Going Feet First Ch. 05

Eventually the conversation came to an end, and the follower of the Faerdron leader went back inside their fort. In moments she returned with a torso-sized package that came complete with a longsword in its sheath strapped to the side.

The Faerdron leader muttered a few things in a condescending tone then, and Aufryn'uit sighed while passing a glare in the Private's direction.

Stop with the damn dirty looks already, he grumbled.

"Galen," the Commandant called.

"Ma'am?"

"That knife you carry in your... strapping. Where is it?"

Frowning, he moved his hand to his hip, feeling for his bayonet. Instantly he frowned at Aufryn'uit while his fist clenched at his side. There was an empty scabbard on his webbing and a none-too-comforting grin appearing on her face.

"You're too comfortable among us," she stated motioning the lower Faerdron forth. "It was taken from you last night and brought here. It's now in the bag. A present from Dreek."

The robed Drow laid the leather pack at Galen's feet and backed away with caution. The Private cast a suspicious glance at both the leaders before looking back down to the bundle. With a level of hesitation he knelt down and undid the ties holding it all together and began an inspection of the contents.

The sword was simple enough, a matte grey blade with a black hilt and a razor edge. The brown scabbard easily tied off onto the left side of his webbing with the attached rope, though he would need to adjust it later as it made his gear a bit lopsided.

Pulling the leather wrapping out of the way, Galen found a very rudimentary set of dull, yellow armor pieces packed tightly and neatly to fit in the pack. A cuirass, a mail undershirt, light plating to cover his thighs, knees, and arms. Rudimentary, but obviously meant to cut weight while protecting what was important.

"With standard... enchants we use," Aufryn'uit stated as Galen went over the cuirass.

"Enchants?" he repeated.

"You'll know. There's more training for you yet and something we need to take care of on our way back."

That's reassuring...

Rummaging underneath the armor, the familiar feel of plastic grips graced his fingertips and he pulled his bayonet from the pile. As he went to return the blade to its scabbard though, he noticed the metal had been changed. Before the knife had typical bluing for its finish, with some bare metal showing from when he sharpened and used it. But now the metal was completely black to the point of being what could only be described as unnatural. It wasn't a shade of black, it looked as though no light reflected off it at all.

"What happened to my-"

"You'll learn soon enough," the Commandant cut him off while moving back to her lizard. "Now pack up and get on the mount. I have a task for you."

Returning his bayonet to its scabbard and quickly wrapping his armor back up for later adornment, he asked "May I ask what the task is?"

"You'll learn soon enough."

God dammit. He moved with the Commandant's aids to climb back onto the lizard.

Giving a farewell to Aufryn'uit in Drow, the Faerdron leader turned and headed back inside her fortress. The Private swore he could hear her chuckling.

...

Galen kept his eyes pasted to the mouth of a cave as he fastened his belt around his waist. Aufryn'uit had brought him and her aids to the edge of the city cavern to deal with a "Drow issue" that would give her a simple test of his skills at the same time. It was also something which had him staring down the entrance to a dark hole, dressing himself into his new equipment with three Sun-kissed that loathed him dearly at his back. It was a wonder his hand wasn't shaking.

The yellow armor he pulled from that leather bag was an instant surprise for the Private. Not only did it fit his body, but the leg pieces fit comfortably enough underneath his pants as well. The mail and plating barely chafed or snagged on the other layers above or below them. When he pulled on his black, long coat overtop the cuirass, he found it still left him room to breathe even after doing up all the buttons in front save for the top one. Over of it all was his webbing, filled with ammo, his few grenades, bayonet and canteen. With the exception of the sword now hanging off his waist belt, the Private didn't feel as encumbered as he first believed he would be.

All his limbs had their full range of movement in every direction, and he could walk and move normally for the most part. The greatest change wasn't in the physical properties of the armor, but the magical. Heat from his body drained into his breast plate at an unnatural rate. Not so much to bring chills or shivers, but enough to keep him from sweating or getting uncomfortable. Then there was the silence of the metal. No amount of metal on metal contact nor shifting of the mail caused even a jingle out of the armor no matter what he tried.

Standard enchantments, huh? Galen thought.

Whatever effect this new armor had on his ability to fight was something he was about to find out.

