Day 60
After a week of serving as a mascot, mistress Julie approached the hawk. “Do you think you could do us a favour?” The request seemed odd but you nodded. “Do you think you could squawk?”
You nodded. You had been making that sound for some time now. Breathing in you let out a sqwuak for her.
“That’s good. Do you think you could try and avoid talking for the rest of the day?” You we’re unsure. “If you can only squawk for the rest of the day, we will give you another point”.
That sounded good to you. You nodded. Her lips began to form a U shape. Something the beak did not do.
It was hard to avoid talking for the rest of the day but you managed it. Your throat felt weird as the day advanced.
The next morning Julie came by again. “You did great yesterday. I gave you another point.” Your tail feathers were shaking. “If you can keep that up for the rest of the week I will give you one extra point per day you do it in that time”.
That sounded easy enough. Each day it got easier. You found yourself getting better at reading the humans body language and worse at reading lips or understanding them.
By the end of the week you could read the points board. But as mistress Julie came you found you could no longer speak. The voice box became a red tail hawks syrinx.
Mistriss Julie was pleased. Two months ago this was a human. Now they were nearly all animal. Soon they should get the hawk hunting.