Titanic: An Amourshipping Story

Chapter 22

Serena kept kicking until her lifebelt lifted her back to the surface. She opened her eyes, but the starry night sky was all she could see. Countless people were screaming and splashing all around Serena. Some weren't moving either from falling to their deaths when the stern went vertical or went into cardiac arrest from the freezing cold.

"Ash! Ash! Ash!" Serena shouted.

All she could hear were people panicking. With no other choice, Serena began swimming without knowing where she was going. Suddenly, she felt two hands on her head and pushed her down. She struggled to get back up to catch her breath, only to be pushed back down soon after. Serena went back up again and swatted the hands away, but she heard a man's voice panicking from her action and wrapped his arms around her head.

"Let go! Please, let go of me!" Serena shouted.

But the man was in such a state of shock that he didn't know who or what he was holding onto. Serena reached for his hair and pulled, but the man was so shaken that he didn't noticed.

"Help! Somebody help me!" Serena screamed.

"Serena!" Serena heard from a distance. "Serena, where are you?!"

"Ash! Ash, help me! Ash, please!" Serena screamed.

Serena heard someone swimming toward her and the man, grabbing her lifebelt by the strap. Ash tried to pull her away, but the man wouldn't let her go. Using the man's screams to determine where he was, Ash punched him repeatedly until he finally let go of Serena. Then he reached out for Serena until he felt the strap of her lifebelt and grabbed it again.

"Serena, is that your lifebelt I'm grabbing?!" Ash asked.

"Yes!" Serena answered.

"Okay, we gotta find something to get out of the water! I need you to swim, Serena!" Ash shouted.

Ash began swimming with one hand while holding onto Serena's lifebelt. Serena followed as best as she could based on what direction Ash was pulling her. Eventually, Ash felt a large plank of wood and swam around it to determine its size with his hand.

"Serena, I think I found something big enough for us to get on," Ash said.

He pulled Serena over to the wood, and they grabbed the opposite end of it. They pulled to get on, but the wood became unbalanced, tipping them both. Serena tried again first, climbing on one side of the wood before Ash slowly crept up on the other side. They were both on the wood but still half submerged in the water. They then tried to kneel on the wood facing each other and huddle in an embrace, but the wood tipped over again. Finally, Ash and Serena got into a position where they held their bodies up next to each other on one end of the wood while their legs were still in the water, with Serena on the right side and Ash on the left. Serena slowly eased up with most of her body out of the water, but she could hear Ash shivering intensely.

"Ash, you're shaking. We should try a different position," Serena said.

"N-n-no, we can't. We've spent too much energy as it is," Ash said. "W-w-we have most of our bodies out of the water, so it'll have to do."

Serena grew unsettled, still feeling they could get their entire bodies out of the water, but remembered Timothy's warning about using too much energy. She put her hand on Ash's and rubbed it, thinking she was sharing body warmth in some small way. A loud whistle came from behind them as an officer holding onto rubble tried to catch everyone's attention.

"Return to the boats! Return to the boats!" he shouted.

The officer kept blowing his whistle, but no one apart from Ash and Serena could hear him. Ash grinned with his teeth chattering and turned to Serena.