Title: Ryan and the Raven
Daltonfic 2020 Big Bang Week 1, Day 1: Windsor House “That damn freshman is keeping a crow in his room!” Luke shouts, jabbing towards the door Ryan has just left. “And I don’t know if he even feeds it, because all that is left of my tarantula is one leg, and a lot of feathers! If he isn’t punished-”
Prefect Ryan Cobb walks down the halls of Windsor House, intent on doing one last surprise dorm inspection before heading back out to the gardens. Roman and Alexander take the longest time to inspect, their dorm is a spreadsheet meant for sleeping, plastered with barely understandable Ponzi schematics- but if it’s not cocaine, Ryan cannot do much.
His priorities are more than inspections today. A group of butterflies were making their home in the flowerbeds. His hopeful successor to the prefecthood of the house alerted him to it. One more floor, pick and choose, then wildlife.
Stopping, Ryan thinks he overheard an argument coming from one of the freshman rooms. Black bat stickers, sparkly letters, and a Transformers stick decorate the space surrounding the number. A cracked door betrays the muffled noise of the two roommates’ disagreement.
With disappointment, Ryan realizes that it is his most difficult room pairing. Houston has already burnt through two roommates already. If they aren’t getting along, he needs to try and find a new person who can put up with their new occultist.
Stepping towards the door, Ryan listens in.
“You can’t keep a raven in here!” It sounds like Hendricks, he thought to himself.
“She’s my familiar!”
“Seriously Dwight, there’s weird and then there is dangerous. She needs to be outside!”
“I’m handling it, I just need to-”
“At least let Ryan tell you what to feed her.”
Well, if called upon he has to see what is happening now.
Knocking, Ryan called out, “Room inspection!”
He hears Dwight yelping. Todd saying something in hushed tones. A squawk? The window is slamming. Movement. A lot of movement. His wildlife senses are tingling.
Ryan opens the door, looking at the freshman. Todd looks as bored as ever. He’s on his bed with a book, shooting annoyed glances at his roommate. Dwight, contrastly, is just as steadfast in consistency as he looks as disastrous as always. The claw marks on his hands though, those are new.
“Last surprise inspection of the day, lucky you.” Ryan said with a smile, coming further into the room. He paused, “Dwight, the salt lines? Really? Housekeeping has enough to deal with.”
Dwight starts on a spiel about their necessity. Ryan has heard it three times now. Instead, he turns to Todd, “are you okay with them?”
“When he keeps them to his side.” He says plainly. “Maybe housekeeping should just skip our room? We can keep our own sides clean.”
“This doesn’t look clean.” Ryan says concerned, the randomly coloured stains on Dwight’s side not immediately recognizable.
“We’ll get it cleaned up.” Dwight assures him.
Ryan gives him a look, circling the room. “I know I confiscated some of this stuff last week.”
“Does that stop him?” Todd asks.
Point.
Ryan sees he’s going to have to compromise here. “Is there anything you’d like to declare at least? What was that noise I heard before I came in? Todd, is he smoking again? Wes told me about the incident behind the garden shed.”
“If he needs to be concussed again, just let Charlie know. He stole Wes’ baseball bat after that.”
“Might be because it was the garden shed.” Dwight says sheepishly. “He didn’t like the smell.”
Todd’s side is cleaner, but not spotless. There are some items of altered uniform in the closet, but as long as he doesn’t see them wearing them it is okay. He wants to ask what that squawk was, but if they’re hiding an animal in here, it should be large enough to see. A bird? Out the window? Hopefully it would fly away. He does not trust Houston’s ability to care for an animal, but he can deal with that when he’s certain what it is.
“The posters can’t be pinned to the wall. Sticky tack or nothing.” Ryan points out, the map on Todd’s side and the sci fi posters on Dwight’s side both being held up with staples.
“Can we get some from the secretary’s supply? I don’t want to order any.” Todd complains, like his desk isn’t already overflowing with raided folders, paperclips, and fine line markers from the Underclass Newspaper Room.
“Order it.” Ryan says, hiding a smile at Todd’s annoyance. “And if you do have anything I can’t find, throw it out. Or come to me. You know I’m here to help.”
“Yes Ryan.” The freshmen chorus.
Unable to figure out what is happening, Ryan leaves. He will figure out what those two are hiding, though he wishes Todd would just tell him outright. The fact they seem to be getting along only hinders attempting to reign in Houston’s more outrageous behaviour. Not that he can say too much being Windsor’s Prefect, but unless the kid mellows it will be hard for Windsor to continue to stay under the administration’s radar- especially with Alfalfa Brightman’s kids destroying the water fountain with dish soap. The sparrow’s drinking water was ruined.
