CRIMINAL.

CHAPTER 20

We run into the hallway which is dark, not bleeding with the red light that was on the ceiling in the male prisoners' room.

"Which way?" Josh yells over the siren as we stand in the hallway next to the elevators.

"The laundry room!" I exclaim. "Jessie says there's an air vent that leads outside. We can crawl through and the girls said they would meet us all outside."

Josh makes no further comments and we start running full speed towards the stairs.

I hear loud thumping noises upstairs as we run down the flight of stairs in the dark staircase.

"They're coming!" I yell.

Josh grabs my hand and leads me down the stairs faster that the speed of light, my legs already growing tired. We come to a small hallway that smells of mildew and Josh runs towards the first door. He jiggles the knob and swears.

"Locked," he says, and I work my magic.

The door clicks open and we both run in, shutting the door behind us and locking it. The laundry room is pretty big with blue walls and washing machines and baskets of orange jumpsuits and white undershirts, and the smell of pine saw is heavy in the air.

"This way," Josh says, leading me towards the other side of the laundry room.

He starts kicking the air vent near the floor, making it rattle. I jump when I hear voices getting louder along with footsteps.

"They're coming," I say to Josh, panicking.

He kicks the opening to the air vent even harder. Banging on the door starts and it's as loud as thunder.

"Josh, hurry!" I yell. I take out my gun, aiming it at the door as Josh hurriedly kicks the air vent.

Suddenly, I hear a large rattle and I turn around.

Josh is kneeling down, already crawling up the dark tunnel leading outside. "Come on!" he calls. "Move your ass!"

I tuck my gun into my pocket and hurriedly bend down just as the door starts to break off it's hinges. I scurry up the dark, cold air vent just as I hear a loud bang and a thud. I hear loud voices and footsteps coming towards the air vent, but I'm already two feet away from the opening, keeping close to Josh.

This air vent is colder and smells awful and I think I feel something crawling under my left palm, but I still keep crawling.

Crawling towards freedom.

Crawling towards my future.

"We're almost there," Josh says after a few minutes of silence. "I can see a light."

He says it as if we're crawling towards heaven, which we probably are.

But you never know;

We could be dead for all I know.

I could've been shot by that female guard with the pierced nose and Josh could've been strangled by that buff-looking guard I tackled and we could be crawling towards God and his open arms.

But would God like what I've done?

Would he think running away from home, shooting some guards, and saving the love of my life who's also a criminal wrong?

Will he punish me for it?

And who's to say we're not crawling towards Hell right now?

Who's to say we'll fall into it's fiery depths and rot there?

I'm snatched out of my thoughts when I hear some rattling.

I notice that Josh has stopped crawling and is grunting, his back hunched. I move over a little, trying to see over his shoulder. I catch the light of outside and my heart jumps into my throat. He's trying to get the air vent off.