Claustrophilia, or, The Other Problem With Lifts (Part 1/2)
Title: Claustrophilia, or, The Other Problem with Lifts (Part 1/2)
Author: echo_fangirl
Characters: Connor/Lester
Rating: PG, for M/M making out
Disclaimer: Not mine, as nice as it would be
Spoilers: Season three cast. Minor spoilers for the 1994 movie "Speed", and for MythBusters' "Elevator of Death". Why yes, it is pure silliness. :)
Summary: James Lester, Connor Temple, a broken lift, and plenty of time to kill.
----
Lifts were a problem.
They weren't a big problem, most of the time. The lifts in the ARC were well lit, they were familiar, and while they weren't overly spacious, the doors only needed to stay closed for a few seconds at a time. Even so, lifts had the potential to be very problematic indeed.
Particularly when they suddenly decided to stop in the empty space between levels.
"Huh." An expression of surprise from Connor, looking alternately from the buttons to the digital display on the wall responsible for announcing the current floor. In the manner of all human beings when presented with apparently non-working technology, he pressed several different buttons at random.
James Lester watched all this silently, deliberately not thinking about just how problematic lifts could be. He glanced at his watch. 9:18.
It took all of forty seconds for Connor to give up on the regular buttons and hit the 'Call for assistance' button. There was a second of dial tone, followed by some electronic sounding tones. The voice which came through was distorted on the tiny built-in speakers, but Lester wouldn't have recognized it in any case. Connor seemed to be on familiar terms with the speaker though, and they spoke amiably about the situation. Lester didn't hear very much of it, too busy visually estimating the volume of their cell. It seemed smaller than he remembered, or maybe he was just thinking of a different lift... Could two lifts in the same building be different sizes? He might speak to maintenance once they get him out of here... Oh for heavens' sake!
"I'm sure your conversation is all very fascinating, but I'd really quite like to get underway some time soon." he snapped loudly. Connor startled, and the voice on the speaker sounded immediately apologetic. It explained something about security systems and partial lock-downs and he probably mentioned a time frame but it didn't sink in. There was a click as the speaker and microphone disconnected and then there was silence.
For about a second.
"This reminds me of all those movies where people get stuck in a lift and have all sorts of dramatic life changing experiences." Connor commented jovially. "Luckily there's no one pregnant in this lift, so we won't have to deliver any babies. That always happens in stuck lifts."
Lester glanced at his watch again. 9:22.
"Did he say how long it was going to take to get us moving again?" Lester asked, gesturing vaguely in the direction of the call button. Connor looked thoughtful.
"This part of the ARC went into partial lock-down unexpectedly. Clarence is looking into it now, it shouldn't take long. A bird probably flew into one of the outside sensors and triggered something."
"Connor," Lester growled, frustrated, "time frame?" Connor shrugged.
"Ten minutes, maybe fifteen. It's hard to say, cause I can't actually see any of the master controls, but it wouldn't normally take much longer than that." Connor paused for a moment, considering his fellow prisoner. "Are you okay?" he asked, "Only you're looking a bit peaky."
"I'm fine."
"Okay then. Good."
There was another silence, which lasted an incredibly long eight seconds before Connor broke it again.
"We also haven't got any estranged couples. They always get stuck in lifts, then by the time they get out they've resolved their differences. Or sometimes it's complete strangers who have both been dumped recently and fall madly in love with each other. We haven't got any of those either though," He almost managed to sound disappointed by that, "just us."
"Indeed," Lester murmured, his mind seeking some sort of distraction.
"So I guess that means we'd be in one of those lifts that's been sabotaged and everyone's worried that it's going to fall a whole bunch of stories and crash at the bottom. Or like that one at the start of "Speed", where it's stuck between floors with only just enough room between the roof of the lift and the floor outside the door, and they have to climb through the gap, but if the lift falls while they're part-way out then it'll slice them in two. That was really..."
"Connor, for the love of all things good, please shut up!"
Intellectually, James Lester knew his breathing was too rapid. The breaths were too shallow and the gaps between them entirely too brief. Hyperventilating never helped anyone. Nevertheless, his lungs burned with the pressure to breathe faster, to breathe more. It was far too warm in here.
