"Stressmomster! Eethers!" Keralis beamed at the two hermits, waving from under the ungodly amount of blankets BDubs had piled on him. He pulled himself out with a soft grunt of effort, and walked over to them. He and Etho fell into a soft hug, then after they broke apart, Keralis  and Stress immediately tackle-hugged each other, causing the cyan parrot to finally leave Stress' shoulder with a startled squawk.

"Oh!" Keralis exclaimed. "You brought a friend!" As the parrot perched back on Stress' shoulder, Keralis cooed over the thing, stroking it with his finger (although Etho could've sworn that there was something almost scripted about his affections). 

The parrot, disgruntled, tried to make its way away from him, but failing that, pecked at his hand. Keralis drew in a breath sharply, cradling his hand as it started to bleed slightly. He and the parrot stared at each other, a battle of wills taking place, and surprisingly, Keralis backed down first, his shoulders slumping with some sort of inevitable resignation.

"Bad, bad bird." Keralis whispered, bidding the duo farewell.

"'E's not a bad bird!" Stress gasped as he walked away, her tone playing at being offended. She lightly stroked it, and it trilled, bumping its head into the crook of her neck. "Don' worry abou' 'im." She whispered to the bird. "'E's real mean."

The two went over to where Cub and Scar were sitting. After, Occam's razor declared that, since Stress and Etho, the ice mages, were ruled out, some other magic might be behind this. And who better to speak to about things that are probably caused by magic than the two people on the server who were primarily spellcasters? Cub and Scar were already engrossed in conversation when Stress and Etho approached.

"Ah. Just the two we wanted to talk to." Etho and Cub greeted, in perfect unison. Scar and Stress tried to hold back laughter as the other two stared at each other, incredulous.

"You first." Scar relented, saving Cub and Etho further awkwardness. He scooched up closer to Cub, patting the blanket mound beside him. "Please, take a seat."

"So, we're trying to figure out who's behind this cold, since it's clearly not us." Etho explained. Cub raised his eyebrow a calculated two millimetres.

"An' you two," Stress gestured at the pair, "Are like, the magic experts."

"We are not experts." Scar blurted the second Stress finished, chuckling that wholesome little chuckle of his. "We're just a pair of goofy guys with... connections."

"Well, you're still the magic guys, so..." Stress protested.

"...I don't know of anything that could cause a cold snap like this except you two." Cub shrugged. "Although there might be something that I haven't come across."

"There are spells that can mimic or amplify someone else's intrinsic magical abilities." Keralis pointed out. All four heads turned to look at him.

"Where did you come from!?" Scar asked, in that void space between shock and exasperation.

"Yeah, appearing out of nowhere is my job." Etho protested.

"Bad bird." Keralis shrugged, nodding to the parrot that was suddenly flying off as fast as its little wings could carry it.

Meanwhile, in the brainy bird who isn't a bird-brain's bird-shaped bird brain...

He flew away as quickly as he could. Why birds had to use such an inefficient method of flight was a mystery to him, but he couldn't fly better until he was out of sight. So he flapped away, soaring across — and there was a door into a back room, with a perfectly parrot-sized window he could escape through! He grinned, as much as something with a beak can grin, and flew through.

He found himself in some kind of storage room, where someone had magically insulated everything. What a perfect opportunity to cause chaos. With a few magically-laden parrot-noises, he shifted back into his natural form, spreading his own wings and lifting off of the ground. With a wave of his hand, the insulation was dispelled, and-

The door burst open, kicked down by Stress. Cub and Keralis were right behind her, with Etho and Scar covering their backs. They all glowered at him, and he sighed, setting back down on the ground, caught blue-handed.

"Aw..." Querat muttered dejectedly, trying to evoke some sympathy from the faces glaring at him. "Why so cold?"

This had pretty much the opposite effect of what he intended.

I did mention that this was timeline Q.

That's not to say that everything in timeline Q is gonna be Querat's fault, but if I mention it upfront, the little rat is probably gonna be involved somehow.

I've been Entropy, peace out from the present!