XXVI
The sirens continued to blare as Penistone and I hurtled along the corridors of the Constantinople at great speed. It didn't take long for us to find a stairwell up to the next floor, and the next, and the next, until there couldn't have been more than a dozen floors left between us and Xena. As we made our way further and further up the ship, more and more people filled the corridors, all of them desperately pushing past one another to get to the docks on the lower decks. It seemed that Penistone and I were the only ones traveling up the ship rather than down it. Eventually, though, the masses of people began to subside, as the passenger liners below slowly filled up with evacuees. Now, the corridors were empty once again.
"Which ward is your partner in?" Penistone called out between breaths, shouting over the sound of sirens which still blasted through the corridors.
"Oh, it's… 2-74." I said hesitantly, thinking back to the number on the door plaque. "But she could still be at our living quarters."
"And where's that?" She asked impatiently. Again, I had to think hard about what number the room was.
"S2-Q-169." I eventually announced. "Do you know where that is?"
"Not exactly." She told me, not particularly reassuringly. "Sector 2, that's Decks 12 to 24. The 169 means we can narrow it down to Deck 15."
"If you say so." I shrugged. I had no choice but to trust Penistone's judgment. She knew the ship better than I did, after all.
"So what does the 'Q' mean?" I asked curiously. No, it didn't really matter, but I like to get all my facts straight. You really should know that by now.
"That just means 'Quarters'." She explained. "I would've thought that was fairly obvious, to be honest."
"It's been a long day, alright." I chuckled, shrugging off Penistone's light-hearted mockery. "It's been a long day…"
About ten minutes or so later, we had found a stairwell which took us all the way up to Deck 15. I'm going to be honest with you, there was a huge plaque over the doors at the top which said 'Deck 15', but somehow I hadn't noticed them the last time I'd come up these stairs. Anyway, that wasn't important right now. At least, Penistone didn't seem to think so, because she soon pulled me through the double doors impatiently after I'd stared at the plaque for several seconds. Now, we were aimlessly wandering the corridors of Deck 15, searching in vain for room S2-Q-169. Door after door after door we passed, hastily reading every single plaque. 552. 389. 287. And then, finally, 185.
"This is it!" I announced hurriedly, beckoning Penistone over to me. "This is the corridor."
"Are you sure?" She called, hurrying over to me, but I was already counting down the doors. 180. 175. 170.
"One hundred and sixty-nine!" I shouted gleefully, my eyes falling on the panel in question. At last, we'd found it. Without any further hesitation, I pushed the door open, and peered inside hopefully. Alas, I was disappointed by what I saw. The room was empty.
"Damn!" Penistone exclaimed as she reached the room and glanced in. "Hard luck, Matthew."
"She must be upstairs." I said distantly, gazing down at the floor. "She has to be…"
"Time's ticking, sir." Penistone continued, ever the optimist. "If you want to get her out of here, then we've got to get moving now."
"Just a second." I assured her, stepping into the room quickly. "Let me get my things." I rummaged around the drawers and wardrobe frantically, but soon realised that my 'things' consisted of the clothes I was standing in right now, and one 'Hyper Light-Speed Travel: A Brief Explanation' by Gareth Arnold Yankovic Oldman. As I stuffed the tattered paper into my pocket, I couldn't help but chuckle at the fact that Professor Oldman's signature read 'G.A.Y Oldman.' I felt guilty about it later (he was dead, after all), but at the time, it lightened the mood a little.
"Well, that's everything." I announced, stepping back out into the corridor glumly. "All my possessions. One officer's uniform and a gay old man's thesis on hyper light-speed travel." It was a sorry collection of personal belongings, to say the least. But at least the uniform was comfortable, eh?
"Then let's get moving, shall we?" Penistone remarked, already making her way down the corridor at a brisk pace. I jogged to catch up with her as she rounded a corner on the right. Soon, we had located a pair of double doors which led out into a stairwell. However, as we struggled with the heavy doors, we immediately realised that they were locked. There was a large window on the door, possibly large enough for us to fit through, but no matter how hard we hit the glass, it wouldn't break. It was simply too thick. Damn ultra-protective quintuple glazing.
"What should we do?" I asked, still trying to smash through the two-inch thick window.