"Are you sure you're okay? Only now you're looking all flushed." Connor speculated. "Maybe when they get us out you should go home, you might be coming down with something."
"I'm fine," Lester reiterated, "I just have things to do today which don't involve recounting the top five hundred greatest elevator movies of our time." He closed his eyes. Sometimes it was easier to control his breathing if he couldn't see where he was. Unfortunately, it didn't seem to be working this time. He opened his eyes again.
"I guess you're not a big movie fan then?" Connor asked. Lester remained silent.
There were several blissful seconds of silence before Connor started again.
"Some people think that if you're in a lift that's falling, you should jump just as you're about hit the ground, but they tested it on MythBusters and it turns out that it doesn't do you any good. What you should do is try and land on some padding, and if you can't find any padding, then you should try and land on another person in the lift. That way, they take the worst of the impact, and..."
"For heaven's sake Connor!" Part of Lester's consciousness, the sensible part which filled in paperwork in triplicate and firmly believed all the world's problems could be solved with a long enough checklist, cringed at his own outburst. Yelling was not going to help curb his anxiety. If anything, it was just going to draw attention to it. The other part of Lester's consciousness, the part which was currently controlling most of his reactions, didn't care in the slightest. Lester had so far been doing a stellar job of rationalizing his reactions, reassuring himself that the lift was fine and that he would be out of it very soon, and Connor's disaster scenarios were making that rationalization difficult indeed.
Connor blinked.
"Sorry... I was just trying to make conver...sa..." The last word came out slowly, his sentence suddenly distracted by another thought. "...tion. Are you claustrophobic?"
"Don't be ridiculous, Connor."
But Connor was every part the scientist who had just stumbled onto a new theory. "That's why your skin went all clammy and flushed. And that's why you don't want me talking about lifts crashing. And why your breathing is all uneven..."
"My breathing is perfectly even." Lester snapped, then forcing his rational voice into place once again, "Connor, I'm fine. I'm not claustrophobic, I just have far too many things to do and I'm not getting any of them done standing around in this lift."
Connor looked thoughtful for a moment. "But if you get claustrophobic, why on Earth would you take a job in a cement bunker dozens of floors underground? That seems pretty counter-intuitive."
"If you recall, when this project started I had a lovely first floor office at Whitehall. With windows." Lester muttered. Oh, how he missed working at Whitehall. Even the lifts were bigger.
"So you are claustrophobic then?" Connor declared, chest puffed with pride at his successful deduction.
Lester gritted his teeth. "It's not claustrophobia. Claustrophobia is completely irrational. I just... Don't particularly like confined spaces." Lester checked his watch again. 9:29. This was interminable.
"Wow." Connor looked thoughtfully at Lester for a moment. "This must be absolute hell for you."
The look Lester gave Connor made his feelings on that matter more than clear.
"Wow. Okay... Is there something I should be doing to help?"
"Can you make the lift move again?"
"Well no... But I could try and distract you? Give you something to think about so you're not focusing on the small spaces and not being able to get out?"
"Not talking about it at all would be a good starting p..."
A loud metallic clang vibrated through the floor. Both men instinctively reached for the nearest wall to steady themselves.
"What the hell was that?" Lester gasped, breathy and fast.
"Metal shifting, or warping maybe?" Connor muttered to himself, then glancing at his companion in a sudden moment of concern, "I mean, it's probably nothing. Probably something to help us get moving again. Why don't you put a call back to Clarence, I bet he can tell us what's going on."
Connor's attempt at an encouraging and supportive smile failed spectacularly on both counts. Lester jabbed angrily at the call button.
He waited.
He glanced at his watch. 9:31.
He jabbed at the button again. The button was aggressively silent.
"Maybe he's just off fixing something, and he can't hear the call button?" Connor offered.
Lester shook his head, stabbing at the button over and over. "There's no dial tone. Last time there was a dial tone." The air seemed to be getting thicker by the second, he couldn't draw in enough no matter how hard his lungs worked. He started pressing every button on the panel, but they weren't even lighting up any more. In frustration, he drew back a hand and hit the smooth metal above the buttons with a flat palm.
There was a sickening jolt as the lift shifted, dropping about a foot, then shuddering back to a resting position.
