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Who: Aaron + Liam
What: Getting horses in London
When: After the hair shows up, before things get too chatotic.
Where: London!

"We're going to investigate the subways, aren't we?" asks Aaron, as he keeps pace with Liam down a London street. The past few weeks have been fantastic, honestly -- Aaron doesn't know when he's been so content. Being out of doors, seeing places he's never seen, being in good company, the future only a vague worry, it's all been good for him. Not even that one wolpertinger they had stumbled across put a damper on it.He's a little worried that he wasn't able to detect any underground creatures, and their existence is still a nagging fear, but this extended camping trip is what has made Aaron finally feel ready to take on the real world and its mysteries again. There's a spring in his step and confidence in his voice.

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Liam is similarly getting jittery as they go deeper into the subway. He does his best to hide it, even though he notices that Aaron is uncomfortable as well. He stays quiet... that is, until his sensitive hearing picks up on a noise. He gestures for Aaron to stop as he listens.

It's not too much longer before a quiet click clack can be heard even to normal ears. The Elf can feel the panic start to well up in his chest, and he reaches back for one of his long white knives.]

Aaron is afraid, yes -- but he's a naturally cautious individual. It's true that he can't see much in the dim underground, but where elf eyes fail, Ranger ears might do a little better. He reaches out to put a cautionary hand on Liam's shoulder, a wordless wait.

Then, he drops to the ground, putting his ear to it and closing his eyes.

Both Aaron and Aragorn recognize that sound.

"Horses," he whispers to Liam. "Two of them, coming this way. I don't know if they have riders."

The Elf sees the horses before Aaron speaks, but the idea of horses in a subway are mind boggling, so he just stares. At his friends words, he snaps out of it.

"Duh," he says immediately. "Yeah, there's two, but they don't have anybody riding them. One's white and one's brown."

....wow, that exchange is really familiar. Aaron freezes for a moment as the memories come rushing back.

"Well, I'll be damned. Some things never change," he says, climbing to his feet. "This isn't the first time you've been an ass about that, but maybe your elf-eyes can tell me something useful, like how they got down here." They certainly weren't a result of Aaron's pulse just now.

The memory of that time also hits him, and he can't repress a small "heh" and raise a hand to cover an amused smile. "...Yeah that was pretty funny."

Now he steps forward into the darkness, his eyes adjusting to the lack of light quickly enough to let him see where he was going. He calls back to Aaron, voice echoing slightly.

"You're just jealous that you can't see forever too."

It's not too long before Liam is walking back out with two horses behind him. The white one without a saddle stays particularly close to the Elf.

"....I only recognize the white one," says Aaron, surprised. "You should, too, if you remembered what I did. Do you know the other one?"

The brown one stretches its neck out towards Aaron, and if Liam isn't leading it or lets it go, it will trot towards him. If not, it'll willfully pull until it's released.

Liam lets go of the brown horse just as it starts to pull, immediately knowing what it wanted. He laughs a little, then nods to the animal approaching Aaron.

"He knows you." He looks up to the white horse for a moment, then back at Aaron. "I don't know about remember, but I know he's mine. I wonder if..."

Before he finishes that thought, he hops up onto the horse's back in a fluid movement. Thankfully, the horse doesn't seem to mind, and Liam actually looks pretty natural up there.

"Sweet! New ride."

...well. Wasn't that convenient. Aaron hasn't been around horses for many years, excepting the trip with Cinderella, but it's clear this horse does know him. He swings up into the saddle himself and settles there, reaching out to pat the horse's neck.

He feels like he should know this fellow's name, and feels oddly ashamed that he doesn't.

"They'll let us make better time, at least, though we'll have to go a little further to get them out." A shift in his weight, a nudge with his heels, and the horse is moving forward, deeper into the tunnel.

Unlike Aaron's horse, the white one doesn't have a saddle or reigns. Still he seems securely balanced. He gives the horse a light kick to get it moving... which it does, but only for a short while. Liam speaks to the horse. "Dude, follow Aaron."

The horse makes a disgruntled noise. What follows is what appears to be a one sided conversation;

"No I don't have any food... I said I don't have any food... No, horsey I got nothing." He sighs and switches to Sindarin. "I have nothing for you! Did you not hear me?!"

Now Liam makes a frustrated groan "Why can't they ever understand me? Ugh, this is going to be a pain in the ass."

