oceans of tears and gales of laughter

[OOC: May and Jewel played by and © Soteria; Memo and Hollywood played by and © Blueflyer.]

The day had dawned cool and fresh as any other, but now the sun was high in the sky and the heat had been intensifying with every hour of its climb. Yeesh, the young woman thought, lifting her legs high to step through the long grass without tripping up. Behind her, the White Foam River burbled gently along its course, and beyond that was the town that she and her companions had left behind. Her thin cotton shirt was soaked with sweat, and she was wishing she hadn't chosen to wear her denim cutoffs.

I mean, I hoped it wouldn't rain today, but this might be just as awful.

Yet May had insisted they try anyway. Don't let the sun spoil their plans for a picnic. Johnny was out of town visiting his family, so it was just the pair of them. Beth pushed strands of her curly brown hair out of her eyes as she gazed ruefully ahead at her friend, a slight wry smile on her face. Hefting the picnic basket on her shoulder, she kept walking steadily. May had said she knew of a good place out here where they could sit and eat and enjoy the relatively unspoiled beauty of the countryside surrounding the town.

Oh well. It was probably good she should come back here again. Closure, perhaps, she might find here.

The last time she had been on the other side of the river, she had nearly cried herself hoarse calling for her lost dogs. She had gone as far as she dared, had enlisted the help of people to search the area. But even of the great monster dog there had been no sign. Beth sighed. It still tightened her chest, being here again. Winter had come and gone, and she was beginning to wonder if Penny and Wings were even alive. She had heard of whippets surviving as strays on instincts alone, but this was the wilderness with its maze of field and forest. So much could happen here to an animal that wasn't familiar with its surroundings. And Penny and Wings had certainly never been here before.

Beth sniffed, rubbing a sweat-grimed arm across her face somewhat crossly. It'd probably never stop hurting, but all she could do was keep going.

----------------------

That awful whining buzz, followed by the tickle of tiny legs on her ear. Irritably, the copper coloured whippet flicked the ear in question, but the fly only buzzed around some more before coming to rest again. With a half-snarl, Penny shook her entire head and snapped at the tickling thing. This was no time for her to have to deal with such pests. It was too warm this day, and despite Penny's short coat her breath was coming in heavy pants as she lay on her side, in her own whelping corner of the den.

The puppies were moaning and crying at her from the curve of her body in which they lay, and she put her ears back in consternation. She had already suckled them that day; she had no more milk to give. Why did they cry so? How could they still be hungry? Penny too whined low in her throat. The noises tore at her heart, but she too was hungry. Even with the fine feasting they had had a week ago when they were first born, feeding these six pups had proved to be hard work. It seemed they did nothing but hunt now. Penny sorely missed running and hunting with the rest, missed being part of the warm cosy pile they had all curled into every night. Together, that way, they had weathered the winter relatively unscathed. Ironically enough their hardships had seemed to come with the spring.

"Shh... shh," she whined fretfully, nuzzling and licking at them to try and still them and their hunger, their noise! One of the dog pups, the largest and firstborn, had managed to drag himself halfway up her flank, and she gently put him back in his place. Turning her face towards the entrance, she waited, longingly, for her companions to return.

( hitch a ride on the back of a butterfly, there's no better way to fly, to get to me )

[OOC: more whippetyplotty things going down at the old mushroom grove. :O
Hollywood (at least in this form) and Memo written by and © to BlueFlyer, Penny and Wings written by and © Shelley "Swift Whippet" L.]

The day was the warmest yet. Penny's jaws were parted, her tongue lolling, not her usual open mouthed canine grin but an uncomfortable grimace that showed only too clearly how much discomfort she felt. Over the past months she had begun to suspect what had happened to her, and now that she knew it to be so, she was terrified. Surely she was too young for this. Her body felt huge and uncomfortably bloated, and it had been swelling more and more by the day. She felt helpless, like a ripe fruit or an overfed rat.

