A Serial Killer in the Midst

by VPVPVP

Sequel to Paradise Sanctuary. Carla and co's offspring and their cohorts are now grown up. However, in the Sanctuary de Amazon, an incident has happened and it is revealed that it was no accident, and killings start to occur. As time goes on, it becomes clear that there is a killer on the loose but it is not a predator.

3. 3- Nigel's incident

Chapter 3- a terrible incident that had happened at Nigel's wicked wings

Ganymede, Gardenia, Samara, Gylfie, Comet, Aragorn and Raya all sat down as Carla opened up the story of Nigel's demise and his last wicked deed before then. It happened two years ago and it had all started when Annette, Miranda, Cinnabar, Larimar and Quincyhad found the aging cockatoo in the street in Rio city during a flight out during one of their visits to the city that year. Nigel had been in a seriously sorry state. He had been largely featherless and starving, his plucked body gaunt with ribs and the keeled sternum showing under the skin, and he had several half-healed cuts and bruises, implying episodes of beating and mistreatment from either humans or other animals. Though they had been wary of how the infamous cockatoo had treated exotic birds including them when they were chicks, the five macaws had taken pity on the cockatoo and had taken him to where they were staying for the summer of that year. This deed had put them at loggerheads with the rest of the group, especially Blu and Jewel who, understandably, STRONGLY disapproved of their taking Nigel in and nursing him back to health and had demanded that they be allowed to kill the cockatoo there and then but the two Lear's, two glaucous and scarlet macaws insisted that they give Nigel a chance for he had been suffering greatly, and Blu, Jewel and the others reluctantly relented though Blu and Jewel and some others such as Zephyr, still wanted to put Nigel to death.

Annette and the other four had hoped that by nursing Nigel back to health and looking after him would persuade him to change his mind and abandon his poisonous rancour of exotic birds he had nurtured for all his life since he lost his career to a parakeet, so they set to doing this task. Over the following weeks, the five macaws had brought Nigel food, often in the form of fresh meat donated to them by Cometa and her family who, like everyone else was unsure of this task, as it was Nigel's preferred type of food, and the quintet had treated his injuries, gave him shelter and even talked to him. Nigel started to show signs of shedding his poisonous hatred of exotic birds and had even got to know some of the second-generation offspring of Carla and company, including Blu and Jewel's grandkids such as Sirius, Bellatrix and Spica, and also the second broods of Blu and company like Luke, Linda and Eddie, Blu and Jewel's own second brood and adopted son. Some new friends such as Greg, Sardonyx, Steven and Kevin, and Augustus and his family also got to meet the cockatoo. Blu and Jewel even at one point showed a bit of sympathy for Nigel and had an uneasy talk with him about his past and Nigel seemed sorry for treating them very badly and had confessed it. However, as Annette, Miranda, Cinnabar, Larimar and Quincy soon found out, this behaviour was nothing more than a sly ruse to cover up his intentions. While he was under their care, Nigel had kept his rancour for exotic birds, especially Spix macaws, and had been weaving a plot against them, only putting on a facade of repentant behaviour from his treatment of them to distract them from his true intentions. Then as soon as Nigel was fully restored to his health, he had thanked Annette, Miranda, Cinnabar, Larimar and Quincy for their kindness and went on his way, the five macaws proud of a job well done in helping an old former-enemy, or so they thought.

