The elevator stopped and began disgorging its passengers. Alliji and Hack had planned a quick escape and sat right next to the door. Before all the passengers disembarked, and the tiny drone could follow them, a klaxon began sounding, and the doors of the lift quickly shut behind the few passengers that had exited.
After three blasts of the siren, a mechanical voice came over the loudspeaker, “A shipboard emergency has been declared on loading dock five hundred dash two. As a precaution, all airlocks might close in one-thousandth of a cycle. Anyone still on loading dock five hundred dash two might be subject to negative pressure. All personnel on the loading docks be prepared to evacuate.”
“What the hell is a thousandth of a cycle?” Hack asked as he started heading towards the affected l
