[Mica]

Hawkfur
WindClan Fury
he/him | 49 moons
[Russet tabby with tuxedo markings and sky blue eyes ]
Purrks: Flock Together T3, Beefed Up T1
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[Crowtooth - @Rani ] [Rabbitpaw - @Dolomedes ]
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Rabbitpaw seemed so calm and collected--even eager for this. Hawkfur massively envied the young tom and his bravery. He could tell he and Crowtooth got along well, and even through his anxiety he felt a little smile twitch on his muzzle. He wished he had an apprentice he got along with so well. Locustpaw and Rosemarypaw had both disappeared without a trace. Maybe, if he received another apprentice, they would be just as into rabbit hunting as he was, like Crowtooth and Rabbitpaw with tunneling.

The group delved into the tunnels, Hawkfur taking up the rear--Rabbitpaw seemed eager to go in and Hawkfur just really did not want to be the one in the middle--Crowtooth's callouts giving them a path to travel.

His eyes strained desperately to make out the shapes of his companions in the pitch, but to no avail. It felt like someone was laying over his vision, and no matter how wide he kept his eyes, there simply was not enough light to see by. He bumped into a wall as they took a turn, unable to see the sharp curve. He clicked in his throat, annoyance and embarrassment warming his big ears. Dust fell onto his shoulder from his brush against the wall, and suddenly he was overly aware of every movement around him. He felt panic bubbling again in his chest, and as a reflex scrunched his eyes shut. Surprisingly, that... sort of helped. Instead of being involuntarily blind, keeping his eyes shut gave him a sense of control over the situation. Now he was less fixated on his lack of sight and could actually use his other senses.

Eyes closed, Hawkfur dipped his head to the floor and let his whiskers brush along the ground. The position strained his neck and he wasn't a huge fan of it, but it did help keep his large paws from tripping over bumps in the tunnel floor. His tufted ears swiveled this way and that, following the echoes of Crowtooth's voice as they reverberated down the passages. He didn't bump into anything after that.

Crowtooth began talking about soil types, though admittedly Hawkfur was a little stuck on the idea of rocks falling from the ceiling and killing you. But that was fine. They weren't by the pines! Right? He didn't think they traveled that far. The idea of tunneling in sand was curious to him. Using supports? He wondered how tunnelers were able to effectively do that when they couldn't see where they were putting the supports. Another tick in the list of reasons that tunnelers should be respected.

Something Crowtooth had said previously pinged in his brain, and Hawkfur opened his jaws to scent the air. He was hit with the overwhelming scent of Crowtooth and Rabbitpaw, but beyond that there were scents of other cats that should have been staler than they were, unless a patrol had gone in not long before he did. Rabbits and voles were another thing he scented, and if he hadn't known that scents last longer here, he would have immediately whirled around looking for them. Everything was so overwhelming down here! And look at that, he was so focused on sensing his surroundings that he had completely forgotten about his anxiety!

Oh wait.