Thanks to all reviewers!
This is hopefully going to be as good as the other chapters, I don't know why but I just feel it will be worse.
"Son! Kid!" Sig heard through his mud clogged ears. The last time he had been clean seemed so long ago, although in truth it was probably only a day or so since he had last washed. Silently he made a vow that if he came out of this alive he would never again complain about having to have a bath. He remembered what had caused him to fall in the mud in the first place and looked up, wiping his face as he did so. He saw Jinx hugging Xin, his father. He realized from the older scavenger's face that Xin was not used to such displays of affection from his son. But he coughed a bit and returned the hug awkwardly.
"How'd you survive dad?" asked Jinx, taking in his father's appearance for the first time. Hs armor was cracked and covered in blood, and there were muddy streaks on his face.
"Don't worry son, most of it isn't mine, I ran into a bunch of smugglers back there." Sig could see, and was sure Jinx could see that his father was lying, and he must have been badly wounded to have that much blood on him. But much to Sig's surprise Jinx believed his dad, or tried to at least. "We'd better go," continued Xin, "some of those scavengers are probably coming to find me."
As they were walking back down the dark murky tunnels, following the route to the surface Sig saw Jinx giving his father worried looks, Jinx had been given the map and had been given a plausible excuse why he should carry it but even he could now see his father looked incredibly ill. His breathing was becoming ragged and shallower than before and he seemed to be having trouble drawing air into his lungs. Sig began to ask him what was wrong when he saw something coming down the narrow tunnel. It was a metal head. It was similar in shape to a centipede but so big that it took up most of the tunnel's space and that its back brushed against the ceiling of the sewer pipes. Sig froze, anything he was going to say vanishing as all thoughts left his head. He could tell from the fact that the others were continuing their conversation that he was the only one with vision powerful enough to see the advancing monster. In an instant his thoughts unfroze and he realized Jinx's father was asking him a question:
"Did you hear something?" He asked
"Run!" shouted Sig in reply as the metal centipede drew even closer. Looking around Sig realized that Jinx and Xin must have seen it too as they had frozen, "RUN!" he shouted again and they snapped out of it, then they turned and all three of them began to run through the sewers.
Xin was lagging behind. His mild trouble with breathing at a walk had turned into him gasping down air at a run. Sig could see that he wasn't going to be able to keep ahead of the centipede much longer. Suddenly he stopped causing Jinx and Sig to stop as well. He couldn't keep up.
"Here," he said pressing an item into Sig's hand. "Look after it, keep it hidden. Hopefully you wont know what it is until you're older. Jinx look after your family and get Sigil out of here." He paused, struggling to breath, "I have to stay here, hopefully I can hold it off. You have to escape, now GO!" He shouted pushing Sig and Jinx away from him. They both began to run, Jinx was struggling not to cry. Glancing behind him Sig saw Xin, propped up against the cave wall, with his blaster trained on the orb of light that was the metal head's skull gem. He fired, but this had no effect but to send an angry roar vibrating down the tunnel. Then he looked around, put his head down and ran for his life.
R&R please!