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Description
Mogar stared unhappily out from under the bear muzzle that rested atop his head.
Elena could not help but laugh at the tokota's clearly disgruntled expression. “It could be worse” she said, smiling broadly. “I could have put you in a tutu or you could be wearing Khrysos' costume.”

Huffing his displeasure, Mogar stood up a little straighter, she was right after all, at least he was not the one that had gotten stuck wearing candy corn. Instead he had been dressed up as his name-sake, Mogar, who had many references throughout Achievement Hunter, especially in the minecraft let's plays, but his costume was based on the one created for the animated show X-Ray and Vav.

Really, it was only the bear pelt that annoyed him, the fur kept itching and the head of the bear felt uncomfortable between his ears. The hand-paints that had been freshly applied for this event, well he had grown used to such things a long time ago, ever since he had been named he had been painted. As usual the paint consisted of two stripes of red wrapped around his front left leg, and a singular ring on his right. There were also two triangular stripes on both sides of his face, the points facing towards his neck, the paint blending into the fur on his cheeks. One thing that was different about his paints was that instead of the typical hand print on his hindquarters there was the paw-print of a bear that had taken Elena many treats to get Mogar to hold still so she could get all the details just right.

The bear pelt was brown, though it was lighter and more red then Mogar's darker brown fur, and had been modified to Elena's needs – it now held pockets for storing items, and she had attached some stirrups to the pelt sewing them firmly into place. There were small straps buckled around Mogar's waist to keep the bear pelt in place and it was also attached at the front of his chest by a red gem that hid some lacing that also helped keep the whole costume on the tokota. Mogar also wore a black hackamore that blended in with his fur, the reins resting on his shoulders for Elena to take up once she was riding him.

On Mogar's legs, lower then the paints were protective wraps in a tawny color from the hide of a dear with the fur of a fox carefully sewn and glued on at the top. The back legs were also wrapped in the same hide, though those wraps also covered his heels and part of the tokota's toes, and both areas were dyed a lighter creamy color.

A feeling of pride swelled up in Elena as she looked at her handiwork, all her effort put on display convincing her it had all been worth while. The individual pieces may have looked simple, but all taken many hours – tanning, curing, sewing, and swearing to put it all together, though of course Elena had her friends to thank in their help, and while they had taken the pelts to a tanner for the tanning and curing the cost of doing so had not been cheap. In Elena's opinion Mogar cut a very handsome figure all decked out like this and in the back of her mind she was already ticking off events they could go to and use this costume at again.

As for her own costume, well she would not be changing into it out here in the open, it was too cold for that. So leaving Mogar with strict instructions not to get into any trouble she went into the cabin where she had stored her costume, changing into it quickly.

She had chosen to dress as Mogar's sword, though instead of making the literal costume and dealing with a bulky outfit she had decided to take a simpler approach, after all she had to ride Mogar - this was no costume contest where the outfits could be impractical and she did not want to deal with her outfit getting in the way. Leaving her underwear, black long johns and white tank top in place for added warm she put on the silvery tracksuit she had bought to represent the silver sword Mogar used in X-Ray and Vav. Next she put on the most bulky part of her costume, the cloth she had sewn and stuffed to look like the sword's handle that went around her neck loosely, the handle pressing on the back of her head gently, the stuffing inside making it stable, but flexible. Another red gem adorned the middle of the handle which was mostly blue, but had some brown wrapping around the neck of it. She had not dyed her black hair, figuring it would blend in enough with the brown and blue of the handle not to make much of a difference.
She wore silvery gloves as well, and while she had not managed to find silver boots they were the same tawny color as Mogar's leg wraps.

Just because Elena was wearing a costume though did not mean she skimped on safety, she had made sure her outfit had a lot of pockets besides the pockets she had sewn into the bear pelt. The pockets held objects such as a water bottle, snacks for her and treats for Mogar. A flashlight, extra batteries, a smaller pen light that you could shake to recharge, a knife, waterproof matches, tinderbox. Some extra leather ties just in case any on Mogar's costume broke, a pack of needles in a little tin along with some thread and other various supplies, nothing too large of course, but it was better to be prepared.