Aaron watches with an amused smile. He has no hard feelings about the incident, of course, but it feels a little like payback for Liam showing off earlier.

"There will be no food until the end of the journey," he says in the same language. He doesn't know that he has the animal-communication aspect of SIndarin back, but there is something in his memories of Aragorn, a piece of knowledge that says that the Elves can speak with animals in the elf-tongues. Aaron thinks that perhaps if the horse hears it from both Mom and Dad, it will listen. "Come with us and consent to bear us, and we will see that you are fed."

The white horse snorts and reluctantly heeds Aaron's command. Under his breath, Liam mutters. "No fair. You're my horse."

After that he has no trouble staying well balanced on the horse as it walks just behind Aaron's. There's a light spot up ahead, but already he could see that there was another dark stretch beyond it.

Aaron chuckles as he turns his own horse around and leads the way down the tunnel -- a thought crosses his mind that basically amounts to you may have elf-eyes, but a man's tongue is not without its uses, but decides not to voice it, because it sounds really gay. Like seriously.

He'll go down the tunnel, passing through the patches of light and dark, taking out a flashlight when it's too dark for his normal human eyes to see through, until he notices something strange. He stops and sniffs.

"Do you smell that? It smells different in this part of the tunnel."

Liam's horse stops with Aaron's. "Yeah, but subways can smell kind of funky sometimes..."

Liam pauses to consider what to do. Rather excited about the trip they've been having and his new found echo-horse, he decides to just push on forward.

"You want to go closer to the tracks?"

Aaron nods.

He's with Liam: possibly in a less excited and more determined way, but they are here to investigate, and he's not going to turn back because of a weird smell. Not when it might be what they're looking for.

(The tunnel itself is wide enough that Aaron can keep a lid on the dull sense of dread that hasn't really gone away. God, he doesn't like seeking out evidence of an Animal in an underground tunnel; his memories of Aragorn have only compounded his nervousness in small or underground places. He's glad he hasn't had another horrible flashback yet, but he can't deny that it's still possible. Every time he's gone underground with Echoes. Every time.)

He rides forward, going deeper into the tunnel and moving closer to the rails. Aaron flicks the flashlight on and shines it ahead of them, moving the beam over the walls and down into the train-tracks, bright enough to get a good look.

It's when they're closer to the tracks that the air begins to get stale. That's when Liam starts to feel a bit claustrophobic. He didn't exactly enjoy living in the mountain in Vegas, it had upped his tolerance some after a while. Still, underground was not his favorite, and the lack of free air had him a little on edge.

He keeps quiet, some of the enthusiasm fading as they go deeper into the tunnel. Then, something catches his attention in one of the passes of the flashlight. Was that... hair?

Liam keeps his voice low. "Dude, wait. I see something." He holds out his hand for the flashlight, asking for it silently.

"Careful," he murmurs, voice just as low: he hands the flashlight to Liam but will keep close, following Liam and the beam of light as he investigates.

Liam shines the flashlight down the tunnel. Ever since his eyes had changed, he could see quite a far distance, however the light only went so far.

"It looks like hair, or maybe fur? It's still pretty far down there, I think we can ride a little longer."

He tries to lead the white horse on, but he's not cooperative.

"...Aaron, can you help me out here?"

...Aaron thinks, for a moment, about how surreal it is that now his job is to talk to horses.

"I don't know if it will work again, but I'll try," he says, a little skeptically. "Come, friend, we have need of you. You cannot go back, and you cannot stay. You can only go forward. We will come out to light and air and food at the end of the journey."

Liam would prefer it if he could talk to his own horse, personally, but now wasn't the time to dwell on it. The white horse moves forward again, though reluctantly. As they move closer, Liam can see more clearly what's down on the tracks.

"Okay, yeah, it's hair." he keeps his voice low, and continues forward until the tracks next to them are practically covered in it.

"Uh..." The Elf gives Aaron a look that asks Any ideas, dude? And yes, the 'dude' was portrayed in his eyes.

What in the name of--

"I've never seen anything like this," Aaron says. He swings off his horse and crouches down by the tracks. "What sort of animal could be responsible?" The ones in America had been a crustacean and a snake. Aaron is running through all the animals he knows, wondering what familiar thing this could be related to.

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closed!

horsey?

horsies!!

pffft I see what you did there...

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I AM SO SORRY FOR THE LATE

YOU FINE BRO