THATS x NOT x NATURAL
⟢───── Ashes × Aether ─────⟣
DEPTH-16 — THE EMERALD CAVERNS DESCENT
Colt’s Group — 1st Path
The emerald tunnel narrowed into a ribbed hallway of glowing stone, the walls pulsing with faint green currents like a pulse trapped in rock.
Colt raised his lighting rod and tapped his wrist console, sending out the next ping.
A soft thhmm vibrated through the corridor.
On the screens back up the line, the map updated.
Depth, pressure, mineral readings, air density, a digital trail for the others to follow.
“Clean reads,” Colt said. “Left team continuing at steady pace.”
Four Royal Guards shifted formation around him, lighting rods held tight, breaths measured.
Mae trailed close behind, scanning the cavern walls with her seismic tablet.
“Rock composition’s still stable… no collapse risk yet,” she said.
No one relaxed.
Down here, a good reading just meant you hadn’t died yet.
They kept moving deeper, the emerald glow reflecting off their gear.
Along the 2nd path.
The right corridor descended sharper, jagged ridges forming natural steps down the slope.
Buck walked point, big frame taking most of the hits from loose stone and low ceilings. Behind him: Aria, Lisa, and five guards in staggered formation.
Lisa paused for a moment.
“How neat… look at this.”
A slick green-blue sap clung to the wall.
Thick. Sticky.
Bioluminescent like tree sap that could swallow the glow of the Twin Suns.
She lifted her collection tool toward it.
The sap reacted.
It pulled back from her metal wand like it was afraid of her.
Then slid down the wall.
Then across it.
Finally it merged with another patch, pulsing once in unified glow.
Aria stepped in next to Lisa, squinting.
“…That’s not natural.”
Buck kept his voice steady, like the big brother of the room.
"Add it to the list" He stated, fatigued and exhausted. Like he's seen too much already.
“Nothing down here is natural. Ironic isn't it? Keep it moving.”
No one argued.
They descended another thirty meters before the next moment.
A young guard misjudged a step on a slanted ledge—his footing gave.
“Whoa—!”
Buck grabbed his harness with one arm and yanked him up with strength that made the others flinch.
“You good?” Buck asked.
The guard nodded, shaking.
Buck let him go and exhaled—hard.
And in that exhale…his breathing rhythm broke for just a second.
He leaned back against the cavern wall.
And the wall responded.
Particles—tiny as dust—lifted from the sap.
Weightless.
Colorless in the air.
Invisible unless the light hit them exactly right.
They drifted toward his face.
Aria kept walking, adjusting her pack.
Lisa was checking the rear.
No one saw it.
Buck inhaled.
Coughed once.
Sneezed.
“Dust,” he muttered.
He wiped his nose, sniffed again, then kept moving before reaching another fork in the tunnels. This one unexpected, again with 2 paths.
An hour later, Kit and Kyro reached the same corridor.
Comms crackled with half-messages from the other teams:
“—Mae here, monitoring still good—” “—Colt’s team still stable—” “—ping—ping—” “—Buck’s team heading—”
Then nothing.
Kyro checked his console.
Kit grew uneasy and looked ahead at the divided tunnels.
“Buck’s team went right?”
“Guess is as good as mine but that was the plan.” Kyro responded.
They kept moving downhill, through the right fork, the emerald glow thickening like fog trapped inside the stone. Kit’s steps were quiet. Kyro’s were deliberate. Their silhouettes stretched long across the cavern walls.
Another static burst pinged in their comms.
Kit tapped it.
“Yo! Buck? Colt? Anyone?”
Silence.
Then, faintly:
“—all good—keep—moving—”
Then silence again.
Kit didn’t like that.
Neither did Kyro.
Earlier — before Kyro and Kit reached the fork—Buck had already led his squad into the left tunnel.
He didn’t slow down.
The team expected him to veer right, the plan Kyro laid out crystal clear. Right fork for Buck’s squad, left for Colt’s.
But Buck didn’t turn.
He walked straight into the left fork without hesitation. Alone and forcing the others to follow him.
Lisa blinked. “Buck—this isn’t—”
“Trust me,” he said, not looking back.
No edge in his voice.
No aggression.
Just certainty.
Like he’d walked this path a hundred times.
Aria exchanged a look with the nearest guard.
Nobody wanted to challenge the biggest man in the cavern, not when morale was already cracking. Not when his instincts had saved them twice already.
Still…
Lisa checked her scanner again, whispering under her breath, “We’re supposed to be right side. Mae’s team has left…”
Buck let out a sneeze and kept going.
The Echo Beacons along the walls hummed faintly as his squad passed — each one flickering just a beat slower than they had for everyone else.
The guards didn’t notice.
Aria did.
Her eyes narrowed.
“Is your stabilizer good?” she asked Buck casually.
“Fine.”
He didn’t check it.
Didn’t even glance.
Just kept walking.
“Buck. Slow down. Walls aren’t stable.” Lisa pressed on.
Buck answered sharply. “I said I’m fine.”
"Erm.. sorry for that, just tired" He immediately apologized.
Buck lifted his wrist console, thumb hovering over the comm tab.
He typed out the update—“Right corridor clear. Moving—”
Then stopped.
Brows pulled together.
Something slipped in his head. He just stared at the half-written sentence like he couldn’t remember what came next.
Like the thought had dissolved mid-air.
“…Buck?” Aria whispered behind him.
He blinked hard.
Then hit send.
RIGHT CORR— MOV—
Mae checked her console, then sent out a comm.
“Buck? Your update cut out.”
Buck blinked slow, like he hadn’t noticed before responding.
“…yeah. Must be the depth,” he muttered.
But he didn’t resend it.
A few minutes deeper, Aria lifted her wrist console to check the map sync.
She frowned.
“…huh?”
Lisa leaned over. “What’s wrong?”
Aria turned the display toward her.
Buck’s ID marker — the tiny blue dot representing his stabilizer — was scattered across her monitor like he stood in one hundred different places.
Like the system couldn’t track him in real time.
“Buck, hold up—” Aria began.
Buck kept walking.
The scattered dots snapped forward becoming one on her map a full two seconds late.
Lisa exhaled slowly. “Maybe it’s just the signal.”
“Maybe,” Aria said.
But her console had never behaved like that before.
She didn’t mention it again.