Hell Rig Read online

  They were alone, one hundred and twenty-five miles out in the Gulf in one hundred-fifteen feet of water. They had no boat, a less than reliable radio and it would take the helicopter ninety minutes to reach them once it had landed and refueled, if they somehow managed to contact it.

  “Gawd! What a piece of shit,” Gleason commented, summing up Jeff’s first impression. Gleason held one beefy hand over his eyes to shade them from the glare of the midmorning sun as he scanned their new home for the week. “Looks like the dump I grew up in.”

  Tolson chuckled. “Except it’s got toilets.”

  Jeff leaned over, suppressing a mild wave of vertigo, and scanned the platform’s main deck spread out below him. Rust and soot seemed to be the predominant colors—rust the color of congealed blood and soot so dark it blended into the shadows. The platform was an old one, built in the 1950’s and reworked as often as the fluctuating price of oil allowed. Rising on four massive, hollow round steel pylons driven deep into the mud and silt below and filled with water as ballast, it had withstood all Katrina could throw at it and came through better than some of the newer rigs had managed. Certainly, it had fared better than New Orleans. The platform had been undergoing a lengthy overhaul before Katrina with only a limited number of its wells operating. Signs of newer construction blended with old architecture spotted the deck.

  Jeff thought again about New Orleans. They had detoured north of New Orleans along the southern edge of Lake Ponchatrain on their trip to pick up a portable pump. Jeff had gotten a good look at the Crescent City as they flew over it on the way out. He hardly recognized the city that he had so often visited and in which he had partied so many nights. Except for the tall downtown high-rise buildings, hotels, and what remained of the Superdome, large parts north and east of the city looked like lakes. The roofs of buildings rose from the water like crypts in a drowned graveyard. Indeed, the deluge had submerged many ancient cemeteries. God alone knew what would have happened if Katrina had not mysteriously dropped from a Category Five to a Category Three before making landfall. The city could have been completely annihilated.

  He, like everyone else in America, had remained glued to the television as dozens of helicopters plucked stranded residents off roofs and as hundreds of volunteers with boats ferried refugees to safety. Other cities opened up their doors for the newly homeless but many stayed in New Orleans and coped as best they could. Crime and outrage rose with the water level. Someone had taken a pot shot at their chopper as they flew over the city. He suspected New Orleans would never be the same again, could never completely recover from such a catastrophic event. Katrina had cut out its beating heart and had exposed it to the world. He hoped he was wrong.

  “It looks deserted,” Lisa said, interrupting his reverie.

  He glanced at her. She was smiling at him, probably wondering why he was staring into space.

  “It’s a ghost town,” he said, returning his gaze to the rig.

  She frowned and walked away, picking up her bag.

  The platform’s symmetry was awry. Jeff stared at it until the answer suddenly came to him. The day shack and portable crew’s quarters were gone, swept away by the hurricane force winds, as were several work sheds and winches, giving the rig an unbalanced look. The towering drill derrick had been dismantled long before the hurricane, as number Thirteen had been an operational pumping platform and no longer a drilling rig, but the rest of the platform had weathered the storm remarkably well. The new construction fared worse, speaking volumes about the quality of the modern work.

  Debris littered the deck—crushed and rusted 55-gallon drums, broken crates, pipes twisted like pretzels by the force of the storm, snapped cables and all the other normal junk of human industrial civilization. Much of the lighter debris had blown away amid the fury of Katrina’s winds, perhaps winding up as part of the wall of debris that etched the shoreline along the Louisiana and Mississippi coasts or littering the sea floor beneath the rig, future home to schools of fish and sea creatures that seemed to prefer the rigs as shelter.

  Black scorch marks curved like arched eyebrows above some of the windows and doors, indicating the worst burned areas. Most of the windows were merely gaping wounds in the walls. The wind moaned a low sad note as it blew across the platform. Earlier chopper drops had brought out a load of plywood and cleaning supplies, paint and spray rigs, portable lights and a sand blaster. Two large pallets of sandbags were stacked haphazardly on the deck as if, like their chopper pilot, the delivery crew had been anxious to get off the rig. Re-Berth’s first job would be sealing the windows against the weather. Then came come the fun part—sandblasting the rust and soot, priming and painting the metal surfaces, and getting the platform ready for the engineering crew coming out to rework the rig, and make it operational once again. With crude oil selling for sixty-five dollars per barrel, Global was losing a lot of money.