Luke Baldwin, one of his more sedate sophomores skids around the corner. Angry, his face is almost red with how furious he is.
“That freshman and his pet crow killed Yorvik!” Luke shouts without preamble.
“What?”
“That damn freshman is keeping a crow in his room!” Luke shouts, jabbing towards the door Ryan has just left. “And I don’t know if he even feeds it, because all that is left of my tarantula is one leg, and a lot of feathers! If he isn’t punished-”
“Baldwin, calm down.” Ryan puts his hands up. “I was just in there, there was no bird. And you know I would know.”
Luke isn’t deterred. “I know it was his! Who else would be crazy enough-?”
“Hey! Ix-nay on the azy-cray.” Joshua pokes his head out of his own room. “Kid’s got OCD.”
“You’re just saying that cause you’re taking that psychology class.”
“It’s not my fault you don’t know how words work.” Joshua counters.
“He’s going to get more than just that if something isn’t done about-”
“Luke. Enough.” Ryan said. “I’ll talk to him later, but as I said. I just did a room check. There was no bird. I believe you, but I can’t just punish someone without a little more proof.”
He continues down the hall towards the stairs into the main common room. Some of the Juniors are playing Rock Band against the seniors. Right now, Sullivan is the only sophomore so Ryan decides it is okay to leave unattended. Luke follows, still rambling about how the freshmen can’t get away with illegal animals in the dorm.
Ryan sighs. “I can’t bring Yorvik back. You know I feel badly. He was a good spider. But if you want, I can talk to my arachnid guy, maybe we can try fostering in a safer tank? It’s not Yorvik, but there are a lot of spiders who would benefit from a territory of their own.”
Luke didn’t like that idea; but considers the suggestion of perhaps upgrading to a scorpion, which can defend itself much more easily against predators within the dorms.
Perturbed, he wonders how there could be a whole crow (though Ryan does not think Luke could properly identity a corvid without a lineup) loose in Windsor without him knowing about it. There is always a lot going on in Windsor, but animals were supposed to be his thing. He would have to be on the lookout for a black bird on campus. While birds can eat a variety of things, an entire tarantula might make it sick. Great. Now he has a poor corvid to worry about, on top of the warbler the Stuarts were keeping in a tiny cage as a mascot instead of allowing to fly in an enclosure the school could clearly afford for their own caged songbirds.
“Incoming!”
Ryan ducks on instinct from previous incidents. A mop flies over his head, clattering to the ground beside him. He turns to see the Seniors sheepishly trying to hide the bucket. It seems someone spilled a bottle of cola, and bleach was the solution they devised to clean it. Maybe if the common room was smaller he would have noticed this side of the room.
“Keep that away from Van Kamp, he’ll trip.” Ryan says to his fellow seniors, who give him enough platitudes to let him continue unworried out the double doors of Windsor House.
The sun is warm, grass as green as it will be before the winter frost settles across campus. Only a few more days until the cold snap. He’d wanted to get the ducks an indoor shelter earlier, but so far only Mr. Tamerlane is listening to his advice. Ryan keeps warning his boarders to leave the duck alone, but this is a reason they don’t officially have a house pet like Hanover’s ridiculous pony.
Walden, one of the freshmen, wants to bring his dog Cookie to school. The dog is supposedly a therapy dog, but from what Ryan sees of Walden’s understanding of therapy dogs it may just have the right sheet of paper. That kid seems to have more money than sense, and cannot even tell Ryan that his dog is anything beyond ‘white’. With enough training, maybe Ryan could change that status, and educate the owner on behalf of the dog.
Jogging across the campus to the gardens, Ryan sees the greenhouses and some of his Windsors there amongst the gardening club. A row of cracked pots and half-eaten greens are strewn on the ground in front of them. Large bags of supplies are also half full, spilling into the decorative beds and Mr. Tamerlane’s immaculate lawn work.
“Hey, prefect!” The club calls over. Charlie, one of his more reformed Windsors, is among them.
“What’s up guys?” Ryan asks, diverting his jog to see the butterflies.
“Amos says you’re good with animals.” The Day student in charge of the club says, pointing as the mess. “What kind of rat did this?”
“I keep telling you, it’s a Windsor prank. It doesn’t even look like much is missing.” A Stuart sneers, a foul look on his face.
“It is field mice, I’m telling you.” Charlie looks close to snapping. Thankfully the group of Seniors who have beaten his delinquency out of him, also stressed the importance of saving your cursing for emphasis alone. “It wasn’t Windsor.”