He grabbed his rifle off the ground and cycled the bolt to chamber a round. Double checking the safety to see it was on, he returned his attention to the cave and tuned his ears back to the sound of the second Commandant's voice beside him. Hopefully she hadn't noticed him not listening to her while he was gearing up.

"...And while Dreek had you tucked inside the base, my squad has been sweeping around the city with the Faerdron and the Red Sisters to handle these things. But now you get to prove we are not wasting time on you."

The Private gritted his teeth, an unsteady hand shifting his helmet around to a more comfortable position.

"I'm not wasting your time..." he grumbled. "How many are in there?"

"Three," Sapril answered from atop her lizard a few paces off to his right. "Perhaps one or two more. Should be less of a danger than the slave with the lightning."

"These ones only killed nine Drow and wounded one of our squad," Maeafin added. "Give street scum magic and they think they own the Underdark."

Aufryn'uit pressed her right middle and index fingers to her forehead, "Do not remind me. Galen, go in and kill them." She looked to the Surfacer with an annoyed look. "And get back out before I get bored."

"You're sendin' me in solo?" he responded with a partly raised voice and a stiffening back.

"You have our training, tanneran magic, and your weapons. If something goes wrong, I'll know and come in..." The Commandant leaned in toward him then, her voice low. "I wouldn't want Dreek's pet to get hurt, would I?"

He didn't how to answer the question, or even if he wanted to know what the true answer was.

With a firm grip on his M-14, Galen flicked the safety off and looked to the cave. The three Drow behind him watched on with either great interest or unnerving grins that he couldn't help but shudder at. They could've been waiting for him to refuse their order, to give them a chance to kill him. Or they could've been waiting for him to slip up and get killed. In any case, he couldn't fight the feeling that they wanted him more as a corpse than a surfacer in their ranks.

A frown wrinkling his forehead, Galen emptied his lungs and refocused on the task ahead.

Those chilly little pricks in that love thumper of yours? Those fears telling you to fuck off and stay out of this war? Shut them the fuck out. The voice of his squad's Staff Sergeant before their mission echoed in his mind. Swallow a fucking car wheel, get some goddamn drive in your body, and shut your mind off. Only thing that should rattle around in your guys' skulls are the orders you are given and the method in which they are to be executed, is that understood?

"Yes, Sergeant..." Galen muttered under his breath.

Thoughts cleared from his head with each exhale from his stiffening lungs. Muscles in his belly tensed while the rest of his body relaxed. He could feel his heart settle and steady. He could feel the magic flow around him. As he passed the threshold of the cave and ventured into the darkness, he felt...aware.

The light from the pillar in the center of the main cavern faded and a prickling buzz swarmed through his eyes to force him to shut them. He quickly rubbed his eyelids before opening them and blinking away the moisture that had developed before something pounced on him. Immediately afterward, his own special Darkvision came alive to turn the darkness into grey.

He picked up on the details of his surroundings, the jagged walls that narrowed and broadened with the shape of the stone and forced him to turn sideways at times to slip through. The random drops in the ceiling or rises in the floor coupled with scattered boulders had him focusing on his feet more than his situation.

After nearly pacing nearly forty feet down the progressively narrowing passage, he came to a stop; holding position just before a vertical crack in the wall barely wide enough for him to slip through with his armor on.

His senses were telling him of a shift in the magic beyond the chokepoint. A shift like this, as he had come to learn, was the result of a life aura. Shutting his eyes, he tried to focus. Tried to "aim" his sense of magic to the area ahead of him and reach out to the bodies ahead. Sloppy was the first word Dreek had used to describe him on his first attempt to try this. But as sloppy as he was, he was sure he had more refinement than the newly awoken mages he was set after. All three of them showed in his senses.

Two were close, within eight to ten feet and unmoving. Possibly pressed waiting at the other end of the passage waiting to kill him the moment he crawled through. The third was a bit farther and a bit more potent in the magic flow in his-or-her body. For all Galen knew, that Drow was cooking up some magic for him to taste should he even try to climb through the gap in the stone.