  He glanced at Lisa as she bent over to tie her bootlaces, noticing the luscious curve of her butt beneath her oversize jumper. Tolson also admired her figure but was far more brazen about it. Lisa straightened up, turned around and glared at both of them.

  “Seen enough?” she asked. Mild irritation stained her voice.

  Jeff turned his head away in embarrassment, but Tolson smiled and answered, “Not yet. I’ve got a slow imagination.”

  She walked away in a huff.

  As Jeff descended the stairs from the helideck to the main deck, he glanced into the darkened windows of the main building. It had housed a small company commissary, dining hall, labs, most of the offices, a few private quarters for supervisors and a recreation room. He saw figures lumbering past, the restless dead of number Thirteen. He blinked his eyes and the ghosts became broken furniture scattered across the floors and piles of ceiling tiles brought down by the rain. The rig smelled of smoke and soot and death.

  When he reached the deck, he noticed Ric Waters standing beneath the crane across the platform, staring upwards. Waters stood about 5’9” and had once been a solidly built man; maybe even pudgy judging by the loose skin on his cheeks and neck, but Jeff noticed how loosely his jumper fit him. It now looked two sizes too big and his cap swallowed his head. Waters must have lost considerable weight since his ordeal. One hand twitched nervously as he held them by his side. The crane’s cables dropped to within twenty feet of the platform’s deck. Smaller wires dangled like hooks from the tackle. Waters began to moan, swaying side to side, as if in some kind of trance.

  Ed stood a few yards behind him, watching. “Waters!” he yelled out.

  Waters jerked around to face Ed. His face was pale and sweat beaded his forehead.

  “Where’s the generator room? We need power.”

  Waters stared slack-jawed a moment before nodding his head and disappearing around a corner.

  “Love! Tolson!” Ed barked. “Follow him. Get us some juice. Jeff, you others, follow me. We need to find us a home for the week.”

  Jeff looked around him. The platform seemed dead, but not as dead as he wanted it to be. It lay disconcertingly quiet and serene, as if playing possum—appearing to be dead before suddenly reaching out to grab him when his back was turned. He shuddered once as the tenebrous feeling swept over him and then picked up his duffel bag, following Ed.

  They forced open a damaged side door of the main building, a single-story structure that covered most of one side of the platform. The door looked as if someone had pounded it with a sledgehammer from the outside. One hinge was broken and the door lay twisted and jammed in its frame. It took Gleason and Bale’s combined muscles to force it open. Stale air, sealed inside since the storm, rushed out. Besides the smell of smoke, mildew, rust and salt, it carried with it an underlying odor, like dead, rotten meat. Jeff looked at Ed in apprehension.

  As if reading his mind, Ed said, “They removed all the bodies weeks ago, a few days after Katrina hit. The coolers are out, though. The contents ought to be pretty ripe by now. I hope you got your stomach back,” he warne
d.

  Jeff nodded and swallowed. “Me too.”

  The door opened onto a long dark hallway with double doors at each end. They found one decent sized room, a former office or break room, with the windows still intact and a table and chairs inside.

  “We can use this as our meeting room,” Ed suggested. He immediately set up the small gas burner for the coffee pot, a priority in his eyes. A door led to a small adjoining half bath but there was no running water. ”Once they had the water running, it would be just like home, cozy and warm,” Jeff thought.

  There were eight private or semiprivate sleeping quarters off the corridor for the office staff. Six remained in good condition, shielded from the storm by the doors at each end of the hallway. Two had broken outside windows, which had allowed in the wind and rain. In one room, the beds and built-in furniture were in shambles, a pile of damp, moldy wood that smelled like a wet dog. The second had fared much better, protected somewhat by the stairs to the helideck, needing only a general clean up to be useful.

  They left one private room for Lisa, while Bale and McAndrews decided to bunk together in the one across the hall. Jeff chose the one adjacent to Lisa’s.

