Chapter 11 – Chase II

Kroma, what the hell are you doing? I scream, my eyes fixed on the Assassin ships. You’re sending me straight to them!

I know, she says, just keep going! 

I curse her and moments later, I see them. Looming on the horizon, the edge of jutting cliffs. They are the colour of red, dropping away into god knows what. The perfect platform.

The vortex seems to breathe in life and it bulges and howls, whirling and expanding.

Above us, the ships begin to retreat  in a wild panic, terrified that the thing is going to spring up and snatch them out of the air and and twist them into nothingness.

But I know what it’s doing.

I run towards the cliffs. Jo-lo is barely conscious now. Blood has seeped all over him, but he’s managed to keep hold of his severed arm and is muttering unintelligible words to himself — or to me, I can’t tell — every now and then.

I glance back and see that the vortex is sweeping around in an arc, calculating my path. It knows where I’m going and it wants to cut me off, to grab us both just as we get there.

It knows, I think to myself. How is that possible, that it knows what I am? 

I bound forward and see that I’m almost there. The cliffs are rising in my view and I scramble up their rocky slopes, leaping for the top.

‘Hold on, Jo-lo!’ I shout.

Are you serious? Kroma cries, aghast. You can’t take him, he’ll never make it! 

Well, I can’t leave him here! I snap and before she can reply I hit the edge of the cliffs where a raging river of black water gushes below and I pull Jo-lo into my body, and jump.