She re-joined Mogar outside, pleased to see the tokota had not gotten into any trouble or messed up his costume she quickly rewarded him with a small treat, rechecked her supplies then mounted up taking a moment to test the stirrups and make sure she was comfortably situated in her makeshift saddle before she and Mogar joined the others in their search for the elusive Oogie Boogie. Oogie was a tawny colored shadow-marked half mane dire tokota, meaning he was significantly larger then Mogar so Elena honestly was not sure what the two of them would do when they found him, but she hoped it would be as simple as maybe tempting him with treats. So far she had not met a tokota that did not fall for treats, the way to their hearts usually proved to be through their bellies. Besides how many hiding places could there be for something larger then a horse? She guessed she was about to find out.

As she rode it took a bit to get used to holding both the flashlight and the reins, and she fumbled a bit with the reins before she decided that holding them in one hand and the flashlight in the other as she would do if she were holding a bow would be the best option. Still, keeping the flashlight steady did take a little getting used to and she had to yell sorry for blinding someone once when Mogar turned to look at their tokota but it did not take long before she got the hang of it.

There were the distant shouts of other riders in the woods and through the field, and flashlights swinging from side to side, some she saw without ever seeing the person holding the source, and she herself got blinded once, but generally once people could tell they were near other people they quickly went on their way. Still the variety of costumes she did see were quite intriguing, some were very practical and others well, they had obviously gone for style points, though without seeing the gear up close it was sometimes hard to tell what was practical.

Riding into the forest she could not help but notice even with her flashlight the forest was dark, though she had been expecting as much. There were also sounds she started to notice more and more the deeper into the forest she rode. At first it was the obvious sounds, the distant bat wings, the owl hooting, frogs croaking and various insect noises. Nothing there to scare her, she had spent many nights camping with and without a tokota and if anything the sounds reassured her.

No, it was the rustling of bushes, the distant snap of of a twig, that made her shiver. Elena was determined not to let the spooky surroundings get to her though and she quickly tried to think of things that could cause the sounds that were not so scary. Birds for example, though normally owls flew silently there could be other birds moving through the night. It could be a wild tokota, maybe even Oogie, or another rider with their tokota. There could be deer, squirrels, raccoons, possums, and a whole list of other woodland creature that caused these noises.

Mogar's presence also helped, if she had been along walking in the woods she might have turned back and tried to find another rider to hang out with by now but riding a horse sized animal that had claws and teeth and was not afraid to use them, well that was a real confidence booster.
Still she remained on her guard, and the occasional flicker of light from the distance reminded her she was not alone in the woods.

For a time the duo moved deeper into the woods, the trees clumping closer together, their lower branches sometimes brushing up against Elena's body, and once catching the fabric of the handle before she managed to carefully dislodge the offending branch and continue on. A low fog had rolled in, and while the full moon still shown she caught fewer and fewer glimpses of it and the night sky. It was the thorn bushes that halted her progress though. There was no sign they had been gone through by anything larger then perhaps a rabbit, so she doubted Oogie had been this way. She turned Mogar to the right, away from the bushes, hoping to come to a less dense area of the forest.

It was a surprise though when the two of them suddenly found themselves next to a looming cliff face, sheer rock meeting their gaze for many yards up. Elena backed up Mogar slightly to get a better look. Fog crept the sides of the cliff, and if she had been further away it may have given the cliff the appearance of floating, as it was it definitely blocked sight of any way up from here.
However the cliff side was rather large and not even trees had been able to grow on that surface so if she craned her neck she could see the moon's light silhouetting some brave trees that had managed to survive on the top of the cliff, but she could not see anything else up there so she turned away.