The Private paused and thought for a moment, one hand moving to one of his three remaining grenades. He debated for a few moments, then finally approached the passage entrance while stripping one of the explosives off his gear. He plucked the pin out and drew his arm back to line up the toss. With few rough edges in the way he just needed to toss the frag straight and true to keep it from bouncing and falling short of the other side of the choke point.

Drawing his arm back, the Private drew a deep breath and released the spoon. With all his might he whipped the grenade at the passage, the steel ball of hate twirling in-flight until it hit the ground and bounced off the stone and into the next room.

There was a shrill cry as a fireball shot down the tunnel in retaliation, Galen barely able to suck himself back against a sidewall in time to dodge the flames. With an unknown time left of the detonator, he plugged his ears and waited. The pressure wave hit first before he registered the explosive boom that rattled his brain even through several feet of stone. Dust fell from the ceiling with a few pebbles coming down afterward onto his helmet.

Without wasting a second he readied his rifle and charged into the passage, muzzle level and butt braced against his hip. On the other side he found an open room, easily twelve feet across and barely high enough for him to stand upright. Two bodies of knife wielding Drow lay motionless beside the entrance, while the third, a male whose clothes were still singed, was thrown back from the light scorch mark his magic had made on the ground just few feet away from the mouth of the passage.

A dim light of their life auras still glowed in Galen's dark vision, but it was dimming fast.

Must be the last of their spirits leaving their bodies... he thought as he quickly glanced over the rest of the room.

There were three bedding sets in the back, with a scant amount of clothes and a healthy stash of food and tools. It looked as though they were preparing to venture out by how some of their supplies were scattered about the partially filled bags. Most of it was shredded by shrapnel at this point, but prior to his arrival, Galen figured they were preparing to leave the cavern.

With the cave secure he went to check the three bodies of the Drow for the slim chance one might still be alive despite their faint auras. He started with the fire caster, pressing two fingers to his neck and feeling for a pulse. With none found he continued to the other two by the entry passage.

"Finished, I see," a voice commented just as he knelt down beside one of the bodies.

The Private turned and came face to face with Aufryn'uit, who was grinning as she stared at the three corpses in the room. With a single nod she turned and crouched back down to leave the cramped space.

"Come, Galen. We're done here."

He looked down at the Drow woman he knelt over and waited. She didn't move, she didn't twitch. There was no rise and fall to her chest. She had to be gone.

Galen let the air from his lungs and turned to follow after the Second Commandant before the full reality of his act could hit him. If he steeled himself, he could probably skip the queasy stomach but he knew for sure the nightmares were coming in the end. They always did.

"That was a surprisingly short encounter," Aufryn'uit said aloud, glancing back to him as though she expected an explanation.

"They were dug in," Galen started as they cleared the low passage and walked normally down the main tunnel toward the open cavern. "I could... feel 'em. And I knew they were waitin' to ambush, so I hucked a grenade to blow them up before I went in. If they weren't dead, I knew they wouldn't be in fightin' shape and I could get 'em with my rifle or knife."

"Interesting tactic..." the Drow commented as a thoughtful look came about her.

Light from the cavern's pillar grew the closer came to the exit. When it was bright enough, a cold feeling swept over his eyes and at once his surface vision returned. After blinking a few times over, he stepped out into the main cavern behind Aufryn'uit and climbed onto the back of her lizard behind her.

"Satisfactory work, Galen. Expect more... 'Outings' like this at my convenience."

His grip on his rifle tightened.

"You're gonna be sending me against more... rogue Drow like these ones?"

"Yes, but don't... 'limit your horizon.' Faerdron were supposed to take care of these three, they'll be pleasantly surprised to find you already did. Results and initiative means you are both effective and useful, and it means you can deal with issues on a whim. It means respect."

"It means not getting' treated like dirt," Galen added.

"Exactly. I did you a favor bringing you here, something I will see returned when I see fit. It's good to have allies, and it is better to have them in your debt."

A harsh curl drew up the corner of Galen's mouth as she whispered something in Drow to her mount, and the lizard growled in response before taking off toward the Sun-Kissed compound. Her aids withheld their simpers as they trailed in behind.

............

