And now Junilla appears in the dark, atop a wide bridge spanning two buildings. There's basically a wall of glass-covered white and gray buildings surrounding kim, including the one at the other side of a grass courtyard full of trees and playground equipment. The darkness is nearly pitch-black, and were it not for the full moon, ke might not be able to see more than a few feet in front of kim.

This is very alarming! Junilla is very alarmed! Ke squawks in alarm, an awful shrill noise which is audible for a considerable distance, and gently gathers up the egg, protecting it instinctively with kis body while ke tries to work out what has just happened, looking around in all directions with kis long sinuous neck.

Suddenly, a wave of lights in the buildings to both sides of ker light up, ker eyes being blinded for a moment. Then a minute or so later, a human woman runs out, dressed in a practical dress worn over a pair of overall, together with a transparent film mask covering her mouth. She looks at Junilla, totally stunned.

Junilla is rather stunned also! The snake was not very helpful and she isn't entirely sure of this - weird monkey-looking creature? - either. Ke shifts the egg to one side so ke can brandish the kitchen knife menacingly and hiss, "Stay back!". Ke also has rather menacing looking wing-claws on the tip of kis wings, although ke can't really bring them to bear while cradling the egg, which looks like it could contain a large human baby or a rather small toddler.

The human woman looking at Junilla stands totally still, very deliberately not moving towards her. "I have no reason to hurt you, you don't need be scared", she says. "You're protecting that egg. We can help you keep it safe. You can relax here."

Okay, so, it speaks. That's. That's one up on the snake?

Probably ke should put the knife down. Probably ke is overreacting because ke has recently laid an egg in a very stressful situation, and now ke is on a - bridge between ships? - and nothing makes any sense.

Ke puts the knife down, gently, to better cradle the egg.

"It doesn't look very safe here," ke explains. "I'm fine with heights, but not without anything suitable to carry the egg in?"

Ke is really botching first contact protocols and should feel ashamed of kimself, but the egg is more important, and apparently whatever it is speaks kis language so maybe someone else has already done the first contact and ke is just completely out of touch? Ke has been pretty busy planning the family boat and not paying much attention to the news, although ke would have thought ke would have remembered something like that.

The woman begins keeping her hands up as she continues speaking to Junilla. "Well, I'm sure there's - something we can make that's suitable for carrying the egg in! You can follow me, and I can show you a place that looks safer! It's a room designed with mothers in mind. It sounds like that's what you want."

"...yes, if you have a hatching chamber, I don't think it's going to hatch right away but it came early and I'm not sure how long it's going to be."

Junilla very carefully shuffles in the indicated direction; ke is extremely sure ke is not really dextrous enough to be moving an egg around on a terrifying bridge between vessels, but at least the waters are clearly very calm right now, as the bridge is remarkably stable.

"Hatching chamber, no! Comfortable and spacious room perfect for you and your child, yes! It's just a quick elevator ride and a few corridors away, come with me." She leads Junilla through one of the doors and into an obscenely spacious elevator, taking it up a few floors before finally leading out into a corridor. She brings Junilla to a door, opening it to reveal a bedroom that easily accomodates a king-size bed. "Not a hatching chamber! Probably the best we have."

That is... a remarkably smooth - elevator? More like an entire moving room, mildly disorienting that it had even moved at all! So much less clanking and wobbling than even the really nice hospital elevator she'd been on.

Ke waddles into the indicated room with the soft nesting spot, and gladly deposits the egg in the huge nest, fussing at the covers until they are ramped up on all sides and it will have a hard time rolling onto the ground.

"Do you have, uh, rails that attach to the nest, to stop it rolling? It feels warm enough here and I think it will be okay for the moment, but if I try to sit on the bed it's going to tilt towards me and if there's nothing to properly stop it rolling off I'll have to watch it."

