The Outskirts: The Sky Raiders (Jace x OC)

Part 18

I quickly ducked from under the shawl and fastened around Cole's neck. "Keep it on." I said to him.
As we took our first steps away from the scorpipede, it reared up, the chains snapping the threads and whipped around violently.
More than one women went flying, but the rest stood still, watching Merva.
Glancing back, I saw the tail whip and stinger stab Merva. I skidded to a halt.
"Kendal!" Cole yelled. "We have to run!"
The stinger stabbed another women mercilessly. Merva stood for a moment, eyes glazed in pain, before collapsing to the ground.
It was horrifying. But I knew there was nothing we could do so I ran, catching up to Cole. The ground started shaking, and the ceiling was crumbling. This place would be down in minutes. With a glance at Cole, I pulled out my sword and pointed it toward the stairs.
"Away!" I shouted. Cole did the same.
Holding the hilt tightly, we flew forward at a low trajectory, never more than a few feet high.
As our destination approached, I realized that we would be crushed against the stone steps.
But the sword decelerated at the last second, sending us tumbling into the stairs rather then smashing into them.
The scorpipede roared again. Driven by terror, we raced up the steps. The stairway seemed longer going up then down. When we reached the top, I tried to retrace our steps to the courtyard.
"This way!" I yelled to Cole, who almost made a wrong turn.
I saw a promising door ahead, it wasn't the door we came in, but it went outside. The life boat was on the far side of the courtyard, the ladder still dangling.
"We need out!" I screamed at the lifeboat.
The lifeboat immediately whipped around and came towards us.
As the lifeboat grew closer. The giant scorpipede erupted from the ground in front of us. Dust took over, and we couldn't see anything. By the time I saw the lifeboat again, it was curving away from the castle.
We had missed our ride. Our fates were sealed.
From high above, an arrow the size of a javelin shot towards the scorpipede. It bounced off the glossy shell harmlessly, and fell to the ground.
I scrambled to my feet. We had to buy ourselves time until the lifeboat came back.
Suddenly, Cole pointed to a balcony, jutting from the highest tower in the castle. Cole used his sword and jumping towards the castle.
I pointed the sword at the ground below the balcony. "Away!" The sword pulled me forward, and I caught up with Cole. I managed to stay in my feet this time when I landed.
The scorpipede was slithering towards us. We pointed out swords up at the balcony and said the command. This time it felt like we were taking flight. We reached the balcony at the peak of our jumps, allowing us to land lightly.
The stringer tipped tail rose higher than the balcony, and stabbed at the wall, only a few feet away from me. The balcony rocked and made a horrible creaking sound. We pointed out swords to the neighboring tower and said the command again. We landed on the roof.
The scorpipede let out another screech-roar. I looked around for the lifeboat, but saw nothing.
I aimed my sword to a higher balcony on another tower and yelled. "Away!" Cole followed me.
The scorpipede had started climbing the tower.
There was no time to really strategize. But I had a rough plan in mind. By the time we reached the top of the tower, hopefully the lifeboat would be in range.
"Follow me!" I said to Cole.
I jumped back to the flat top of the other tower, landing in a crouch. I looked around.
When I saw the lifeboat, my heart sank.
They must have not seen us climbing, because they were way to low. I tried to buy some time by jumping back to the other tower. We jumped just in time. The other tower heaved as the scorpipede climbed to the top.
If we waited, the tail would skewer us. Cole looked at me, and I knew we had the same idea.
We pointed our swords away from the towers and yelled the command.
I heard the tail strike the castle behind us and an angry screech. We sailed out past the cloud holding the castle and started dropping.
"The parachute!" I yelled at Cole.
I gave the cord a sharp tug and we floated slowly over the endless drop.
"We've got you!" yelled Jed from below.
The lifeboat appeared beneath us and we landed in it gently. Eli began bundling the parachute back up as Jed steered us away.
I tackled Cole with a hug. "That better have been a bad one." I said. "No way I'm doing that again." Cole laughed as I let go of him.
We sat in silence as the Okie Dokie flew us back to the Domingo.
"Quite the performance." The captain said when we landed.
"I thought we were dead." Cole replied. I just nodded, completely exhausted.
Jace strolled over to us, a roguish grin on his face."You two, are officially my new best friends." Then he leaned in and whispered in my ear. "I told you so."
I just rolled my eyes but I couldn't stop a smile..
"That was a bad one, right?" I asked Jace.
"Terrible." Jace conceded. "You shouldn't have survived."
"One down." Cole said shakily.
"Well," Jace said, scratching the back of his neck. "You technically have to bring something back for it to count."
I sighed. "Come on man, we almost died."
"I didn't even think about that." Cole groaned.
I walked over to Cole. "Well, we have the shawl." I said. "I don't think its very valuable though."
The captain took the shawl from Cole. "It's less than we would normally except, but that was a brutal first outing." He eyed the shawl more closely. "It's in good condition. The other semblances ignored you after you put it on.
Granted, it's more effort than we would usually go to to acquire a wrap, but we'll count it valid."
I sighed with relief. Jace came up behind us and put an arm around both our shoulders.
"Nice job, rookies!" He said with a jeering smile.
"Only forty-nine to go!"