Archainn Tunnels hello sleepwalkers

@Sven this is basically batman begins

His ears faltered for a second, and she was suddenly very sure his answer would be a no but she held onto bottom lip to keep it from protruding. There were probably a lot of things on this kid's to do list, and his parents probably wanted him home or something. There were plenty of good reasons, though none of them were good enough to soothe the painful thumps in her chest. In her quickly floundering mood, she nearly missed the developing smile on the pale face before her. The nod was the only confirmation she needed, and she leapt to her feet excitedly, already beginning to consider which direction seemed the most promising. 

1.  Behind her, the way she came: not exciting
2.  Behind Sven, the way he had come: exciting for her but probably not for him.
3. To their left: pitch black
4. To their right: also pretty black, for all intents and purposes identical to the left
   

Right it was, then! She would have picked the path even if Sven hadn't offered the lead to her. "Come on," she chirped. Bounding past him through the darkening tunnel mouth, leaving behind the hole in the ceiling and gushing sounds of the water. "Hope y' know your lefts from your rights! I don't. So it's your job to remember which way I go so we don't die in here." Despite the fatalistic statements, her attitude was as chipper as ever. Getting lost and dying in the tunnels was not even a possibility, to her.

Above her head there was a weird rummaging sound, like lots of tiny bodies making little pips and muffled screeches. They did not sound like wolf sounds, and at any rate she was not sure that wolves could climb rocks that were so smooth and steeply curved. "So, Sven, I was thinkin--" the dark girl began to say, but stopped suddenly when she felt air rushing over her head. Whatever it was, it was too dark to see and it vanished instantly. Rather than ducking, she straightened a little, which was an unfortunate choice. Another creature whizzed right past her, knocking her ear. "WHAT THE"

has not seen batman doesn't really get bit by a bat does he?

SVEN ARCHER

& the night is closing in

It felt odd that his responses could instill such joy in another wolf. Sven watched her with growing interest, his smile increasing subtly in size the longer he did. Why couldn't his age-mate aunts and uncle have been like this girl? At least now he had something of proof that it was most likely their problem that had separated them and not his.

His head turned to watch her launch past him before his body followed. He kept pace with her, walking parallel to her flank so long as the width of the tunnel she had chosen allowed. The darkness that enveloped them was more complete than any he had known before, but he hadn't been scared before on his own and certainly wouldn't be now with such bubbly company leading the way. Even her airy assignment to him of keeping them alive did nothing but broaden his smile. What a charmingly odd girl.

Dutifully he began to commit their steps to memory, happy too that she would trust him with such a task, even if her tone spoke to him that she wasn't all that serious about the possible fatality these tunnels could provide. He used his nose as well, monitoring how the fresh air that had filtered into the cavern they were leaving behind was dissipating. This was his focus until odd sounds began to creep into his ears.

There wasn't an air current available to move anything inanimate, and so it must have been that the noises came from something living and unidentified. For the first time since entering the tunnel system, Sven became unnerved. Sahalie's voice abruptly entering the air nearly made him jump, a job that the hurricane her startling words brought on certainly finished. It was just a few at first, but then the girl exclaimed and a whole lot more of something broke off of the ceiling and swarmed around and past their heads. The sheer unknowing set Sven into flight mode, but he could at least tell that whatever they were was above, and therefore his mind hollered that they needed to get down.

Landing a forelimb across Sahalie's shoulders, Sven attempted to pull his new friend down into a crouch with him as he hissed, "Duck!"

@Sven /giggles to self

Save for the one that grazed her ear, in the seconds following her exclamation she was not hit again. The girl could, however, hear many, many more above her head flapping and screeching at a frequency that hurt her ears. She had never heard anything so shrill before. Sven's leg was on her now, pushing her down as he said, "Duck!" Loudly—since the flapping and screeching itself was hard to overcome—the girl responded to her friend, "What? I don't think they're ducks! Ducks quack. These are probably some different sort of bird."

By the time she stopped shouting she realized the cloud of shrill birds was already gone and her voice was now the only thing echoing off the smoothed walls of the cave. She shrunk down a little, uttering a small "sorry" to her friend for abusing his ears.