One day, Nigel had appeared again and had opted to take some of the members of the group on an outing, among them Luke, Linda, Eddie, the five golden fruithawks and two white-and-silver owls, Sardonyx and her two sons, and a number of other individuals including Rutile who had been an adolescent back then, having been born to Stella and Soren shortly after the events of the Paradise Sanctuary story. Like her older brother Sandalwood, Rutile had not inherited her mother's albinism, and her fur was reddish rather than amber unlike Sandalwood, but her fur was redder than her cousin Acerola whose fur was auburn, or brown with a reddish tint. Rutile sported a highly unusual and bizarre feature: clusters of spiky, pale yellow straw-like hair decorating her head between the ears and behind her head. This head hair was as unique as some of the head feathers seen in a number of the birds part of Blu and company's group, such as Roberto and his family's mop-like head feathers and Lavender's unique ponytail; Aurora and many of the female macaws of her line's pigtails, Iris's three-part flower-like crest and Betelgeuse's pineapple stalk-like crest. Because her head hair resembled the needles of a mineral that sometimes took this form, Bia, due to her being knowledgeable in a large number of scientific topics with geology, rocks and minerals being one of them, much like her father Blu, niece Bellatrix and two of her sons, Einstein and Miles, and also Poinsettia, described the female pup's head hair as being like titanium dioxide or rutile needles and Stella and Soren decided to name her after the mineral after seeing a picture of it on a device humans called an iphone and seeing how similar their daughter's head hair looked to the needles, and so Sandalwood's sister got her name. Rutile's eyes were lime green, brighter than Sandalwood's leafy green, and she was rather like her brother in personality in a number of ways, but she was more confident and sociable unlike Sandalwood who had been rather shy. However, she had been one of the victims of Nigel's ruthless trick that had left her traumatised which was reminiscent of Sandalwood's traumatic experience at the wings of some careless toucans which rendered him afraid of heights and flying, only the trauma had forcibly planted an entirely different fear into Rutile altogether.

Rutile and the others with her including the seven fruithawks and owls then left with Nigel for the cockatoo had managed to win much of Blu and company's trust for Nigel had seemingly shed his hatred for all exotic birds. Then during that outing, Nigel had told the group that he had a special surprise for them and their relatives and friends, especially Annette, Miranda, Cinnabar, Larimar and Quincy as a thank you for taking care of him, giving him a comfortable place to stay and nursing him back to health. Then when he arrived at a spot, an empty path, he left the little group to stand there and wait for the surprise. That was when he had the plot he had been growing behind the scenes unleashed, and he had forcibly coerced a number of seagulls into assisting him in this wicked deed. The group, which consisted of Luke, Linda, Eddie, all five fruithawks and both owls, Sardonyx, Steven, Kevin, Rutile, her and Sandalwood's cousin and Sebastian and Anabelle's son Ferdinand, Petunia and Chlorophyll's brother Edmund who was the only second-brood son of Aramis and Esmeralda, and Desdemona, one of the sisters of Azul and Wilbur and second-brood daughters of Porthos and Orquidea, and also all the grandkids of Blu, Jewel, Zephyr, Aurora, Roberto and Brisa: Justin and Carla's daughters Sonia, Spica and Melody; Bia and Virgil's sons Sirius, Einstein and Miles; Tiago and Matilda's two chicks Byron and Bellatrix; Charlotte and Músculo's son Jason; Finnick and Kira's chicks Achernar, Diego and Polaris; Felix and Turquesa's son Cody, and Lavender and Garrett's daughter, Lilac, had remained standing there, wondering what sort of surprise Nigel had in store for them when suddenly, the sounds of barking erupted and before the group knew it, they were set upon by a large group of savage dogs, all of them dangerous breeds and mainly used as guard dogs or other jobs requiring aggression, but some of these dogs were of some of the infamous breeds. These dogs had been released by Nigel's seagull assistants and next, chaos erupted.

This chaos lasted for a few frightening minutes but Steven and Kevin had managed to escape and get help, while at the same time, Annette, Miranda, Cinnabar, Larimar and Quincy had arrived to see the chaos and when they had seen who was being attacked, alarm had torn through them and they had rushed in to help. In the process, they saw Nigel standing along the sidelines, an EXTREMELY sadistic, bloodthirsty look on his face reminiscent of that of an infamous flying fox that led the colony into battle for the sanctuary with the birds years ago, chortling as he watched the carnage, even stepping in to seize one of the Spix macaws, Linda, who had managed to escape and throw her back into the scene, and then Eddie, her adoptive brother, when he tried to escape and toss him directly into the jaws of one of the vicious dogs. However, when Nigel saw the five macaws that had cared for him glaring at him in extreme mortification, he had fled with those five macaws in hot pursuit. The five macaws had been UTTERLY devastated at the cockatoo's change of attitude especially how he had thrown a wounded and extremely frightened Linda back into the fight and then Eddie, directly into a dog's jaws. After they had gone, help had finally arrived and Blu, Jewel, Zephyr, Aurora, Roberto, Brisa, and D'Artagnan, Athos, Porthos, Aramis, Phoebe and Levi and their respective mates Sapphire, Ruby, Orquidea, Esmeralda, Cobalto and Lapis Lazuli, together with James, Ebony, Broccoli, Daisy, Collette and the falcons and merlins including Orion and Velocity, and also Augustus, Melissa, Stella, Soren and some of the archaeobirds, worked together to viciously drive off the dangerous dogs, some humans eventually rushing in to help after hearing the commotion.

