Dappled light filtered through the sparse foliage of the birch forest. Birch forest? Kat's eyes snapped open. She had gone to sleep in a normal bed, in Ohio.
She felt her ears turn to face the constantly shifting song of the wild birds, her belly rumbling slightly, her beak salivating at the thought of catching one of the larger birds for a meal. It all felt so right, even though it was all, wrong for her. She wasn't a hunter, she was a truck driver. But her twitching talons, and the claws on her hind feet all disagreed with that assertion.
Kat stood up on all four feet and looked around. She experimentally stretched her wings, watching as the dark purple and grey feathers splayed out revealing a layer of white feathers underneath without even having to think about each movement. Her purple and dark grey tail feathers swished behind her easily. Instinct told her she was ready to fly, if the need arose, but that she shouldn't waste energy on flight when it wasn't necessary, especially when she didn't know where her next meal would come from.
Walking to a tree she tested her talons, almost effortlessly dragging the points through the hardwood. Turning around, she chopped down the entire tree with a single kick using the long daggers emerging from her large leopard-like paws.
Her purple crest rose in shock as the tree fell, three oval disks of birch striking other trees and bushes shaking loose some tasty-looking berries. She looked at her hind paws as best she could while standing, the disks having formed from gaps between the claws. That'll be handy.
Rolling over, she easily bent back to pluck remnants of the papery bark off the claws using her beak. Trying to grip the paper with her talons she sorely missed the dexterity of human fingers, but with some effort, and propping the paper against the fallen tree trunk, she managed to pull off and weave several strips into a basket she could carry with her beak.
She soon filled the basket with the tasty berries and some useful-looking sticks, as well as the three disks of wood. She'd played enough survival games to know that you never knew which items would be useful and that she'd need a better inventory solution, and quick.
As she walked she realized her direction hadn't been picked at random. She was following… something. A scent? Yes, but of what?
Her answer came quick enough as a clearing opened to several other gryphons all talking around a large stone. Kat hadn't thought to test her beak for speech till that moment, but cleared her throat and gave a chirp for attention. She didn't even know why she'd chirped, it just felt right.
The gryphons all turned their gaze to her. One gryph, with gold and brown plumage and a shimmering gold pelt spoke, "Ah, the noon sleeper. I found her earlier not far from here. Come, introduce yourself. I was Profesor Donovan Anatolia, of Turkey, now I am Sky Breaker. I have claimed the white peak north-northwest of here."
To her surprise, Kat knew exactly which direction that was. She stepped forward and set her basket down where others admired the craftsmanship. "I was… I was a trucker in Ohio. I guess, I am now Kat Highnoon."
Sky Breaker nodded and pulled a disk from the basket, laying it upon the nearly flat stone table. "And it appears, Ms. Highnoon, that you are a tinkerer. Once we are a bit more settled, it would be helpful if you teach us how you wove this, and cut these. We have been trying to use our new bodies to perform the acts of science we collectively understand, but this is all new to us as well."
He gestured to the other gryphs, "We have all just been discussing a proposal by Swift Wing that this valley be communal land. We all feel a need for our own territory, so we should each claim a section of the surrounding mountains. We can come here to this stone to meet and discuss the use of the forest and its resources."
As he spoke she saw one of the other gryphs looking at the considerable wear on her basket's handle. She hadn't walked far, but her beak had already done considerable damage. She plucked out a sturdy stick, chomped it down to size, then used her hind claws to carve a hole in the center of two disks. Using the third in her beak, she hammered the disks onto each end of the shortened stick. Slipping the handle into the gap, she lifted the basket by the much more durable pulley-like wooden handle.
Putting it back down, she looked at the stunned faces all around. "Um, I guess that's your first lesson. Our new bodies have some built-in tools."