  “Tolson and I can share,” he said. Of all the others, he and Tolson got along the best.

  “I’m not sharing with the psycho,” Clyde called out, meaning Waters.

  “He can have the dungeon,” Easton said with a mean spirited chuckle, eyeing the storm-damaged room that needed a bed. “It might suit him.”

  “One of you can bunk with me,” Ed told them.

  Clyde rolled his eyes. “I’d rather sleep with Easton than put up with your snoring.” He punched Easton in the chest. “I got bottom bunk, roomie.” Easton groaned and rubbed his chest.

  “I’ll bunk with Waters,” Sims said with a shrug, surprising Jeff. “I don’t mind.”

  “Sleep with one eye open,” Clyde warned.

  Ed took the remaining private room for himself, tossing his small bag on the bed. “We’ll have to strip the beds, of course, because of possible mold and mildew, and use our blankets. No clean sheets or maid service, I’m afraid.”

  Clyde snorted his derision at the thought of clean sheets and maids.

  “Clyde. Let’s check out the rest of this joint,” Jeff suggested.

  “I’ll come, too,” Easton chimed in, tossing his pack on the top bunk. “Maybe they got a candy vending machine around here.”

  Jeff shook his head. Easton’s sweet tooth was undoubtedly the reason for his bad teeth and rank breath. He doubted Easton would find anything edible left on the rig.

  According to the building plans, the hallway led to two small offices, a slightly larger reception area in the front of the building, and the cafeteria and recreation room in the rear. They chose to inspect the cafeteria first.

  “Is that blood?” Gleason asked, rubbing his finger down a red-brown stain on a door bearing the International Symbol for restroom. The door was shattered and off its hinges. Deep gashes looked as if someone had taken an axe to it.

  Jeff looked closely. He could not be certain, but he hoped it was just a rust stain. “Nah. It’s just rust from the pipes above,” he said.

  Gleason eyed the maze of pipes running overhead, “If you say so.” He did not sound entirely convinced of Jeff’s quick appraisal.

  They peeked inside. There were four stalls and four urinals. A large round fountain sink in the center of the room operated with a foot pedal, leaving the hands free. Jeff tried it but no water came out.

  “No water in the tank above. We can set up a pump and fill it with salt water. We can at least have a flushing toilet. Any small comfort will only make the job easier. We can refill the tank with fresh water when the supply ship arrives and have showers.”

  “Better than hanging your bare ass over the railings,” Gleason agreed.

  An open door at the rear led to a large communal shower.

  “God, it stinks,” Easton said, pinching his nose between two fingers.

  “Smells like stale piss,” Clyde said.

  Jeff eyed the red stains on the wall beneath two of the showerheads and the streaks running to the floor drain and said, “Maybe something else, too.” A large booted footprint was visible in the red stain. “Let’s go.”

  The cafeteria was in shambles. Tables were scattered and overturned. Broken dishes and glass made footing treacherous. Fallen ceiling tiles lay in molding piles on the floor. The smell of rotten food permeated the air. Gleason forced open the back door and the incoming breeze swept most of the offending odor away.

  “Bale and Sims get to clean out the cooler, agreed?” Gleason said.

  “Right,” Jeff seconded. He did not want to shovel out a ton of rotten meat and vegetables. Easton nodded his head vigorously. Jeff looked at a particularly large crimson stain on the floor that he could not explain away as rust. As he stared at the stain, its odd shape became that of a man thrown onto his face, one arm and hand stretched above him. He could even make out the fingers where they had clawed uselessly at the tile floor and the imprint of the nose, eyes and mouth, opened wide as if screaming, frozen forever in dried blood. He could even hear the scream, distantly at first as if forcing its way through the steel deck and concrete and tile, solidifying in the air.

  “Easton! Turn that damn thing off.”

