Chapter 9: That Sinking Feeling

“Let’s do another iteration,” suggests Mikaela. “Do you want to change character?”

“Yes,” I reply. “I’m going to be a steerage passenger this time.”

Mikaela decides to replay her previous role. The reason for my decision to change character is to avoid the feeling of responsibility that was being heaped on my shoulders because I didn’t know where some stupid key was kept.

After a few minutes break we start a new iteration. I allow Mikaela to adjust a couple of the game parameters at her request. The starting situation is slightly different from before; partly because I’m playing a different character, and partly because the parameters have been tweaked. When the scene begins this time I find myself in a position which I’ve been in before, albeit at a different time and place.

“Grunt ... Grunt ... Arrghhh! ... Take that, wench! ... Gonna come! Gonna come! Yeah!” cries the steward as he shoots his load into my cunt.

We are hidden from the other passengers by an overturned table, but we can’t disguise the noise of our rutting. The steward should really be telling people what to do in this emergency. Not unreasonably the gathered passengers are expecting some form of leadership from the steward. They are waiting in vain. The great ship suddenly stopped in the middle of the night and rumours are spreading which will cause panic if left unchecked. Is the ship sinking? Do we go to the boat deck? ... If so, how? The steward is more intent in satisfying his animal lust than doing his duty. I’m a willing partner in my deflowering although another time and place would have been preferable. The steward and I have been flirting ever since I boarded the ship, and now he’s taking advantage of the current situation to fuck me.

“Look!” cries a passenger. “The floor is tilting. We must get out of here!”

Those few simple words break the uneasy calm in the large area where about fifty of the steerage passengers have gathered. Panic sets in and people start rushing about in different directions. The steward belatedly realises that perhaps we are all in real danger. He pulls up his trousers and dashes down one of the corridors. I and a few others follow him in the expectation that he knows how to get out of here.

If the steward knows the way to the boat deck, he never makes it. The sound of tortured metal is accompanied by a sudden change in the angle of the floor. The steward, who by now is several metres in front of those following him, suddenly loses his balance and falls headlong down a steep narrow set of stairs leading deeper into the bowels of the ship. He lands at the bottom with a sickening crunch. He’s at least unconscious, if not dead.

“Go check on him, girl,” growls one of the passengers to me. “He’s the only one who knows how we can get out of here.”

“Just because the man fucked me doesn’t make me responsible for his well being,” I reply, not wanting to climb down to the lower deck which by now is starting to fill with water.

Unfortunately the other passengers with us are united in their belief that I’m the one who must brave the rising water. Time is against me, so I don’t waste valuable seconds in arguing further. By the time I’m half way down the narrow stairs it is obvious that the steward is beyond helping us. His upper body is under the rising water, and there’s no sign of movement. I’ve no space to get a good hold to pull him to safety, even if I had the strength.

I return to where the others were standing, only to find they haven’t bothered waiting for me. I can hear them further down the corridor so I head in that direction. Soon I join a much larger crowd at the foot of a wide staircase leading up. Unfortunately a metal grill across the stairs blocks our way.

“There must be a key!” cries Rob, who has just joined the crowd now gathering in front of the grill. “A ship’s officer or steward will have the key! Has anybody seen one?”

The man who had demanded that I check on the steward who fucked me speaks up. “Find the key, girl! The key. You must know where it is!”

If the steward had a key on him, then it’s now deep under freezing water. Surely they can’t expect me to go back and look. But mass panic isn’t a state in which rational thinking holds sway. Standing here doing nothing isn’t going to help us either, so I resign myself to a desperate search for the key.

“I’ll come with you,” says a woman whom I quickly recognise as Bess.

Pushing our way through the milling crowd isn’t easy. To add to our problems, water is starting to flow along the corridor. It’s knee deep by the time we reach the narrow staircase where the steward fell. The stairs themselves are under water and common sense tells me that it’s suicidal to attempt to reach the steward. But I must try. I quickly remove my outer clothes as they will only hinder my movement under water. Bess holds them for me as I quickly descend into the water wearing only my light undergarment. For once luck is on my side, and I feel rather than see the steward’s body. I quickly fumble around his body for the sign of any keys. But that’s as far as my luck holds. Either he never had any keys, or they have fallen somewhere away from his body. I can’t stay any longer in this freezing water so I abandon my search.

Bess is still waiting for me despite the water having risen to her waist in the meantime. I’ve no time to put my clothes back on as the corridor will be underwater in a few minutes. She and I return to the others as quickly as we can. The large crowd is now surging forward trying to get through a narrow gap in the grill. Someone has managed to break the grill and create a small gap. But the gap is perilously small, enabling only one person at a time to squeeze through. At the rate the water is rising, it’s unlikely more than a third of those here will be able to get through the gap in time. I notice Michelle is near the back of the crowd.