Chapter Fifty Seven - Into the Depths

Xu Lin had never really interacted with natives of any worlds before. Her parents were Captain's (her mother would never accept anything but equal partnership, being as head strong as her Uncle) of a long distance freight transport. The huge ship usually accepted runs that no one else wished to tackle. Xu Lin was conceived at the beginning of one such journey and took her first cold sleep shortly after her first birthday. As they transported non perishable goods such as metal, plastics, electronics and the like, Xu Lin had only met people of her own race who lived on those worlds. Even then, Spacers tended not to make deep connections as due to the spells in cold sleep, the people she met more than once seemed to age before her eyes, while she stayed young.

Once she was old enough to want to be out on her own, she had simply left one ship for another, but did not get on with the vice-captain of that ship, who tried to lay claim to her being that she was female and he was the highest ranked single male. (The Captain of that vessel was an old Grandfather, who treated her as just another crew member, which she was grateful for). She had left the ship as soon as possible, working in a space station for a time, avoiding other amorous males until her Uncle had picked her up thanks to her parents concerns for her.

As such, she had not been sure what to make of Willow when she had first seen him. At first glance, there was not too much difference between the forest boy and her people; he was bipedal with two arms and two legs, similar facial features, above average height and whose frame would not look out of place for someone with administration duties or some other desk job. Sure his colouring was odd being tinted green and hair that couldn't even be purchased in a high level salon, but otherwise he appeared 'normal'. When he had leapt into the tree and began to climb it, she clearly became aware of those sharp little talons that emerged from his fingers in place of nails. It truly sank into her fibre at that moment that he was not of her species.

And then she had come to see the boy's friend, Slate, a cave person. She had never met anyone whose skin was a dark grey like brushed titanium. His body was thick with flesh, not fat for each muscle was clearly refined, and though she suspected he was of a height to match well his build, she could not tell as he sat upon real fur blankets. His eyes were cold and pure black when he observed them, not an ounce of colour nor white to be seen. His hair looked as if someone had painstakingly created each delicate strand from the purest silver before attaching it to his stone scalp. He seemed far more alien to her than Willow, appearing to her eyes like a moving chiselled statue. Just as her mind began to accept his appearance, two others appeared, who she assumed were cave people also from the way that Slate greeted them, but they looked somewhat different.

The male's build was not too much different, his muscles were less ropey, slightly smaller and his skin far smoother. But the flesh was brown not dark grey. Her people also could have brown toned skin, but it was an ashen shade as if bled of the richness of this man's colour. His hair was also a metallic shade, but a stunning copper and his black eyes seemed much warmer. The female with him shared the same skin tone, but she had an obviously feminine shape, despite it being thicker than what Xu Lin understood as normal, due to the slight shaped muscles in her arms and legs. Still she was very curvaceous, making Xu Lin feel as if her own body was lacking.

Upon hearing their mission, the man named Basalt, who turned out to be the village chief's son, decided to lead them to where his father lived. They did not leave straight away, however, the cave people were nocturnal and needed an hour or so to refresh, seeing it was already noon.

The tunnel's Slate used were narrow and not well defined, the soldiers were having a hard time catching their bulky garments and weapons from time to time as they walked. There was also a major lack of light. The soldiers pointed their torches towards the floor so not to blind their guides, but it did not relieve the pressing darkness greatly. Xu Lin tripped on a jagged raised step and Basalt caught her gently in order to prevent her from face palming the hard rock.

"Thank you," she murmured. He nodded warmly with a smile, making his face appear quite handsome despite it's alienness. Still he was not Song Jian handsome and Xu Lin knew who she preferred.

"We are not far from my home now," the man mentioned in his deep toned voice. "You will be more comfortable there."

Xu Lin thanked him again.  If she was honest, she did not feel overly uncomfortable in the tunnels, she had faced narrow spaces and crawled through small holes before, just those places were made of tempered metals rather than natural rock.  She had had more difficulties dealing with the open spaces above ground and the endless foliage of the forest.  And the bugs..  she screeched as she saw a large creepy crawly with endless amounts of legs slither past the light of the torch.  She clearly spoke to soon!

