Jack and Thomas run out of the palm court into a dense crowd. Jack pushes his way to the rail and looks at the state of the ship. The bridge is now completely under water, and there is intense chaos on deck. Jack begins to help Thomas put his lifebelt on, but he quickly gave it to a passenger, thinking they need it more than he does. Jack gave Thomas an astounded look, as people stream around them, shouting and pushing.
"I'm a strong swimmer, Jack." Thomas says, giving him a knowing smile. Jack returned his beautiful smile.
"Okay. We'll keep moving aft. We have to stay on this ship as long as possible." Thomas nods, before they push their way aft through the panicking crowd. Up front Collapsible A is whirled like a leaf in the currents around the sinking ship. It slams against the side of the forward funnel. Nearby, Fabrizio is drawn up against the grating of a stokehold vent as water pours through it. The force of tons of water roaring down the ship traps him against it, and he is dragged down under the surface as the ship sinks. He struggles to free himself but cannot. Suddenly there is an explosion somewhere deep in the bowels of the ship as a furnace explodes and a blast of hot air belches out of the ventilator, ejecting Fabrizio. He surfaces in a roar of foam and keeps swimming.
Jack and Thomas clamber over the A-Deck aft rail. Then, using all his strength, Jack lowers Thomas toward the deck below, holding on with one hand. He dangles, then falls. Jack jumps down behind him. They join a crush of people literally clawing and scrambling over each other to get down the narrow stairs to the well deck... the only way aft. Seeing that the stairs are impossible, Jack climbs over the B-Deck railing and helps Thomas over. He lowers him again, and he falls in a heap. Baker Joughin, who was now punch drunk, happens to be next to him. He hauls Thomas back to his feet, while Jack drops down and the three of them push through the crowd across the well deck. Despite the bitterly cold North Atlantic, and his wet clothes Thomas removes his coat, then slings it over Jack.
"What are you doing? You're going to get cold." Jack was stunned, even though he slipped his arms into the jacket. Thomas looked around, though he too, was beginning to shiver.
"You need this more than I do," Thomas says, his voice quavering from the cold. Jack's eyes began to tear. Soon, he was yanked by Thomas.
"C'mon. We need to find a spot at the rear." Thomas says, while Jack agrees. Near them, at the rail, people are jumping into the water. The ship groans and shudders. The man ahead of Jack is walking like a zombie.
"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death--" the man prays, his eyes transfixed to the heavens above. Both Jack and Thomas were impatient, as well as other passengers who were scrambling their way to the poop deck.
"You wanna walk a little faster through that valley, fella?" Thomas gives the man a quick shove up the stairs.
The stay cables along the top of the funnel snap, and they lash like steel whips down into the water. Cal watches as the funnel topples from its mounts. Falling like a temple pillar twenty eight feet across it whomps into the water with a tremendous splash. People swimming underneath it disappear in an instant. Fabrizio, a few feet away, is hurled back by a huge wave. He comes up, gasping... still swimming. The water pouring into the open end of the funnel draws in several swimmers. The funnel sinks, disappearing, but-
Hundreds of tons of water pour down through the 30 foot hole where the funnel stood, thundering down into the belly of the ship. A whirlpool forms, a hole in the ocean, like at enormous toiler-flush. A person swims in a frenzy as the vortex draws him in. He is sucked down like a spider going down a drain. Fabrizio, nearby, swims like hell as more people are sucked down behind him. Like a miracle, he manages to be in the clear. He's going to live no matter what it takes.
Water roars through the doors and windows of the once graceful Grand Staircase, cascading down the stairs like a rapids. John Jacob Astor is swept down the marble steps to A-Deck, which is already flooded... a roiling vortex. He grabs the headless cherub at the bottom of the staircase and wraps his arms around it. Astor looks up in time to see the huge glass dome overhead explode inward with the wave of water washing over it. A Niagara of sea water thunders down into the room, blasting through the first class opulence. It is truly the Armageddon of elegance. Below decks, the flooding is horrific. Walls and doors are splintered like kindling. Water roars down corridors with pile-driver force, destroying whatever path the water entered.
Thomas and Jack struggle to climb the well deck stairs as the ship tilts. Drunk Baker Joughin puts a hand squarely on Thomas' butt and shoves him up onto the deck.