While the last patrons of the night either stumbled or were carried out the front door of the inn, Dee ran a damp cloth over a table top to clean off a bit of spilled ale and bread crumbs. Across the room, Petra swept the floor with a broom and sour look on her face. The barmaid, Nitra, cleaned glasses behind the counter while the waiter, Zuriel, mopped up the mess left behind from a young man who couldn't hold his liquor. The three of them reveled in the relaxing peace that came with the end of the day, despite the sour mood of the Full-blood.

A Nekonian swearword caught Dee's ear as Petra trudged away from the pile of dirt she had swept up and went for a dust pan in the corner. The Hybrid sighed and finished up her table before picking up the pail of water beside her. It was easy to see that simple chores were not a favored task of the Shadow Stalker, but for the past week she had been staying in the inn, and she had to "Earn her keep, no matter how temporary her stay may be," as Nitra had put it. The place was hers after all, and she held the right to ask what she willed for rent.

What didn't make sense to the half-breed was why Petra didn't use what coins she heard jingle in the pouch she carried with her in the day. Circling around the bar and carrying her pail around into the back kitchen, Dee dumped the contents into a basin built into the corner of the floor and watched the water flow down the drain. Just how long was Petra's master going to be?

More than a week she had been here already. By day she made rounds through the market and hovered around the main gate. By night she was scouted Fretheim's manor and the area around it. She said she found the room her Elven friend was held in, confirmed the presence of her captor, and figured a general schedule and route for the guards. What more did she need?

"Something wrong?" Nitra asked.

Dee sighed while turning to face the tavern-keep. Both her eyes to the floor she leaned up against the wall and crossed her arms. She went to say something, but then paused and pursed her lips. Her tail shifted uneasily between her legs and she only ended up giving a shrug and a shake of the head for an answer.

Shifting her weight to her rear foot, Nitra brushed a strand of brown hair behind her ear and tucked up it into her bun. Those intelligent yellow-green eyes of hers thinning as she stroked her narrow chin.

"You are worried about something," she challenged.

Her fingers fidgeting, Dee nodded. "Yeah... but... it's all complicated right now."

"Too complicated for me?" Nitra mused, only to drop her smug look when the Hybrid nodded.

"So complicated I can't rightly explain it in a way that it'd make sense."

"Deary, even if you're polishing Petra's pearl up there or planning with her to kill off that nobility prick that-"

"It's about him," Dee cut her off, glancing over Nitra's shoulder to see Petra tossing the contents of her dustpan out the front door.

Leaning in, the Hybrid whispered, "I'll talk to about it later, but not now. Not if I can still figure it myself."

At first Nitra frowned, but then rolled her eyes and stepped off toward the front. "I'm here if you want to talk."

"I know," Dee replied, smiling gracefully.

After Nitra returned to cleaning out the used mugs, the Hybrid pushed off the wall and left the kitchen heading for the stairs. Zuriel had finished cleaning and Petra was already climbing the stairway to the second floor. Likely to prepare herself for her outing tonight.

I still need to change the sheets before bedtime, not sleeping in the musk of their seed... she thought, rubbing her forehead and trudging up the stairs.

"I'm going to bed," she declared loud enough for Nitra and Zuriel to hear on the floor.

"Sleep well."

"G'night, Dee."

The Hybrid waved her hand and headed to her room. When she grabbed the door handle, something sounding like a sheet being whipped out caught her ear. Opening her door she found her old sheets wrapped up on themselves in the corner with Petra already spreading fresh ones across her mattress.

"What's this?" she asked, a bit of surprise to her tone.

Rather carelessly tossing a trio of pillows to the head of the bed and grabbing a blanket from beside her feet, Petra answered, "I overheard guards complaining this afternoon about being forced to go on extra night patrols for the next few days."

The hybrid thought for a moment, "So...?"

"Extra night patrols means more eyes on the area."

"And that means extra guards making it dangerous to go out?"

"Right."

"Okay." Dee paused a moment and watched as Petra finished making the bed.

Every night for the past eight days, the Hybrid had fallen asleep alone and woken up with the Neko curled up beside her. To be together with her as she fell asleep for once... it was a complicated thought. Part of her was unwelcoming of the idea, considering what Petra admitted to be within her comfort zone with other females. But then there was what Petra admitted to be within her comfort zone with female intimacy, and the results she boasted to come with it.