Huan Han also paled, being used to an environment like Xu Lin, while the soldiers seemed amused by their reactions.  The forest boy, however, seemed to be having the worst time of them all.  He seemed torn between throwing himself into his friend's embrace for comfort and slapping away those arms as he was angry at the owner.  Numerous expressions seemed to be swimming over the grey youth's face, but it was too dark for Xu Lin to identify them.  When the tunnel finally emerged into a large cavern, there were numerous sighs of relief from all, with the exceptions of Willow and Balsalt's sister, Amber.

Willow's eyes kept sliding upward as if searching for a sky that was not there and Amber's glances kept returning to Slate and Willow as if discerning the interactions between them.  The girl was clearly not stupid, Zhang Min thought, she knew that there was something more than simple friendship between Slate and Willow.  Clearly, it was deeper on the part of the cave boy from the overly concerned way he treated Willow and that perhaps wounded her all the more.  Amber's heart was very obviously set upon the boy who didn't once look at her beyond his initial greeting at the lake.

Zhang Min could not help but mention this to Song Jian, who snorted softly in response.  "You see what is between them, but you always fail to see what is closer to home," the man murmured cryptically, making the small sniper pause in thought.

Xu Lin glanced about the village as they approached.  It seemed to be located in two connected large caverns for the most part and the crude stone brick buildings seemed to protrude somewhat or were flush against the smoothed cavern walls.  The latter presumably were a face shielding holes in the rock wall where the actual homes were situated.  Most of the doors were simply thick flaps of leather, but here and there were ones made of wood.  The space in between the houses could be classified as a street for it was fairly large and small gatherings of villages could be seen either side of it.  They all paused in silence as they saw the Outsiders, some even ushered their children off of the street into their homes hiding away from them.

Several men, dressed in a similar fashion to Slate, poured out of a large building, crude swords and spears in hand.  Basalt waved at them and Slate nodded, so they sheathed and relaxed their weapons, but remained wary.  They followed behind the group at a slight distance.

Finally Basalt lead them to a fairly well crafted building with a thick wooden door.  Amber then separated from them in a burst of speed to enter the house without a word of farewell.  Zhang Min suspected that she would be nursing a wounded heart and couldn't help but feel sorry for the girl.  It was sad that she had fallen for a man who liked men, any hopes she might have harboured were clearly shattered when she had realised.  He wondered how he would cope in a similar circumstance and then realised that he could not imagine; he had never really liked any of the few females at the mining outpost to begin with, let alone discovered if any of them preferred their own sex!

A moment after Amber ran in, an older man who shared Basalt's features came out. He looked over the odd party in front of him and asked; "What is going on here? Why is Amber so upset?"

Basalt shook his head. There were a group of Outsider's in front of his house and his father asked this first? The old man spoiled his sister too much! "Father, these people have something important to discuss with you. As for why Amber is upset, I am not entirely sure." However as he said these words, his eyes slid over to view Slate, who stiffened under the scrutiny.

What did I do? He wondered. He didn't feel he should be blamed for any feelings still lingering within the girl who he had clearly rejected more than once and who still followed him and stalked him! Her 'accidental' bumpings had been far too frequent and obvious to be coincidental. The few hunters who liked to chat with him teased him endlessly about it. He didn't have time to care about her now, anyway, Willow, who had finally consented to holding his hand for comfort, was trembling in discomfort and still looked towards the caverns stalactites as if wishing them away so he might see the sky. Slate desperately wanted to hold him until his shaking ceased, but he didn't think Willow would appreciate that right now.

The chief invited the Sergeant into his home and Basalt had Xu Lin follow, as she knew what the suspect looked like. No one questioned this, the woman was clearly prettier than Han Huan after all!

Just then a miner came running towards them to knock upon the Chief's door, barely registering the group still lingering outside. "Chief! Chief!" He yelled. "There is a stranger at the rock salt mine! But he's not one of us, he is an Outsider!"

Author's note; I feel like I have rambled on a bit the past couple of chapters, but I'll try not to regret it too much! I feel like my block is easing now and everything should flow again. I blame myself for getting distracted by writing new stuff recently!