Flew The Coop

Xenia seemed shocked at the mess in front of her. She returned to Dahlias farm to check up on the seed she had planted a while ago and found Dahlia sitting in front of the coop. Head in hands until she looked over and noticed Xenia approach. Good lord, looks like it’s time for another favor.

“Xenia! I’m so happy to see you back! I could use some help, my clucklings managed to get out and I can’t find them. Some might be too far from the farm for me to find.. Do you mind?” Dahlia seemed tired, from what Xenia could tell. Looked like she could use the week off.

Still, it didn’t make her any less upset. She felt like she was doing more favors for Dahlia than she was doing anything else. If not actually doing the favor she was spending time recovering from whatever side effect she got from helping. Be it sickness, becoming dirtier than a dog in a swamp, or otherwise.

“Are you sure you’re, like, at all competent to run this farm!? Hire a farm hand, I beg you!” Xenia cried out at Dahlia’s timid request to help find the missing Clucklings. This time, she had somehow let her clucklings escape from their coop. How one managed this, Xenia didn’t know but she was now being roped into helping catch the lot of them.

“It’s just been a busy month, it’s not usually this chaotic!” Dahlia didn’t exactly seem happy with her choice of help, it took Xenia a week to recover from the last bout of help she did. She didn’t know how much more complaints and requests she could take if the other got hurt or sick again from this. “I can make it worth your while again, I’m not making you do this stuff for absolutely nothing!”

“Fine, fine! Whatever. You owe me.” Xenia crossed her arms and jogged off before Dahlia could get in another word. Time to go find some clucklings.

First question to answer, how does one find a missing cluckling? Currently found answer is to just bother everyone you pass by and wander around aimlessly. Clearly, two very effective methods. Maybe she should have asked Thorn who basically made a name of herself for being a creature tracker rather than trying to solve this issue by trial and error. She was never the smartest arborling out there though, can’t expect too much.

It took maybe two hour but finally, finally Xenia found tracks in the dirt that matched a cluckling, or at least she thought they matched a cluckling. She wasn’t an expert of anything. Now it was simply time to follow them and then grab the cluckling. Easy as pie. Clearly nothing can go wrong with this plan, nothing at all. 

Twenty minutes of just following tracks until Xenia found the actual cluckling. Then another ten minutes of Xenia trying to catch the cluckling with her bare hands, failing miserably as the cluckling flapped and jumped around, out of her reach every time. There was a few falls here and there, and she didn’t catch the cluckling or even come close to even grabbing a single feather. Clearly, the cluckling out matched her.

Time for plan B then. To try and be more sneaky, hiding behind things and moving slowly to not alert the bird.

First, she tried to hide behind a bush and jump out to catch the cluckling. This failed pretty quickly since bushes tended to make noises when they moved and it caused the cluckling to run off again. 

Second, she tried a tree. This one actually worked pretty effectively, no noise and it was big enough to hide Xenias entire body. Good! Step one complete, cluckling is in her arms and flailing a bit. Made it hard to hold.

There was a few escapes from the cluckling, and it became apparent that carrying the cluckling around with her bare hands wasn’t going to get them anywhere. Time for some creativity.

Gathering some sticks and leaves, she made a makeshift cage. It wasn’t the most sturdy thing given it was made entirely of scrap that Xenia had found but it would hold the cluckling until she was able to make it back to Dahlias farm. Or so she had hoped.

Another round of ring-around-the-rosie with the cluckling and a tree, she managed to securely capture the cluckling in the makeshift twig cage. It seemed a lot calmer once it wasn’t being manhandled by a screeching arborling.

The travel back was a bit of a hit or miss situation. There was a few times Xenia let the cage get a bit too messy and the cluckling hobbled out but she was able to remake it and catch the cluckling again. Though, what should have been a three hour walk turned into a five hour nightmare. It was dark by the time she got back.

“I do hope you found the rest of them because I’m not about to go out there when the woods is as dark as a cave out back! I don’t want to get lost trying to fix more of your problems!” Xenia loudly announced as she put the cluckling back in its rightful place, the coop. It didn’t take long for Dahlia to run out from behind the house with what appeared to be the last cluckling missing. Joy. If nothing else that confirms that she’s done for the night and can let go of any of that remaining tension in her bones.

“No worries, the rest were close! You managed to get the one that was farthest away.” Dahlia seemed tired, it made Xenia a bit softer. Only a little bit, she didn’t have a lot left in her to fight anyways, too tired herself.

“Good! Time for sleep then!” Xenia started to march off until Dahlia grabbed her arm and dragged her back, a sleepy smile on her face.

“Not yet. Have to feed them. You mind helping me at all?” It took all of Xenia’s willpower not to scream as she groaned and moaned but followed Dahlia to where the food was kept. At least she would be able to sleep the moment she reached a comfortable bed.