(Taking some liberties with the structure of the lab room. -C)
INT. ISHNU CITY TUNNELS
Keller, in utter blackness, swears.
KELLER
Aw, shit.
She pushes on, moving on her hands and knees, through the dark Ishnu tunnels. Occasionally, she comes to an intersection, and a beam of light comes from somewhere, illuminating her darting eyes for one spare moment before she pulls back against the wall - like hell she's going to allow herself to be caught. Sweating and covered with blood - Kaheel's, and her own - she takes a breath and begins to move again when all is dark. She comes to an intersection, moves tentatively out into the darkness to test the waters, decide where she could go.
Leaning forward, she touches something wet. When the light comes around again, she lifts her hand. Green Calderan blood.
KELLER
Jackpot.
A noise sounds. It's like the soft knell of a funeral bell. And then, a roaring noise. We've heard this before - it's the sound of a Vai moving down the tunnels. At top speed. Keller doesn't know what it is, but something tells her to dive - and dive she does, back into the tunnel at which she came. She shuts her eyes for a moment, curling herself into a ball, stuffing her body into the darkest part of the tunnel.
The Vai speeds by.
And slows.
Keller attempts to stifle her breathing - she takes a breath and holds it. Doesn't move, doesn't make a sound, doesn't even breathe.
A blackness reaches back into the intersection - a blackness darker than the tunnel's darkness, a blackness that moves with the viscosity of blood. It spreads into the intersection, and into Keller's section of the tunnel. She clambers back. It moves forward. Back again, she moves. And it advances. She moves back.
And then, there's another inhuman scream.
It's the scream of a sentient being. The darkness dissapates abruptly, and the roaring of the Vai resumes again. The tunnel reverberates. They know something alien is here.
Keller scrambles forward, dives through the intersection. She has to get out of here, and get out of here now.
The blackness moves behind her. It nearly grabs at her toes. Keller can't believe herself that she's moving so fast. But she has to get away - has to get away - can't let it get her - but, look - ahead of her, there's a chance, a green light, a -
Coming up in front of her is a hole in the floor of the tunnel. Green light pours out of it like an inviting Christmas party - and right now, she'd do anything to get away from the blackness, to save her skin.
She tumbles through it headfirst.
INT. CONTROL CHAMBER
Keller tumbles into an empty, strange-looking chamber. The ceiling is high, so she has enough time to throw her head underneath her body, flip, and land crouched, fairly well.
It's a large, cavernous room reminiscent of Daly's most recent experience, whose walls are completely covered with utterly alien computer equipment, made to the specifications of Vai prehensile appendages - as she can't think of them as hands. The floor - dark, smooth, metal - is interrupted every few feet by inset glass circles, through which harsh light pours, creating cones of light on the ceiling and a number of strange shadows on Keller's face.
She makes it to the wall. Looking at the computers, she runs her hands over it, but can't understand a thing.
KELLER
The interface - ah - I can't tell -
This is a control room, she realizes. A control room for whatever unholy operations go on in a nearby room.
She notices something, then, out of the corner of her eye. Crouching down at the edge of the nearest glass circle, she notices there's something under it.
It's the top of a tank. Inside, a broken, emaciated, nearly-dead Calderan form floats. A Calderan woman. Chellah.
And directly beyond her, helplessly staring into the tank - Kaheel.
KELLER (looking around, urgently whispering)
Kaheel! Kaheel!
------------------
channe@[url="http://cryoterrace.tripod.com"]cryoterrace[/url] | "Last one to kill a bad guy buys the beer." -lost in space