KCH (Kids Clubhouse) Story Submission

Chapter 9

Hannah was making her way down the stairs. She had two options in front of her. Either go to her cell, or go find a way off the boat.

Hannah was really wanted to go for the second option, but the sounds of other guards coming ruled out that option. Attacking the guards with the gun would cause more trouble for him. Plus, it's one gun against five guns. There would be no way she would survive.

Hannah ran down the stairs quickly. She didn't want to encounter another guard, and she really didn't want to headbutt a person again. Her head was killing her when she headbutt that guard, now the pain had subsided, but it was still sore.

When Hannah reached her cell. She tried opening the door, but the door didn't budge. She remembered that he had the security passkey. But the security system showed a red light every time John scanned it.

'Great, now what do I do?' She thought, looking around.

Going back up for duty wasn't an option now. Going to meet Russel could protect her for a short while, but if the guards found that she was with Russel, and not in her cell... Hannah didn't want to think about swimming in a salty sea. She felt tired trying to imagine herself doing so.

The sound of footsteps coming down the stairs were getting louder. There were also distant shouts. Hannah didn't have much time to think about swimming right now. She looked around, hoping to find a garbage bin she could hide herself in. Sadly, there was nothing except for large pipes. Hiding behind the large pipes was no option, for she could still be seen easily.

Hannah was running out of ideas. She started panicking, looking from place to place, wondering where to hide herself. There was just nothing, apart from his cell, which was not co-operating with her.

She ran around frantically, looking for some kind of hiding place, some kind of disguise. In the end she just gave up and sat down in front of his cell door, hoping that the guards wouldn't kill him.

Hannah looked up, making a final prayer to God.

Hannah found her hiding place.

She had never felt this squished in her entire life.

The vent above her was the only place Hannah could hide in, and was a pretty decent place to hide in. But it was a bit too small for Hannah.

Climbing up the pipes wasn't a problem, but the screws on the vent hatch were loose, which Hannah thought was merely a coincidence. But getting into something which you're too big for is hard, especially when you are getting in the opposite way.

Somehow Hannah managed to get in and close the vent hatch. Hannah wriggled herself in and crouched awkwardly in the vent, waiting for the guards to leave.

A minute passed by. Hannah felt like she was waiting for an hour. Finally, the guards came, and Hannah stopped breathing for a moment, and just stared at the guards through the vent openings.

Some guards were looking inside her cell, which somehow opened. The other guards went scouring the rest of the floor, or at least, that's what Hannah assumed them to be doing. 

Hannah had a lingering thought in the back of her head, saying that she would get caught, and that she would die. She asked it to shut up for sometime.

The guards below were mumbling something. That made her curious. She wanted to slowly open the hatch and listen to what they were saying. But she knew that she would fall down, and become prey to the greedy eyes of the guards, all waiting for her.

It had been five minutes since the guards came, and they still weren't done searching for Hannah. Sitting in the chute for so long felt very uncomfortable. She shifted her position a bit.

And dropped the pass card which was in her pocket.

Hannah turned pale white, just staring at the card.

The guards had heard Hannah, which just made her even more petrified. She really didn't want to be thrown off, into a sea of sharks, devoured to the last bone.

Hannah made two decisions. She would move ahead in the passageway, hopefully finding another place to hide, or to stop overthinking.

She picked up the card, placed it in her mouth, and ever-so slowly crawled ahead the in passageway, careful not to leave heavy steps.

"Go up there and check if that woman is hiding in the ventilation system."

Hannah made her movements faster every moment, hoping each time, something else wouldn't fall out of her pocket. It would be dangerous, even lethal, to the escape plan if any evidence was left.

Hannah made slow, but precious progress through the passageway. It wouldn't be long before Hannah might reach a safe place... or at least another hiding place.

"No one is here. What do we do?" Hannah heard in the distance. The whole idea of 'Don't-Make-Noise' left her. She crawled as fast she could, making sure that at every turn, she didn't leave anything behind.

After a couple of minutes of crawling, Hannah thought that it was time to get out of there. She went towards the nearest vent outlet and looked down.

 She couldn't exactly see what was there, but it was well lit, which meant that there was someone inside.

Hannah was about to crawl on ahead, when he heard the guards. Hannah was confused as to how they made so much progress in such little time. Once Hannah was sure that the card wouldn't fall down, she went back a bit to listen more carefully to what was being said.

"Sir, we have found a piece of paper, it seems to be some sort of a map of the ship."

Hannah couldn't hear the reply by the other guard.

Hannah wondered what the reply was. She hoped that it was to stop the search and celebrate.

Hannah went on in the passageway, not wanting to waste time. She had to make it to another safe spot soon.

'This is it, I'm dead.' Hannah thought as she crawled through the passageway as fast as possible.