Not that Wings hadn't helped. He had taken pains to be kind and gentle to her, and lately he had been hunting for her as well now that she wasn't as fast as she was. She had appreciated it very much, though it annoyed her a great deal that she couldn't run as fast and as far as she had before. The other dogs, too, had been sympathetic in their own ways, though Penny could have sworn she detected some degree of coldness from Hollywood. But she was too worried to care about that right now.

Now, here she was, lying in the shelter of their den, in her own corner that she had lately been preparing, scratching around in the now-soft earth to make a small hollow for herself. That alone was telling her that her time was near. The pups were moving inside her; she could feel them as they shifted, and was it just her imagination or had their movements become more and more vigorous over the past few days? Penny didn't know anymore. She curled herself around her bloated belly, feeling uncertain and rather scared.

( and i will shine on, for everyone )

[Memo and Hollywood played by and © Blueflyer.]

She had started acting strange about a week ago.

All that time she had been somewhat more playful with him than she had been in a long time, and he had responded in kind. But all he had to do was tread one hair wrong and she'd start growsing at him to go away, and he would promptly -- albeit bewilderedly -- obey. Sometimes she'd even chase him a few steps, her teeth flashing -- just the other day she had caught him on the neck, and it still smarted, since he could never quite get at it properly with his tongue. Honestly, he had no words to explain this new development in her behaviour.

What was even more strange was how he wanted to be around her all the time now, for all her fickleness.

He had had even less luck explaining that, beyond the idea that something in her was calling to something in him. But she would never have any of it, so really how true could that be? And yet, the compulsion remained. Not only that, but she had been demanding more and more space with each passing day. First the corner, then half the space, and today he had just been forcibly ejected from the sheltered hollow behind a rocky bluff that had been their home for some time already.

He had retired to this place where the air was sweet and it was relatively warm, and had just lain in the grass to ponder. Failing to come up with any kind of explanation for this, he let his thoughts drift as he used to do. The winter had just been one long drawn-out neither-day-nor-night of running and hunting and eating and sheltering, and he had no time at all to simply think. Having that time, now, was somewhat refreshing.

Wings? Was that his name, was that who he was? It seemed so strange and foreign to him now, in this place where nobody seemed to need names at all. He knew his companions' voices, he knew their scents, he could tell who they each were at a distance just by their silhouettes and the way that they moved, friend or stranger. He knew the way that they hunted together, knew their techniques and their strengths and their weaknesses, knew how they could all work together to get what everybody wanted in this time and place: food. He knew that they each knew him the same way. And that was enough.

Penny. Hollywood. Memo. It all seemed like part of a distant world, like something he had been once, but was no longer. That world, whatever it may have been, was gone. She, his fiery red She, was the only thread of his old life that had not frayed and disappeared behind him. Now there was only cold and hunger baying at them from all sides, and all they could do was to keep on running as fast as they could go.

The seal and white whippet raised his sleek head from his paws to gaze about him. Yes. Now, this was all there was, and moments like this were all that he had of his own.

( the most she will do is throw shadows at you but she's always a woman to me )

[MG RP. Memo and Hollywood's parts written by Blueflyer.]

He had been here before; perhaps that had been the reason why his feet had led him here unerringly through the night. He had not known entirely where he was going, but he only knew that they had to leave that horrible place with its horrible beast. Anywhere would be better. They needed a sheltered place where they might rest, and curl up together for warmth, and where he might find such a place he did not know, but he had set off walking to where his legs might carry him, and he had found for them both a shallow, scooped-out hollow between the roots of a tall tree just big enough for both of them to huddle together inside. Things always seemed different in the dark, though the pale face of the moon seemed to him more sinister than it had before due to what had transpired in the night. It was almost as if the damn thing were laughing at their misfortune.

And yet, as the morning rose upon the field of tall grasses with their light dusting of frost, he felt that strange familiarity settle over him as he regarded it, and all of a sudden he realised why his own instincts had taken him here. He remembered the sighting, the spring of the soft earth beneath his paws. The chase, the bones crunching in his jaws and the taste of blood. He remembered his instructor in the hunt, the tall, wise, kind, red and white courser of the noble profile and the fine upstanding ears, swift of foot and of jaw, and more wily than any rabbit. Penny would have liked him.