"Nno, but a crib is sort-of-rails, and I can easily find one of those!" She nods two times, very slowly, before rushing off and coming back with an extra-large crib. It's made of a special plastic that makes it very unexpectedly light, even if she's also carrying in some extra blankets. It slots in neatly in the gap to the left of the bed. "Our beds don't have rails! But... the crib is enough, right?"

"Ah, yes, a little nest just for the egg, that should do nicely." Ke very gingerly lifts the egg out of the makeshift nest and arranges it in some blankets in the crib. "There, much better!

I'm sorry, I have had no manners at all. I'm Junilla Secondbreakfast and I'm very thankful for your work in hosting me."

The woman wearing the transparent mask nods back. "Caretaker Clarissa 145332, but really, calling me Clarissa is the only option that makes sense in all honesty. I am glad to be at your service! While also being at the service of this center's many other women. Of course. Do you wish to see the bath, or do you just want to settle in here?" 

"I'd - rather like some idea about what's going on, if that's okay?

This is a hospital vessel, then? I have some credit with Seacalm, but I came through laying quite well and if you're not in a reciprocal arrangement, I hope I'll be able to repay credit once...

Uh, I don't suppose you are in communication with anyone who could reach the rest of my family? They must be very worried."

"What's going on, is that this isn't a vessel or Seacalm at all! When it comes to  repaying, I'll quite a bit of my money for now, so don't worry. I'll tell you if things start straining my wallet! And unfortunately, I can't even conceive of a method of contacting the rest of your family!"

"Oh, dear. Well, I suppose you should show me the bathroom, then, and maybe how I can get food? And then I'll be settled for a bit, although if you've got a terminal I can access or, pen and paper I suppose, that would be nice."

Junilla feels quite tired all of a sudden, and really just wants to nestle down in that nice soft looking bed for a bit, once the necessities are definitely in place and there's no more immediate danger.

"...Yes. Getting food will be a mild issue at the moment. But only at the moment."

She leads Junilla towards the bathroom, revealing a spacious room with a combined tub and shower in the corner, placed inside a shower cabinet. There is a wide sink placed on the left wall, working as an extra wide changing table, together with a relatively low, squarish toilet placed against the opposite wall. The entire room is painted a stark white, with even, warm lighting that's at once inviting and makes the big room feel even bigger.

"To order food, you'll have to ask! What dish is the one you want the most, at the moment?"

That is a... spectacular hospital bathroom! It'll be really useful if ke can't get in the sea, which is sounding like a lot of effort. Ke could do with a nice stiff feather brush but ke's sure there must be one round here somewhere.

"This... is just for me?"

Ke is feeling a little light-headed, from the relief, and also... there's no movement, is there? None at all. Hospital vessel must have been the wrong word somehow, but this ship must have excellent stabilisers. Ke supposes that's a really good thing to have on a hospital vessel, in many ways, even though it's slightly disconcerting.

"I'd just like whatever fish you've got most in, I think, ideally something white - ooh, if you happen to have swordfish and it's not too much - maybe simmered in nut milk if you do that, almonds if you've got them? And just some seaweed, not especially fussy, dulse is good. Got to keep my mineral intake up after making all that eggshell!"

"Well, yes, the only door in is from your bedroom. We... kind of have all the fish we could ever want, outside of swordfish, unfortunately. I can bring you any breed of tuna you want, with coconut milk and the sweet almonds, I'm pretty sure that's a thai seafood thing? And... I'll ask the chef to add some... seaweed, I know people eat it, just not the kinds there are." She taps away on her phone. "I can get you everything but the swordfish! What are your favorite fish types outside of swordfish? So you can finally get some food in your stomach."

"Tuna sounds great, if you've got yellowfin even better?" Ke'd normally not be quite so specific in this kind of situation but the - creature? person? - did offer any breed of tuna, it would probably be more rude not to take - it? them? - up on it.

"Better how? We have all kinds of tuna! We can get you bluefin or something else! Uhh..."

"More like swordfish, more solid flesh? Don't worry if it's a hassle, any kind of fish will do. Maybe not sea cucumbers, I never did like sea cucumbers."

