Entry 1: Mobile
"Do you know
why mobiles calm brand new hatchlings so?" asked the smartly-dressed Imperial man, threading red silk string through a bamboo hoop with unnervingly deft claws.
Pyrrhus had been a... controversial... invite to the gathering. He was generation 14, very far removed from Conch and Basic, and it... showed. Being Plague-element was totally fine-- some even found it a desirable trait, thinking of strengthening their founders' genetics. Being one of Clan AXQU's weird Chosen One experiments was also, generally, considered fine; they could be trusted to behave well and politely even if they were a bit strange.
But there were
terrible rumors attached to Pyrrhus, rumors that bore fruit with only the slightest of digging. Hideous things,
unthinkable things, things perpetuated over countless years longer than he'd technically been alive... Clan AXQU's family branch got weird in the later generations. A monster, provable and in fact, worshiped in some circles as
The King of Blood and Sacrifice, for whom the very idea of remorse was laughable.
And yet, nobody had ever found evidence of him harming family. He'd been nothing but affable and polite the entire gathering, gently rebuffing mind readers with no harm done to anyone.
If Pyrrhus noticed the uncomfortable silence, he gave no indication.
"It's an instinct from the early days of creation, instilled separately by every Dragon God. Countless clutches were lost by predation from the air, with Greatowls, Rocs, and Goshawks in particular fond of newly hatched dragons. If hatchlings go still and calm, then aerial predators are unlikely to see them, which keeps them safe and warm in their nests. The same reason they go calm when you fly silent overhead-- it has nothing to do with your presence, and everything to do with them being fit for survival. But the reaction to your voices is love."
He paused, using one wickedly sharp talon to drill holes in the hoop. To attach decorations to his mobile.
"...
and a response meant to endear themselves to you so that you're more likely to feed them, of course. But then again, what is
love but the social pack-bonding instinct of any sapient creature?"
He started to attach feathers together into fans, and those into bizarre structures, each extremely precise in its placement.
It took a
very long time, and didn't look like much at the outset, but shining a light on Pyrrhus's mobile from above projected the unmistakable shadow of a high-flying Greatowl below. He blew a gentle breeze across the mobile, and the silhouette appeared to flap.
"I have very much enjoyed pack-bonding with my fellow social creatures," He said with an ironic little grin. "Thank you. Sincerely."
The little ones didn't appear to be frightened of the mobile; rather, it seemed to have a sedating effect. Even the fussiest infants quieted and, eventually, found themselves lulled to sleep. No mage could detect a single thing wrong with it, nor could the psychics find any fear response in the babies. Just a specific tool, for a specific purpose, to trip a specific instinct.
The monster's gift to his family had been
sincere.
Based on the evolutionary reason why mobiles are thought to calm human infants!
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