Annette, Miranda, Cinnabar, Larimar and Quincy had engaged in a vicious battle with Nigel that raged down several streets of Rio, the culmination of the fight eventually coming in the form of Cinnabar tackling Nigel, who was bloodied and covered in numerous scratches and bite marks inflicted on him by his opponents, midair when he tried launching himself at the quintet perched on a high wall, WELL out of Nigel's reach. Cinnabar had then deliberately and brutally rammed the cockatoo against the wall, breaking both of his wings and causing him EXTREME agony, before Cinnabar then threw him down onto the floor and added the finishing touch with a brutal claw swipe to the face, inflicting a set of bloody claw marks on it. Before Nigel had launched himself at the quintet on the wall, Quincy had issued Nigel a severe warning that the five macaws had the high perch. Then after crashing hard onto the floor, Nigel had erupted into a volcanic explosion of agonised screams, especially from his severely damaged wings and brutal claw gashes to his face from Cinnabar's attack, which was what the EXTREMELY FURIOUS Cinnabar had wanted in revenge for getting that group into trouble with the vicious dogs. As he continued to wail and screech in excruciating agony, his five former carers glared at him with a mixture of devastation at the betrayal, tearfulness, rage and anguish, and without a single sliver of sympathy for him whatsoever.

"We TOOK YOU IN AND NURSED YOU BACK TO HEALTH!" screeched Quincy, "BECAUSE YOU WERE IN A DESPERATE STATE!"

"WE EVEN BECAME FRIENDS UNDER THE BELIEF THAT YOU HAD SHED YOUR LIFELONG HATRED OF BIRDS SUCH AS US," added Miranda.

"AND NOW YOU REPAY US BY LURING THAT GROUP INTO possibly FATAL DANGER WITH THOSE VICIOUS DOGS!?" screeched Annette. Nigel then glared with the most vitriolic, rancour saturated eyes, the TRUE colours he had kept hidden all that time, at the five macaws.

"I HATE YOOOOUUUUU!" he bellowed at the top of his voice, his tattered crest fully flared and his blood-shot eyes burning with caustic hatred that was far more corrosive than ANY acid the five macaws could think of.

"It is clear that you haven't even changed, Nigel," sobbed Larimar, "We treated you with kindness and friendship, even going as far as treating you like the brother we never had, but based on what you have done to that group, it is clear that you are NOT willing to change your ways after all."

Nigel had continued to glare at the five until finally, two familiar blue forms arrived, and on the faces of those two forms were UTMOST FURY and HIGHLY VITRIOLIC rancour. Nigel, when he saw his two nemeses Blu and Jewel then approach him, flared a sadistic smile but when he saw what they were going to do, he looked pleadingly to Annette, Miranda, Cinnabar, Larimar and Quincy but the five just stood there and did nothing, and simply stood back to allow the two blue macaws to do what they had wanted to do since they saw him. That was when Nigel met his end. The two Spix macaws had inflicted him with a gruesome and painful fatal blow that led him down a slow and painful death, and even today, Annette, Miranda, Cinnabar, Larimar and Quincy still shuddered and felt their stomachs lurch from how Carla's parents had slain the cockatoo once and for all, something they should have done a long time ago, Jewel had once declared. When Carla mentioned this, she only summarised it to the fruithawks before continuing to the aftermath after the dogs had been driven away.