A howl pierced the air and Mogar spun around, his hackles raised, a low growl coming from deep in his throat. There on the top of the cliff was a large tokota sized shape, and another howl came, erasing any doubt Elena might have had that sound came from up above. Goosebumps covered Elena's arms and she shivered.

For a moment Elena was held in a sort of trance, but as the shape disappeared from sight she shook herself. Could that have been Oogie? The shape had certainty looked and sounded like a tokota. She kept glancing at the cliff as she formulated her and Mogar's next move, expecting whatever it was to be standing there watching her. She noticed in the back of her mind that the forest had gone eerily silent after the howl, and it did not help her now jittery nerves.

Coming to a decision she pushed Mogar forward, away from the thorn bushes, following the cliff side, and gradually the sounds of the forest returned as they walked. It was not far until Elena shone her flashlight and saw a darkness in the sheer cliff wall. Mogar picked up his pace and they were soon at the mouth of a very large cave. There they paused once more. Elena considered their options, they could keep looking for a way up, or they could go into the cave and see if it let to a way up or if Oogie was perhaps hiding inside? But what if the cave was home to something not so friendly? She dismounted Mogar and stared into his blue eyes. “What do you think Mogar? Do we go in?” The tokota sniffed the air and then the ground and walked a few paces forward into the cave, looked back as if to say well come on and continued walking forward slowly but with no other sign that the tokota had scented a predator nearby.

Taking a deep breath Elena followed suit, the ground was slightly slick and moss and mushrooms grew within the dark space, but there was no rancid smell to suggest this cave belonged to a bear, and no guano that would have been a sign that bats made this place their home.

Getting further and further away from the entrance Elena noticed that the cave was sloping upward. Perhaps this was a way to cliffs after all. A glimmer of orange caught her eye and she turned the flashlight to see some dried orange paint on one of the walls. Didn't Oogie have some orange paint on his shoulder?

As the tunnel continued upward the ceiling grew lower, but not by more then a few inches so that Mogar had to half-crawl upwards. Still the tokota did not turn back and the space was still wide enough that Mogar could easily turn around and Elena only had to duck in places. The low ceiling provided a second clue, once again suggesting they were on the right track, caught in some roots was tawny colored fur, definitely from a tokota, and it looked to be the right color for it to have come from Oogie.

Suddenly the ceiling rose and there was moonlight glimmering promisingly up ahead. A way out! Mogar quickly walked out of the hole, and Elena trotted to join him. They had come out on a wide ledge, the cave sloping back behind them, and a valley sprawled below them. There was another sheer cliff further to the right, and though Elena could not see where the cliffs met she guessed that these two cliffs had been hiding the valley from the rest of the world, or at least she did not remember it being on the map she had studied before she had volunteered for this expedition. The top of the cliff was only about 10 feet above them and a rough rocky path looked like it led all way up and the same path looked as though it went down into the valley.

She mounted Mogar once more, trusting the tokota's balance and instincts better then her own and allowed him to slowly make his way up to the cliff top. Once there she looked for more clues, though the plateau was by no means large, it was certainly large enough to comfortably fit at least three regular sized tokotas that the top along with the hardy trees that had made their stand here. Shining her flashlight behind a tree she was rewarded with what she had been looking for, a paw-print. Granted she could not tell if it had come from a dire tokota as it had gotten smeared over, but she was fairly convinced now that even if they were not hot on Oogie's trail they had found a hiding place of his.

Looking down from the cliff she could once again see flashes of light indicating other riders in the forest. However there were no such flashes in the valley, though the cave she had found had proved to be an easy way up there was no telling how close anyone else had been to it when the thing she believed to be Oogie had howled. It did not appear though that anyone else had yet found this place.

Taking a quick drink and snacking on a granola bar she also let Mogar eat and have a little snack, though she impatiently wanted to keep going, and she felt as if Oogie was slipping from her grasp with every passing second. Finally though she urged Mogar to head down the path that seemed to head into the forested valley.

They began their search, unaware of the gray eyes following their progress, simply watching and waiting.

