedro, were you—"
Pedro didn't let Jewel finish her accusation. "NO! Not THAT kind of good time! I was…I had some stuff to drink."
She sniggered. "You mean you got—"
"Yes."
"And you wanted to take our children there," Blu said disapprovingly.
Pedro crossed his wings. "Well if they had been there, I wouldn't have drunk. Duh."
"Pedro, don't get sidetracked, what happened last night?" Jewel asked, more interested now that Pedro had revealed his intoxicated state.
"Well, that's the thing…I don't remember much…"
"What do you remember?"
"We got there, and we were singing, and then I met up with these cool seagull guys, and then…I-I know we were walking home, and Nico was there telling me something about the ground, and so was Raoul, and he was taking us a different way home. A shortcut, maybe?"
"Okay, what next?" Blu asked, glancing over at his children, still playing carefree in the water.
"Something came at us, something huge, I don't remember whether we were hit or not."
"Well obviously not," Jewel said.
"Oh. Right. Well…we were almost hit then, because next thing I knew I was with these two other cardinals—"
"I thought you were with seagulls?"
"No, Blu, man, that was earlier! Stay with me!"
Blu huffed. "Sorry that your drinking escapades don't make sense."
"This is why I'm so worried, dude! Because next thing I knew, there was this cat!"
"A cat?" Jewel sounded skeptic.
"Yes! A cat! It came out of nowhere, girl! And then I think…I-I think I tripped over a wagon, or something with wheels, because everything was a blur, and then I collapsed in this bush."
Blu and Jewel met Pedro's monologue with blank stares. "That certainly explains the thorns," Jewel said in an appeasing tone.
"You guys don't believe me?" Neither of the Blue Macaws would meet Pedro's eyes.
"It's not that, Pedro, just…you weren't yourself last night. I just have a hard time believing any of that happened," Blu explained. "I mean, maybe it did, but that wasn't what happened, you know?"
"And you think I'm the one who's drinking?"
"No, I mean that maybe to your intoxicated mind that was what was happening, but it was something different in reality."
"Fine, then where's Nico?"
Silence took over as the couple tried to think of an explanation. Jewel tentatively asked, "When was the last time you saw him?"
"The last time I remember is right before the cardinals took me away," Pedro said slowly. A look of apprehension suddenly seized his face. "They mentioned him."
"What did they say?" Blu didn't look terribly nervous.
"I don't—I don't know."
"Maybe they were taking you home because Nico wanted to stay longer," Jewel proposed.
"No…Nico's never done that. If I'm…um…in an unfit state to go home, he's always there." Pedro scowled at the ground, as if it was somehow responsible for his confusion. "That's why I feel like something's up. It was so clear then, I remember being really super aware of what was going on, and now I have no idea."
"Well either way, we should probably find him," Jewel said.
"Have you checked if he's with Rafael yet?" Blu asked. Pedro shook his head, eyes still scrunched in a concerned, pensive expression. "Let's go see him. Jewel, would you mind terribly staying with the kids?"
Jewel grabbed her mate's wing before he could lift off. "I'm coming too."
"What about the kids?"
"Do you expect me to just wait around here while you guys solve the mystery? The kids can come," she said. She turned towards the water. "Kids! We're going to see Uncle Rafael!"
All three little blue heads peered from the water. "Can we stay here?" Javier yelled.
"No, you have to come with us!"
"But Uncle Raffy's kids scare me," Rey shouted, barely audible.
"Both of us will be there." Blu understood Rey's fear well, and secretly wished he didn't have to go to Rafael's tree. It was really quite terrifying.
The three kids swam to shore, shook themselves to dry off, and then clumsily flew to rest beside their parents.
"Blu, go ahead with Pedro," Jewel said. "We'll be right behind you."
Blu pecked his mate on the cheek and took off, trying to keep up with Pedro's rapidly disappearing form. Jewel let the kids begin to fly after their father until they were between her and Blu, and then took off to bring up the rear.
Blinding sun pierced Nico's eyes, and he instantly closed them again. The familiar bustle and din of downtown Rio reached his ears in a slightly muffled state, and as he gingerly moved his wings, they hit smooth plastic.
