Banks was at Hynd’s side seconds later. The sarge’s face was pale, his eyelids fluttering. Blood flecked his lips.
“Something’s broken inside, John,” he said, bubbling more blood. “Broken ribs, maybe a punctured lung. And it’s fucking painful.”
“Medic!” Banks shouted, banging on the door above him. “We need a medic here, right fucking now.”
He quickly stepped across the gantry and looked down. There was no sign of the beast. There was also no sign of the docking area; it had been smashed down into the depths, leaving only twisted and torn metal behind.
To the rig crews credit, they reacted to the situation with almost military speed and efficiency. The doctor who arrived was a small, tidy man who ignored everything but his new charge and only answered questions after he’d examined Hynd thoroughly and the sarge was being taken away on a stretcher.
He addressed Banks directly.
“He’ll live,” he said. “And don’t worry. We’ve got all mod cons in our infirmary; we get accidents on a regular basis out here and I make sure we’re equipped to deal with them. He won’t be walking around for a while but after I’ve tended to him, he won’t want to. I think he’s punctured a lung but there’s not much blood so it could be no more than a nick. If that’s the case, all it will take is a simple wee operation, some stitches, and he’ll be right as rain. As I said, don’t worry. I’ll make him comfortable.”
“You’ll have to work fast, doc,” Banks said. “We might be leaving in a hurry, possibly within the hour.”
If we’re given that long.
He didn’t say it out loud, but he didn’t have to. He saw in the doctor’s eyes that the situation was clear to him.
Banks stopped the stretcher bearers before they could move away and bent over Hynd.
“We’ve still got to have yon wee chat you wanted, Frank,” he said. “So don’t go anywhere without telling me.”
“I suppose a fag is out of the question?” Hynd said, started to laugh then coughed up more blood. That was the signal for the stretcher bearers to move.
Without another word, the medic followed them off the gantry, leaving Banks and Seton standing alone in the rain. Across the other side of the walkway, a line of crewmen were standing looking down into the water, as if in disbelief at what they were seeing.
The alarms cut off abruptly and the only sound now was rain lashing on metal and the crash of the sea on the pillars of the rig below them.
“Now what?” Seton said.
“I was going to ask you the same thing,” Banks replied, ignoring the rain and lighting up a fresh smoke. “I’m down four men since we got here—three lost out there in the dark, one away to a hospital bed. My batting average is shite today. So it’s over to you. Maybe your luck will be better.”
“You’re ready to believe me?”
“Sandy, after what I’ve seen these past few years, I’m ready to believe just about anything. Did you see yon best just now? The fucker shut its eyes deliberately as we were about to shoot, then it smiled at me. This bloody thing is sentient. I’d bet my pension on it. What do you need and what can I do?”
It turned out that Seton’s needs were simple—all he required was use of the rig’s tannoy system, turned up loud, and a means to play a recording he had on his phone through it.
“I can’t authorise the use of rig equipment for non-company personnel,” the rig manager said.
“I wasn’t asking,” Banks said. “I was telling. Now we can do this by the books; I’ll call my colonel, he’ll call the minister, the minister will call your boss, your boss will call you, and you’ll do what you’re told. Or you can stop being an arsehole, save us half an hour, and do what you’re told right fucking now. What’s it to be?”
As Banks knew he would, the man backed down immediately; his bluster was only of any use when he had power over the people he used it on…it cut no ice with anyone else willing to give as good as they got. And after the day Banks had had, taking shit from middle managers wasn’t on his to-do list.
The operator, after double-checking with the rig manager, was able to oblige Seton’s needs.
“How long?” Banks asked.
“Ten minutes, tops,” Seton replied and went to join the operator at the console.
“What now?” the manager asked, the petulant whine of an admonished child all too clear now in his voice.
“Either we get rescued or the beast comes back and we test my theory,” Seton said from the console. “Want to put a tenner on what comes first?”
Banks left Seton to it and went in search of the infirmary. It wasn’t hard to find, merely down one flight of stairs and a few yards back along a corridor. Nobody stopped him entering and he did so to find the doc bent over Hynd. There looked to be a lot of blood, far too much of it. But the doc smiled grimly when he saw Banks approach.
“He had a wee hemorrhage when I opened him up to see what the problem was and things got a tad messy. But although it looks bad, it’s really nothing to worry about. I’ve got him sorted and stitched back up again. He’s under sedation and will be out for a couple of hours.”
“Was it his lung?”
“Aye, and I was right, it was just a very small puncture, easily repaired. But he broke three ribs and he’s going to have to be careful not to burst his stitches. He’s also going to be sore for a good wee while. Don’t expect him to be an action man for a few weeks or so after he wakes up.”