Description
Mogar stared unhappily out from under the bear muzzle that rested atop his head.
Elena could not help but laugh at the tokota's clearly disgruntled expression. “It could be worse” she said, smiling broadly. “I could have put you in a tutu or you could be wearing Khrysos' costume.”

Huffing his displeasure, Mogar stood up a little straighter, she was right after all, at least he was not the one that had gotten stuck wearing candy corn. Instead he had been dressed up as his name-sake, Mogar, who had many references throughout Achievement Hunter, especially in the minecraft let's plays, but his costume was based on the one created for the animated show X-Ray and Vav.

Really, it was only the bear pelt that annoyed him, the fur kept itching and the head of the bear felt uncomfortable between his ears. The hand-paints that had been freshly applied for this event, well he had grown used to such things a long time ago, ever since he had been named he had been painted. As usual the paint consisted of two stripes of red wrapped around his front left leg, and a singular ring on his right. There were also two triangular stripes on both sides of his face, the points facing towards his neck, the paint blending into the fur on his cheeks. One thing that was different about his paints was that instead of the typical hand print on his hindquarters there was the paw-print of a bear that had taken Elena many treats to get Mogar to hold still so she could get all the details just right.

The bear pelt was brown, though it was lighter and more red then Mogar's darker brown fur, and had been modified to Elena's needs – it now held pockets for storing items, and she had attached some stirrups to the pelt sewing them firmly into place. There were small straps buckled around Mogar's waist to keep the bear pelt in place and it was also attached at the front of his chest by a red gem that hid some lacing that also helped keep the whole costume on the tokota. Mogar also wore a black hackamore that blended in with his fur, the reins resting on his shoulders for Elena to take up once she was riding him.

On Mogar's legs, lower then the paints were protective wraps in a tawny color from the hide of a dear with the fur of a fox carefully sewn and glued on at the top. The back legs were also wrapped in the same hide, though those wraps also covered his heels and part of the tokota's toes, and both areas were dyed a lighter creamy color.

A feeling of pride swelled up in Elena as she looked at her handiwork, all her effort put on display convincing her it had all been worth while. The individual pieces may have looked simple, but all taken many hours – tanning, curing, sewing, and swearing to put it all together, though of course Elena had her friends to thank in their help, and while they had taken the pelts to a tanner for the tanning and curing the cost of doing so had not been cheap. In Elena's opinion Mogar cut a very handsome figure all decked out like this and in the back of her mind she was already ticking off events they could go to and use this costume at again.

As for her own costume, well she would not be changing into it out here in the open, it was too cold for that. So leaving Mogar with strict instructions not to get into any trouble she went into the cabin where she had stored her costume, changing into it quickly.

She had chosen to dress as Mogar's sword, though instead of making the literal costume and dealing with a bulky outfit she had decided to take a simpler approach, after all she had to ride Mogar - this was no costume contest where the outfits could be impractical and she did not want to deal with her outfit getting in the way. Leaving her underwear, black long johns and white tank top in place for added warm she put on the silvery tracksuit she had bought to represent the silver sword Mogar used in X-Ray and Vav. Next she put on the most bulky part of her costume, the cloth she had sewn and stuffed to look like the sword's handle that went around her neck loosely, the handle pressing on the back of her head gently, the stuffing inside making it stable, but flexible. Another red gem adorned the middle of the handle which was mostly blue, but had some brown wrapping around the neck of it. She had not dyed her black hair, figuring it would blend in enough with the brown and blue of the handle not to make much of a difference.
She wore silvery gloves as well, and while she had not managed to find silver boots they were the same tawny color as Mogar's leg wraps.

Just because Elena was wearing a costume though did not mean she skimped on safety, she had made sure her outfit had a lot of pockets besides the pockets she had sewn into the bear pelt. The pockets held objects such as a water bottle, snacks for her and treats for Mogar. A flashlight, extra batteries, a smaller pen light that you could shake to recharge, a knife, waterproof matches, tinderbox. Some extra leather ties just in case any on Mogar's costume broke, a pack of needles in a little tin along with some thread and other various supplies, nothing too large of course, but it was better to be prepared.

