Suyan stared up at the figure with huge eyes. Finally, she said, < Hello. You're very strange, I've never seen one like you. >

"Aw, shit," Hawk muttered, and a flurry of movement went through the many heads as he looked round. "Uh, hey, can anyone--I need help translatin'."

The heads all aligned themselves to point into the shifting space beside him, where the shape of wings shrugged half open and closed. A silhouette came vaguely into sight there, as featureless as if seen through a thick fog. Maybe it spoke, but the words were inaudible, and it didn't elicit any reaction in Suyan, who merely looked.

"Ok, uh," the heads turned back to Suyan, coming somewhat more into focus as they lowered to her level. Skull-like, eyeless sockets, a long muzzle that was somewhere in the vicinity of a beak, serrated along the jaws in the approximation of teeth. He addressed her in clumsy Aetherian. < Hello. I am new at Aetheri. Aetherian, > he corrected himself. < My name is Hawk. >

< Ah, I see, > she replied pleasantly.