Stesokur Entry 6: Deez Keas Displease

Stesokur, unlike Datanerith, is not building inwards or downwards, but upwards. This approach, aside from just being something new and interesting, provides me with a great deal more security. Every floor only has to worry about the stairs below it! If, for example, a legion of elves attack, I can send all of my dwarves to the top floor, destroy the stairs so the elves can't get up, and then... I guess just hope for the best? I haven't thought that far ahead. But still! Up to that point, it's a full-proof plan.

Except for fliers.

The giant keas swarmed en masse. I was terrified. Then I googled what a "kea" was and went "aw! It's just a big ol' parrot! That's no big deal. Just like Toucan Sam! They'll follow their nose, say something about crackers, and then... steal from me?

C'mon, man, what do you even need cloth for? Make your nests out of sticks like normal birds!

Well that sucks! I actually kinda needed that, too. I don't have much cloth, aside from what I embarked with, and I wasn't quite set up to make my own cloth, just yet. Still, though, as far as problems go, I've had worse. Like the constant goblin menstruation coming from the sky. 

Well, these giant keas, in addition to being total dicks, are actually pretty violent. Here's one beating up a little boy:

 Remember, kids! "K" is for Kea!

You'll notice we're pretty high up at this point: and my floors are incomplete. See, I like to build small "bridges" of flooring so that my dwarves can get to the walls first. It takes a lot of stone to build the entire floor, and I like to prioritize my walls so I can prevent shit like this from happening. But, obviously, the walls ain't finished (and neither is the roof), so in come the keas to harass my people. I'm worried that the dwarven child might get knocked off the bridge and fall down several stories to his death, but he's actually doing pretty well:

She's 14 years old. The most badass thing I'd done at that age was beat Mortal Kombat 3 on Expert mode.

Not only did young Kubuk not fall to her death, but she actually threw some decent punches and took some hits like a champ. By the time the crossbowdwarf squad made its way to the rooftop to protect her, the kea had lost interest and flown away. Kubuk was taken into the beginnings of my hospital on the first floor, and, thank Armok, we still had enough cloth for the doctor, named Avuz, to successfully treat her.

So, lesson learned. From now on, I keep a few soldiers stationed on the top floor while it's under construction. I have lot of miners and stone haulers hanging out up there, and I need to keep them under protection from... you know. Dangerous things. Birds'n stuff.

"My cousin's out fighting dragons and what do I get? Parrot duty."