Welcome to Gaia! ::

Belldandy sat on a bench at the park and twiddled her hooves nervously. Her mother had set up a play date for her with another filly in the hopes that the timid unicorn could make some friends. Both mothers were in "the business" and Aurora assured her the two fillies would have things in common because of it. Bell was not as confident.

A cerulean warbler landed on a branch nearby and began to chirp. Worry insantly evaporated as Bell climbed onto the back of the bench and raised herself up on her tippy hooves to look at the bird. The warbler hopped backwards a couple paces, peering down at the unicorn curiously and chirped again. Bell answered back with a little whistle of her own. The bird tilted it's head and chirped again, and again Bell whistled back, trying to match the tone and frequency of the blue colored bird's voice. She became so focused on her task she completely forgot that somephony else would show up soon.

Bell froze, looked at the filly who'd appeared and remembered herself. She darted down to the seat of the bench, her cheeks pink. Sky blue coat, red hair, topaz eyes, yes this should be the right filly. Good impression you've already made! she chastised herself. You should have just kept sitting on the bench!

"Y..yes I'm Belldandy. Sorry! You must be Star Spangled. I um.." she looked between the filly and the bird, who was peering down at both fillies curiously. "I think that birdsong is very pretty, don't you?"

Excellent coversation starter. she though, even though she was sure Star would now think her stupid as well as weird.

Bell flushed. "Just birds.." she said softly. "They all sound like different flutes when they sing and sometimes I get inspired to write small songs. They're all for flute though.." she shuffles her hoof a little. "I like to play flute.." she added. Well no duh. I swear your brain is as transparent as your horn.

A couple squirrels started playing chase in the branches above the squirrels, scattering the birds. Realizing she'd been talking about herself forever, she quickly changed the topic. "So..so..what do you like to do?"

Bell started to relax. Star was open and friendly. She admired that. "I do have a book with a snowdrops on the cover where I write down little fragments of music that I think sound pretty." She smiled a little. "My Mommy and all my siblings and I can sing but only mommy and my brother do it regularly. Oh wow..a chorus?" Bell looked impressed. "I don't think I could let anyone else hear me singing."

Above the fillies, the squirrels have started playing tag, running and jumping from branch to branch. The first squirrel jumps from one tree, over the fillies heads' and onto a branch jutting out from the tree on the other side of the bench. The second squirrel follows suit, but it's jump falls short and it ends up hanging off the edge of the branch by it's fore paws, trying to haul itself up onto it. Unfortunately, the branch couldn't take all of the movement from the squirrel trying to climb up it and snapped. It and the squirrel fell down into the bushes just behind Belldandy.

"Eeepp!" she jumped to her hooves and backed away from the brush. "W..what was that..?"

Belldandy pushed some of the bushes to the side as well, peering down where Star was looking. The squirrel was curled in a tight ball chirping in a high pitched, distressed tone. The unicorn's eyes filled up tears almost instantly. "Oh..oh no..the poor thing." She looked up into the other filly's bright gem eyes. "What should we do Star? We can't just leave.." Bell couldn't bare the thought.

Belldandy looked down at the poor little creature. She thought it might be the leg because it seemed to be at such a weird angle.

"Needs to be kinda firm and can hold it's weight..oh.." Bell spied a larger tree that was shedding some bark. Standing on her back hooves she grabbed at a large chunk that was almost ready to fall off. With a snap it gave way and the filly rushed over and pushed the piece of bark next to the squirrel. Her stomach knotted a little.

"It'll be in pain if we just pick it up.." she explained about the time one of her mother's bandmates had broken a wing and how it hurt when he moved it too much. "I don't want to hurt it but I don't know how else to get it on the..."

She had an idea.

"Uhm..this will sound weird..but could you face the other way for a second?" she couldn't handle it if Star was watching her while she was levitating, it would make her nervous and she might end up dropping and hurting the squirrel worse. Plus, her magic tended to creep people out.

When the other filly was looking away, Bell took a huge breath and held it. Magic, the motes so tiny and subtle to be nearly invisible, wrapped around the animal and slowly levitated it. It was a small feat, and she put the squirrel down on the large bark strip gently, but it felt like she'd just done the hardest magic trick in the world.

"Can you get him out of the bushes now..?" Bell rubbed at her temple. There was no way she could levitate the squirrel and the bark. "It might be faster if you can fly him to your friend.."

A few days later, Belldandy sat down and wrote a letter.

"Dear Star Spangled,

Mossflower came by today and told me that the squirrel we found is recovering well! She said you flew him in very carefully and told her about our saving it. She kept saying how kind we were to do it! She kept making me blush with all her compliments!

She said we should come by when the squirrel is well and we could all release him together! I thought that sounded nice. Would you want too? Let's play again soon, hopefully with less squirrel injuries this time.

Your new friend,
Belldandy"