"Sorry, mister!" Thomas gave a small blush, then looked down to see who it was. Hundreds of people are already on the poop deck, and more are pouring up every second. Jack and Thomas cling together as they struggle across the tilting deck. As the bow goes down, the stern rises. In boat 2, which is just off the stern, passengers gape as the giant bronze propellers rise out of the water like gods of the deep. People began jumping from the well deck; the poop deck; the gangway doors.
Some hit debris that were scattered in the water and are either hurt or killed.
Once on the poop deck Jack and Thomas struggle aft as the angle increases. Hundreds of passengers, clinging to every fixed object on deck, huddle on their knees around Father Byles, who has his voice raised in prayer. They are praying, sobbing, or just staring at nothing, their minds blank with dread. Pulling himself from handhold to handhold, Jack tugs Thomas aft along the deck, while he tried to find his way up the sloping deck as well. They continued to struggle on, pushing through the praying people. A man loses his footing ahead and slides toward them. Both Jack and Thomas help him.
The propellers are now twenty feet above the water and rising faster. Jack and Thomas make it to the stern rail, right at the base of the flagpole. They grip the rail, jammed in between other people. It is the spot where Jack pulled him back onto the ship, just two night-and a lifetime-ago.
Above the wailing and sobbing, Father Byles' voice carries, cracking with emotion.
"...and I saw new heavens and a new earth. The former heavens and the former earth had passed away and the sea was no longer-"
The lights flicker, threatening to go out. Thomas grips Jack as the stern rises into a night sky ablaze with stars.
Father Byles continued his prayer.
"I also saw a new Jerusalem, the holy city coming down out of heaven from God, beautiful as a bride prepared to meet her husband. I heard a loud voice from the throne ring out this is God's dwelling among men. He shall dwell with them and they shall be his people and He shall be their God who is always with them."
Thomas stares about him at the faces of the doomed. Near them are the Dahl family, clinging together stoically. Helga looks at him briefly, and her eyes are infinitely sad. Thomas sees a young mother next to him, clutching her five year old son, who is crying in terror.
"Shhh. Don't cry. It'll be over soon, darling. It'll all be over soon." she says, comforting the young one, then began to slowly rock him.
"He shall wipe every tear from their eyes. And there shall be no more death or mourning, crying out or pain, for the former world has passed away."
As the ship tilts further everything not bolted down inside shifts. Cupboards burst open in the pantry that showered the floor with tons of china. A piano slides across the floor, crashing into a wall. Furniture tumbles across the smoking room floor. On the promenade deck passengers lose their grip and begin sliding down the wooden deck, hundreds of feet before they hit the water. At the stern the propellers are 100 feet out of the water and rising. Panicking people leap from the poop deck rail, fall screaming and hit the water like mortar rounds. Down below, swimmers look up and see the stern towering over them like a monolith, the propellers rising against the stars...
...
In Boat 6 Rose looks on as the sounds of the dying ship and the screaming people come across the water. The spectacle of the Titanic, her lights blazing, reflecting in the still water. Its stern is high in the air, angles up over forty five degrees. The propellers are 150 feet out of the water. Over a thousand passengers cling to the decks, looking from a distance like a swarm of bees. The image is shocking, unbelievable, unthinkable. Rose stares at the spectacle, unable to frame it or put it into any proportion.
"God Almighty." Margaret says, voice shaking. The great liner's lights begins to flicker.
In darkness Chief Engineer Bell hangs onto a pipe at the master breaker panel. Around him men climb through tilted cyclopean machines with electric hand-torches. It is a black hell of breaking pipes, spraying water, and groaning machinery threatening to tear right out of its bedplates. Water sprays down, hitting the breaker panel, but Bell will not leave his post.
CLUNK!
"Keep those breakers in! Keep them in!" he shouted, as the breakers kick. He slams them in again and- WHOOM! a blast of light! Something melts and arcing fills the engine room with nightmarish light-
The lights go out all over the ship. Titanic becomes a vast black silhouette against the stars. In Collapsible C, Mr. Ismay has his back to the ship, unable to watch the great steamer die. He is catatonic with remorse, his mind overloaded. He can avert his eyes, but he can't block out the sounds of dying people and machinery.
A loud, deafening cracking comes across the water.