Hell Rig (23 page)

“What about the supply ship?” Lisa asked, nodding to the slowly spreading debris field. “It must report daily to someone.”

“Maybe, but by the time they realize something’s wrong, the hurricane will be on us. They’ll never search for it during a blow.”

“We’ll have to batten down this rig real tight and ride it out,” Ed said. “It rode out the first one. Maybe we’ll get lucky.”

“Luck is a fool’s bet,” Sims said. “We’re prisoners here. Fate has dealt us Aces and eights.”

“
Men are not prisoners of fate, but prisoners of their own minds,”
McAndrews quoted.

Sims looked at McAndrews. “Who spouted that foolishness?”

“Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He was an expert at overcoming adversity.”

“Well he ain’t here. We are,” Sims retorted. “If we try to ride out a hurricane, Waters will kill us all.”

“So we go. Now, before the fog comes back,” Jeff suggested. “We take the TEMPSC and leave.”

McAndrews shook his head. “How far do you think we’ll get before the hurricane hits us?”

“I don’t care,” Jeff said. “I’d rather take my chances out there.”

“Well I care. Waves the size we’ll face in a hurricane will crush the emergency craft like a beer can. I don’t want to drown.” McAndrews had raised his voice.

Jeff was not giving up but he relented. “Maybe you’re right. We hunt down Waters and kill him.”

“We can’t just murder him,” Lisa protested. “He’s a sick man.”

Jeff remembered Waters’ spectral appearance the last time they saw him. “I don’t care,” Jeff snapped at her. “If I see him, I’m going to kill him if I can. No more holding him prisoner, no more talking to him.” He looked at McAndrews. “What about you?”

“He or whatever he’s become murdered my brother. I intended to kill the sick bastard no matter what.”

“And you?” he shot at Sims.

Sims smiled. “Unlike all of you, I think we’re dead no matter what we do, but just for the sake of killing time, I’ll help search for the bastard. Who knows,” he laughed, mocking Ed. “Maybe we’ll get lucky.”

Jeff looked at Lisa, winced at the disappointment visible in her eyes. He wondered how she could defend Waters after seeing him like they had.

“You and Ed take care of Tolson. We’ll look for Waters.”

They brought up Captain Lefavre’s body and that of his first mate they found a short distance away badly burned. His neck was broken. They placed them in the cooler beside the bodies of Bale, Gleason and Easton.

“Quite a somber collection isn’t it,” McAndrews commented at the line of bodies. “Maybe you better pick your spot now, while you can.” As they closed the door, he suggested, “Seal it tight. We’ll run out of fuel in a few hours and the cooler will shut down.”

The air around the platform was already getting ripe from the garbage they had collected to deliver to the supply ship. In the heat, it was only going to get worse.

They set to work creating weapons. That required a trip to the cellar deck. Wading through the cold water in the metal shop, Jeff almost changed his mind about the hunt. The thick soupy liquid was ripe with odor and clung to his boots. Biting back his disgust, he found a small air cylinder and rigged a spear gun using sharpened metal rods as darts and a hollow pipe as a launcher. He practiced with it a few times until he could spin the control valve quickly enough to get off a shot and hit a target twenty yards away. He strapped the cylinder to his back.

McAndrews settled for a long steel rod, sharpened at the end like a javelin with several wraps of duct tape in the middle as a grip. Sims seemed amused by their preparations.

“Aren’t you going to use a weapon?” Jeff asked him.

He pulled a long knife from a scabbard beneath his shirt. “I’ll use this.”

Jeff noticed the blade was so clean it gleamed.

“Do you ever use that thing?”

Sims smiled and walked away.

“I guess we’re as ready as we’ll ever be,” Jeff told McAndrews. They went back upstairs to inform the others. He knocked at the door to the main building. “We’re ready,” he yelled inside.

Lisa leaned out the door and gave him an encouraging smile. “Forget what I said. Kill him. That’s not Waters we saw. I want you back here safe.” She kissed him on the lips. He returned it, reluctantly pulling away.

“Keep the doors locked.”

“Take the pistol,” Ed offered. “You might need it.”

