The Chronicles of Heaven's War: Burning Phoenix
Page 23
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Terey was thrown from her chair to the floor, piles of papers and books tumbling down from the desk upon the woman. Screeching of ripping metal and buckling deck plates was deafening, her apartment being on ‘C’ deck just forward the #3 engine room. Jumping up to the sounds of bleating sirens and red, flashing hazard lights, the woman dove for the opened doorway just as the lighting died and the ship violently pitched to starboard, throwing her back into the room.
Spinning crazily around in the blinding darkness, Terey fell, smashing her face against a footlocker, breaking her nose and cutting a deep, bloody gash across her forehead. Stunned, she fell to the floor in a faint.
When Terey came to, the air was heavy with an acrid odor of poisonous gases. Frantically, she groped in the blackness for the fire locker. Half blinded by blood streaming into her eyes, she felt her way around the room until crimson rays of the flashing hazard lights reflected off the chrome handle on the locker. Releasing the latched door, the woman could do little more than groggily fumble through its contents for a respirator facemask, managing with great difficulty to put it on.
The filtered air helped revive Terey and clear her head. Using the wall to steady herself, she managed to stand and stumbled out into the passageway. Its floor was unreasonably warm, indicating the flight deck directly below must be ablaze. Choosing to go forward, she turned to the right and hurried as best she could down the companionway toward the front of the ship.
Going was difficult at best. Not only did Terey’s injuries hinder her sight, growing pain was making it hard to concentrate in the frothing smoke, so thick that only the ghostly red glow of the emergency lights could penetrate it. Clutching the handrail that ran along the wall, Terey slowly made her way down the corridor until it opened onto a catwalk that traversed the ‘D’ deck storage bay. On the other side of this bay, she would find the portal for her escape.
As of yet, ‘D’ deck storage bay, filled with fighters in various stages of repair, had not been damaged. Thick smoke rolled in through the two aft passageways, quickly filling the area with toxic fumes. The air forward was not as fouled, and Terey could see closed bulkhead door on the other side of the catwalk. Her hope for survival increased.
At that instant, another violent tremor rocked the Chisamore, pitching Terey to the deck and ripping away her facemask. In futile desperation, the woman searched for the mask in the burning smoke, its noxious poisons tormenting her eyes and lungs. In only seconds, Terey was retching in uncontrolled vomiting, but her heart refused to give up the fight for survival. Having only her sense of direction, she struggled forward on hands and knees to seek escape, a sick headache sapping her strength until she was crawling along on her belly.
After what seemed an eternity, each breath burning her lungs like a blazing firebrand and every movement agonizing, Terey made it to the closed hatch. Try as she might, the woman no longer possessed the energy to reach the hazard switch that would alert others beyond the door to the presence of someone on this side.
Totally exhausted, Terey could no longer contain her emotions. Like a forlorn little child, the woman began to weep, not for her coming death, but for the futility of effort and struggle - it being all for naught. She reached up once more for the button protruding beyond the wall only inches from her fingers. Then there came another violent shaking of the ship and a sudden crashing that fell upon Terey’s ears.
Before the woman could cover her head for protection, a heavy girder broke loose, smashing into the wall above her, falling across her back after crushing her hand. Terey cried out in anguish as her face crashed into the deck plates. A sudden rush of freezing air racked her body as a black cloud consumed her mind. The valve on a nearby oxygen container had been ruptured by the falling girder, burning the unconscious woman’s flesh, but also filling starved lungs with life-saving oxygen.
On the other side of the sealed hatch, blatting sounds and flashing lights were catching the attention of firemen stationed near a boson’s locker off the upper hangar deck. Cautiously, they approached the door, contemplating the risk of opening it. Was someone seeking escape, or was it a false alarm? The fire captain stared at the hatch. She alone must decide, there being no time to seek approval from the bridge. The life of the entire crew might well rest on the choice she had to make, or possibly the life of just one person stranded on the other side of that door. Safety or destruction, the life of many or possibly few, or only one, wisdom or foolish emotion, life-saving rescue or misjudged folly, what was it to be?