#cortez.

well, he’s glad  somebody  finds it fucking  funny.

for his part, he’s less than amused.  her sharp little beak’s knicked his ears all to hell and back and he’s bleeding from the lobe of the left one  --  he regrets ever teaching this brat to  laugh.  cousin’s influence ain’t made her any better behaved, neither;  if anything, he’s made her about twenty times  worse.

...  and still, cortez is given the majority of his forgiveness.  one massive index finger is offered as a taxi, and he buses her up onto the brim of his hat, from there, which  --  despite her weight  --  stays miraculously in place.  it’s  murdoc  he punishes, jabbing the steel toe of his boot into murdoc’s shin the second muds cracks a smile.

first it was grendel’s earrings  –  the bottommost one of which cortez had so graciously decided to  rip directly out of his lobe,  a couple days prior  –  and then it was his ratty old socks    ( only the left ones! ),    his wallet, the useless stash of dimes and nickels in the bottom of his wallet  …  that naughty bird’s robbing him  blind!  but after all the grief she’s given him  –  you still don’t fuck with the chains, man.  WHY  would you fuck with the chains!?

her fat, over-fed little body is promptly  SNATCHED  in one big, calloused hand, and gren holds her up to eye-level, peering down into that beady black soul.    ( he’s never mean, loves her too damn much to be mean  –  but he’s firm, firm enough to keep her fixed in place. )    the chain is still in her mouth, and she beats her wings only once in protest before going limp in grendel’s grasp  –  a tactic murdoc taught her, no doubt.  play dead.  gren doesn’t buy it;  he can hear the easy beating of her heart.

   “ yer too  smart  for your own damn    good, bird. ”     his lips twist up into    a pout.    “ i don’t have the dough t-     -   YYYYEEEEE-OOOOWWW !!!! ”