Outpost (29 page)

'Yeah.'

'Are
you okay about Nikki?'

'What
about her?'

'Jane
said she took your boat.'

'I
welded a couple of oil drums together,' said Ghost. 'She and Nail did most of
the work. I doubt she'll make it home. And if she does? Well, good for her.'

'But
it was your boat. Your idea.'

'Jane
wants to get everyone home. I promised to help.'

Ghost
gestured to an empty chair.

'Has
anyone seen Mal?'

'No,'
said Punch.

'It's
eight o'clock. Who's taking over patrol?'

'Me,'
said Gus.

'So
where is Mal? He should have checked in half an hour ago.'

'Taking
a shit. Changing his socks. Relax. He'll be here. He's not going to miss
dinner.'

'I
don't like it,' said Ghost. 'We put a man on guard and he goes AWOL.'

Ghost
stood in the corridor.

'Mal?
You out there?'

No
reply.

Ghost
stepped back inside the officers' mess.

'Everyone
stay here, all right? Nobody go wandering off. Punch, get your gun.'

They
searched Mal's cabin.

'Mal?
Hello?'

They
knocked on the bathroom door.

'Hello?'

Empty.

They
searched the passageways and checked the barricades. 'Mal. Where are you?'

He
wasn't on the bridge. He wasn't on deck. The zodiac still hung from a lifeboat
crane. He hadn't gone back to the rig.

'Maybe
he got drunk,' said Punch. 'Decided to go below deck on his own.'

'Why
would he do that?'

'Bravado.
He wanted something. Had a hankering for nachos or a cigar. Thought he could
get it on his own. Outrun the freaks. Duck and swerve. Come back, brag, show
off his trophy.'

'Yeah,
that's the kind of idiotic thing he might do. I don't like it, though. Not knowing
for sure.'

Sian
found them on the bridge.

'There's
something you should see.'

She
led them to a door at the end of a corridor.

F
ÖRR
ÅD

A
small storeroom. Toiletries and laundry.

A
trickle of blood from beneath the door.

'Stand
back,' said Ghost. He hefted the axe. He tested the door. Unlocked. He pushed
it open with his foot.

'Hello?
Mal?'

He
reached round the doorframe and switched on the light. The trickle of blood
snaked from behind a rack loaded with bed linen. Sheets, coverlets and pillow
cases.

Mal
lay dead on the floor. His eyes were open. His throat was cut. He held a knife
in his hand.

'Blot
some of that blood,' said Ghost. Punch threw down folded sheets to sop up the
blood. 'Close the door. I want to take a long look around before anyone else
comes in here.'

Jane
jogged a circuit of C deck. There was light, but no heat. Many of the corridors
had split open when D Module fell from the rig. Several passageways terminated
in ragged metal and thin air. Jane enjoyed the sensation of cold. The rest of
the crew had embraced the luxury of
Hyperion
,
but Jane volunteered to stay behind in the steel austerity of Rampart and man
the radio. She broadcast periodic maydays to the Arctic rim, and listened to
the static of an empty waveband.

She
and Ghost spoke, morning and evening, by radio. '
Take care, baby cakes,'
he said, at the end of each
call. She missed him.

Jane
ran five kilometres, then stripped to her underwear and pumped iron in the
corner of the deserted canteen. She used Nail's abandoned gym equipment. She
was both repelled and attracted by Nail's pumped physique. Veins and
striations. He was a human fortress. She envied his brute strength.

She
played AC/DC on the jukebox as she hefted dumbbells. She played the music at full
volume. 'Bad Boy Boogie' echoed down empty corridors.

Jane
rested between each set of exercises by throwing a titanium shark knife at the
canteen dartboard. The heavy blade thunked into cork, slowly ripping the board
to pieces. Nail could hit a target at twenty metres. Jane trained herself to
hit it at thirty.

Years
ago, when the refinery was fully manned, the Starbucks coffee shop used to run
a book exchange. The coffee shop was now a vacant retail unit with a couple of
broken bar stools. Jane found a box of books among the litter, including thirty
issues of
Combat
Survival
magazine. Each issue contained carbine and pistol spec sheets. Back-page
adverts for tactical holsters, mosquito nets and surplus Israeli gas masks.

She
read about snake bites, reef knots and edible insects. She enjoyed the fantasy
of desert sand and jungle heat. There were cut-and-keep plans for bear traps,
squirrel snares and high- velocity slingshots. She made a mental note to search
the boathouse for bungee line.

Jane
made herself a sandwich. She sat in the observation bubble and read about
bamboo jungle shelters. She learned the best way to cook a tarantula over a
campfire. Ghost called her on the radio.

'It
looks like you'll be doing another funeral, I'm afraid
.'

'What
do you mean?'

'
Mal
didn't show up for dinner. I got worried. We went looking. We found him in a
laundry cupboard. His throat was cut through
.'

'Do
you think there is an infected passenger creeping round the crew quarters,
hiding in the ducts? Someone you missed?'

'We're
doing a sweep. We're armed, moving in pairs. Nothing so far. The barricades are
intact. None of the grenades has tripped. Besides, Mal was hidden in a
cupboard. These diseased freaks maim and kill. They don't clean up afterwards
.'

'So
what's the deal? What are we looking at?'

'
We
found a kitchen knife with the body. He had it in his hand. Blood on the blade
.'

'Do
you buy it? Did he kill himself? What's your instinct?'