Then the lights went out.
-----
To be concluded in a couple of days...
Author: echo_fangirl
Characters: Connor/Lester
Rating: PG, for M/M making out
Disclaimer: Not mine, as nice as it would be
Spoilers: Season three cast. Minor spoilers for the 1994 movie "Speed", and for MythBusters' "Elevator of Death". Why yes, it is pure silliness. :)
Summary: James Lester, Connor Temple, a broken lift, and plenty of time to kill.
----
Lifts were a problem.
They weren't a big problem, most of the time. The lifts in the ARC were well lit, they were familiar, and while they weren't overly spacious, the doors only needed to stay closed for a few seconds at a time. Even so, lifts had the potential to be very problematic indeed.
Particularly when they suddenly decided to stop in the empty space between levels.
"Huh." An expression of surprise from Connor, looking alternately from the buttons to the digital display on the wall responsible for announcing the current floor. In the manner of all human beings when presented with apparently non-working technology, he pressed several different buttons at random.
James Lester watched all this silently, deliberately not thinking about just how problematic lifts could be. He glanced at his watch. 9:18.
It took all of forty seconds for Connor to give up on the regular buttons and hit the 'Call for assistance' button. There was a second of dial tone, followed by some electronic sounding tones. The voice which came through was distorted on the tiny built-in speakers, but Lester wouldn't have recognized it in any case. Connor seemed to be on familiar terms with the speaker though, and they spoke amiably about the situation. Lester didn't hear very much of it, too busy visually estimating the volume of their cell. It seemed smaller than he remembered, or maybe he was just thinking of a different lift... Could two lifts in the same building be different sizes? He might speak to maintenance once they get him out of here... Oh for heavens' sake!
"I'm sure your conversation is all very fascinating, but I'd really quite like to get underway some time soon." he snapped loudly. Connor startled, and the voice on the speaker sounded immediately apologetic. It explained something about security systems and partial lock-downs and he probably mentioned a time frame but it didn't sink in. There was a click as the speaker and microphone disconnected and then there was silence.
For about a second.
"This reminds me of all those movies where people get stuck in a lift and have all sorts of dramatic life changing experiences." Connor commented jovially. "Luckily there's no one pregnant in this lift, so we won't have to deliver any babies. That always happens in stuck lifts."
Lester glanced at his watch again. 9:22.
"Did he say how long it was going to take to get us moving again?" Lester asked, gesturing vaguely in the direction of the call button. Connor looked thoughtful.
"This part of the ARC went into partial lock-down unexpectedly. Clarence is looking into it now, it shouldn't take long. A bird probably flew into one of the outside sensors and triggered something."
"Connor," Lester growled, frustrated, "time frame?" Connor shrugged.
"Ten minutes, maybe fifteen. It's hard to say, cause I can't actually see any of the master controls, but it wouldn't normally take much longer than that." Connor paused for a moment, considering his fellow prisoner. "Are you okay?" he asked, "Only you're looking a bit peaky."
"I'm fine."
"Okay then. Good."
There was another silence, which lasted an incredibly long eight seconds before Connor broke it again.
"We also haven't got any estranged couples. They always get stuck in lifts, then by the time they get out they've resolved their differences. Or sometimes it's complete strangers who have both been dumped recently and fall madly in love with each other. We haven't got any of those either though," He almost managed to sound disappointed by that, "just us."
"Indeed," Lester murmured, his mind seeking some sort of distraction.
"So I guess that means we'd be in one of those lifts that's been sabotaged and everyone's worried that it's going to fall a whole bunch of stories and crash at the bottom. Or like that one at the start of "Speed", where it's stuck between floors with only just enough room between the roof of the lift and the floor outside the door, and they have to climb through the gap, but if the lift falls while they're part-way out then it'll slice them in two. That was really..."
"Connor, for the love of all things good, please shut up!"
Intellectually, James Lester knew his breathing was too rapid. The breaths were too shallow and the gaps between them entirely too brief. Hyperventilating never helped anyone. Nevertheless, his lungs burned with the pressure to breathe faster, to breathe more. It was far too warm in here.
"Are you sure you're okay? Only now you're looking all flushed." Connor speculated. "Maybe when they get us out you should go home, you might be coming down with something."
