Sophia's eyes slid open, and the moment they did, she felt a surge of terror. The last thing she remembered was slashing at a Hyacinth's neck with the human object - and then everything had blacked out. Sophia slowly sat up, from where she had been lying on her side. She groaned, touching her head. My head… she frowned, feeling her neck, and the back of her head, where the source of the pain was. They felt damp. As she pulled her wing away to examine it, it came away streaked with red. The reality of where she was hit her - on a cold stone floor, surrounded by stone walls. Outside, she could hear the faint echo was rushing water, and the murmur of bird squawks. She knew exactly where she was. Have to get out of here. Have to get out. Sophia sprang to her feet, rushing for the hole in the wall - it lead to a dark stone corridor, by looks of it. What she would do next, she hadn't a clue, but she had to get out. Sophia had run about foot before something snagged on her ankle. With the momentum, she couldn't stop herself - she smacked face-first into the stone floor. Briefly stunned by the fall, it took a few moments for Sophia to realize that there was something tied to her ankle, restricting her movement. Rolling over, Sophia lifted her foot, only to see a glaringly bright, orange tether tied around her leg. It was just over two foot long, and it ran to the wall, where it was tied down with a complicated mass of knots. She blinked; how many knots was that? Whoever had tied it had made sure she couldn't break free, and when she tried to bite through the tether, it barely had an effect.

"What… is this?" she stammered to herself, but then, from the shadows, she heard a sound that made her blood run cold. Cruel, mocking laughter, from not just one, but a few - the coldest laugh she knew by heart. Kerja. Despite her fear, Sophia only had one thought - she didn't care about her safety, she cared about Bromeliad. She hadn't seen whether Bromeliad had fled or not."My daughter." Sophia said, slowly. "What have you done to my daughter?"

"You don't need to know that." replied a voice - without doubt, it was Kerja who spoke. Terrified of the voice, Sophia leapt to her feet, pressing herself against the wall - but she only heard footsteps, growing louder as they came closer to her. "Now, Sophia. We can do this the easy way, or the hard way. You have option A and option B. Option A is tell us what we want to know without a fuss. And Option B -" Kerja paused dramatically. "Well, let's just say you'll regret picking that option. So, what'll it be? A, or B?" Sophia had to say something. But there was no way she was picking either option.

"Stay away from me…" Sophia hissed, as Kerja's face loomed in her vision. Kerja looked into the shadows, where her companions were - they were muttering things Sophia couldn't hear. Then Kerja turned back to her.

"Option B it is." She snarled.

Meanwhile

As dawn approached, it became clear that the heavy rain had no intent of stopping. Halfway through the night, the dark grey clouds had finally started shedding raindrops, but three to four hours later, it was still going strong, the dark shade of the cloud almost unchanged. The growling of thunder occurred rather frequently, and lightning had illuminated the sky more than twice. Bia and Orchid were sheltered under a tree stump, staring out in dismay. "Of all the days." Orchid grumbled. "Of all the days to start crying, the sky chose today." Bia looked sideways at Orchid.

"What a weird phrase." Bia commented, out of the blue. A smile crept to Orchid's beak at Bia's comment.

"Mom says it whenever it rains… her grandmother used to say it. Anyway, what are we going to do? Flying's hard in rain…" that was true. While feathers were usually oily and repelled water, flying through rain wasn't exactly a piece of mango - and it was certainly unpleasant. Should they stay sheltered, use this precious daylight to look for their missing friends? It took Bia some thinking.

"The longer we wait, the further apart we'll probably get." Bia sighed. "Okay, let's put ourselves in their shoes -"

"Shoes?" Orchid gave her a funny look. "We don't wear shoes - we're birds. Besides, if we did, we don't have their shoes on us -"

"It's just an expression, Orchid." Bia giggled, before she let out a burst of full-on laughter, despite the situation they were in. That was one of the reasons why she liked Orchid - she was so funny without intending it. It made her so likeable, with her clumsy and mischievous personality. Orchid looked briefly puzzled, before the white skin around her beak and eyes flushed pink with embarrassment.

"Oh, sorry, I'm no good with metaphors." Orchid gave her a helpless shrug, looking a bit embarrassed and annoyed at the same time as Bia continued to laugh. "Anyway - you were saying?" Once Bia had stopped laughing, she turned back to Orchid, unable to wipe the grin from her face.

"Alright. Let's put ourselves in their shoes for a moment - not literally - what do you think they're doing in this situation?"

"Freaking out?" Orchid suggested.

"Other than that?" Bia prompted.

"I'd say they're out looking for us, despite the rain." Orchid shrugged again. She looked at Bia for several moments, before she sighed. "Joy. We're going into the rain, aren't we?"

"You got it." Bia nodded, feeling amused at the look of dismay on Orchid's face. "Look, it's getting lighter for the moment - let's use this to look for them."

"But it's raining!" Orchid complained, pointing outside. "What if we do find them, and Tiago sees my ruined head feather style?" Orchid pointed at her head and cheek feathers, which were half-flattened from how she had slept. "Looking like this? How humiliating!"

"Trust me, Orchid, he won't care. He'll just be happy to see you safe and well, you know." Bia assured her, picking up the sack filled with their supplies, putting it over her shoulder and under her opposite wing, so she didn't have to hold it. "Let's just get this over with, and besides, don't you want to see them again?" She reached into the bag, extracting her sketchbook, opening it to Orchid, showing her the drawings of Azure, Carla, Bruno and Tiago. She saw the longing look in Orchid's eyes as she looked at the drawings of their companions - she knew it made sense. Her gaze lingered on Tiago and Azure, before she finally nodded. With that, Bia slid her book back into the bag, and they headed off into the drizzle.