  He looked at Gleason who was yelling at Easton. Easton had turned on the water faucet of the sink and was smiling as the air bled out in a loud screech. He shut off the faucet and the scream stopped. Jeff sighed. He was letting the place get to him. He eyed the kitchen. Rig workers were notoriously well fed. It was one of the ways the company kept men off shore as long as possible. Ferrying in new crews and training them was costly. It was much cheaper to pay bonuses to those capable of handling the long weeks, even months of isolation off shore. The food was bountiful—all you can eat steaks twice a week, fresh seafood caught off the rig, potatoes, vegetables, gravy, sandwiches, fruit, pies, pastries and ice cream with every meal. No worker ever went hungry. Jeff had seen some workers down a half-gallon of ice cream by themselves after a heavy meal as well as take a bagged lunch of four large sandwiches to their work site. Good cooks were in great demand. A bad cook didn’t last long on a rig. More than one cook had been rousted out of bed in the middle of the night and unceremoniously deposited on a supply ship for the long, embarrassing ride back to shore.

  Easton walked behind the serving line, lifting lids on the chafing dishes. Thankfully, the disaster had struck between meals and the line was relatively clean. The ovens, though, were a different matter. Easton opened one, only to be overwhelmed by the appalling odor of rotten meat. Four moldy beef roasts sat in roasting pans.

  “Care for a slice?” Easton asked with a grin.

  Jeff fought down the nausea and walked out, but not before noting that there were no maggots in the meat. That struck him as odd.

  “The pantry is in pretty good shape,” Gleason reported from the open door. “Water got in but the canned goods are okay. I wouldn’t try the crackers though,” he added with a wink.

  They entered one room off to the side of the cafeteria. Numerous card tables, arcade games and a wide screen TV furnished the room, a recreation room, Jeff supposed. Cards and poker chips littered the floor and tables. More odd, reddish-brown stains marred the linoleum tile floor. Jeff tried to ignore them.

  “Great! Pac Man,” Easton shouted, pointing to one of the arcade games against the wall. As he reached out to touch it, the lights flickered overhead and the video game roared to life. When the music blared suddenly, he leaped back into the arms of Gleason, who roughly shoved him away. Easton tried to smile, but was clearly embarrassed by his reaction. Lisa and Tolson had restored the power.

  “What a rush!” he said with a giggle.

  “Good! They got the juice back on,” Gleason said. In the background, they could hear one of the two generators sputtering, but running.

  The overhead lights pulsed a few times
before coming on. In full light, the rust-red stains looked more like bloodstains than Jeff cared to imagine. One long smear ran from the center of the room, across the floor and out the door as if something, or someone, had been dragged away. The disarray of the furnishings seemed out of proportion to the actual storm damage. The wind and rain had not penetrated this room. It looked more like the scene of a riot or a big brawl than the aftermath of a storm.

  “Look at that!” Easton shouted in glee as he spotted the vending machines standing in a small alcove off the game room. “Sodas, candy, chips. It’s a gold mine!”

  “The chips are probably stale,” Jeff warned.

  Easton laughed and kicked at the front of the candy machine. His foot bounced off the Plexiglas front and he almost fell down. He tried again and failed.

  “You ain’t got enough ass for your sass, Easton,” Gleason said and pushed Easton aside. Gleason shattered the front with one kick of his size thirteen boot.

  Easton reached inside and grabbed a half dozen Baby Ruth bars, shoving them in his pocket. “Thanks, Clyde.” He pulled a dollar bill from his pocket and tried to slide it into the soda machine. When the machine would not take it, he punched all the buttons and waited for his soda. Nothing happened.

  “Rusted up,” Gleason said. He grabbed the machine with both hands and shook it vigorously. The soda dropped with a thud into the slot. Easton grabbed the soda and popped the top as Gleason stepped back. The hot, shaken soda spewed all over Easton.

  Gleason laughed so hard he began to cough. Jeff tried not to laugh.

  “Damn you, Clyde!” Easton yelled as he threw the offending soda away.

  Gleason shrugged. “What did you expect? It’s been sitting in there cooking for God knows how long.”

  Easton turned to leave.

  “Wait! Maybe they got some Tic-Tacs in there too, for your breath,” Gleason suggested.

  Easton rolled his eyes, did an approximation of a Billy Idol sneer and stalked off. They explored the outside wing of the main blockhouse and found a stairwell leading down to the cellar deck containing the mudroom, storerooms and workshops. The lights were out and the stairwell looked dark and uninviting. Cold, damp air smelling of mildew welled up from the lower level in spite of the heat.