𝑺𝒎𝒐𝒌𝒆 | 𝑮𝒆𝒏𝒆𝒓𝒂𝒍 𝑲𝒊𝒓𝒊𝒈𝒂𝒏 𝒙 𝑶𝑪

Two

Barely anyone dared to speak. Once they passed the first marker, one of the passengers, the girl who had been arguing earlier, asked how many more were left. They weren't exactly excited after learning there were thirty-seven to go.

Jolana tried her best to look brave. She attempted to just look straight ahead, separate herself from everything but she flinched when the screeching began. The horrible volcra were slowly becoming aware of the skiff. It didn't help when they passed the remnants of the old skiff. All the soldiers stood by, ready to attack back at any moment. Despite her capabilities, she wasn't supplied with a gun. She had an idea of why. One thing she didn't enjoy about doing the gritty work of actually fighting was that people assumed she couldn't. It was always fun to kick someone's ass because of it. The thing is the volcra wouldn't care how badass she was.

With no real way of defending herself, she ducked down with everyone else.

Jolana did the only thing she really could at this point. She figured the best thing to do when unarmed in an area full of monsters was to close her eyes and hope this was all a bad dream.

"No!" she heard someone whisper quietly. She didn't want to open her eyes but she did and saw that their only safe light had gone out. She forcefully closed her eyes again. 

She then heard a familiar sound, like a match, no a lighter. She still hadn't opened her eyes but she could sense there was light next to her, and not the safe one. 

"Blow it out! What are you doing?" the same voice whispered. Jolana prayed for a saint to come and save them of course but she spent a lot of her time praying for a quick painless death. She didn't want to feel it if the volcra ate her. 

Jolana opened her eyes just in time to see the volcra creep behind the man holding the lantern. It picked him up and took him away. He dropped the lantern while he flew away. It fell next to Jolana and the deck beside her erupted in a blaze. She had never seen fire burn like this. She only ever had seen the controlled blaze of a lantern or other candle. Those flames were comforting, these flames made you want to look closer but also were so big and widespread that you would feel desperate to get away.

All hell broke loose.

She crawled away from it, trying to stay down while the ones with guns and the grisha tried to fight it off. She ended up next to the cartographer who had asked about the markers. 

Jolana watched as the inferni from before, and multiple of the other soldiers were killed by the monsters. She saw a gun on the ground and thought to herself,

"If I'm going to die, I'm going to die fighting,"

 She grabbed the gun and started shooting at the volcra she was able to hit a few despite her trembling hands and panic. She wasn't scared of people, but these certainly weren't people.

She walked backward trying to get a better shot but tripped over the lantern that had started this whole mess. She dropped the gun into the flames. The girl who had been beside her looked desperately at her friend who was in the arms of one of volcra. 

The obviously part-Shu girl reached her hand into the flames, no doubt singeing her arm. The girl shot and hit the volcra before running to her friend. The thing is there were plenty more volcra and they were coming toward the Jolana and the cartographer. Completely defenseless, seeing them coming right at her she put her hands up in defense. The flames around her got much bigger, the fire grew tall separating her from the volcra and she couldn't quite figure out why. It felt like the pits of hell. She knew this would be her end.

Then there was a searing burst of light and all the volcra were gone.

Had the saints answered?

Were there actual saints aboard the skiff?

Jolana was so tired. She passed out surrounded by flames but not burned.