In the aftermath, a number of casualties had resulted, some of them with severe injuries. Luke had ended up with a badly mangled wing that was beyond saving, resulting in it getting amputated by the bird doctors who then had him become a permanent resident in Tulio's Aviary in a specially built compartment for birds and other animals not able to return to the wild where he lived now while one of the fruithawks, Samara, had suffered serious injuries. Like Luke, she had to go through surgery to repair the damage but unlike Luke, she did not suffer extreme damage to her wings that would have left her grounded for life. As Carla mentioned this, Samara actually flinched and shuddered violently as she remembered the gnashing teeth of those vicious dogs and the carnage involved. The other six fruithawks and owls however, had managed to escape to safety thanks to Sardonyx who suffered a broken wing. Steven and Kevin had managed to lead all fourteen young Spix macaws to safety though Byron had suffered a serious leg injury and also had to go through surgery, along with Q, Sardonyx, Samara, Ferdinand (who had lost an ear and ended up with a massive scar across his torso from a paw swipe from one of the dogs, which he had sustained while protecting the Spix macaws and the fruithawks and owls) and Edmund. However, there had been two fatalities. Eddie, the adopted brother of Carla, Bia, Tiago, Luke, Linda and Blu and Jewel's adopted son, had sustained injuries so severe that he had eventually succumbed on his way to Tulio's Aviary, and that had been utterly heartbreaking for Blu and his family and the final nail in the coffin for Nigel, which was why they had come to slay Nigel besides the permanent grounding of their son Luke. The other fatality had been one of James's brothers Danny who had suffered a fatal neck injury. The rest of the helpers had also sustained some injuries but thankfully, none of those injuries were fatal.

That incident had left the majority of Nigel's victims badly traumatised in addition to the heartbreak caused by the loss of Danny and Eddie. Stella and Soren had been extremely devastated that their daughter Rutile had almost been killed in the incident as it was for them history repeating itself with their son Sandalwood almost getting killed after being knocked off the end of the branch by the toucans onto a pond of water and nearly drowning, and Rutile had been left deathly afraid of city dogs reminiscent of Sandalwood's fear of heights; her cousin Ferdinand had also become extremely afraid of city dogs except the friends of the group such as James and the other greyhounds, and his parents Sebastian and Anabelle and sister Acerola had been devastated at almost losing him, history essentially repeating itself with the fire. Carla, Bia, Tiago and the other Spix macaws had been utterly frightened at almost losing their kids again, among them Sirius, Bellatrix and Spica, and that extreme fright had been replicated on Felix, Charlotte and Lavender and their mates over their chicks Cody, Lilac and Jason for they had almost been lost. Though these three were absent during the events of the Paradise Sanctuary, it had been an extreme scare for the three Spix families, but the macaw most frightened of all was Greg. He had almost lost his mate and two sons. At the fraudulent Paradise Sanctuary, this family of scarlet macaws had already lost one of their sons Lars who was eaten by one of the caracals who was friends with Dalek the parrot-detesting chameleon. Had Sardonyx, Steven and Kevin been killed by the dogs thanks to Nigel, Greg would have lost the rest of his family. But what was most devastating of all was the near loss of the five golden fruithawks and two white-and-silver owls. Samara had been so badly injured that Blu and company had actually thought that she was going to pass away but thankfully she had recovered after two long months but the dog incident which had endangered all seven of the last individuals of the golden fruithawk and white-and-silver species was most mortifying. If it weren't for Sardonyx's brave actions, all seven precious individuals would have likely suffered serious injuries rather than just Samara, with possibly fatal consequences. Another mortifying consequence was the devastation Annette, Miranda, Cinnabar, Larimar and Quincy faced at the utmost betrayal from Nigel as well, especially when he had deliberately endangered the lives of their close friends just to devastate them and get them into trouble. Then as Carla finished this story, the five fruithawks and two owls shuddered, their eyes finally been reopened to why they had to be protected so carefully. However, telling the story had sent Carla into a frigid lake of tears so she was practically sobbing.

"Honestly, you seven, you have ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA of how IMPORTANT it is for you to STAY SAFE!" she wailed, Justin placing a comforting wing on her back, "Your species' survival and existence depends SO MUCH on it, so you MUST be EXTREMELY CAREFUL in EVERY AREA..."

Ganymede, Gardenia, Samara, Gylfie, Comet, Aragorn and Raya just gazed at the chubby Spix macaw as she continued to weep. Then Alexandre came in, shuddering.

