"Hi! Do you happen to know where the queen is?" I ask one of the birds running a stand. They give me a strange look before giving me directions to the castle. I thank them and walk back over to where Gold and Bree are waiting.
Bree holds out her hand and I take it, slightly blushing as she helps me up onto Gold's back. I tell Gold what the bird told me and she nods, taking off towards the castle. I look up and see a bunch of birds flying in the sky, somewhat in a type of formation.
"It's kinda like if we had flying cars," Bree says following my gaze. I nod and we watch the air traffic. At one point, a few birds for into a fight and all the traffic behind them stopped, most of the birds who were stopped looking angry and yelling.
"Car crash," I whisper to Bree. She giggles and I smile happily, loving that I made her laugh. We make it to the castle and Gold lays down to let us get off of her. We jump off and look up at the floating castle in the sky. Birds fly in and out of it, easily getting up there because they can fly.
"Definitely suiting for birds, but how do we get up there?" I ask Bree. We look around and she points out a floating thing that's taking some different type of animals up to the castle. We walk over to it and get on, getting stares from the other animals on the floating platform.
I feel Bree hold onto the sleeve of my shirt and I give her a reassuring smile. Gold stands beside us, giving anyone who looks at us wrong a glare. I look down as the platform starts going up and I'm in awe of how tiny all the animals on the ground look.
The platform keeps going up and I realize that the palace is way higher up than I originally thought it was. Bree seems a little shaky about being so high up in the air and I softly pay her on the shoulder. She gives me a wobbly smile and pets Gold with the hand she isn't using to hold onto the sleeve of my shirt.
The platform stops at the top and we get off, walking to the castle. There isn't a door, just a huge hole for the birds to fly in and out of as they please. We walk through the hole and into the palace. The front of it is some kind of loading and unloading place, and birds all around us are bustling around to get things done.
I walk over to a bird who looks like she's supervising the whole thing. Bree and Good follow behind me, the three of us almost immediately catching her attention. She walks the rest of the way over to us, her wings relaxed behind her back.
"We need to speak to the queen. It is an urgent matter," Gold says. The bird looks down at our bracelets in shock and then nods, motioning with her wing for us to follow her. She leads us through another open hole and into what seems like a waiting room.
She walks up to the bird at the front desk and talks to them for a minute. They nod before telling us to sit down in the chairs, while they go get someone to send the queen a message. Gold opts to curl at our feet while me and. Bree sit in the seats.
There's a good view of the outside from the window and we can see all the birds coming into and out of the palace. Bree points out some of the different types of birds that she knows, telling me about their lifestyle, well at least the lifestyle they have on Earth.
The receptionist walks back in and nods to us before sitting back down in their chair. They press a wing to a podium on their desk and start doing work on it, seemingly typing with their brain. They don't have to say a word the whole time, the hologram just seems to know what they need from it.
"It's like what would have happened if animals in the Earth evolved like we did," Bree mumbles. I nod and keep watching the hologram in awe for a while before I start to get bored again. I get up from my chair, carefully stepping over Gold, and walk over to the window.
A bird carrying a particularly large package comes in, knocking over another bird standing on the ground. I laugh quietly and Bree looks over at me confused. I wave her over and she walks over to where I'm standing by the window and looks out.
Another bird runs into someone on the ground and we both laugh. We talk about all the collisions that happen, at least one a minute happening. There isn't anyone guiding the birds in or telling them where to land, which is probably part of the problem.
"They really need a better system down there," I say to Bree. She nods and we keep watching as birds fly into each other, knocking other birds, or packages down. I hear the receptionist gasp and we turn around to see them staring at their hologram in shock.
"The queen requests to meet with you now," they say somewhat shakily. They get up from where they're sitting and we follow them out of the room to talk to the queen. I make a mental note as we walk to mention making a system for the birds coming in and out of the castle with packages.