Ryan shrugs. “I haven’t heard of anything about messing with Gardening Club. Most Windsors don’t find it would give enough of a reaction.”
“So what did it?”
“He’s biased.”
“You wanted a prefect’s opinion.”
Ryan ignores the chattering, kneeling in the grass in front of the ruined supplies. Small holes, certainly rodent sized. Pellet dung mixed in with the bag of grass seed, but oily residue around the holes? Signs in the potted plants of the teeth marks were inconclusive, but he did already know what caused this.
“They’re common brown rats. It’s not a huge problem, but it’s not a prank.” Ryan says, brushing his knees off.
“How do you know that?” The Stuart challenges.
“Simple.” Says the prefect, “Mr. Tamerlane already told me about the infestation he’s fighting off. Haven’t you guys noticed the humane traps around campus?”
The silver boxes scattering the campus are meant to be inconspicuous on purpose. Ryan paid extra for the grounds to have the best versions so he could release them back into the fields where they belonged.
“Were you going to tell us?” The head of the Gardening Club exclaims.
“It’s being handled.”
“So what the hell are we supposed to do?”
Ryan considers it. “If you really want to keep pests away, you can invest in a garden snake. Something large enough to be a good rat catcher, but small enough it shouldn’t cause issues if you do something stupid to provoke it to bite you.”
“Justin mentioned something about that.” Charlie says, cutting off other arguments. “His gardens back home have loads of natural pest control.”
“The warmth of the greenhouses should also allow a year round solution.” Ryan said. “I know a guy who runs a rescue, he has a pair of them he’d love to rehome.”
“And you still say this wasn’t a Windsor prank?” The Gardening Club head asks, suspicious of Ryan’s immediate solution.
“Ask the groundskeeper, or the office admin. She took the order for the traps around campus.” Ryan raises his shoulders, his good nature taking over. They would believe him or not. It did not entirely matter as long as they did not try to kill the rats with poison that may hurt the other local animals on campus.
It does not take long for the club to believe him. A phone number is given and snakes promptly rehomed. Ryan walks away in a good mood. Truth be told, the snakes please him more than the clearing of Windsor’s reputation; but a double win is a good bonus.
Finally he reaches the rose garden. Ryan breathes in the sweet smell of the flowers. Around him the swarm is feasting on nectar, and he is careful not to startle them from their important task. They ravage the carefully manicured briars, returning some of the ridiculous ornamental roses into a more natural state. Ryan thinks the twinkling light of the white, yellow, and oranges on their wings is far more beautiful than the flowers could ever be.
His camera does not do them justice, flitting from flower to flower as he follows with soft steps. He has been to sanctuaries before, but never with this much privacy to observe them. Thankfully, most students do not frequent the rose gardens. Dobry’s rose garden is more of the clandestine spot for lovers; Ryan has found he is far more likely to find his Windsors in the library, the gym locker rooms, or one notable incident behind a curtain outside the entrance hall with David Sullivan and a Dobry girl who should not have been there. It is not of his concern though, he’s got his private time alone with the cloud of glittering wings.
Ryan stops. A black feather is resting on the ground in front of him. Could it be?
Around the corner of the briars he spots her. A juvenile raven, a monarch held between her beak in twitching death throes. Her movements are lazy. Her feathers do not shine, they barely reflect the light at all. The dying butterfly she is trying to eat looks more alive than she is.
Ryan’s heart drops. He cannot rush forward. He will not disturb her. She is in pain. Is this what his freshman was trying to hide?
There are no marks, just an air of sadness around her. She cannot swallow her prize. The butterfly falls to the ground. He’d run and offer her any food he can, his mental stores of knowledge on birds are gone. He cannot think.
The raven gives a sad quork at her lost food, flapping her wings weakly.
“Did someone hurt you?” Ryan approaches, hands up and thinking of what he’d heard last time at the vet for poor Markie when the Brightman twins tried to feed him potato chips. Birds will eat too many things near human dwellings that are not good for them. He had to believe the freshman duo would not intentionally copy such Windsor insanity.
Her inky black eyes met his. She flew off, stumbling in the air. Ryan looks to where she is going, but she ducks behind a building not to be followed.
Its’ looking down near the dead butterfly that Ryan sees it. Exposed piping with dark peck marks in it. The shiny copper paint gives way to a chalky white. He informs Mr. Tamerlane, but it is too late for that raven he will learn later. Ryan’s walk back to Windsor is sombre.
Another win, another loss. He tucks the black feather into his pocket. Back in Windsor he has to negotiate with the sophomores to stop trying to cook anything larger than a sandwich. Worrying about them stops him from worrying about the animals. It mostly works.