"I'll get you the yellowfin, it's still fine!" She taps her phone a bit more. "It's on it's way now, don't worry! Just, relax and spread your wings! Yes." She looks at Junilla with an awkward grin on her face.

That is - some kind of facial expression! Junilla should make some kind of facial expression. Junilla is way too tired to make some kind of facial expression, so ke obediently spreads kis wings instead. It feels a bit weird doing this in a room, not out on deck, but... it's actually quite, freeing? To have the space to do this?

"Thank you so much," ke replies, in lieu of trying to work out how to smile without accidentally looking threatening instead. Normally ke'd tuck kis wing around someone if ke wanted to express that kind of sentiment, but ke doesn't know whether that will be actually taken as friendly or not, these - entities - do seem to like their space.

She nods. "I'll be happy to help you, more. If you don't need anything now." She points at a button hidden on the wall next to the door leading into the bath. There's an image of a baby bottle, above an illustration of a heart made with a dotted line. "Touch this button gently, if you need to call us for help. It can be for something like caring for the egg, or answering your questions. Hit it hard if it's a medical emergency. If you can take things by yourself for a while? I'll be nearby."

"Sure. Thank you."

Junilla will - hang around awkwardly on the bed and do a meditation exercise and try not to fall asleep? It's so hard not to fall asleep, because the bed is incredibly soft and inviting, but ke's ordered food and it would be impolite not to be awake to receive food when it shows up. It would have been easier if ke had something to read, but it seemed too difficult to successfully ask for that.

Occasionally ke pats the egg. Ke feels like ke should be talking or singing to the egg or something to make up for the lack of multiple voices around it but ke's just too tired.

It goes 40 or so minutes before a beautiful chime gets Junilla's attention, as ke sees a small, cute robot carrying a huge portion of food just like Junilla had described to the woman, together with the necessary cutlery. A quick taste reveals that it's made from the finest ingredients, judging by how amazing all the food is.

Junilla startles awake - ke had totally lost the battle with the comfortable bed nest, it was just too tempting.

Ke takes the food from the - mechanical creature? - and says, "Thank you," just in case this is also a talking kind of creature.

The food is almost worryingly perfect! Ke wonders if they really did take kis hasty promise of working off the credit to heart, and are giving kim the luxury treatment so ke feels guilty enough at the resulting balance to work for them for a good long time. But it's hard to worry very much with a huge dish of perfectly simmered yellowfin tuna with some delightfully crispy seaweed which ke can't quite identify, but tastes good all the same.

Ke can't possibly finish the whole thing right now, as much as ke would like to; in lieu of anywhere else to put it, ke stashes it on the changing surface for now, at least ke's not going to tread in it there and it's not like ke is going to need that for a while.

Looking at the changing surface, ke can feel the worries about not having a proper family group assembled creeping back in, so ke returns swiftly to the bed and resumes meditating, to chase that delicious nap with a good proper sleep.

The blankets are all... heavier than usual? They feel really nice and spread a calming, soothing pressure all over ker body, though.

At first ke finds it kind of awkward to not tangle up kis wings uncomfortably, but with a bit of careful arrangement ke finds an extremely snuggly position and drifts deeply off to sleep.

It feels amazingly restful for Junilla; the air here is incredibly fresh, nearly indistinguishable from breathing in mountain air or forest air, and the warmth of the blankets is Just. So. Nice.

Mmmm. Zzzz.

All good things must come to an end, though, and ke eventually wakes up, confused and disoriented. This must be a dream, right? Except everything looks very real, and there's a bit of a crick in kis wing from an unfamiliar, if very good, sleeping arrangement, and kis egg is definitely there.

What was ke meant to do next. It's probably got to be summoning the nice - overgrown smooth monkey - and asking about things?

No, right now it's using the amazing huge bathroom, ke ate rather a lot last night. And, ke is reminded, working out what to do with the leftovers, which have now been out all night and are probably not quite so great as they started out...