Slowly cracking open his eyes, Nico realized that he was not looking at the sun's corona, but a sliver of some sort of wrapper. He kicked the plastic covering off. The instant the semi-protection of the litter blew away, the sun's full heat washed over him. Judging by the heat and the position of the sun, it had to be almost noon.
The canary sat up, feeling remarkably less sore than he expected after being choked, dropped, and whacked unconscious. Twice. Last night was worse than the time Pedro experienced his first and only night terror, chucking a javelin at an attacking spider in his dream and thwacking Nico with a stick in real life.
A moment of panic overtook Nico as he realized his bottle cap was not on his head, but sweet relief replaced the adrenaline coursing through his body when he realized it was on the edge of the curb. He picked it up, dusted it off, and placed it on his head, regaining not only his precious hat, but a feeling of comfort and capability.
The feeling disappeared when he fully remembered the events of last night.
Raoul leading him and a drunken Pedro down an alley (how stupid were they?), two tires flying at them from the rooftops, Pedro being taken away, Diego dropping him, unconsciousness, a cat in the alley, mentions of Pedro, Raoul threatening the kids—
Raoul threatened the kids! That was what had happened right before he hit the stop sign! Nico glared up at the offending obstacle, happily noticing there were no dents, nor scratches. That meant he probably didn't have any on his body, either.
Nico sat down on the curb he'd spent last night on, legs dangling off the edge. He wanted nothing more than to fly off in search of Pedro and the Blue Macaws, but he had to clear his mind, had to think for a minute. The creepy cat said that Pedro somehow escaped, but where was he? Nico couldn't very well go flying around Rio looking for a random wagon at the bottom of a hill, no matter how worried he was about his missing friend. Rio was big, the wagon had probably been moved by now, and Pedro might have flown away already, anyway. No, it would make much more sense for Nico to go find Blu and Jewel, who were probably in one of their usual spots around the rainforest.
Angling his bottle cap in preparation for the frantic flight he was about to undertake, Nico jumped off the curb and flew into the midday sky.
"Not since yesterday," Rafael told Pedro, Blu, and Jewel. "What's wrong? Did he take that really lame surfboard of yours again?"
"My surfboard's not lame…" Pedro sulked.
"It barely stays afloat."
"It doesn't have to work to be cool."
"Says you."
Jewel interrupted. "Rafael, are you sure you haven't seen him?" Her motherly instincts were starting to surface.
"Like I said, not since yesterday." The Toucan gestured towards Pedro. "You two said you'd perfected your act for tonight."
Pedro's wing smacked his forehead. "The Best of the Branch! That's tonight!"
"How could you forget?"
"I've got a lot going on, man."
"Lay it on me."
"Better get ready for this one," Blu muttered.
"Okay, so I had a little to drink last night—"
"Were you with those seagulls again?" Rafael looked down his beak at the flustered cardinal.
"Maybe. Anyway, I remember heading home with Nico and Raoul…"
Blu looked towards the chicks as Pedro launched into his story. Javier and Abelina were gleefully playing tag with six of Rafael's dozen children, and Rey stood in the corner scrutinizing the game with all the studiousness of a scientist in a laboratory.
The identical eyes of father and son met, and Rey quickly sidled over to Blu.
"Why aren't you playing with the others?" Blu whispered, so as not to distract from Pedro's story.
"It doesn't look like fun."
Blu glanced at the playing field. One Toucan chick jumped on another's shoulders, toppling the both of them into a huddle of their siblings and sending off a domino effect of screaming chicks.
"Agreed."
Rey huddled into his father's side and the two turned back towards the spectacle of the day. Pedro had not yet stopped talking.
"…And then I woke up in a bush and went to find you guys."
Rafael stroked the underside of his beak. "It's a good thing you never get side effects from your actions the following morning."
"I don't know what to do, Raf."
"Are you sure that's exactly what happened?" he asked in a non-skeptical tone.
"From what I remember."
"I don't have a good feeling about this," Rafael said.