The copper-coloured bitch stirred beside him, and he nosed softly at her dark-tinged ear. His companion opened her narrow jaws wide in a delicate yawn before shaking her head blearily. "Whass 'appenin'?"

"Come now. We must go and get food."

Penny's eyes were still very large and dark, and she trembled slightly for whatever reason she could not quite remember, but she stood up beside him and together they shook out their sore muscles, preparing to trot off into the grass in search of an unlucky rabbit.

( it's yet to be determined, but the air is thick and my hope is feeling worn )

[OOC: 'Dawg', 'Mushroom Grove' and all related elements © theWhisper.]

It began as any other night might have. It was dark outside, and the air was cold, but the leashes were out and the coats were on, and Johnny was waiting at the door with their beloved friend, Dusty, also on leash and in coat. What else could this all mean but an expedition? And who were they to pass up an expedition?

Cari wasn’t coming of course, not that she minded this time. She simply regarded them sleepily from her blanket by the radiator, purred good-naturedly at them and closed her eyes again. It was certainly odd to see the Van so relaxed about not being invited on a walk, but there it was. Beth seemed perfectly happy to leave her there; she was talking to them in that high excited voice, saying ‘walk’, ‘walk’, ‘walk’. ‘Johnny’, ‘Dusty’, ‘friend’, ‘car’, ‘walk’. That was really as much as they needed to understand, and tails wagging furiously, they charged out the door.

Dusty greeted them avidly, and together the three of them piled into the car door that was held open for them. Together they curled up on the seats, smelling of leather and Johnny and Dusty and some strange sort of flower, eager for adventure. Penny pressed her nose to the window, her ears high. Wings sat up, peering over her shoulder out into the dark, and Dusty whined eagerly. This sort of thing didn’t happen often, and they were going to milk it to the full.

As the car engine roared into life, and they swayed out of the driveway and away, the dogs braced themselves against each other into the turns, always scrambling across the seat and piling themselves atop one another to watch the world blurring past them, fast, faster, faster than any of them could run. The excitement was mounting by the minute, bubbling within them all. Travelling this way was all very well, but just wait until they got outside! The wind in their ears and faces, the crystal air in their lungs, the feel of the earth thudding satisfyingly against their paws as they launched themselves into the air with each flying stride.

“Wonder where we’re going?”

“It’s not the park, surely? We’ve been in the car too long for that.”

“Oh, oh, I bet it’s the beach. Ahah, see look, I told you, I told you I told you! Oh, smashing!”

( have you danced with the devil in the pale moonlight? )

"Bye!" Penny called gaily to the Chihuahua pair, as Wings wagged his tail in farewell.

He turned his head to gaze briefly at Penny's sleek, fine head with its dark expressive eyes, and ears that lay flat in the showring and stood up every which way when she was anywhere else. His tail swept back and forth one more time, thoughtfully, as he considered her. It was so good that they weren't like Geraldo and Isa, fighting like tomcats and having to make up later. True, the two of them had had their moments, especially at first, but they'd never really fallen out in that manner. Why, getting to know her as he had done over the time she had lived with him, he considered her a valuable friend and packmate, his best friend in many ways. There was Beth, of course, but then Beth wasn't a dog...

Penny would make such a fantastic mother.

( something in the way she moves me )

Wings glanced dubiously at the red whippet bitch before him. Normally he was all too happy to meet other whippets, but there was something about this one that made him think twice before his usual pleasant greeting. Something about her stance, that fiercely proud posture and the way she held her head. The look in her dark eyes was the challenging gaze of a hunter. This was a bitch who clearly felt she was in charge of things – and wouldn’t hesitate to let anyone else know about it. As she was somewhat smaller and more slightly-built than he was, this disconcerted him somewhat.

Nonetheless, he stepped forward, wagging his tail low to convince her he wasn’t a threat, and extended his nose to sniff hers. She responded by stepping back a pace, ears folded.

“Hang on a minute! Getting a bit forward, are we?”

( and you don't pull my strings 'cause i'm a better man )