Chapter 12

Three Weeks Later...

Lilian watched over the crowd, since she was left in charge by Zeel. He decided not to come because of some unknown business that he had to attend to. Everyone else in the tree was leaving for the city of Rio de Janeiro for the event known as Carnival. Everyone was excited. Everyone but Caitlin. In the past three weeks, she had grown feathers and her eyes had fully developed. She had one brown eye and one green. Her wings were green and a bit yellow. like her fathers, and the rest of her body was blue, like her mothers. She had yellow around her green eye, and blue around her beak and other eye. She had shown signs that she had powers, but they were still sure that she did. Since she could not fly yet, she held onto her father's back as they boarded the underground trams. They sat in the rear of the tram with Jewel and Bia. Tiago had went with Mauro's group,made up of himself and other teleporters, who had volunteered to teleport whoever they could, since the tram couldn't fit everyone. Some of the Spix macaw tribe was coming as well, which was the reason of the trams being so full. Carla had gone to the front of the train to spend time with her boyfriend and his family. Cody saw Boah also enter the car, having a weird look as he passed Jewel and Bia. He looked scared. I wonder why he is so scared of them. He's been like this for the past two weeks. What happened between them? He stopped thinking about it when he felt something tugging on his wing. He looked down to his wing to see Caitlin tugging it. "Yes, what is it?" he asked with a tired voice. All the preparing had exhausted him, but she was very hyper. He knew a question was incoming. And he was right. "What is this thing we are going to, Papa?" He forget that he hadn't explained to her what was happening. "Well, Carnival is a big parade in the city called Rio. The humans who live there make stages that they drive down a large road, which lots of other people watch. Then, the people on the stages perform." She still looked a bit confused. "But what does that have to do with birds?" He prepared to explain more. "As you know, birds are very common in Rio, with many types flying around. We celebrate Carnival by dancing and performing, mostly at the base of the big statue." Then she asked another question. "What's the satue look like?" This is going to be a long trip. He continued to answer as the tram started to move.

Jewel sat quietly, with Bia laying in her lap, sleeping peacefully. She, however, was not having a peaceful dream.

Jewel's Dream

She woke on a large cliff overlooking Rio. It was peaceful and sunny, like always. She watched it, wishing Blu was there. But then, a large flash happened in the middle of Rio. It forced her to close her eyes. When she opened them, she saw fire all over. Only the lower half of the statue was left standing. The forest was either burning or dead. She could hear screams and explosions. She heard someone behind her, and turned to face them. It was the cloaked bird. "What is this?" It stayed silent physically, but she heard a voice in her head. "The future is near. Soon, this wil be the present." She shook her head in disbelief. "No. It can't."

"But it will. It is too late. It has already begun. Our only chance was the past, but the past is too far. The world will burn, and extinction will commence." In a rage, she knocked the bird over, revealing nothing but a blue feather in the cloak. Before she could recognize it, she heard an explosion, then a blast that destroyed everyting. It was over in an instant.

End Of Jewel's Dream

She jerked her head up in fright. She quickly calmed down, since she was used to the nightmares. She saw Bia was still sleeping, and so was Cody, Caitlin and Boah. But Boah seemed to be having a nightmare. He seemed to be struggling, and mumbling something. She couldn't understand what he was saying, but she knew it was bad. She lifted Bia off of her softly to go to wake him. She shook him lightly, which resulted in him almost freezing her. He stopped himself when he saw who it was. "Oh. Sorry Jewel. Just a bit restless. Bad dream. And no, I don't want to talk about it. But thanks for waking me. I never want to be tormented like that again." She patted his head lightly then went back to Bia, who was still sleeping peacefully. She placed Bia's head on her lap once more and looked around. She then grabbed the piece of singed cloak, wondering who it was. Who are you?" she said to herself in a whisper. Only time would tell.

Cody woke to the sudden stop of the tram. He managed to hold on, but Caitlin didn't. He felt her fly off, and waited to hear the thud. But he heard nothing. He opened his eyes to see Jewel leaning forward next to him, holding a bundle of feathers above the ground. The bundle was Caitlin. She lifted her from above the ground and set her on his lap. "Next time, please be more careful." He let out a relieved sigh to see she was unharmed. He stroked her head as she whimpered from her fall. "Thank you." Jewel started to go back to Bia to wake her. "Anytime for a friend. Besides, you'd do the same." He agreed. He would do the same for any of her children.

After the birds exited the underground tunnels beneath the statue, they went into groups to go to practice their performance, see family and friends or just see the sites. Cody and his family left to visit his human carer, who had come to visit, Jewel and her family went to join them to visit Linda, Blu's human carer and Logan and Boah went to visit Nico and Pedro's club. The groups split up as the cloaked figure followed Jewel's group.

Jewel was flying alongside Lilian, talking about stuff until Eduardo, Jewel's father butted in. "So, we're about to see Blu's life, right?" Jewel felt sad at the mention of his name, so didn't answer. "Sorry. I didn't mean to say his name. I know how sad it was to lose him. It hit us all hard. It's like your mother all over again."

