Chapter 7

After the rockets are fired, the tension in the crowd increases dramatically. Those who were unwilling to believe that anything was amiss before are suddenly scrambling to secure a spot in a lifeboat. The crewmembers are at their wit's end trying to control the crowd. And from my place near the side of the deck, I can still pick up bits of pieces of conversation.

"I thought this was just a drill!"

"God himself could not sink this ship…*"

"Hold on for your lives, the ship is tilting, I say!"

And indeed it was. It was very subtle- you had to be paying close attention to feel it- but there was definitely a list to port. Of course, 'holding on for your lives' was really quite unnecessary, but people tend to dramatize things when faced with reality. Perhaps if they would open their eyes more and accept a situation more readily, they would find that-

"Excuse me, mister, but I beg of you to help me!"

A tug at my sleeve brings me falling back down to earth. A girl of about ten or twelve with short, cropped brown hair searches my face, her eyes filled with sorrow and desperation. I smile reassuringly and bend down, a hand on her shoulder.

"What is it that you need?"

She swallows. "M-my family boarded this ship with second-class tickets. We had a servant with us as well. But we was riding third class." A sob. "Please mister, please help save him!" Her words tumble out, mixing together and causing my head to spin in confusion.

"Well, I'd be happy to help you," I start in a voice that I hope is gentle and soothing, "but I don't seem to understand- why is he in danger? Considering the state this ship's in, I would say that we are all equally in danger."

"But you don't understand," she wails. "Peter is trapped. They're all trapped. Some are lucky- they managed to escape- but several of the third class passengers have been blocked by the gates*."

Despite the bitter cold, sweat pours down my neck and back as I sprint down staircases, through hallways, into elevators. After having promised the small girl that I'd return her servant back to her, I'd entrusted her to an officer to protect, having seen her parents nowhere around.

How could they…how could Gauron practically steal away the lives of some people? I'd thought that perhaps he'd grown a heart since the last time we'd met! Thoughts race through my mind, most of them along the same line.

But what if Gauron hadn't known about the gates? Perhaps he'd ordered them to be taken down, but the crewmen had forgotten…and besides, the gates were probably meant to hold back the mixing of lower classes with higher ones…

I skid to a stop just as I'm rounding a corner. Loud shouts can be heard, as can the ringing of metal. Taking a few more steps forward, I see a tall, barred steel gate tower in front of a pack of frenzied passengers, shouting and demanding to be let through. The barrier does not budge.

I boldly walk towards them. At the sight of someone on the other side of the gate, one man yells, "Let us through! Please! We have children with us!" Which, upon further inspection, I see is true.

"Alright!" I yell in a loud and commanding voice. Slowly, the chaos dies down as plan forms in my mind.

"I have a way to let you all through! But it's risky to be standing near the gate, so I want all of you to head around that corner and crouch down, with your hands covering your ears, just as a safety precaution."

You can tell by the looks on their faces that they are skeptical, but the passengers do as they are told, walking in huddles, afraid of what's to come.

Reaching inside my pocket, I pull out a hand grenade. Good thing security didn't catch me bringing this on board.

I remove the safety clip, then hold the grenade in my right hand. Backing slowly away from the target, I pull the safety pin out with my free left hand, then toss it with deadly aim at the barricade before ducking behind the nearest wall.

BOOM. There's a magnificent explosion, perhaps not a large, grand scale one a real bomb would give, but that wasn't my intention anyways. I peek back around the corner, and see, relieved, that the gate has been torn apart, debris lining the floor. The walls haven't been too damaged, and thankfully the floor hasn't either.

"It's safe to come out now," I call.

The passengers tentatively creep out from behind their hiding places and, having seen the spectacular end result, whoop and cheer.

"Be careful for the debris. You never know, perhaps you won't die from drowning, but from tetanus."

Hearing this startling statement, they slow down their pace, scanning the ground for any scrap metal. And Gauron said that I couldn't take a joke.

Having remembered the little girl waiting on the deck, I suddenly ask, "Wait a moment. Is there a Peter Allen here?" For an awful moment, I wonder if I accidentally blew him to bits with my hand grenade.

"I'm Peter Allen," A tall, blond boy replies, moving towards me. "Is there anything you need? Or…perhaps, you heard of news about Miss Esther?" He asks a bit too quickly.

"If you're talking about a little girl of about ten with short brown hair, then she's fine. She was the one who asked me to come down here and rescue you," I say.

"Thank goodness," Peter sighs, relieved. "I was hoping that she would escape ahead of me on a lifeboat."

"Well, I don't know about that, but she's in the protection of an officer, so she's guaranteed to have a spot."

"I don't know how I can repay you," he says, his voice filled with emotion and gratitude, "I am but a poor servant, but if there's anything you need, just give me a call."

"I'll think about it. But, in the meantime, could you possibly enlighten me as to the situation of the ship right now? Like…perhaps the water level?" What if I'd come down here all for naught, and we were going to drown anyways?

Peter's expression becomes grave. "The water has risen already above the C deck. In a matter of minutes, it will start flooding onto this very floor. I suggest that you escape now, if you want to have any chance of making it." He starts to look fidgety, looking this way and that. He wants to see to Esther, I think to myself.

"Not quite," I say, smiling sadly. "There are still a few more passengers to be liberated. Esther told me there was a gate on the other side of the B Deck, and I'm going to head there right now. You see to your precious friend."

And with that, I turn on my heel, running as fast as I can as the watch on my hand advances a minute.

*"God himself could not sink this ship."- A quote which is said to have spoken by a Titanic crew or passenger, but there is no evidence.

*Third class gates- Okay, so here's my big fallacy. I researched this a bit. In the Titanic movie, apparently there was a gate that trapped passengers. However, a PowerPoint by Cathy Akers-Jordan (who researched this a bit further, even citing sources from survivors) has said that, if there were any barriers at all, they were not so high as to trap anyone behind them. I just incorporated this in there to further dramatize the situation.