"That incident has taught us ALL an ULTRA-IMPORTANT lesson as well, especially Annette, Miranda, my and my sisters' brother Cinnabar, and Larimar and Quincy," said he, "and those five regret trusting Nigel even now. We have learned a lesson in not only in protecting you seven especially from fatal danger but also about being careful of who we trust."

"We honestly had no idea that Nigel still had that poisonous, corrosive hatred of exotic birds and desire for revenge boiling within him," said Estelle, before her gaze turned to Carla and the other Spix macaws present, "especially against Blu and his family and the other Spix macaws. It was clear that he intentionally lured their chicks, as well as Blu and Jewel's second brood, into going with him so that he could have those dogs maul them to death to tear their hearts into two, but thankfully, only Eddie and Luke paid the price with his life for the former and the loss of his wing for the latter but it could have been worse."

"Those five macaws' actions in taking Nigel in and nursing him back to health had caused quite a rift between them and Blu's family after that," said Charlotte, shuddering as she remembered how, in the following weeks since the incident, Blu and Jewel had fiercely told Annette, Miranda, Cinnabar, Larimar and Quincy not to approach Carla, Bia, Tiago and their families under the threat of a savage attack with Jewel even threatening to fracture their wings at one point, prompting their parents, Athos, Ruby, Levi, Lapis Lazuli, Sapphire and D'Artagnan to keep them well away from the pair of enraged macaws until they had cooled down. Though Jewel didn't mean it, Charlotte did not want their many-year friendship destroyed, especially that of D'Artagnan and Levi's families and if Jewel actually went through with that threat and injured those five, it was likely that D'Artagnan, Levi and their mates Sapphire and Lapis Lazuli would NEVER EVER forgive Jewel and that would have a devastating chain reaction. Ruby would turn against Jewel along with Athos if she had ever went through with injuring Cinnabar, and if that news had reached the red macaw tribe back in the Amazon, it was likely that the enmity the red macaws once had for the Spix macaws would reignite once again. Not to mention the bad light Jewel would end up in before her own tribe, and Eduardo and Mimi would certainly NOT want her doing a deed like that. HOWEVER, these consequences were what Levi, Lapis Lazuli, D'Artagnan and Sapphire and also Athos but also Ruby as well, wanted to avoid. As for Jewel, Zephyr, Roberto, Aurora and Brisa had given her a serious lecture on what would happen if she ever acted on that threat and Jewel eventually had to apologise to Athos and the others for threatening Annette, Miranda, Cinnabar, Larimar and Quincy like that, and since then, the macaws had moved on.

The rift between Blu's family and Annette, Miranda, Cinnabar, Larimar and Quincy at lasted for a good number of months but eventually; Blu and Jewel had forgiven the five macaws and had allowed them to hang out with Carla and company again, having come to the conclusion that everyone involved was to blame for the incident involving Nigel. These events had indeed been an EXTREMELY PAINFUL lesson for everyone and now, they were more careful with who to put their trust in. This also included Augustus and his family regarding Rutile and Ferdinand's near death with Ferdinand losing an ear and acquiring a massive chest scar that was reminiscent of the scars borne by so many of the colony flying foxes when they fought birds, and the flying fox family, along with the flying foxes now living on the Blu Bird Sanctuary had decided to never approach ANY city dog or cat except those friends with Carla and company, EVER again.

While Carla and the others closed their lecture to the five fruithawks and two owls about the Nigel incident, Diantha rushed in.

"Guys, it's NEARLY MIDNIGHT!" the toucan bellowed, dissipating the sad mood almost instantly, "Let's GET READY TO CELEBRATE!"

Carla, Bia and Tiago seized the box of matches and prepared to light the fireworks for they were more genuinely sensible with pyrotechnics unlike the fruithawks.

"Everyone FLY to our PLANNED STANDPOINT, WE'LL BE WITH YOU IN A MINUTE!" screeched Tiago as Carla struck a light on a match.

"Can I help?" asked Ganymede.

"No, Ganymede," said Bia sternly, "Remember what we've told you about matches and fireworks."

