Major Lorne breathed in and out deeply, ignoring the stab from his ribs with each breath. The water was somehow rising much faster than it had been, and was now up to his knees. He'd been trying in vain for half an hour to open the door, and his leg was throbbing again. Luckily, from what he could make out in the black haze, it didn't seem to be bleeding too heavily, however, the shot wasn't a through-and-through, so the bullet was still embedded in his thigh. On top of all that, his arm had begun to ache again. It was not going well.
He had no idea where the Wraith had gone, but he had deduced that it wasn't coming back. He'd been toying with the idea of thumping on the door, but he didn't want Gordon to know he'd got himself free, and he was aware that no one other than the Wraith would be down here, so it was pointless.
"Come ON!" He hissed, resting his forehead on the wall from exhaustion. "There's gotta be a way outta here." 'Where's the light switch when you need it?' he thought. Suddenly, for few moments, he could see the brown colour of the door in front of him, and then it was gone.
"What the…?" He said. "No. They can't have." He frowned. He could've sworn the lights had flickered. "What did I do to make that happen? My head was against the door…looking for a way out…light switch!"
oOo
"Status report!" Rodney McKay called, not looking up from his screen.
"All access routes in the north-west sector are going into automatic lockdown, I'm still trying to bring up the pipe schematics but the water pressure's decreasing exponentially." replied someone.
"Dammit!" Rodney hissed. "Power levels?"
"Stable. No change in the past thirty minutes."
"Oh, well that's something at least…" He muttered.
"Wait a minute, there's some strange activity in one of the maintenance labs."
Rodney sighed, realising he was about to ask the same question he'd mocked the Colonel about some time in the past. "Define 'strange'."
"It looked like the lights flashed." The technician replied.
"Flashed? Like, on and off?" Rodney asked.
"Yes. They came on for a few seconds and went off again. Look! There it goes again."
Rodney looked. The technician was right. The lights were on in one of the rooms- now they were off again. Something was definitely 'strange'.
oOo
"Yes!" The Major said triumphantly as he managed to 'think' the lights on as they responded to his ATA gene. "No! Come on!" They'd gone off again. Lorne wanted to yell in despair but thought better of it. Gordon might be lurking outside. The water was creeping higher and higher, it was just above his knees now.
"I bet Colonel Sheppard would be able to turn you on if he were here." Lorne muttered darkly. In response, something above his head flashed and a shower of sparks rained down just beyond him, hissing as they hit the water.
"Alright, I'm sorry!" Lorne called, looking up at the ceiling. "Please?" He said nicely. If Atlantis were a person, she'd have snorted at his attempt at flirting. However, that nice man John Sheppard wasn't there, so he'd have to do. She complied.
"Yes!" He said with a grin as the lights finally stayed on. "Thank you." He added hastily, as something sent out a few more sparks. He looked around him. There were at least five pipes gushing out water, one of them had been completely pulled in two. He poked at the wound on his leg. It was still bleeding, but only a small amount, meaning the bullet hadn't severed his femoral artery. That, at least, was a plus.
As he glanced around, he noticed his gun holster at the opposite end of the room where the Wraith had left it. He went over to it, strapped it to his good leg, and slipped his gun inside it. As he looked up, he noticed something in the far corner of the room, stretching from the floor to the ceiling, almost completely hidden from view by a huge pipe. It looked like a ladder. He followed it up and found himself staring at a walkway that stretched right across the room to the other side, straight into the wall. Well, at first glance it looked like a wall. On further inspection, Lorne could see that it was actually a door. The walkway was completely invisible unless you were looking for it, it was made of the same type of metal the pipes were made from and blended into the background of the ceiling.
Knowing that he was pretty much out of options from where he was, he decided to try it, just to see if it left him any better off than he was. It couldn't get much worse. He almost slipped as he navigated through the water and around the pipes, but he finally made it to the ladder. The large pipe was leaking, so the steps were covered in water. It was going to be difficult to get up with his injury – the ladder looked even higher from the bottom.
"What the hell." Lorne muttered, and grabbed the ladder, heaving himself up each rung. It was more difficult than he'd thought and his leg was slowing him down. It was a high ladder and he nearly fell twice, but eventually he managed to haul himself to the top and onto the walkway. He staggered across it and came to the door.
"I don't suppose there's any chance of this one being open?" He asked to no one in particular, but to his surprise, the door hissed open to reveal complete darkness. He pulled out his gun and squinted, trying to make out any Wraith-like forms. He edged into the room and almost jumped when the lights sprung on. The ones in the room behind him went off at the same instant. Lorne stepped further into the room, and the door slid shut behind him.