Post by Socks on Sept 3, 2011 13:25:24 GMT -5
Limited Bluez & Nina Ristuccia
"Let me get this straight. You got this horse?"
"Er... yes. Is this really so hard to believe?" Blue tossed his head in irritation, dancing a little and trying to pull the reins out of Wingo's hand. Nina, sitting on his back, looked incredulous. She actually knew this horse, which was a big surprise. Usually the horses that came to Shamrock looked like the end of a rat's tail caught in a trap and could run just about as well, but Limited Bluez... Well, she'd seen him around and he'd run one big heck of a season as a two and three year old. True, he'd never been a big star in the more important races, he'd probably been sold because of persistent bad finishes in the Unicorn Horn, but the colt had a lot of talent and everyone knew it.
"Well, whatever. But if I find out you stole him, I won't ride him," she quipped, a bit churlishly, but she was admittedly excited. Nina had never been the one riding these big fancy horses who would fly as soon as start. For most of her career as a jockey she'd been stuck on ill-tempered maidens and brats like, well, Holden and Presley, her two main rides with Shamrock. This horse, though... He had experience. He'd known the gig from the moment he'd stepped onto the trailer to now, when he found himself on the practice track in the early morning with Nina on his back. He knew that he was going to be running, and was simply waiting for the word go to take off.
Admittedly, he wasn't waiting very patiently. He was hot as hell from weeks off of regular racing. He hadn't been on the track since February, hadn't worked out since then either. He was simply frustrated and stressed out, and his recent move hadn't done anything to help that. With no one to vent his aggressive energies on, having been kept in relative isolation in the small side barn, he had taken to kicking at walls. Though his ground manners remained impeccable and he never bared his teeth or hooves at a human being, there had been some fear that he would probably jump a fence to beat someone up just to have an outlet for his energies. So, he hadn't been turned out, and since the facilities at Shamrock were rather limited most of his working out had been simple trotting around on a hand lead. He had quickly grown bored and impatient with that.
"Try not to let him kill himself, would you?" Wingo asked, not taking his hand off of the reins. He knew that there was no way Nina was going to be able to keep the colt below a gallop, not while he was this tight sprung. But all the same, if she let him go as much as he wanted, he'd probably run himself into the ground and quick. He was a sprinter, he could demonstrate incredible bursts of speed, but only over short distances. And at the moment he seemed likely to keep running until the end of time.
"Actually, I'm not going to let you go yet. I'll just jog alongside for a bit, I think..." he looked rather nervous, almost ill, as he picked up a run to stay near the colt. Blue picked up an eager trot, attempting to leave Wingo behind first thing but checked by the hand and the rein, feeling the drag and yielding to it as he'd been taught to. Wingo was soon running, for once glad for his youth. No doubt had he been as old as most assistant trainers he wouldn't have been able to keep up for long, but this was working rather well.
"Remind... me... next... time..." he wheezed after a few lengths, "to bring a damn pony and ride it instead." Out of breath, he let go of the reins and wit the barest of squeezes from Nina, Blue was off and the dry dirt was all over Wingo's face and nose. He coughed and wheezed, trying to see through quickly tearing eyes ahead to track the progress of the colt and rider, but found this rather difficult.
Nina, meanwhile, let out a gleeful whoop as the horse took off, surging under her like a freight engine, tight muscles uncoiling as he stretched out like a shadow across the ground. Blue ran long and low, not head-up and tight like Holden or with a short stride like Presley. He milked his sixteen hands for all they had and simply ate up the ground, running like a fire'd been lit under his tail. Nina stretched out practically flat on his neck to match his extension, her hands in his mane, her whip totally forgotten and completely unnecessary. He ran simply for the joy of running, for the freedom and release from stress that it brought.
She didn't know how long they ran, she couldn't hear anything but the wind around them, feel anything but brilliant speed, the gliding motion of horse over ground. Licks of red mane tickled her bare cheeks, and she let him fly unguided for several lengths before remembering that they needed to come back to Earth. It was only reluctantly that she attempted to gather in the reins, to sit back, to make him slow. He stumbled as she checked his speed, but kept running. Traces of foam lined the corners of his mouth, his eyes and nostrils wide. He had a rabid desire to keep going, to never stop...
She checked him again, harder, and his gait faltered. He almost stumbled, but then he slowed to a trot, one ear flicking back, suddenly realizing the strain in his legs, the sheen of sweat on his neck. He wasn't hurt, but the sudden speed had shocked him, and Nina at once knew that she should never have let him go like that. She could vaguely hear Wingo, running alongside the fence, fairly spitting with rage at her for letting the colt do that to himself.
But, if nothing else, some of the tension was gone from his shoulders and legs, from his very nature. His trot slowed, she let him go on a loose rein, and he had no more desire to fly like that. How cruelly his lack of work and unpreparedness had brought him back to earth, just when he'd been about to fly again. But, the workout had proved one more thing: Blue still had his mind in the game, and he was still ready to tear it up.