He shook his head. “You keep it here. Protect Lisa.”

Lisa reached out and touched Jeff’s face, letting one finger trail softly down his cheek. “We’ll be all right,” she said. She quickly glanced at Sims and back at Jeff. “You watch out.”

Jeff nodded and left.

* * * *

They began at the bottom of rig and worked upwards. The landing deck was clear. The sea, dead calm earlier, now rose in waves that smashed the supporting legs. The grating of the landing deck bounced like a trampoline and rang out like a played instrument but the platform rocked gently. Jeff knew worse was to come. The wind picked up considerably as if combating their efforts. It tore at their clothes and beat at them with invisible fists. Lightning flashed in the distance to the south, but was visibly approaching nearer. Rita was coming and announcing her intent.

“One of us will have to keep an eye on the stairway in case he tries to sneak past us,” Jeff said.

“The others will try to force him out of hiding,” McAndrews agreed.

On the cellar deck, Jeff and Sims took the job of flushing out their quarry while McAndrews guarded the stairwell. Jeff carefully investigated the maze of pipes while Sims entered the pump shack. He searched tool bins, sheds, and the underside of the deck above, any place a man could hide—all without luck. Sims walked around a corner shaking his head. Together, they searched the chemical warehouse, flooded workshops and the mudroom. Sims climbed the ladder to the walkway above the mud vat.

“Nothing here,” he said and climbed down.

“Let’s check the inside hallway,” Jeff suggested.

They found it flooded almost knee deep.

“Must be leaking from the workshops,” he observed.

The few rooms off the hallway proved to be as empty as the rest. Jeff knew the inside stairwell was blocked. They had filled it with chairs, couches—anything they could find. A rat, if there were any on the rig, couldn’t get through.

“If he’s down here, he’s damned invisible,” Sims commented dryly.

It was beginning to look like a wasted effort. He shrugged his shoulders at McAndrews’ unspoken query as they exited the building. Waters had to be somewhere above them.

This time, Jeff watched the stairs while McAndrews and Sims searched. He did check out the helideck while still keeping the stairway under observation. The wind had taken on an ominous chill. He watched McAndrews enter the generator shed, the tool shed and a small warehouse, shaking his head after exiting each one. Sims lifted pieces of debris and scoured the mounds of garbage. Finally, McAndrews reached the far end of the platform and waved them to him. Jeff kept his eyes open for Waters as he crossed the deck

“He has to be somewhere,” McAndrews complained. “He can’t just disappear.”

Jeff remembered the way Waters had melted into the fog and wasn’t as certain. “We must have missed him,” he said.

“How?” Sims said, “Unless he’s a ghost.”

“I don’t know. Somehow.”

Laughter floated to them from somewhere off to their right.

“Waters,” Sims said, looking around. He pointed to the pallets of garbage. “I’ll flush him out,” he said, pulling his knife and brandishing it in front of him like a Roman
gladius.

“Wait!” Jeff called, but Sims had already disappeared into the maze of garbage. He considered following but decided to stay with McAndrews. They poked around a few pallets but found nothing. He saw no sign of Sims or Waters. As they walked by the warehouse, something fell by Jeff’s feet. He looked more closely and saw it was piece of a bloody ear, Easton’s ear with all his earrings still attached. He looked up. Waters was standing on the roof of the warehouse, staring down at them.

“Bastard!” McAndrews yelled at him.

Jeff aimed his spear gun and fired but too hastily. The shaft missed Waters by a few inches. Waters looked down at him and grinned. He leaped from the roof and landed on his feet between Jeff and McAndrews. Now, Jeff had no shot without the risk of hitting McAndrews.

“Get out of the way, Mac!” he warned, but McAndrews was already advancing on Waters with his spear. Waters raised a bloody knife. Jeff recognized it as Sims’ and felt a twinge of guilt at his dislike of Sims. It looked as though Sims, too, had fallen victim to Waters.

“We’ll see if you’re a ghost,” McAndrews said to Waters.

Waters shook his head slowly, grinning the entire time. “No ghost. I’m much worse.” To show what he meant, he slowly walked through an oil drum rather than walk around it. His body melded with the metal of the drum, became a part of it, and then oozed from it, leaving small strands of black goo trailing behind him that broke away from the drum only to be reabsorbed by his body.