She re-joined Mogar outside, pleased to see the tokota had not gotten into any trouble or messed up his costume she quickly rewarded him with a small treat, rechecked her supplies then mounted up taking a moment to test the stirrups and make sure she was comfortably situated in her makeshift saddle before she and Mogar joined the others in their search for the elusive Oogie Boogie. Oogie was a tawny colored shadow-marked half mane dire tokota, meaning he was significantly larger then Mogar so Elena honestly was not sure what the two of them would do when they found him, but she hoped it would be as simple as maybe tempting him with treats. So far she had not met a tokota that did not fall for treats, the way to their hearts usually proved to be through their bellies. Besides how many hiding places could there be for something larger then a horse? She guessed she was about to find out.

As she rode it took a bit to get used to holding both the flashlight and the reins, and she fumbled a bit with the reins before she decided that holding them in one hand and the flashlight in the other as she would do if she were holding a bow would be the best option. Still, keeping the flashlight steady did take a little getting used to and she had to yell sorry for blinding someone once when Mogar turned to look at their tokota but it did not take long before she got the hang of it.

There were the distant shouts of other riders in the woods and through the field, and flashlights swinging from side to side, some she saw without ever seeing the person holding the source, and she herself got blinded once, but generally once people could tell they were near other people they quickly went on their way. Still the variety of costumes she did see were quite intriguing, some were very practical and others well, they had obviously gone for style points, though without seeing the gear up close it was sometimes hard to tell what was practical.

Riding into the forest she could not help but notice even with her flashlight the forest was dark, though she had been expecting as much. There were also sounds she started to notice more and more the deeper into the forest she rode. At first it was the obvious sounds, the distant bat wings, the owl hooting, frogs croaking and various insect noises. Nothing there to scare her, she had spent many nights camping with and without a tokota and if anything the sounds reassured her.

No, it was the rustling of bushes, the distant snap of of a twig, that made her shiver. Elena was determined not to let the spooky surroundings get to her though and she quickly tried to think of things that could cause the sounds that were not so scary. Birds for example, though normally owls flew silently there could be other birds moving through the night. It could be a wild tokota, maybe even Oogie, or another rider with their tokota. There could be deer, squirrels, raccoons, possums, and a whole list of other woodland creature that caused these noises.

Mogar's presence also helped, if she had been along walking in the woods she might have turned back and tried to find another rider to hang out with by now but riding a horse sized animal that had claws and teeth and was not afraid to use them, well that was a real confidence booster.
Still she remained on her guard, and the occasional flicker of light from the distance reminded her she was not alone in the woods.

For a time the duo moved deeper into the woods, the trees clumping closer together, their lower branches sometimes brushing up against Elena's body, and once catching the fabric of the handle before she managed to carefully dislodge the offending branch and continue on. A low fog had rolled in, and while the full moon still shown she caught fewer and fewer glimpses of it and the night sky. It was the thorn bushes that halted her progress though. There was no sign they had been gone through by anything larger then perhaps a rabbit, so she doubted Oogie had been this way. She turned Mogar to the right, away from the bushes, hoping to come to a less dense area of the forest.

It was a surprise though when the two of them suddenly found themselves next to a looming cliff face, sheer rock meeting their gaze for many yards up. Elena backed up Mogar slightly to get a better look. Fog crept the sides of the cliff, and if she had been further away it may have given the cliff the appearance of floating, as it was it definitely blocked sight of any way up from here.
However the cliff side was rather large and not even trees had been able to grow on that surface so if she craned her neck she could see the moon's light silhouetting some brave trees that had managed to survive on the top of the cliff, but she could not see anything else up there so she turned away.

