Max woke suddenly in a panicked sweat, unhooking herself from the straps of the chamber and twisted her upper body to the side so her back was against the wall between her and the convict. She did all this in a matter of seconds but the flying metal still grazed and pierced her side at the last second as she had twisted away. Max grunted at the pain but grabbed the straps of her chamber as the door was torn off its hinges.
'Jesus Christ, that bloody hurt. What the hell is going on?' Max thought as she tried to get a good grip to keep from getting pulled and thrown out the end of the ship that just got torn off from the impact of their crash landing. "This is just my luck, well done Max. You picked the ship that going to kill you." She said to herself as she started to look around.
"Damn it!" Max grunted as she saw Johns hanging on for dear life further up the ship. "He's still alive, what a pity." Sighed max as she continued to look around her as more and more objects and chambers were getting ripped from the ship. She felt her chamber start to come loose from the floor and knew it wasn't going to hold out too much longer, shrugging on her black bag, searching for a more secure spot she heard something.
At first she thought it was just a sound being made by the ship but as she concentrated, it became clear that it was from the person in the chamber next to her. It was a whimpering of a small child. Realising this, max grabbed a cord that was hanging from the ceiling just outside her chamber, when she let go of her straps the suction immediately pulled her out making her body nearly parallel to the floor and feeling a hell of a lot of stain on her muscles.
The child was only around the age of 3 with his chamber set up to accommodate a small child. As he saw Max hanging in front of him he held his arms up for her, an indication that he wanted her to pick him up. Latching onto the side wall, Max pulled herself into the chamber. She knew it wouldn't hold much longer so she quickly tried to undo the straps. Noticing that the harness like straps wouldn't budge she got the small knife out of her boot and cut the harness to free the small boy, wrapping an arm around him and throwing her weight out of the chamber, still hanging onto the thick cord, as it came loose and was ripped out of the ship along with her own and also the criminals but with a quick glance she saw no one inside.
Using as much strength as she could, Max moved the boy so his arms were around her neck with her left arm wrapped around him and her right arm gripping the cord which started to stretch and would snap within seconds. There was a Metal beam about a metre above her, slightly to her left but if she tried pulling on the cord to reach it she would cause it to brake quicker. 'You have got to be shitting me!' Was all max could think when she realised what the outcome would be.
Max, as she was preparing to use her body as a shield for the small boy for when they would be pulled from the ship once the cord snapped, didn't realise someone tying a thicker, more secure, cord around their chest, arm and around the beam as they slowly lowered themselves towards her. So when the cord finally gave way, the hand grabbing her upper arm made her give a small gasp as she snapped her head up and looked into the blind folded face of a man twice her size with a shaved head wearing a black wife beater.
'This must be the convict, Shit now I do owe him.' Max thought as he started to pull her and the boy towards him, rolling onto his back on the wide beam then wrapped his arm around her waist with her back to him and her arms around the boy. Steadying all three of them on the beam using the cord until a minute or two past and the ship came to an abrupt halt.
With relief max dropped her head back onto the man's chest, not caring if he had a problem with it or if he would slit her throat, she was just glad that the kid and herself were still alive.
'He wouldn't slit my throat now that he made the effort to help us, would he?' Max was thinking, still laying on the man with her eyes closed arms around the boy with one hand on the back of his head for protection while trying to even out her breathing before having to face the convict that was now sniffing her hair and neck.
'…Sniffing my hair and neck. WHAT!'