Banks was about to reply to thank the doctor when the quiet was broken by a sound from somewhere outside, the same bagpipe-drone wail they’d heard before. Banks went outside to the gantry and looked down, half-expecting to see the horse-head again. But there was only emptiness below; the noise was coming from farther off.
Out in the dark waters beyond the reach of the rig’s lights, the beast sang.
9
Somewhere several miles to the south and west of where Banks stood on the rig Wiggo chewed on another smoke and tried to peer past the rain out the floatel control room window.
“Do you have any fucking idea where we are?” he asked the operator at the control board. The man had clearly been making inroads into his whisky supply and when he spoke his speech was slurred and slow.
“Heading in the general direction of Aberdeen at about ten miles an hour. We’ll be there early tomorrow at this rate. I’ll buy you a pint when the pubs open in the morning.”
“If we’re in Aberdeen when the pubs open, you can buy me two,” Wiggo replied.
The chances of that seemed remote. The wind outside had continued to rise and the see-saw motion of the deck below them had got more pronounced, making moving around difficult; Wiggo had bounced off walls several times on his way up from the mess and had only narrowly avoided being thrown back down the stairwell. He wasn’t keen on making the descent quite yet. He lit up another smoke from the chewed butt of the last one and watched more rain lash at the windows.
“Will there be somebody out in this looking for us?” he asked.
“Probably,” the operator replied. “Some of those air-sea rescue blokes in Aberdeen are right nutters; they’ll come out in any weather. It’s like a badge of honour to them. But it’ll be risky for everybody. They can’t land on top here— there’s not a big enough flat area and we’re jinking about too much in the swell. So it’ll be a cable and winch job, one at a time. In this wind, that’s not for the faint hearted…or sober.”
He took a slug of Scotch straight out the bottle and again Wiggo refused when it was offered to him.
“Save it for the morning in Aberdeen,” he said and saw the look in the man’s face.
He doesn’t expect to make it ‘til morning.
“What are you not telling me?” Wiggo asked then asked the same question again when he didn’t get an answer. Finally, the man replied.
“Haven’t you noticed? Maybe it’s because I spend most of my time here and ken the mood of the place.”
“Noticed what?”<
br />
“We’re getting heavier in the water. There’s less rotation for one thing and we’re not moving with the wind as fast as we were; that’s leading to the sloshing around in the swell getting worse.”
“Getting heavier? What do you mean?”
“Remember the engine room and the water? I’m guessing it has got a bit deeper down there. Maybe a lot deeper.”
“You’re telling me that we’re sinking?”
“Give the man a banana.”
“How long have we got?”
“Depends on this storm, the integrity of the hull, and how quickly it’s getting in. But if I was to bet on it… three hours? Maybe. Maybe less.”
“I can see why you’ve taken to the drink,” Wiggo said grimly. The main raised the bottle in a mock salute before taking another long swig.
Wiggo left him to it and headed for the stairs. He took the descent gingerly, clinging tight to the handrail at every step and trying to match his downward steps to the rise and fall of the swell, like following a partner’s steps in a dance. He was only partially successful and smacked his shoulder hard against the wall when one particularly bad swell almost threw him off his feet. He wasn’t in the best of moods when he went down the last remaining stairs. On safely reaching the mess hall level, he headed for the door that opened onto the engine room stairwell. He didn’t have to open it to know they were in trouble; the carpet was wet before he got within six feet of the door itself and water could be seen forcing itself through the crack at the bottom where it didn’t quite touch the floor.
“Come on, big man,” he said, praying to a God he had never really believed in. “Gonnae give us a break here?”
He didn’t get an answer, but then again, he hadn’t been expecting one.
When he got back to the mess hall, he got Davies and Wilkins on their own and laid out the situation to them.
“The water’s up to the level of the top door along the corridor there, and the mannie upstairs reckons we’ve got three hours, tops, before we start circling the plughole. I think we should move everybody up to the control room,” he said. “Nice and quiet with no fuss. Tell them it’s in preparation for when the air-sea rescue chopper gets here.”
“There’s one on its way?” Davies asked.
“I’ve no fucking clue,” Wiggo answered. “But don’t quote me on that. But the mannie upstairs has an idea on that as well; he thinks there’ll be somebody coming out of Aberdeen looking for us. So we act as if there is and keep acting that way as long as we can. Got it?”
“Got it, Corp,” both privates said in unison.
