chairs, began sliding down the floor, along with people. A very unfortunate man slammed into a bolted down table, only to have a sliding piano crush him. The gigantic Christmas tree fell over, pinning dozens of people to the floor. Balto had grabbed hold of the doors he had entered through and shut them in order to keep at least some of the water out. Then he lost grip and slid along the floor to the right wall (now bottom wall). Finally, the ship came to rest. The floor was now the ceiling, the ceiling was now the floor. The survivors were shouting, some were crying, and almost all of them were looking for friends and family. The chaos was unimaginable. Balto had never seen such disorder and panic in his entire life. He looked around and saw a four year old girl pinned underneath a table that had fallen on her. She was dead. As if all this wasn't bad enough, the ceiling (well, now the floor) had about two inches of water in some spots. Balto watched the water move to the ceiling lights, then spark. A jolt of electricity went through the water and electrocuted all the people unfortunate enough to be standing in it.

The captain got up on the highest area he could stand on, and shouted to the crowd.

“Everyone stay calm! Help will be here soon. If we just stay here and keep calm, we'll be alright.”

Someone shouted from the crowd “What happened?”

The captain answered “We were hit by what is called a rogue wave. They are very rare, very large, and very dangerous. In case you couldn't tell, it seems as though the ship has flipped over. Now for the good news. The very instant we were hit, an emergency GPS distress call was sent out, meaning that we will most likely be found by rescue teams within a few hours, maybe less. So, as I said before, please stay calm.”

Everyone seemed to calm down a bit after that. The captain had found a doctor in the crowd, and had told him to begin helping injured ones. The doctor had also given a few volunteers instructions on first aid, so they could also help people. Balto thought this was a bunch of baloney. Not that doctors were helping people, he liked that, but he most certainly didn't agree with the captain's theory about 'Stay here, you'll be safe'. He didn't profess to know much about ships, but he knew that ships weren't designed to stay afloat upside down. He stepped up onto the high ground area where the captain had been a few minutes ago.

“People! Fellow passengers! May I have your attention?”

Everyone looked up at Balto.

“We can't stay here and wait for help! We need to go!”

“But,” said someone in the crowd “The captain told us to stay!”

“Yes, and he knows a lot more about this ship than I do, but I do know this! This ship was not designed to stay afloat upside down! And also, that glass over there,” he pointed to the large windows in the dining hall “Is now under water! It will bust when too much pressure is applied against it.”

“How would we get out if the ship is upside down?”

“We leave through the propeller tubes.”

“Okay, how do we leave this room? We're trapped!”

Balto looked around the dining hall. He noticed a door with a ledge up at the top (or, the floor) of the room.

“Where does that door lead to?” he asked Stella.

“The kitchen.”

“We leave through there.”

Now the passengers were furious at him. “How in the world are we supposed to leave through there? Fly?”

“We prop up that Christmas tree against it and climb.”

Balto walked over to the tree and began lifting it, without waiting for anyone. Of course, he couldn't, but then Jenna came over and began helping. Then came Nikki, Kaltag, and Star arrived and lifted.

“Come on, heave!” said Nikki.

“Heave with all your might!” said Kaltag.

“This is a waste of time. We...” said Star, then Kaltag whacked him in the head.

The next to help were Sylvia and Dixie, much to Jenna's pleasure. Then, much to Jenna's surprise, Steele came. Soon they had thirty passengers picking up the massive tree, and propping it against the ledge. People were about to start climbing on when Balto said “Hang on. I should go up first to make sure it's secure.”

He climbed to the top, then shouted down “It's a little wobbly! We should do it single file so it doesn't fall!”

Then of course, people began arguing over who should go first.

“We should do it in order of who came to help put up the tree,” said Steele “So in that case, Jenna would go, then Nikki, and so on.” Everyone agreed to that. First Jenna went up, then Nikki, then Kaltag, Star, Sylvia, Dixie, Steele, Boris, then another passenger, a 20-year old named Kodi. The next up was the waitress, Stella. She was about halfway up when someone screamed. Every head in the hall turned toward the voice. The woman that screamed was pointing at the windows. Balto, being a bit far away, had to squint. Then he saw the reason for panic. The glass was cracking.