Sahalie pulled herself back to her feet. "Uhm, anyway, what I was thinking was that. Maybe we could name these tunnels after us." She stared at him expectantly for a moment before realizing she should explain herself more. "Like. Svalie Tunnels or something. Ya know, since the two of us found 'em and all? Sv for Sven and Alie for Sahalie." Though he probably didn't need it broken up in so much detail. It was pretty obvious. She chewed on her lips.

"They can be our tunnels."

SVEN ARCHER

& the night is closing in

His ears flattened against his head, both against the sound and the attempt to make himself as small as possible so that whatever it was didn't nail him. It sounded an awful lot like wings, and he began to think they must be birds. He'd seen owls burrow before, so it made sense that they'd live down here, right? But where were they coming from, where would they perch? Was there another cavern nearby?

At least somewhat recognizing the startled monsters made him feel a bit better and less scared, and that the storm passed without either of them being harmed. Sahalie was yelling something and as the last of them left and took the roaring echoes with them, her words became intelligible to his far-less rattled mind; something about ducks and the same conclusion he had come to.

Leg off her shoulders and leaning away from her volume, his widened eyes stared at her for a moment before a relieved giggle escaped his jaws. She was so... different from the severe wolves he'd grown up with. That made her weird, but instead of confusing him it just made him smile, confirming that it was in a good way.

"My bad," he muttered amiably under his breath, rather than explaining what he had meant. Had it been any of his other age-mates he knew, he would have been damn sure they were aware he had not been wrong.

Sven hoisted himself back up and shook out his fur, before Sahalie's voice echoed around him once more. Name the tunnels? Hey, that would be pretty cool. That would make these his, or well, theirs. She further went on about her idea, reinforcing this amended thought of his and even suggesting they name it after themselves. Awesome.

"Yeah!" he agreed, tail picking up with a wag. "Our tunnels. That'd be badass.

Svalie is kind of hard to pronounce, though... 'cuz my name. Maybe, um... Archainn?"

@Sven

Luckily her new friend needed no additional convincing as the enthusiasm spread about his body. Her brilliant smile reappeared with the punctuated "yeah!" glad that someone else liked her ideas. Sometimes she was very worried that others—the adults in particular—thought she was quite silly. However her left ear made a subtle twitch to hear such a harsh word like ass used in such a cavalier, yet jovial manner. She kept herself from startling, but wondered what sort of upbringing Sven was experiencing. What did badass really mean, anyway? How could a negative word like bad and a badbad word like ass be said with such a happy expression?

This was not worth dwelling on. She had a tunnel to name!

Sven did have a point. The Sv sound was a little complicated to produce, unnecessarily so. She gave a curt bob of her head. Her face began to blossom when he spoke his own suggestion: Archainn. Immediately she understood it: the Arch from Archer and the Ainn from Tainn. It sounded a whole lot better than Svalie. It also meant a lot more than just the two of them. This name was backed by the legacy of two strong, historic families. This name mattered. "Then it is agreed!" she pronounced in a very official tone. "Archtainn Tunnels it is!"

Unable to take herself very seriously, the girl's pretense dissolved quickly into giggles. After several moments, though, she stopped as if she were suddenly aware of where she was for the first time: a dark tunnel God knows where. With a boy. With Sven. Another bubble of laughter, slightly more nervous, burst from her, "I like you Sven. You're fun. And a good navigator."

"We should do this again sometime. Go out and find places to name." 

(This post was last modified: Jun 24, 2016, 01:47 AM by Sahalie.)

SVEN ARCHER

& the night is closing in

His grin grew as she confirmed his suggestion, making it official. Archainn Tunnels, their tunnels. That was so "Awesome."

Even though she then started laughing, he was starting to feel comfortable enough around her to not take the sound personally. She wasn't laughing at him or his idea or how impressive this discovery was, she was just happy and that purity made it infectious. But then the lilting sound changed a little bit, and his smile faltered for a second before words took its place and made him feel good all over again.

She liked him, thought he was fun, and skilled at something useful. Yeah, he could definitely get used to being complimented like that. His tail was wagging heartily now as he beamed at her. He had a friend.

"Definitely. I'll come back and see you again, I promise," he told her, and Sven Archer never made a vow he did not mean.