A howl pierced the air and Mogar spun around, his hackles raised, a low growl coming from deep in his throat. There on the top of the cliff was a large tokota sized shape, and another howl came, erasing any doubt Elena might have had that sound came from up above. Goosebumps covered Elena's arms and she shivered.

For a moment Elena was held in a sort of trance, but as the shape disappeared from sight she shook herself. Could that have been Oogie? The shape had certainty looked and sounded like a tokota. She kept glancing at the cliff as she formulated her and Mogar's next move, expecting whatever it was to be standing there watching her. She noticed in the back of her mind that the forest had gone eerily silent after the howl, and it did not help her now jittery nerves.

Coming to a decision she pushed Mogar forward, away from the thorn bushes, following the cliff side, and gradually the sounds of the forest returned as they walked. It was not far until Elena shone her flashlight and saw a darkness in the sheer cliff wall. Mogar picked up his pace and they were soon at the mouth of a very large cave. There they paused once more. Elena considered their options, they could keep looking for a way up, or they could go into the cave and see if it let to a way up or if Oogie was perhaps hiding inside? But what if the cave was home to something not so friendly? She dismounted Mogar and stared into his blue eyes. “What do you think Mogar? Do we go in?” The tokota sniffed the air and then the ground and walked a few paces forward into the cave, looked back as if to say well come on and continued walking forward slowly but with no other sign that the tokota had scented a predator nearby.

Taking a deep breath Elena followed suit, the ground was slightly slick and moss and mushrooms grew within the dark space, but there was no rancid smell to suggest this cave belonged to a bear, and no guano that would have been a sign that bats made this place their home.

Getting further and further away from the entrance Elena noticed that the cave was sloping upward. Perhaps this was a way to cliffs after all. A glimmer of orange caught her eye and she turned the flashlight to see some dried orange paint on one of the walls. Didn't Oogie have some orange paint on his shoulder?

As the tunnel continued upward the ceiling grew lower, but not by more then a few inches so that Mogar had to half-crawl upwards. Still the tokota did not turn back and the space was still wide enough that Mogar could easily turn around and Elena only had to duck in places. The low ceiling provided a second clue, once again suggesting they were on the right track, caught in some roots was tawny colored fur, definitely from a tokota, and it looked to be the right color for it to have come from Oogie.

Suddenly the ceiling rose and there was moonlight glimmering promisingly up ahead. A way out! Mogar quickly walked out of the hole, and Elena trotted to join him. They had come out on a wide ledge, the cave sloping back behind them, and a valley sprawled below them. There was another sheer cliff further to the right, and though Elena could not see where the cliffs met she guessed that these two cliffs had been hiding the valley from the rest of the world, or at least she did not remember it being on the map she had studied before she had volunteered for this expedition. The top of the cliff was only about 10 feet above them and a rough rocky path looked like it led all way up and the same path looked as though it went down into the valley.

She mounted Mogar once more, trusting the tokota's balance and instincts better then her own and allowed him to slowly make his way up to the cliff top. Once there she looked for more clues, though the plateau was by no means large, it was certainly large enough to comfortably fit at least three regular sized tokotas that the top along with the hardy trees that had made their stand here. Shining her flashlight behind a tree she was rewarded with what she had been looking for, a paw-print. Granted she could not tell if it had come from a dire tokota as it had gotten smeared over, but she was fairly convinced now that even if they were not hot on Oogie's trail they had found a hiding place of his.

Looking down from the cliff she could once again see flashes of light indicating other riders in the forest. However there were no such flashes in the valley, though the cave she had found had proved to be an easy way up there was no telling how close anyone else had been to it when the thing she believed to be Oogie had howled. It did not appear though that anyone else had yet found this place.

Taking a quick drink and snacking on a granola bar she also let Mogar eat and have a little snack, though she impatiently wanted to keep going, and she felt as if Oogie was slipping from her grasp with every passing second. Finally though she urged Mogar to head down the path that seemed to head into the forested valley.

They began their search, unaware of the gray eyes following their progress, simply watching and waiting.