“Please!” Corrina screamed at the door. “I have a child, please let me in, they have guns!”

There was no response. She banged more, and shook fiercely at the door handle.

“Come on,” Gerry said with his hand on her shoulder. “We’ll try again.”

Near the end of the hall the doors were spaced further apart. Again Corrina stopped, repeating her cries and banging on a door. Again there was no response.

Another burst of gunfire, but the sound was different. It was echoing in the open cavity of the ship’s belly rather than muffled through her walls. Travis kicked the door in with a powerful stroke, splintering the doorframe around the deadbolt.

The group pushed through the doorway.

The door was still on its hinges, and Travis shut it behind them, pulling a chair up to hold it in place. The cries of the hallway and from the Atrium were shut out almost completely. They all slowed their breathing without speaking.

The four were in a small foyer and turned left to walk out into the main room of the cabin. An elderly couple stood in the corner, by the closed drapes of a balcony. The man held the woman tightly and they stared at Travis and the others behind him.

“I’m sorry,” Travis said. “We have a child and they have guns, we need to hide.”

The cabin was a large luxury berth. Tan leather easy chairs and a matching couch faced a flat-screen TV at the far left.  A round table was circled by high-backed blue cushioned chairs, all sitting on white and blue ceramic tiles. To their right was a gleaming black grand piano and a wet bar, behind that an open door showed the bedroom.

Gerry introduced the group.

Darren remained quiet. Still the fire alarm rang.

“What’s going on?” the old man said.

“We’ve been attacked,” Gerry said, speaking quickly. “A military ship blew up the bridge, they rammed us, and then the men came on board with guns. They were in some kind of uniforms.”

The old women made an exclamation.

“Military uniforms?” the old man said.

“No,” Travis said, and then he thought of what those orange suits were. “No, like prison uniforms. They must’ve taken control of their ship during the rescue.”

“Please,” the old man said, “sit down. The kid, does he need anything? We have food and drinks in the fridge behind the bar. My name is Norman, this is my wife Vera.”

Travis deposited Darren on a bar stool.

Norman and Vera came away from the wall, and Vera collapsed into a chair at the round table. There was another volley of gunfire, and a horrible scream.

“What’s going to happen?” Darren said.

Nobody answered.

“They blew up the bridge?” Norman asked.

Gerry nodded.

“So who’s driving the ship?”

“They’re all dead,” Gerry said. “They rammed us in the rear. I can’t imagine our engines could work.”

“What about the captain?”

Gerry shrugged.

“What do we do?” Norman asked.

“We wait,” Travis said. “We wait and hope nobody bugs us and that ship leaves.”

Nobody spoke. Norman got a glass of orange juice for Darren. There were occasional screams from outside, some nearer, some farther.

Another blast of gunfire, from a handgun. It was followed by an angry voice.

“Get on the floor!” they heard from close by.

Quiet again from outside, quiet in the cabin. There was no noise for some time.

“How will we know when they’re gone?” Corrina asked.

“I’ll look,” Gerry said. “But not yet.”

They heard their cabin door pushed open, the chair falling over. Two men in orange jumpsuits walked in from the small foyer, one holding a pistol, the other a knife. They wore bandanas Travis recognized as gang colors. He’d seen them at work, around knife and bullet wounds.

“Against the wall,” the one with the gun said.

“Where’s your money?” the second one said. “Just hand it to us and nobody dies in this room.”

Corrina was squeezing Darren’s face into her breast and they moved towards the wall.

“We don’t have anything,” Travis said. “We were rescued by this ship from New York, we don’t have any bags or anything.”

“New York’s dead, and you will be too if you don’t show us the money.”

“You’re from Rikers,” Corrina said.

“What? Sing Sing, bitch,” the man with the gun said.

“That ship was rescuing you,” Travis said. “And you killed them?”

“Rescued?” the man with the gun laughed. “Taking us from one cage to another? We were the last ship out. A last-minute ship and not enough crew. So we’re not going back to the cage. Now this is somebody’s money pad, so I want to see some.”

“I have a wallet,” Norman said.

He went to the table behind him and held it to the prisoners. The man with the knife took it and opened it.

“Oh man,” he said as he fanned the full sheath of bills. “The millionaire. The millionaire and his wife.”

He began singing the Gilligan’s Island theme. “Just sit right back and you’ll hear a tale, a tale of a fateful trip.”

“Every moment you waste here,” Corrina said, “your chance to get away shrinks. That’s a Navy ship! How long do you think before they find you? What good will this money do you? You need to get off this ship or you’ll go back to the cage.”

“I will shoot you if you don’t shut up,” the man with the gun said.

Travis and Gerry closed their shoulders together in front of her.

“This is going to cost you your freedom,” she said.

“Man, what do you know? This is the free-est I have ever been. We ain’t going back! And whatever is left after all this, we’ll want money.”

“Alright, millionaire,” the one with the knife said, “what about your wife? Let’s see Mrs. Howell’s jewels.”

“My wife has a purse,” Norman said. “It’s in the bedroom.”

“She can show us,” the one with the knife said. He grabbed Vera.

“She won’t know where it is, let me,” Norman said.

“Stay there!” the man pulled on Vera and dragged her a step.

“Norman?” Vera said. “What’s happening?”

She stalled to look back and the man tugged her hard.

“No!” Norman shouted, pushing between them.

The man with the gun fired, and the explosive sound rung in all their ears until all they heard was Norman squealing as he fell to the floor. The gun was already pointed at Travis’s chest. It was done. The nice old man was still on the floor and the BANG of the shot still rang in Travis’s ear.

“Now get me the damn money and the damn jewels, Mrs. Howell,” the man with the gun said.

Vera began crying, her legs buckled, the man with the knife held her up and yanked her forward.

“Norman,” she said.

Darren was held tight to Corrina’s breast. He closed his eyes and just trusted in her arms around him.

“Bastards,” Gerry said.

“You want some too? I told you how to keep from dying,” the man with the gun said. “He didn’t do it.”

Travis was on his knees, holding Norman’s head up. Norman’s eyes were closed and he wheezed in jerks.

“Just let him go and stand up,” the gun still pointed at Travis.

“You’re sub-human. Filth!”  Travis said.

“Sub-human,” the man with the gun repeated. He spoke like his tongue was swollen. “Yeah, sub-human. Might as well drown in the cage. We was always sub-human… and you never cared if we killed each other, if we grew up with crackpipes on the ground and bullets in the air,” the man held Travis eyes-to-eyes and continued. “They told us New York was gone, man. Washington, gone. Miami, Boston, gone. They ain’t coming to stop us. So we sub-humans should play nice now we’re free?

“People like you have nightmares about the world burning. People like me fantasize about it. And there’s a lot of people like me. You all shouldn’t have made us so angry.”

The man fired again. Norman fell forward into his own blood on the floor. Vera screamed.

The man with the knife was holding her with both hands but she was strong and almost broke away.