A cabal of kingfisher kookaburras are long term residents at the Run. After the routine terror of maniacal laughter at dawn, they crouch motionless on strategic posts and branches. Eyes fixed, beaks angled to focus point, they wait. And wait. As some skink of short attention span eventually flinches, they drop to the ground; brutal, quick, precise.
Except Digby. The rule-proving exception and embarrassment of the extended family, Digby is a dreamer who is clumsy, not quite serious enough, and prone to mistakes. As the sun grew lower in the sky today, Digby forgot himself. Trying to take an imagined shortcut he was previously warned about, he drove his beak at speed into a more than usually clean window. Pulling upwards sharply at a right angle in the last inch, to deflect some of the impact, light on in brains and brawn, he survived.
Digby is demoted now, back to fledgling grade aerodynamics and basic manoeuvres, under the strict supervision of the flight instructor and not allowed out unsupervised.
The boss darkly imagines ‘rehoming’ as a management tool. A senior sidles up to him on a branch as dusk settles. Two merge into darkness, deep in conversation.