"Really?" Blu asked. "You feel like something's wrong?" The group had learned long ago to trust Rafael's eerily accurate instincts.
"I think so too," Jewel piped in. Her mother's intuition was also a respected source of information.
"I guess we've got to find him then," Blu said.
"Is Uncle Nico missing?" Rey asked, just now comprehending what the adults were discussing.
Jewel frowned. "Why aren't you playing with the other kids?"
"I didn't want to die."
"You aren't going to die, sweetie."
"Have you seen what they're doing over there?"
"Actually, it's a pretty legitimate fear," Rafael admitted.
"Honey, this is grown-up talk, why don't you at least go try to play?" Jewel gently pushed her son towards the children's festivities.
"I don't want to! I want to know what's going on!" Rey crossed his wings and stomped defensively.
"We might as well tell him, Jewel," Blu said gently. "Rey, we're not sure where your Uncle Nico is, but we're probably worried over nothing. So don't you worry about it."
"Okay…"
"See? Crisis averted," Blu gloated.
"A crisis? To avoid a crisis there has to be a crisis!"
Blu's face fell.
"That means there is something wrong." Rey pointed at his father accusingly.
Jewel looked disapprovingly at Blu. "Nice going, Dad."
"Look, Rey," Blu tried to explain. "It's a little serious, but it's nothing you need to worry about. Just go play and let us handle it."
Rey scowled. He hated being left out.
"A little serious?" Pedro broke in. "We're performing tonight! If he's missing on the day of The Best of the Branch, that's past a little serious."
"Maybe I'm wrong," Rafael tried to sound comforting. "Like you said, it's performance day. He's probably just grabbing leftover smoothies from that stand at the boardwalk, or stealing the shoe shiner guy's rag to spiff up his bottle cap. I bet he'll be by your tree within the hour."
Pedro's expression went blank.
"…You didn't check your tree, did you?"
"No."
Raoul's expression radiated disbelief, although his annoyed eyes never actually met those of the cat. "You couldn't find either of them all night?"
The cat flicked his tail, his version of a shrug. "Rio's a big place. Who knows where the cardinal went, and there was no telling how long the canary been gone before you finally noticed. He could have gotten anywhere."
"He couldn't have gone that far."
Diego watched Raoul and the cat argue. It was all they ever seemed to do—the cat kept reiterating the comforts of the adoption center, and Raoul kept stressing the prospects of a free meal. Although the entire gang had searched all night and morning, no one was able to turn up anything by the time Raoul ordained a meeting.
Behind him, sitting on the tires that had somehow escaped being moved from last night, the rest of Raoul's gang whispered amongst themselves. The ensuing battle in the alley was, Diego had to admit, good entertainment, and the result would dictate everyone's actions for the rest of the day.
"Maybe if you were better at playing hide-and-seek," Raoul menaced, "this would be done by now."
"You forget that this is a favor." The cat's voice, equally menacing, dripped contempt. "I will find those birds for you, and I will answer the challenge. But I will not be spoken to as if I were a child who lost his milk money."
Raoul tried to glare, but his confidence faltered. His audience could not blame him—he was up against a cat.
"Fine. Do whatever you want."
"As I am prone to do."
The frustrated parrot turned towards his gang. "What kind of leads do you guys have?"
"I didn't find anything, except some trash," Diego said.
"Indeed," the cat agreed. "All I came across was discarded litter."
"And no one could get anything out of anybody? No one from last night saw anything?"
"Most people we asked were aware that Pedro was drinking," the navy-colored cardinal offered.
His brown-feathered partner piped in. "And some of the ones who stayed later saw you offer to take them home. Miguel said he was about to help Nico when he saw you, and then he figured they were in good hands." He smirked.
"What else?" Raoul was a little concerned over the pelican proprietor of The Branch seeing him, especially one on such friendly terms with Nico and Pedro, but he pushed it from his mind. Bigger things were happening.
"Nothing."
Diego knew he would probably pay for the comment, but it couldn't go unacknowledged. "What are you going to do about the Blue Macaw kids?"