Later

"This is hopeless!" Carla complained loudly, from where she was scanning the forest floor from a branch. Their plan was to go from tree-to-tree, calling and searching at the same time, but their efforts had no success. "Five hours, and nothing." Giving up, she sat down heavily, crossing her wings in frustration. This was so frustrating, and they were getting no closer to finding her sister and friend. They'd been searching for several hours, but they hadn't seen as much as a flash of blue feathers. It was still raining, to make things more depressing, but at least it wasn't as heavy as it had been at dawn. The clouds were still dark, however, guaranteeing more rain. She and Bruno were looking from this tree, while Azure and Tiago were scanning from an adjacent one.

"Don't be so negative!" Bruno insisted, dropping down onto her branch. He had been trying to convince Carla that they'd get somewhere eventually, but she never changed her mind. When Carla's expression didn't change at what he said, he gave her a reassuring smile. "We'll find them, just you wait and see."

"But I'm so worried…" Carla hung her head, eyes dull. Bruno sighed, before he leaned forward, giving her a small kiss on the temple.

"Just keep going." He encouraged, before flying back up to his branch. Carla blinked, her temple feeling warmed from Bruno's gesture. Suddenly, she felt less hopeless. Feeling a fresh wave of positivity, Carla fluffed up her feathers, fixing her eyes on the forest floor to look harder. In the next tree, Azure and Tiago were calling Bia and Orchid's names, while scaling the tree. However, Tiago kept giving Azure quizzical looks.

"Hey man, you feeling okay?" he asked. Azure had seemed a bit nervous since they had woken - he kept looking around, looking anxious, while jumping at every twig that snapped, and every animal call that rang out. His feathers seemed more fluffed up than usual, and he was rather fidgety.

"Me?" Azure jumped, surprised at Tiago's voice.

"Yeah, you. You seem a bit nervous today." Tiago tipped his head to the side. "Worrying about Bia and Orchid?" he guessed.

"Partially…" Azure replied. He kept looking around. Should he share his concerns? "Um… do you feel as if… you're being - I don't know -" Azure looked at Tiago. "Followed? Or watched?" Tiago looked puzzled, a frown crossing his features.

"Uh… not really? What do you mean, watched?" before Azure could reply, however, Tiago's eyes flickered upwards. "Hold up. I think I just saw something move…" eyes fixed on whatever was above them, Tiago quickly vanished into the branches above. Azure shook his head, before following him. When Azure eventually caught up to the older teenager, he found him in the higher branches, around the tree trunk, facing a wall - a wall of woven twigs and sticks. Immediately, Azure was very confused -and uneasy.

"What on earth is this?" Azure asked, looking at Tiago for help, who was frowning. The wall was constructed from small twigs and sticks, with leaves and feathers - grey feathers. Whatever it was, Azure didn't like it at all. It reminded him of something, but he couldn't pin it down. Finally, he had an idea. A huge nest. Nest? Azure's head snapped up, as a few twigs came raining down on his head. Tiago's talons were sinking into the wall, and he was climbing upwards. Within moments, Tiago had clambered over the edge, and out of sight. "Tiago, get back here!" he called, before hooking his claws into the twig wall, picking his way upwards, until he reached the top. Tiago was standing in the middle, looking around in curiosity. The construction inside was a dip, with the walls looming on the edges. More grey feathers littered the twig ground, but Azure couldn't recall any flight-able bird with grey feathers. He had a vague memory of Roberto telling him and Isaac about the birds of the rainforest, but he couldn't remember much from that lesson. It had been so long ago, when he and Isaac were very young. On the right side, there were fragments of thin, white shards and pieces - they reminded Azure of Orchid's eggshell, when she had hatched. Eggshell. They were in a nest. Of course! Why hadn't he figured it before? Tiago then paused, picking something up, before turning around to Azure.

"What's this?" he asked, holding it up. It was white, and a rough oval shape, with multiple holes and hollows - around the size of a rat's head. Multiple cracks showed that it was a bit old, and it was brutally crushed, as though something had bitten down on it hard. As Azure looked at it, he noticed two holes in the front - and tiny pieces of shard-like material sticking out of a hole near the bottom of it. They resembled eye sockets, and teeth… Azure stiffened, thinking of how he had associated the size of it with a rat's head. Tiago then frowned at the object in his talons, faint recognition lighting in his eyes. Then he dropped the object, with a sickened expression. A rat's skull. As Azure looked around Tiago, he noticed an array of other white objects - more like white sticks. Some smaller, and others much, much larger. Tiago was surrounded by bones, and it looked as though he had realized it, because he now looked afraid to touch anything around him.

"We should go - " Azure began, but then he felt something land behind him - something with large wings. Tiago's head snapped up, and then he froze.

"Azure." He said, quietly. "Make… no sudden movements." Azure stared back at Tiago, before he heard it - ragged breath behind him, coming from large, powerful lungs. His blood turned to icy water, and suddenly, he was afraid to breathe, or make the smallest of movements. Azure then caught sight of Carla, in the next tree. As she looked at Azure, seeing whatever was behind him, she let out a shrill, terrified shriek. Bruno shot out of some nearby leaves, obviously to see what she was screaming at - then he saw Azure. Bruno gasped, seeing whatever it was, before he slammed a wing over Carla's beak, to smother her scream. Too late. An ear-splitting screech erupted from behind him - not macaw, but something macaws feared. It was something Azure's parents had warned him about, and now he remembered the owners of the grey feathers. As he whirled around to look, claws sank into his back, yanking him away. At first, he panicked, but as he spun round, he found himself facing Tiago. Tiago's brown eyes were filled with terror, a look Azure had rarely seen on him. Then Azure was being shoved from the nest.

"Fly!" Tiago shrieked.