Ganymede rolled his eyes with disgruntle and complied. Within moments, those that could fly hurriedly took off or dropped into flight in the case of the flying foxes and ascended to the Christ the Redeemer statue. The second-gen offspring quickly left the dancefloor and joined their parents on the iconic statue as well. Carla, Bia and Tiago then lit the fireworks quickly and as soon as the fuses of all of them was lit, they blew out the matches, made sure that they were completely out and hastily took off to the Christ the Redeemer statue. On the ground, Broccoli, Collette, Daisy, Roxanne and Vulcan rushed off to join the other cats, dogs and Control de Plagas Squad while Orion, Velocity, their families and Spike rushed off for the Christ the Redeemer statue to watch the imminent fireworks display.

On the Christ the Redeemer statue, all the families of the main cast stood. Carla stood with her mate Justin and daughters Sonia, Melody and Spica; Bia stood with her mate Virgil and sons Sirius, Einstein and Miles; Tiago and Matilda stood with their chicks Bellatrix and Byron; and Charlotte stood with Músculo and their son Jason. Nearby, Finnick, Felix and Lavender stood with their respective mates Kira, Turquesa and Garrett and their chicks Achernar, Polaris, Diego, Cody and Lilac.

Alexandre, Poinsettia and Spinel stood with their respective mates Estelle, Wilbur and Sheldon and chicks Sol, Adenine, Guanine, Cytosine and Thymine; Betelgeuse, Antares and Rigel; Azul stood by with Brooke, Alegria and Thomas, and Petunia stood with her scarlet mate Benjamin and their hybrid chicks Altair and Aldebaran, and Chlorophyll, his military mate Ashley and hybrid chick Perdita stood near them. These macaws had angst boiling within them at the imminent fireworks display while near them, the hyacinth macaws and Phoebe and Cobalto's family sat. Indigo sat with her mate Victor (his signature coconut fruit shell cap on his head) and their daughter Sugilite while Zebedee stood with his mate Iris and their three chicks Celeste, Castor and Pollux. The Lear's and glaucous macaws stood near the hyacinth macaws. Jasmine, Finn and their chicks Vega and Regulus; Trixie, Aiden and their son Arcturus, and Tristan, Neytiri and their chicks Katniss and Canopus stood altogether while Ariel, Eric and their daughter Elsa stood with Frodo, Ellie and their son Sylvester; Spyro, Marella and their son and Bambi (who had been carried up here by the hyacinth macaws for archaeobirds could only glide), Diantha, Lillie and Gladion, Eustace, Serena, Yolanda and Vincent and Rosa, Clemont and Peach and also Milo. Lastly, Stella, Luna and Sebastian the flying foxes stood with Anabelle, Acerola and Ferdinand (whose left ear was missing and his chest bearing three streaks of scar tissue slashing through the fur), Soren, Sandalwood, Connie and Rutile and Orion, Spike, Hermione, Velocity, Riker, Hunter, Eris, and Zelda the falcons and merlins. Standing near the falcons were the five fruithawks Ganymede, Gardenia, Samara, Gylfie and Comet and two owls Aragorn and Raya. These seven were still disgruntled at being disallowed at lighting the fireworks but despite this they still looked forward to seeing the display. Then within seconds, shouts erupted.

"FIVE... FOUR... THREE... TWO... ONE... HAPPY NEW YEAR!"

And at that moment, the night sky above Rio de Janeiro erupted into a dazzling display of various fiery colours as fireworks were sent into the air, accompanied by the loud explosions as the rockets blew apart and spilled their contents. The seven fruithawks and owls watched the fireworks they wanted to light explode at a safe distance from them and the others with them.

"Well, regardless of how the fireworks could have been set off, they're still wicked and epic, anyway," Ganymede said to the other six who smiled in agreement. As the fireworks continued to explode, Carla gazed at her mate Justin, daughters Sonia, Spica and Melody, brother Tiago, sister Bia, her sister-in-law Matilda, brother-in-law Virgil and her nephews and nieces, as well as her cousin Kira and her family and everyone else present.

"Well, this year is off to a good start, gang, let's hope it's a good one," she said with a smile before resuming watching the fireworks. The crowd of animals on the Christ the Redeemer's arms and head continued to watch the display while everyone else on the ground, such as Broccoli and his friends and sisters, watched from there. The display was indeed spectacular as the New Year was welcome by the Brazilian city with literal bangs and flashes.