"No it's not. Mother didn't always feel left out. Mother didn't have a brother who wanted him dead. Everyone loved mother. But I was the only one who loved Blu, along with his children. When he first arrived, you tried to get rid of him. You made him feel left out. In fact, you must feel glad he's gone. Remember when Roberto tried to get a move on me. I was there when you told him to. I couldn't believe you, so I didn't talk about it. But you had gone too far. You tried to use Roberto to make me happy, even though I already was. You just wanted a strong leader. Well Blu was strong, and smart. Did you forget what he did? So stop thinking about your needs, and think of others." She gathered her children and took off, leaving Eduardo, Mimi and Roberto behind. He felt a part of him die. From the shock he had received, he fainted as his heart felt about to explode.

When they landed, Lilian went straight to Jewel. "Are you alright?" She received a piercing glare from her angered friend. "What do you think. I just exploded in front of my dad. I never have before, but he went too far. I never want to see him again." Lilian saw she needed to be alone, and ushered the kids inside. Only Bia could see her true emotions. And she knew she had past the breaking point.

Caitlin and Linda were talking when they heard a knock at the door. "Tulio, can you get that?" They heard someone running down the stairs. They continued talking till they heard Tulio call out to them. "Linda! Guess who came by to say hello." Linda and Caitlin went into the front area of the library to see Tulio with birds on him. Linda instantly recognised one of them. "Jewel?" Jewel flew to Linda and perched herself on her arm. "Yep. It's me, Jewel." Thanks to the translators they ewer given, the humans could understand the birds as if they spoke the same language. "How have you and the family been, Jewel?" Jewel looked back to her kids, who were playing with Fernando. "They've been fine. I just wish he was here to see it all. I miss him so much." They both felt tears in their eyes. Remembering the day he died. And remembering the days he lived. Linda heard the oven had finished cooking and quickly left, Jewel still perched onto her arm.

When Lilian first saw the human who let them in, she was quite surprised. Oh no. It's the bird man. She rolled her eyes at his squawking, even though he could just speak normally. She walked past and saw two females walk in. One she knew as Linda, who Jewel went to, but the other was someone new. Cody noticed she looked curious, and flew straight to the new human. "Hey Caity. How has my gal been lately?" Even though they were two entirely different species, Lilian felt a tinge of jealousy. She went to greet herself to the human, who was known as Caitlin. "I've been fine, mate. So, this must be your new gal, huh? That means you can't call me gal no more, but something else, or she might a bit jelly." Lilian felt herself fuming inside, but kept a happy face. "Hello, I'm Lilian, Cody's wife and mate. You must be Caitlin." She shook Caitlin's hand with her talon, trying to resist the urge to claw it. Then Cody went over to hi daughter. "And this, Caitlin, is Caitlin. Say hi to her, honey." Caitlin gave off a shy wave to her human counterpart. "You named your daughter after me? How sweet. Anymore more, or is she an only chick?" No more came out from behind anything, so she guessed that she was the only one. "Well then, now I konw that you must not be busy, or you do alot, but with-"

"That's enough now. We don't want to go into details. Let's just say a few times and leave it at that." Caitlin hugged Cody tightly, almost strangling him. "My little baby is all grown up. I'm so happy for you!" She then heard a voice that sounded like Cody, but older. "Do you mind not strangling our son? We would rather him alive." She looked down to see two other Military macaws. The other one, a female spoke up when they were noticed. "We are Cody's parents. I am Lisa, and this is Max. And we thank you for looking after our son when we lost him. We are most grateful." Max murmured something, resulting in a stomp on his talon by his wife. She asked him politely to spend time with his grandaughter, and he obeyed, walking away in a grumpy mood. "Sorry about him. He's just a grumpy old bird."

"I hope I don't end up like him. I would never live with myself being that grumpy."Cody complained. He then received a reassuring scratch under his neck from Caitlin. "You'll be fine. I'm pretty sure I raised you better than that, no offense to him, of course." They heard Max call out, as if he heard everything. "Offense taken. I am not grumpy and I was raised fine." Lisa shook her head at him. "His parents were always so strict. He had to ask them for about a month to be with me. He even had to get a lecture everytime before he went outside. I would have to wait half an hour for him. I think it's just him turning into them. Me, on the other hand, am more free willed, and give children a multi-sided choice, instead the one-sided ones he was given. I tell you, he's going to be sleeping by himself if he continues like this." She spent more time with Caitlin while Cody went to Lilian. "Hey Lil, I know that look. Blu had it a lot when I was around the ladies. Caitlin always said I was quite the love bird. But I just toyed with their emotions, like they did to others. Just call it a taste of their own vitamins. Man, I hate them. So as I was saying, are you jealous from me and Caitlin?" Lilian immediately began acting strange, which answered his question. "What? Me, jealous? Yeah, you wish." Cody gave her an unconvinced look. "Sure, Miss Green Eye. And when I say green, I mean Jealousy. And it's actually quite funny since you actually have green eyes." She was about to argue before he started sniffing the air. "Oh, I know that smell. Yep, Linda's best dish for birds, or at least for this country. Smells like...mangoes soup with brazil nuts and a side salad. Smells good. Let's go eat. The trip here has made me hungry." Lilian sighed and left with him to eat dinner.