[PRP] Hijinks ensue (Arco Iris, Silvo, and Helios)

[Revolutionary Roniel]

Together they lounged on the bank of the river. It was a beautiful sandy bank on a beautiful sunny day. Silvo sprawled flat on his belly the way only an alligator could. His entire immense length was splayed out on the sand and even Helios had to admit that it was an inspiring sight. Arco Iris perched atop the crest of Silvo's majestic sail. His eyes were shut and it was pretty clear that he was dozing off. Actually, it was pretty clear that everyone was dozing off except for Helios. Helios let out an exaggerated sigh. That was the way it usually worked.

He cared about his two mates but had to admit, they were a little flaky from time to time. He had thought that they had all gone down to the river to spend time together. Napping didn't count as spending time. He could have napped just as well here on his own, and so could they. Grumpy, he stared into the gently undulating water of the river. He had half a mind to drop a rock on Silvo's head and wake them both up. He was right about to start looking for one when something caught his eye, movement in the river.

"Wait, Silvo? What's that?" he asked sharply, fluttering backwards away from the water's edge.  

[Revolutionary Roniel]

Silvo's eyes slid open with an aggravated rumble. It was just like Helios to cause a scene when they were having a nice moment. For all that Helios complained about Arco Iris having a dramatic personality, Silvo personally found Arco to be the more sensible of the two.

"What?" he mumbled, still not quite awake.  

[Revolutionary Roniel]

"I saw something!" snapped Helios. Silvo wasn't even taking him seriously! And Arco was still asleep. This was all just wonderful. "There is definitely something in the water, and as the less edible between the two of us, I think you should check it out!"

Silvo had the resplendent mass of a fully grown alligator. Helios was about the size of a runty crow. A gorgeous, gold-feathered, and glittering runty crow, but a runty crow all the same.

"It was black and red," he muttered, craning his neck higher to peer into the water. "I know it was right-"

"There it is!" squawked Arco Iris in alarm, having been not so asleep as his companions had expected.  

[Revolutionary Roniel]

Dracorex lunged from the water, spines snapping open as soon as his foot touched dry sand. "You!" he snarled, glaring straight at Helios' shocked face. "It was you, wasn't it? Don't you dare even try flying away now that I've got you!"  

[Revolutionary Roniel]

"What?" asked Arco Iris, clearly lost.

"What did you do?" snapped Silvo, joining the lizard in glaring at Helios.

"What the heck?" asked Helios, feathers puffing up in indignation. "I've never seen you in my life! What the heck are you even talking about?" He was going to have Words with Silvo later. If a raccoon popped out of a tree and started accusing Silvo, Helios wouldn't take the raccoon's side. He spoke the truth. He had no idea who the weird spiky lizard was and definitely didn't know why it was accosting him.  

[Revolutionary Roniel]

"You stole it from me!" Dracorex was incensed. His fury was just as hot as his colors and now it was unleashed. "You took my most precious possession and you know it! What do you say to that, eh?" He slapped his tail into the sand with each sentence. He hoped he'd soon be able to be slapping the damn bird instead.  

[Revolutionary Roniel]

"Really?" Arco shook his head, thoroughly disappointed. "Helios, I thought you were through this? You told us you hadn't stolen anything in months." That was too bad. Helios had been doing so well lately. Arco hated to think that he had fallen back into old ways.

"We're terribly sorry," rumbled Silvo. "If you tell us what it is, we'll get it back to you as soon as we can." So Helios had gone back to pilfering things. Silvo just hoped he still knew where the item was.

Wounded now as well as angry, Helios glared at his two mates. "You're siding with him instead of me? I didn't take anything! What does he even think I took, huh?" He focused back on the lizard, wishing he was big enough to toss the slandering reptile back into the water it had crawled from.  

[Revolutionary Roniel]

"You remember it, I know you do!" growled Dracorex. "I saw you take it! It was red, the deepest most wonderful red you ever saw." He felt a jab of pain thinking about how beautiful it had been and all the work he had poured into it. All that work, only to have it stolen by some twerp of a freaky tooth bird.  

[Revolutionary Roniel]

"Red?" echoed Arco in a confused chirp.

Red. And then Helios remembered. His face darkened with shame, thankfully invisible beneath his feathers. "I..." he stammered, suddenly at a loss for words. "I didn't know it belonged to anyone. I thought I'd..." He winced, cutting himself off before he looked like even more of a jerk. "I'm sorry. I'll go get it for you."

He looked apologetically at Silvo and Arco Iris, both looking at him with a mixture of disappointment and confusion. "I'll be back in a minute." And then he flew off.  

[Revolutionary Roniel]

It seemed to good to be true. Dracorex hadn't really expected to have it returned, he was just upset enough to want to confront the thief anyways. They all waited with painful suspense until the sound of flapping once more approached. Now the golden bird carried something between his dainty claws, a single stem with a single red rose on the end, perfect in its beauty. Dracorex had grown the rose bush from seed and this was the first year it had bloomed, a single perfect rose the result of his years of effort.  

[Revolutionary Roniel]

Guilty, Helios put the rose down on the sand between him and the lizard. "I really am sorry," he said. "I didn't know the bush belonged to someone but..." He winced again. "I guess I should have known better." It had been too good to be true, a perfect rose in a perfect weedless patch. Of course it had been gardened. Now he just felt like an idiot.

"A red rose," breathed Arco Iris, blinking between the flower and Helios' downtrodden form. "I..." Suddenly it all made sense. Arco felt a swell of emotion within his chest. "Red's my favorite color," he muttered, barely louder than a whisper.

"Red's my favorite color!" he said again, louder. "He got it for me, right?" He smiled at Helios, truly touched. "Thank you. It's beautiful."

Now even more embarrassed, Helios scuffed at the ground with a foot. "Yeah... well, you weren't feeling so great this morning, so I wanted to get you something. Surprise! That was a mistake." He gave a half-hearted smile and flared his wings. Arco smiled and laughed. Warmth suffused Helios. That smile was all he had wanted from this whole misadventure.  

[Revolutionary Roniel]

Dracorex scowled. Now he felt like he was the jerk here! He slid his hand over the stem of the rose, looking at its perfect form one last time...

"Just take it," said Silvo, adding himself back into the conversation. "Helios is good at finding things. These days, they mostly don't even belong to other people." This was said with warmth, not condemnation. Arco Iris had been down lately. This was the most cheerful Silvo had seen him in days.

"All right," said Dracorex gruffly, but secretly relieved. He took the rose gently in his mouth. He had hoped to let it live and wither on the bush, but he supposed this was fine too. Now he could put it in that vase he had. Maybe he could even find a trader with a new vase to put it in!

"Don't do it again," he grumbled, though his words were hardly coherent past the flower in his mouth. With that, he was gone. He swam more carefully this time, head and rose always kept above the water.  

[Revolutionary Roniel]

"Thank you," said Arco Iris once the lizard had left. "No one has ever stolen a flower for me." He chuckled again, fluttering down from atop Silvo's sail to settle into the sand beside Helios instead.

"So that lizard grows roses?" mused Silvo. "Maybe we should do that. Could start our own little rose business, right?" His eyes twinkled with humor. He wouldn't be caught dead digging around in a garden like some rabbit.

"Sure, sure," said Silvo, starting to get rather amused himself. "I'm pretty sure I know the first step too... hire that guy to do it for us!"

And they all laughed at that one. All awake now, they talked and they enjoyed themselves on the bank of the sandy river. Despite the interruptions, it ended up being quite a lovely day.

~Fin.