'Dead
man holding a knife. Hard to argue it was anything but suicide. I guess I will
have to tell the lads. It'll be bad for morale, but I can't lie to them.'

'I suppose I'll have to give an address. God knows
what I'll say. I barely knew the man.'

'Another
day, another shroud. Do you think there'll be any of us left by spring
?'

Punch
and Ghost wrapped the body in a sheet. They dragged the corpse outside and laid
it on a bench. Moans and snarls. Infected passengers watched from the promenade
decks beneath them.

They
searched Mal's pockets. A torch. A lighter. A packet of mints. No suicide note.

'Take
his boots,' said Ghost. 'We don't need his coat, but we need snowboots.'

Punch
inspected the neck wound with a flashlight.

'Cut
through his windpipe. Cut down to vertebrae.'

'Did
you speak to him much? Did he seem depressed?'

'Talk
to Nail. Mal was his buddy.'

They
bound the shrouded body and laid it in a lifeboat to chill.

Punch
and Sian retired to their cabin. A four-room suite with a king-size bed, home
entertainment system and kitchenette. The previous occupant must have been a
senior member of the crew. Punch had cleaned out the man's possessions. He
swept clothes, letters and photographs into a garbage bag. The guy was probably
wandering mindless and mutilated below deck. Better not think too much about
his fate.

Punch
propped the door closed with a chair.

'Are
you worried there might be an infected sailor slinking around?' asked Sian. She
was running a bath.

'You
saw the wound. It was a clean slice ear to ear. These rabid bastards bite. They
like to rip and tear.'

'Maybe
Mal couldn't stand the isolation. All that stuff going on back home. No
daylight. I'm surprised more blokes haven't succumbed to depression.'

'His
head was virtually severed.'

'What
are you saying?'

'I'm
not sure. Probably nothing. Despair can build into a type of mania, a type of
super-strength. A person could do themselves a lot of damage if they put their
mind to it.'

Punch
stood in front of the bathroom mirror. He picked up a toothbrush and pretended
to slit his throat.

'It
could be done, I suppose. That kind of gash. A person could slice through their
own jugular and windpipe if they did it hard and fast. They would have to be
pretty determined. Only someone desperate to be dead could carry it through.'

'Murder?
Is that what you are suggesting? A fight gone bad?'

'I
don't know. From now on you better not walk around on your own if you can help
it. And always carry a knife.'

Sian
stripped and climbed into the bath. Punch kicked off his shoes and started to
unbutton his shirt.

Sian
had yet to comprehend that women had become a rare and valuable commodity. The
years ahead were likely to be brutal and lawless. Punch used to be everyone's
friend, but now he was envied and hated by the crewmen around him. If he wanted
to possess Sian he would need to fight, and maybe kill, to keep her.

Ghost
crossed to Rampart. The refinery was now joined to the island by a sheet of
ice. He ran, swerved infected passengers, made it to the platform lift face
steaming with sweat.

He
and Jane sat in Rawlins's office.

The
refinery was equipped with submerged cameras so the crew could monitor the
integrity of the great floatation legs, and the status of the seabed pipeline
and manifold.

They
switched on a wall screen. They powered up the underwater floodlights and
selected camera views. Pan and tilt.

The
crumpled shell of D Module, lying on the silted moonscape of the ocean bed.

Jane
selected a different camera position. Steel rope coiled on the seabed.

'That's
all right,' said Ghost. 'The remaining tethers are intact. Pretty vicious
riptides round here, but we'll hold firm.'

He
swivelled a joystick. The camera angled upward. The floatation leg.

'What
a fucking mess,' said Jane.

'A
big dent, but no puncture,' said Ghost. 'Should keep us stable. Should keep us
afloat.'

'We
hope.'

'Your
average liner is a series of hermetic compartments. Half the ship could flood
and we would still be able to sail it home. Maybe we can get the mini-sub in
the water. Take a look at the hull top-to-toe.'

Jane
summoned Nail from
Hyperion.
They sat in the canteen.

'How's
your arm?'

'Better.'

'You
can work the mini-sub, yes? You and Gus. You can drive it, pilot it, whatever.'

'We
used it to inspect the seabed pipeline.'

'How
would you like to take a look at
Hyperion'
s
hull? There's a hole in the plate. It's taken on water. It would be good to
know the extent of the damage. There's no way we can check structural
integrity from inside the vessel. Too much opposition. We need an under-sea
survey.'

Nail
rocked back in his chair. He had found some fancy clothes aboard
Hyperion.
He wore a black leather shirt.
He wore a heavy gold bracelet and a Tag Heuer watch. He stank of booze.

'The
sub hasn't been used for months. Strictly speaking, it should go back to shore
for an overhaul.'

'I'm
sure you want to get home as much as anyone.
Hyperion
is
all we have left.'

'I'll
mull it over.'

Deep
Sea Vehicle
Mirabelle.

Nail
and Gus climbed through the roof hatch. Gus took the pilot's seat. Nail was
co-pilot. They put on headsets.

They
slapped rows of toggle switches and powered up the sub. Banks of
instrumentation winked into life.

Gus
took laminated sheets from a wall pocket. Pre-dive checks. Battery life.
Ballast pressure. Air. Telemetry. Thrusters.

They
packed sandwiches, mineral water and a piss bottle. They checked their escape
suits.

They
saw Jane through the cockpit bubble. She stood and waved. Nail tested the
manipulator arms. He snapped the serrated titanium claws in front of her. She
stood her ground.