The Descent

Chapter 55 - Going In

Denton sprinted away from the control room, wiping tears from his eyes. He regretted telling Gabi about the fate of his family. The words had just come tumbling out of his mouth at Gabi's hesitation to try to save Jarell, without concern for her feelings. There was no need for her to know that his father had been responsible for the death of his own family. Once said, there was no taking them back. He had panicked.

He ran past several open doors that revealed dark offices and conference rooms, his footsteps echoing off of the hallway walls like hammers. He burst through the door at the end of the hallway and slammed into the opposite wall, then slid to the floor with a groan.

After a couple of deep breaths, he got to his feet and looked around, his hand against the wall as support. A smile spread across his face as he realized he had stumbled right into the passageway that led to the underwater module, the same hallway he had explored when he first arrived at the complex. That meant he was close. He took a deep breath and did his best to ignore his aching body, then retraced his prior path to the module airlock.

When he stepped into the room of the airlock, a bright red light above the airlock door flashed a continuous rhythm, once every second. He had no idea what the flashing meant, but he suspected it had something to do with the imminent departure of the module. His eyes went to the walls on each side of the airlock door. The emergency abort had to be nearby. 

A recessed handle inside a rectangular square on the wall caught his eye. That had to be it. He reached for a small handle, pulled it and then promptly stumbled backward as the handle broke off and fell out of his hand and hit the floor.

He muttered words not appropriate for anyone's ears as he instinctively reached for the broken handle and stared at the flat piece of metal that just moments ago had been the solution to his problem.

The door behind him flew open, and Gabi burst through the door. She froze in her steps as she absorbed the scene of Denton standing in front of the hatch, the broken handle in his hand.

"What did you do?" she said and grabbed the handle from his hand, turning it in her hand.

"It just came off," Denton said and slammed the palm of his hand against the wall in frustration, a move he immediately regretted as pain shot through hand and arm.  With a grunt, he leaned back against the wall and let out a sigh.

Gabi look at him, eyebrows raised. "It just came off?"

"Yes. I reached for it to open the hatch and it just broke off," he said and pointed towards the broken remains of the handle sticking out at an awkward angle. "That's the emergency abort, right? It's the only hatch I see."

Gabi nodded and leaned in closer to examine the hatch. She grabbed the remains of the handle with her fingertips and pressed the bottom edge of the panel with the index finger of her other hand. A faint click inside preceded the hatch swinging open. Behind it, the red emergency abort handle came into view.

"How did you..." Denton started but shut his mouth as Gabi pointed to the four black letters that spelled PUSH on the hatch, right next to the remains of the handle. He held up a hand before Gabi could say anything. "Don't, ok? Just pull the handle."

Gabi looked at him with a smirk and nodded. She reached for the handle, twisted it counter-clockwise and then pulled it out and down. A small green light illuminated above the switch and a whining sound started up somewhere behind the walls.

Above the airlock door, the red flashing right changed to flashing orange.

"Is it working?"

Gabi nodded. "It is. The orange flashing light tells us that the module's descent has been interrupted and its direction reversed. It's coming back up."