COLLAVORATIVE STORY GAME

As Doris, the guard, and Balthazar struggle, Torunga comes to. He sees the second assistant watching helplessly, and he's clearly at a loss for what to do. Torunga picks up the gun, having been too unconscious to hear it go off, revealing that it was a fake. He then goes to untie Elise. That's when the second assistant leaps into action, fully tackling Torunga.

Elise looks up at the rafter agape. Invigorated, she shouts, "What did you do to him?" and she kicks the assistant hard in the head as he's trying to get up from having tackled Torunga. She manages to free the hand that Torunga was trying to untie and she frees herself. Balthazar and the guard manage to finally subdue Doris, but the other assistant attacks them.

Balthazar shouts, "Both of their mind control units have been damaged! Do something!"

Torungu puffed his blue chest and propelled into the air with powerful wings. He clawed at Elise's bindings, then carried her out of the building through the hole he made before his transformation as huge curls of smoke reached around them.

He couldn't fly far once they were outside. His legs started to cramp. He'd have to get used to his new body.

They rested on the roof of a nearby skyscraper. Elise coughed and spluttered for minutes before she could speak.

"T-Torungu, can you understand me?"

"Rawwwrk." Torungu chewed on his shoulder feathers. "Rawwk..."

Elise sighed heavily, then hacked up some more phlegm.

When the cops arrived at the building, Balthazar Stymphalia, his mind-controlled scientists and his ninjas were long gone, along with most of their research. All that was left was a single vial filled with an ominous-looking liquid, that had rolled under a table out of sight. It was immediately shipped off to forensics to be studied.

"It appears we're in a bigger mess than we thought." Chief Bigsiddy Jones said, looking out over the city from the rooftop he, Elise, and the now-parakeet Torungu were on.

Torungu had grown even shorter over the last few hours, and was now indistinguishable from a real parakeet. Sitting on Elise's shoulder, he replied:

"Stymphalia's mother said her son has always loved birds. That while his peers in school bullied him and made his life miserable, he would always find solace in his avian friends. It's plausible he sees humans as a stain on the world, and is trying to raise a highly intelligent bird species to stop mankind's reign on Earth. This would explain why he is not only turning humans into birds, but also birds into hyperintelligent killing machines."

Elise agreed. "He said something about injecting adult birds and bird eggs with a certain substance. Most of the time, it kills them or turns them infertile, but his army of attack finches is apparently one of his successful experiments."

"Like I said," the Chief pondered. "It appears we're in a bigger mess than we thought."

He slowly turned to face the odd woman-and-bird pair.

"So what do we do to stop him?"

Chief Bigsiddy Jones clapped his hands on the table near him. "That settles it. America is counting on you two! Those both sound like fool-proof plans. Take what you need from the armoury, and move out!"
Then, he lights a cigar, and adds, "But, I'm warning you two! You're on thin ice! Couple of loose cannons out there... If you don't finish this in two days, you may as well hand in your badges!"
With that, the Chief kicks them out of the room.

Torungu got confused about his role and dressed in ninja garb fit for a parakeet.

Of course, by letting two days pass, they were both without a job, and therefore had no support from the FBI.
All the same, both agreed that they must stop Balthazar at all costs, because the world is in grave danger! And so, secretly left the FBI's back door with their equipment.

Inside the lab, the two found an old man staring at a monitor.

"So you finally came..."

Elise pulled out her gun.

"We've come to stop you!"

The man slowly turned around in his chair. The resemblance to Balthazar Stymphalia was uncanny, but something felt off.

"Almost three centuries ago, my great great great great great great great great grandfather irreparably screwed up the world. You two were the only ones who could stop him. And what did you do? You vanished, to fight some non-existant evil in the future."

Elise looked at the parakeet on her shoulder, confused. Torungu could do nothing but shrug his wings.

"You're not Balthazar Stymphalia?"

"No. I'm not. And I'm afraid you'll find travelling back in time to find my ancestor will prove far more difficult than travelling here. Time likes to stay linear, you know. Travelling forwards is easy. Travelling back takes energy. Lots and lots of energy..."

Geared out with weapons from the future, Elise and Torungu followed the old man outside. Suddenly, a grey speck appeared in the sky.

"Quick, hide."

"What's that?"

"A police scout. The rebels have taken up residence in this area, so it's trying to find any humans. If it spots us, we're dead."

When the scout came closer, Torungu took a quick peek. It was an eagle, wearing body armour that looked like it was made of plastic. It was wearing a night-vision goggle over one eye, and vigorously scanning the area with the other.

"The birds have perfected light-weight, protective polymer armour. None of our outdated human weapons can penetrate it, and it's light enough to fly around in to boot. We rebels were doomed the moment they started researching it. Some of us hold on to hope, but extinction is just around the corner. You have to change the past. Make sure this never happens."

"But how can we get back to the past?"

"See that large building in the distance? That's the local solar farm. The plant has a temporal facility. That's what we're going to use. But make no mistake about the power it will cost. We'll have to do it at noon on a sunny day, while also redirecting all of the nearby city's power supply to the rift generator. There is very little margin for error."

"Then how are we ever supposed to pull this off?", Elise responded incredulously.

"I have a friend on the inside..."

Gnarled was right.

"Oh, it's..." Elise glanced around the shabby, tattered house. She couldn't find anything positive to say, and just ended her sentence there.

Torungu flopped onto a gnawed mattress. "I'm as tired as monster truck."

"Oh, Torungu, that really is a terrible joke," said Elise with a great sigh. "Listen, uh... Dude, do you have anything to eat? We really need sustenance before our perilous mission."

The cockatoo tipped a plastic bag of seeds upside down, and Elise sprung her hands out. She nibbled on the powdery, chewy seeds and longed for a juicy bird burger.

Torungu was sound asleep. Dude fluttered over to him with a threadbare blanket in his talons. He released the blanket over Torungu and it gently hugged his body.

A lonely looking stove in the corner caught Elise's eye. Her stomach growled. Dude poked her shoulder and as she glanced upwards, dropped a blackened banana into her hands.

"It's not much, I'm afraid. I'm not used to having humans around, you see."

"No, that's... thanks, Dude. You're very generous." Generous in meat and fat, she was really thinking. Elise gobbled up the last of the seeds, then started on the banana. Covered in dark, gooey spots and overly sweet, it was hardly a palatable snack.

She shot a sideways glance at Torungu. He had always been a heavy sleeper.

Dude settled on a mouldy armchair and clawed at the TV remote.

"I'll see what the state of the city is on the 7 p.m. news."

Elise crept over to the stove and turned the oven on. She wasn't the greatest cook, but knew to warm up the oven before sticking a meal in there. On her tippiest toes, Elise stalked Dude. His crest was silhouetted in a blue TV glow.