"I'm fine," Lester reiterated, "I just have things to do today which don't involve recounting the top five hundred greatest elevator movies of our time." He closed his eyes. Sometimes it was easier to control his breathing if he couldn't see where he was. Unfortunately, it didn't seem to be working this time. He opened his eyes again.
"I guess you're not a big movie fan then?" Connor asked. Lester remained silent.
There were several blissful seconds of silence before Connor started again.
"Some people think that if you're in a lift that's falling, you should jump just as you're about hit the ground, but they tested it on MythBusters and it turns out that it doesn't do you any good. What you should do is try and land on some padding, and if you can't find any padding, then you should try and land on another person in the lift. That way, they take the worst of the impact, and..."
"For heaven's sake Connor!" Part of Lester's consciousness, the sensible part which filled in paperwork in triplicate and firmly believed all the world's problems could be solved with a long enough checklist, cringed at his own outburst. Yelling was not going to help curb his anxiety. If anything, it was just going to draw attention to it. The other part of Lester's consciousness, the part which was currently controlling most of his reactions, didn't care in the slightest. Lester had so far been doing a stellar job of rationalizing his reactions, reassuring himself that the lift was fine and that he would be out of it very soon, and Connor's disaster scenarios were making that rationalization difficult indeed.
Connor blinked.
"Sorry... I was just trying to make conver...sa..." The last word came out slowly, his sentence suddenly distracted by another thought. "...tion. Are you claustrophobic?"
"Don't be ridiculous, Connor."
But Connor was every part the scientist who had just stumbled onto a new theory. "That's why your skin went all clammy and flushed. And that's why you don't want me talking about lifts crashing. And why your breathing is all uneven..."
"My breathing is perfectly even." Lester snapped, then forcing his rational voice into place once again, "Connor, I'm fine. I'm not claustrophobic, I just have far too many things to do and I'm not getting any of them done standing around in this lift."
Connor looked thoughtful for a moment. "But if you get claustrophobic, why on Earth would you take a job in a cement bunker dozens of floors underground? That seems pretty counter-intuitive."
"If you recall, when this project started I had a lovely first floor office at Whitehall. With windows." Lester muttered. Oh, how he missed working at Whitehall. Even the lifts were bigger.
"So you are claustrophobic then?" Connor declared, chest puffed with pride at his successful deduction.
Lester gritted his teeth. "It's not claustrophobia. Claustrophobia is completely irrational. I just... Don't particularly like confined spaces." Lester checked his watch again. 9:29. This was interminable.
"Wow." Connor looked thoughtfully at Lester for a moment. "This must be absolute hell for you."
The look Lester gave Connor made his feelings on that matter more than clear.
"Wow. Okay... Is there something I should be doing to help?"
"Can you make the lift move again?"
"Well no... But I could try and distract you? Give you something to think about so you're not focusing on the small spaces and not being able to get out?"
"Not talking about it at all would be a good starting p..."
A loud metallic clang vibrated through the floor. Both men instinctively reached for the nearest wall to steady themselves.
"What the hell was that?" Lester gasped, breathy and fast.
"Metal shifting, or warping maybe?" Connor muttered to himself, then glancing at his companion in a sudden moment of concern, "I mean, it's probably nothing. Probably something to help us get moving again. Why don't you put a call back to Clarence, I bet he can tell us what's going on."
Connor's attempt at an encouraging and supportive smile failed spectacularly on both counts. Lester jabbed angrily at the call button.
He waited.
He glanced at his watch. 9:31.
He jabbed at the button again. The button was aggressively silent.
"Maybe he's just off fixing something, and he can't hear the call button?" Connor offered.
Lester shook his head, stabbing at the button over and over. "There's no dial tone. Last time there was a dial tone." The air seemed to be getting thicker by the second, he couldn't draw in enough no matter how hard his lungs worked. He started pressing every button on the panel, but they weren't even lighting up any more. In frustration, he drew back a hand and hit the smooth metal above the buttons with a flat palm.
There was a sickening jolt as the lift shifted, dropping about a foot, then shuddering back to a resting position.
Then the lights went out.
-----
To be concluded in a couple of days...