What did you just do? (small preview)

Almost immediately, she tore across the room, buried her beak in the couch pillow, really pushing her face into it, and let out a long, atonal screech. I already kinda knew what was going on: emotions raging, almost boiling-over in their intensity. Possibly almost every kind of it.

Her poor little brain couldn't handle what was happening. Attempting to rationalize what she did, she was slowly going mad.

This, or part of it, was my doing, I was almost completely certain.

The tiny bird must be so very confused; it was out of character for her.

Cognitive dissonance is a beach and a half.


If she knew why she was in such distress, not only would that not work for me, she probably wouldn't be screaming.

“It's not that bad. Neither of us have even really gotten started yet.”

She pulls her face out of the pillow and flips herself over to sit upright.

What I can only describe as confused gibberish slowly dissolves into speech. “Why...why did that feel good...? Like, I...I can barely think straight.” She folds her hands in her lap, twiddling her thumbs. “I'm...I'm reeling...?!” A quizzical chirp.

“You shouldn't be asking ‘why does this feel good?’, you should be asking ‘ why am I so scared of myself?’”

“You make no sense! Why would anyone be scared of themselves?”

Her mouth is lying now, but her body isn't, its language clearly reading as relaxed.

“I’m helping you grow as an individual.Everyone has a dark side – ”

“Yeah, and yours is clearly the one running things, Hannibal Lecturer. But seriously. Why'd you think that was even a little bit necessary? I already don't wanna be here!”

“Let me...let me recontextualize things. You...your actions speak louder than words.”

“That's always the case...with literally anyone. Get to the point!”

“I'm not making you do anything you don't wanna do. If you don't want to, or you can't, my powers don't work.”

Nope, but what she doesn't know can't make her hurt herself.

“This is a big lot of nothing.” She put the pillow to her side and stood up. “Where's your bedroom? I'm gonna go sleep this off.”

“Right past the bathroom.”

“Thanks.” Her timbre quivered.

If she was stressed out and I kept messing with her, I would have more of a challenge on my claws than I could feasibly solve. So I took a calculated turn of inaction, returning to the actual business of the day.

She could wait, but I'd need to try far more subtle tactics to win her over.