Everyone began climbing up the tree in a mad frenzy. Balto called down to them, telling them it would only stay erect if one person went up at a time. Seeing it was useless, he yelled to Stella to climb as quickly as she could. Then, time stood still. The glass that made up the windows broke, and ushered in a torrent of freezing water. Stella was three feet from making it onto the ledge when the tree tipped. It slowly slid away from the ledge. Balto began screaming as loud as he could to Stella to jump. Stella just stood, frozen in fear. Balto stretched out his hand as far as it would go. Then, he caught her wing. He pulled her up as the rest of the tree crashed onto the floor, and in seconds it was covered by water. The eleven that had made it onto the ledge looked down, watching the other passengers thrown about, struggling to keep afloat, seeing some screaming that they couldn't swim. Reluctantly, Balto shut the door, muffling all the cries for help. He stared at the other ten people.

“We should be going.” he said quietly.

The kitchen was in disarray. In addition to everything not bolted down being in shambles, it looked as though a fireball had gone through. The people were blackened, and all the things that were previously flammable were gone, burned to a crisp.

“Well, where do we go from here?” asked Steele.

“There's an elevator shaft just ahead.” said Stella. “We could go through there.”

Balto and Kodi began prying the elevator doors apart. When they opened, Balto took a look to see how far it would be across. He told everyone to find something they could use as a bridge to get across. Then he made the mistake of looking down. The floor of the elevator was ripped up, leaving jagged shards of metal pointing up at them. Then he made the even worse mistake of looking up. The elevator was hanging from a mere strand of cord. Sparks were flying off of it as the strand loosened more and more.

“Uh... hey guys? Hurry it up!”

Fortunately, they found something. A long metal table, the exact length of the elevator shaft. They laid it down, and Balto went across to stand on the other end in order to hold it steady. Then he also tried prying open the other doors, but couldn't budge them.

“Hey Steele! Come over here and help me out!”

Steele sighed. “Yes my master.”

But, he went across and helped Balto open the doors, but they still would not budge.

“This is hopeless.” said Nikki.

“They're probably jammed.” said Kaltag.

“So this is it, we're going to die!” said Star. So Kaltag hit him on the head, as usual.

Balto was about to give up hope, when he noticed another set of elevator doors above them. Luckily, these doors were wide open.

“Steele, how far up would you say those doors are?”

“About ten feet. Why?”

“Do you think you could prop me up that far?”

“Sure.”

“Could you?”

“No way.”

“Why not?!”

“'Cause technically, it makes more sense. How much do you weigh?”

“About 140 pounds.”

“I weigh 130. And you're about five inches taller, so I'd get farther with you pushing me. You prop me up.”

Steele had a point. Although he was five-foot-eleven, Balto was almost six-foot-five.

“Okay, okay, whatever.” So Balto heaved up Steele. Then Jenna came over, and Balto propped her up to Steele, who finished pulling her up. Then went Stella, then Boris, then Sylvia, then Dixie, then Kaltag, then Star. All the while, Balto noticed the elevator wobbling more and more. He shouted over to Nikki and Kodi, who had been the ones holding the table steady on the other side “Come on! Quick! The elevator won't stay much longer!”

Kodi said to Nikki “You go across, I'll hold the table.”

Nikki began going over as fast as he reasonably could, when he heard Dixie scream. He looked up at the elevator only to see it coming down on him. The elevator smashed the table to bits, and landed in the bottom of the shaft on the sharp metal shards, with Nikki on the bottom.

As bad as this was, they had another problem. Kodi now had no way of getting across the shaft. Finally, he resorted to the only idea he had. He backed up a couple of feet, then ran toward the shaft. When he reached the edge, he took a large leap. He smacked the wall, seven feet below the open doors, but grabbed hold of something. Then he climbed up the remaining seven feet. The nine others were quite impressed.

Through the elevator was a small room, none of them knew what it was for. What they did know was that it led to a large ladder that would enable them to travel halfway up the ship. They

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