McAndrews stopped walking. His jaw dropped. “What the fuck—”

“He’s part of whatever possessed this platform,” Jeff called out, guessing at the truth.

“Impossible.” McAndrews hefted his spear with both hands, and with a look of determination in his eyes, ran at Waters. He stopped two paces away and lunged the spear into Waters’ chest, smiling as the spear hit home. His smile vanished as Waters slowly stepped aside, letting the spear rip through his body, which mended as quickly as the flesh parted. McAndrews’ eyes shifted from spear point to Waters in confusion. “Impossible,” he repeated.

“Run!” Jeff warned, but it was too late.

Waters took advantage of McAndrews’ moment of indecision and swung Sims’ knife. It connected with McAndrews’ arm. McAndrews screamed in pain and dropped the spear, backing away slowly with blood dripping through the fingers of the hand that he held to the wound. Waters didn’t seem to move, but in a blur was suddenly standing behind McAndrews. He slashed again, this time across McAndrews’ broad back. McAndrews did not scream, but his face contorted into a mask of pain.

“Mac!” Jeff yelled and ran toward his friend, trying to stop what he knew was inevitable.

McAndrews slumped to his knees as the pain hit him. Waters stood over him as a priest would a penitent sinner. He touched McAndrews’ head with one bloody hand, brushing McAndrews hair from his eyes. He dipped a finger in McAndrews’ wound, causing McAndrews to scream. With his bloody finger, he made an upside down cross on McAndrews’ forehead. McAndrews began to wail as smoke erupted from the bubbling cross. Jeff caught a whiff of burning flesh. Waters leaned over and whispered in McAndrews’ ear and smiled. He stood up and let the smile drop.

“Ego Te absolvo a peccatis tuis in nominee ego
,” Waters intoned slowly in Latin from the Catholic mass. “In my name, I absolve you.”

As he spoke the last words, black flames erupted from Waters’ hands, poured over McAndrews’ head and body like oil, anointing him in dark fire. The flames pooled up on the deck around both of them, blocking Jeff’s view. He could hear Waters’ laughter over McAndrews’ horrendous screams through the ebony conflagration.

“No!” Jeff screamed as he lunged at Waters but Waters was no longer there. He had simply melted into the deck. Jeff collided with McAndrews, knocking him from the flames. McAndrews’ blackened shriveled body went sliding across the deck leaving a trail of acrid smoke.

Jeff ripped the harness holding the air tank from his shoulder and beat out the few flames that threatened to ignite his own clothing with his hands. Waters had vanished. Jeff rushed to the side of the warehouse and grabbed one of the new fire extinguishers they had installed. He pulled the pin and sprayed McAndrews with a stream of fire retardant, but knew it was already too late. He could see McAndrews’ fire-ravaged body through the dying flames. Finally, the black flames died out, leaving a rime of white CO2 over McAndrews’ body like freshly fallen snow.

Jeff stared in horror as McAndrews’ eyes opened and stared up at him. With superhuman effort, McAndrews lifted his head a few inches from the deck. His lipless mouth formed a word.

“
Samedi
,” he forced out with his last breath. His eyes closed and his head fell back to the deck in death.

Jeff knew McAndrews was dead without checking his pulse, which he was reluctant to do. McAndrews’ body seemed to shrink in on itself as his skin peeled and flaked away in large patches, revealing the seared flesh beneath. He saw Sims’ knife, the one Waters had used, lying on the deck. The wooden handle had shriveled and blackened and the shaft warped from the heat. He reached for it but stopped short of picking it up. He searched for Sim’s body and found him sprawled between two pallets of garbage, a bloody gash on his forehead. By all appearances, he was dead also.

“Sorry, Sims,” Jeff whispered. “I wonder if you’re wandering in that vast plane of existence between heaven and hell you spoke of.”

Sims eyes flickered and opened. He groaned. Jeff leaped back in surprise.

“Don’t count me out yet, Towns. I’m not dead, just sore as hell.”