The bathroom doesn't have any kind of special toilet; it's just a relatively squarish human toilet, in white. Junilla would presumably just sit down to use it?

Junilla does indeed plop kis cloaca down on the obvious hole above the nice little pit of water and let go with a sigh of relief. Then shake a bit and... okay, where are the wipes, there have to be wipes somewhere, maybe ke will just get a flannel...

A surprise stream of water splashes against Junilla's nether regions for a few seconds, before a wave of slightly warmed air dries ker off rapidly.

...oh of course, it's one of the really fancy toilets. Ke should have expected that, being as the bathroom is super fancy and all.

Ke pats kis feathers to check they're really dry, but it seems to have worked well, so ke shrugs and heads to the call button, brushing against it with exquisite gentleness because ke is kind of embarrassed ke has to summon someone at all, but ke doesn't know if ke is even allowed to go wandering off, and anyway there's no-one else to keep watch on kis egg.

Ke takes a moment to take some deep, regular breaths and absolutely not freak out about being stranded a long way from everyone who was meant to be helping kim with this, in a totally unfamiliar place. Okay. Maybe just freak out a little bit.

It's only few minutes of waiting before a different woman walks in, also wearing a transparent mask like Candice did. She jumps on seeing Junilla. "Hi why did you call" she says on instinct. "Do you need help or information?", she continues.

"Uh, information? Possibly some help too?" Ke feels bad about upsetting all the nice hospital staff, but they seem to be kis only source of, like, what is going on here, or food.

"Information about what? Just tell me everything, there are no dumb questions." She does a good, if imperfect job, of hiding her shock at seeing a bird inside a human's room.

"Okay. So. Uh. This is going to sound weird, but you already know this is weird, because you are - you don't have feathers?

I just - appeared - from a place that only has people like me - nothing else speaks, there are a few animals that kind of have a little bit of their own communication but it's pretty basic...

And - apparently you don't expect this kind of thing to happen either - so I have no idea how to, like, get food, or start contacting people to see if there's a family group looking for more that I might be able to get placed with, or even if you do anything the way that I expect it to happen?"

Junilla is getting steadily more shrill of tone and ruffling her feathers in a kind of awkward fidgeting pattern throughout kis attempted explanation.

"And I have some leftovers in the bathroom but I left them out overnight and don't know what to do with them now."

"Yes, we don't have feathers! That's the... unusual part? We'll have to find out what to do next. We can help you find a family group, there's probably lots of families that are happy to have a cool bird like you in their family, together with your cute bird baby! When it comes to the inedible and foul-smelling leftovers, just let me handle them." She walks into the bathroom, quietly tossing the food into the diaper pail kept under the changing table before the lid seals it up and blocks any odors. It feels weightless as she pulls it, thanks to the motorization of the hinge that it's attached to.

Oh right there's a bin. Of course there's a bin. A really nice bin that probably empties itself or something.

Junilla kind of wants to sink through the floor and never interact with anyone ever again, but ke has an egg to think of.

"Do you have, like, a terminal I can go to, and... set myself up a local account to use?" Surely a huge hospital vessel like this would have a good information system, everything else they have seems to be perfect. "That might be easier than trying to think of... everything.

Although if the terminal room is very far I'll, uh, you probably don't even know what to watch for in an egg, do you..."

"You won't need to leave your room at all! I can give you a phone to use, and it lets you have a terminal, if you can call it that, anywhere you go! I can go find one for you. And no, we don't know what to watch for in an egg and really want to leave it in the hands of someone who does! Please don't leave this egg in our hands!"

"Oh, you have a portable terminal! Even better. Yes please, I would like a portable terminal and if it doesn't have its own tutorial I might need a bit of initial help on how to navigate your local information system. Hopefully that will mean I don't have to keep calling you for everything!"

"Well, I'll... come back with one! Yes. Soon enough." She turns around, leaving Junilla alone for a while.