Raoul furrowed his eyebrows. "I'm not entirely sure. But I think I have an idea." He didn't want to admit that the last-minute threat had been an empty one, something he yelled to slow Nico down. The kids were the first idea that popped into his head, the only butter his churning mind had yielded. Unfortunately for him, Raoul didn't know anything about the Blue Macaw family, except that they were friends with Nico and Pedro. He had never even met them. Given more time and resources, he could easily hunt them down with a much better plan, but last night's failures meant he couldn't afford to. Locating the two targets of his original revenge took top priority.
"Okay. Here's what we do," the green parrot said as he clasped his hands together definitively. "Diego, take Mike and Pete to the beach." He pointed at the cat. "You, go prowl the west side of town, the side you haven't done yet. The rest of you, go north."
"Where are you going to go?" Diego asked.
"I told you." Raoul said as he grinned. "I have a plan."
The sounds of the rainforest enveloped Nico in a welcoming hug. There was no place like home. Too bad he couldn't appreciate it like he normally did.
Although Nico passed over a few acquaintances on his way, he avoided eye contact with everyone to save time. He needed to reach Blu and Jewel's tree ASAP, there was no telling how serious Raoul's threat had been, or how quickly he could carry it out.
Only yesterday, Raoul, Nico, and Pedro had been friends, performance buddies. How long had Raoul felt such insane jealousy, an envy intense enough to provoke him to such drastic measures? Sure, Pedro received a lot of praise for his brilliant breakdancing, and Nico equal respect for his voice, but was it important enough for all this? Besides admiration, attention, and applause, their stage talent didn't give them that much. Well, girls flirted with them pretty frequently, but Nico had always assumed that was because of his natural handsomeness and charm. Granted, he didn't have an explanation for Pedro.
Flying at almost double his usual speed, Nico almost missed the large, open tree that served as Blu and Jewel's home. Lucky for him, the Blue Macaws had chosen a tree on the outer edge of the forest to be close to Linda's bird sanctuary.
He landed, exhausted, on a branch right outside the entry hollow. He rested for only a moment before bolting in.
"Blu? Jewel? Kids?"
No one was home.
"No one's here," Pedro said dejectedly after glancing in at he and Nico's tiny abode. "If he's not home or with you guys, something's got to be up."
"Well let's not panic," Rafael said. "Like I said before, maybe he's just running an errand or something."
"What errands do either of us run? And on the day of The Best of the Branch? And without telling me?" Pedro shook his head. "I've got a bad feeling about this, guys."
"Mama, what happened to Uncle Nico?" Abelina asked, tugging at Jewel's feathers. Rey, of course, had immediately informed his siblings of what was going on, and they had bluntly refused to stay with Eva and the Toucan children a moment longer. No bribes from either parent made a difference.
Jewel stuttered. "I'm not sure, sweetie." She looked at Blu. "Maybe I should take them home."
"NO!" All three children yelled at once. Concern for their uncle and a desire to be in the loop with the grown-ups had combined to make the adamant chicks downright scary to deal with. Blu gave Jewel a knowing glance—he was more used to this than she was.
"Well…I guess we can all go search the beach," Jewel said, still unsure if she should let the kids come along.
"We were just at the beach," Javier pointed out.
"But we've been gone for a little while. We can ask everyone there if they've seen Nico."
"I have an idea," Rafael broke in. "Blue Macaws, you go down to the beach and see what you can find there, and then go to the bird sanctuary and see if Linda can do anything. Pedro and I will go look downtown, talk to some of the Branch's frequenters, see if they saw anything. We'll meet at the sanctuary in, say, two hours. If none of us have any leads, we'll figure out what to do then."
Blu and Jewel nodded, their children adopting determined and excited expressions at being part of a grown-up search party. They looked to Pedro for confirmation.
His face had gone white.
"I remember what those two birds said about Nico," he said softly. Receiving no answer, he continued. "They said he was gone."
As always...reviews are greatly appreciated, and Chapter 4 should be up fairly soon, although it is proving to be the most difficult to write so far. Thanks for reading!