"We'll have to find another stairwell." Penistone replied. "And hope to God that it's not locked." I agreed, and we were just about to turn around and leave, when I noticed the shadow of a person against the wall on the lower branch of the stairwell.
"Hold on, Penistone." I called, seeing that she had already begun to walk away. "Someone's coming up the stairs. They must have… heard us." I hesitated midway through my sentence as I realised that something was afoot. There was something odd about the shadow. It was almost… inhuman.
"Oh, no." I continued hesitantly, as the shadow suddenly grew larger. An excruciating noise filled the air as a Xenomorph bundled around the corner at the foot of the stairs. I tried to back away from the window slowly, but it was too late. It had already locked eyes on me. Figuratively, I mean.
"We need to move." I mumbled, making my way over to Penistone quietly.
"What is it?" She asked, looking over my shoulder at the door behind. As soon as she saw what was stood at the window, though, her face fell.
"Maybe it won't be able to break through the glass…" I whispered hopefully, turning to look at the creature again. As soon as I had finished my sentence, the Xenomorph had silently pressed it's face up against the glass. It drummed it's fingers against the glass gently, as if examining the obstacle. Then, it stepped backwards, opening it's enormous jaws with a screech. It charged towards the door, and when it's face was less than an inch away from the glass, it's inner jaws shot out. They pushed through the window effortlessly, shards of glass flying everywhere.
"You were saying?" Penistone remarked sarcastically. I hadn't yet taken my eyes off of the door, which was now hissing loudly as it's magnetic lock began to falter. The seal must have broken when the Xenomorph punched through the glass. Now it was only a matter of time before the door simply opened itself. I looked over at Penistone, who had already sprung into action. She flew back around the corner and into the corridor, and I quickly followed. I heard the Xenomorph screech from behind us again, along with the sound of a loud click as the door mechanism finally failed. Just seconds later, the creature was on our tail. We bolted along at breakneck speed, but the Xenomorph was faster. If we could only find a corridor which looped back around, we could go through the open door and up the stairs to Xena's ward.
"This way!" Penistone shouted, darting around a nearby corner. I obeyed, as did the Xenomorph behind us. It seemed there was no way we could shake it now. But then, I spotted a glimmer of hope. In the corridor ahead was another doorway. If we could get through it, we could shut it behind us, buying us precious time. It was our only hope at this moment in time.
"Get the door!" I shouted to Penistone as I crossed the threshold of the doorway. She immediately dashed through behind me, slamming her hand against a button on the control panel. The door fell to the ground, the Xenomorph immediately smashing against it with a loud thud.
"Fire Door 12-27 has been shut." An electronic voice suddenly bellowed across a speaker on the ceiling. "To prevent the further spread of fire, all other fire doors on this corridor will now be shut." I looked at Penistone, who rolled her eyes in annoyance. What sort of idiot thought that was a good idea? Whoever it was, I hope they were smiling now, because if we didn't get off of this corridor before those other doors shut, we were fucked.
"Come on!" Penistone shouted, pulling me down the corridor towards the next set of doors. We may have lost the Xenomorph, but now we were facing an even bigger threat: being trapped aboard the station when it exploded in… about forty-five minutes. The two of us wasted no time, hurtling down the corridor at great speed. We had barely passed through the next doorway when the heavy door slammed itself shut behind us. We didn't stop. We didn't even look back. We simply kept moving, and soon ran through the next doorway, which also closed itself abruptly as we passed.
"Not far now!" Penistone shouted between laboured breaths. "That doorway ahead's the last one!" My legs were beginning to ache, but I pressed on. We had to get through that door before it closed. If we didn't… well, it didn't bear thinking about. We quickly approached the doorway, until it was little more than a few metres in front of us. And then, the worst happened. Without warning, Penistone tripped, collapsing to the floor in a heap. I glanced back over my shoulder as I stumbled backwards through the doorway, and saw that she had already begun scrambling back to her feet. But the door's locking mechanism had already been engaged. No sooner than she had managed to stand up and gather her bearings, the enormous sheet of thick metal began to slide downwards. I caught one final glance of Penistone's face, contorted with fear at the realisation of what was about to happen. Then, the door reached the ground, a deafening thud erupting through the corridor as it did so. There was nothing I could do to help her now.