Junilla goes to fuss over kis egg. Ke gently turns it, and tries to sing something from memory.

"Sleep now my little one, dawn is soon breaking,

Dream now my little one, dream deep of the world,

Squirm now my little one, your freedom is coming,

Dance now my little one, dance deep in your mind,

For soon you will dance in the light."

It's probably two hours before the woman that saw Junilla most recently comes back with a simple, cheap smartphone. She lets ker tap a button that leads to a site with lots of information about the skyscraper maternity care center that kes in, with information about the medical center, 24/7 daycare, rooftop garden, pools and its vast range of other amenities, including detailed plans of every floor.

Ke finds it a little awkward, as kis wing-claws are really not very compatible with a phone screen! Ke kind of awkwardly finds an angle to lay a wing-finger sideways on the screen and get an area with sufficiently soft scales to make successful contact, after a few tries.

Ke looks wistfully at the pools, but ke is absolutely not going to attempt to carry the egg anywhere and the '24/7 daycare' apparently emphatically does not apply to eggs.

"Is there some kind of - forum, matchmaking form - for finding potential family members?" ke asks. The screen and the navigation is extremely impressive, so maybe... "Or some kind of... general index?"

"Well, I'll bring you the site showing info on families that desire to have additional members? Families seeking expansion, Parent City Curie". Many different group photos of several adults with quite a few children, or a few babies, show up on Junilla's phone. She's spoiled for choice if she's looking for a family wishing to add another member to it. Although none of them would presumably have had an egg as part of their family before?

"Oh good, yes, your exchange board has pictures!

...how do I get a picture of myself to include? I think that people might think I am just making things up if I just send them text about it, I don't want to get moderated.

And is there somewhere I can look up anything I don't understand, so I don't have to waste your time asking you everything? Like, a dictionary will probably do, I don't expect I'll be running into complex scientific terms or anything."

Their - babies - are weird looking. It is not at all appropriate for her to point out their babies are weird looking. It's probably just the lack of feathers, if the grown ups were not bundled up as if they were very cold and didn't have that long head fur they'd probably look weird too.

"Well, if you use your voice, dictionaries generally get you an answer back? There's really... and endless amount of things to choose from, if you want to look things up. Also, your phone has the ability to take a photo. I think you should start off using your voice. Your hands... they're kind of awkward to use with a phone, wouldn't you say?"

"Oh, it just - understands words? How does it know when it's being addressed - oh, if it can take pictures is it looking too - am I being rude talking about it like an object?"

If the helpful creatures can speak and act like people, maybe their really great screen thing is also sapient?

"Well, it has a microphone that's constantly turned on. Usually. You have to activate the camera, though. You're not rude at all, it's just a lump of plastic and sand, feel free to call it whatever you want. So, you wanted to try taking a photo? If you say "take a picture of me" as its own sentence, it starts to get going. Maybe try that?"

Ke looks in the general direction of the phone and carefully intones, "Take a picture of me."

And it *clicks*, showing an image of Junilla on the front. It wasn't taken at a particularly good angle; after 10 or so seconds, it switches to showing a live feed of what the camera is seeing on the phone's screen, the picture it had taken reduced to a small corner of the image. "Maybe try finding a good angle that shows your whole face? Make a clicking noise, when you're happy with where you are in the picture. Try it!"

Junilla experiments a bit with the strange mirror, finds what ke thinks is a flattering angle, and clacks kis beak expectantly.

"Can you take one for me from a bit further away, so they can see all of me? I guess it would be polite to put measurements too, I think I take up a bit more space than you with the wingspan, do you have a measuring tape or something?" 

"Sure! I'll step a bit back." The woman manages to take a photo showing all of Junilla. "And this phone has a kind-of measuring tape? You'd need to stand very still." She quickly finds one of the apps that measures distances through parallax, and uses it to get rough idea of Junilla's proportions, moving her phone a bit to the right to let the app's magic do the work.