The Aftermath ✔

34 EATING FEELINGS ... AND ENEMIES

"Are you sure you're not going?" Eli asked, crouching down under the table. No one was there. "Come on. It's important. We'd all want you there." It was a sizeable greenhouse and he didn't relish the thought of having to check under each and every damn table.

But when he reached another, he ducked down.

Nothing.

He came this far. Going back empty handed wasn't a real option.

Something scurried away and he hurried to intercept it. Being half naked for over a month, he appreciated his new suit and didn't want to sully it.

Even so, he knelt at yet another table. That's when he saw it, the large bird, the size of a chicken, with the human head. It cocked its head to the right and opened its beak.

"Oh, shit," Eli protested.

Two hands snatched it up. "Gotcha." Manny held the infant up and preened. "Did you think I would not find you, little one? I've got you."

The creature smiled and Manny did as well. He threw her up and then caught her, her brown wings flapping in both the rise and fall.

Five feathers waved on the creature's head when Manny put her on a wooden shelf and held out his hands for her to fly into them.

"Come on. Come here. Come on," he entreated.

He was almost playful.

The harpy scampered out then ducked back.

"Aww. Come on," Manny coaxed. "You've gotta fly some time. I got some more seeds. Look."

When he chewed one then offered it to the shadow, Eli approached with caution.

A beak snapped the morsel up, nicking Manny with it.

"Ow. Shit." He would have kept on whining if something didn't hop forward then back again. "Aw. Come back for more, have you?"

Eli narrowed his brow. This was unreal.

By the time three more fingers suffered the same fate, Manny acknowledged him.

"Look at this," Manny insisted. "Look at this baby. It is perfectly hideous. Look. And I adore her!" Once he put the mush into the palm of his hand, he didn't move.

The first thing Eli saw were the big eyes. They were disproportionate to the bird beak. Because while the rest of the creatures face looked fowl, those eyes were...human. As were the ears. It resembled something concocted in a madman's lab.

The bird body was the bit that had him gagging. It had no hands, only wings and it hopped onto Manny's palm and ate.

His fingers snapped shut. "Gotcha."

The thing made a pitiful chirping cry as it was picked up.

"Now, don't you go running off until we can get you airborne." Manny flopped down by the bag of seeds and went about chewing some more. But when he offered it, the thing simply cried.

"Ah. Come on. If I let you go, you are going to run away again."

The baby harpy stopped crying suddenly and instead stared him down.

Manny raised his right eyebrow then scowled. "Ah, crud." A minute later, a white liquid ran down his forearm. He sighed.

"Is that a normal baby reaction?" Manny asked Eli. "She just looks you in the eye when she craps all over you. Like...right in the eye like some mafia boss.

"Sir..." Eli began.

"Give me a second. She starts crying if she's not kept clean. I was gonna use this bucket and make it into a birdbath but the poor thing cannot swim yet. All the rest of her feathers just grew in yesterday. Isn't she sweet?"