They got no argument from the crew when they relayed the idea to them. Their mood was sombre now and they all appeared to have accepted Wiggo in the role of the man with the plan. Wiggo stayed at the rear while the privates shepherded the crew upstairs. They had to take it slowly with the lad with the broken arm and even then he was thrown against the wall when the vessel lurched in a particularly heavy swell. He let out a yelp of pain that echoed loudly through the mess hall.
The chef, Tom, stayed behind beside Wiggo and helped him lug the remaining kit bags up the stairs.
“We’re in trouble, aren’t we?” the big man said.
“Always,” Wiggo replied. “Comes with the job, as you said. But no worries. My captain will get us out of here. It’s kinda what he does.”
“What is he, fucking Rambo?”
“Better,” Wiggo replied. “He’s Scottish.”
There weren’t enough chairs to go ‘round in the control room and when Wiggo arrived there, he found men scattered around the perimeter on the floor, backs to any wall space they could find to sit against. He was amused to see that the operator had hidden his whisky bottle away, unwilling to see it emptied in sharing among so many.
“What now?” one of the crew asked.
“Now we wait for the rescue chopper,” Wiggo said. “Smoke them if you’ve got them.”
The rain continued to lash against the windows, and the vessel lurched in the swell. And now he was looking for it, Wiggo noticed that the floatel did indeed feel heavy, lower in the water.
“Come on, Cap,” he whispered, praying to someone he actually had faith in. “Get us out of here.”
The only sound in the room was the patter of rain and the whistle of wind from the storm outside. Everyone was lost in their own thoughts; Wiggo, for one, wished he could shut them down, but the worry kept rising up, threatening panic.
He’d often secretly wished for more responsibility and had been quietly proud as punch when the captain promoted him to corporal, despite the fact he’d done it on the back of the death of his best friend in the Loch Ness affair. Since then, he’d been kept busy looking after the younger lads in Syria, Norway, Mongolia, and the Congo. He’d thought he was handling that duty just fine.
But now he had this roomful of men looking to him for leadership and command.
And I’m not sure I’m up to it.
He was still trying to push the negative thoughts away to make room for some positivity when there was a loud crackling spark from the control panel and a puff of black smoke rose ‘round the operator sitting there.
The lights failed two seconds later, plunging them into blackness.
The room echoed with yelps of panic that were allayed when Wiggo switched on the sight-light of his rifle and the privates followed suit.
“Davies, we got any torches in the kit?”
“I’ll check.”
Wiggo waved his light around the room until it fell on the operator at the control panel.
“What happened?”
“We lost power,” the man said.
“No shit, Sherlock. What caused it?”
“My guess? Water got into the main panel in the engine room.”
“Backup generator?”
“Also in the engine room.”
“I can fix that up right quick,” one of the crew said.
“I’ll go with you,” another piped up.
“Sorry, lads,” Wiggo said, raising his voice so all could hear. “You can’t do that.”
“You can’t tell us what to do,” the first man replied.
“In this case, I can. The engine room’s flooded. The water’s all the way up the stairs to the door on the deck below us. It’s why I moved us all up here in the first place.”
A stunned quiet fell over the room.
“We’re sinking?” Tom said, little more than a whisper.
“Aye. But slowly. The chopper will be here before we get into real trouble.”
He tried to put some conviction into his voice but as he waved his light beam around, he saw the skepticism on the men’s faces.
Davies came up out of the kit back with two flashlights. Wiggo passed one to Tom and one to the operator at the control desk.
“I don’t ken how old the batteries are in these, so save them until we really need them.”
He had Davies and Wilkins switch off their rifle lights, aimed his own at the ceiling, and they all sat there, quiet again, under the umbrella of dim light it cast.
“Anytime now will do, Cap,” he whispered. “Anytime now.”
10
There had been no recurrence of the beast’s weird song for the last half-hour, although tensions in the control room on the rig were still running high.
“Do you have any fucking idea how much this shit-show is going to cost us?” the rig manager asked.
“I don’t give a flying fuck about your bottom line,” Banks replied. “And I doubt if many of your crew here, those out on yon lost floatel, or the men we lost down in the dark with what’s left of the supply boat give a flying fuck either. The important thing now is to get everybody to shore safely.”
A huge wave hit just at that moment and the whole rig shuddered under the impact. Banks ignored the still spluttering manager and addressed the operator at the radio.
“Any word on those choppers?”
“I just got off the blower with A
berdeen. One’s incoming, twenty minutes out weather permitting. There’s another two twenty minutes behind that.”
Banks turned to the manager again.
“You need to start getting people out to the helipad for evac. They’ll want to lift and clear as quickly as possible.”
“I’m not going to do that,” the man said.
Banks drew his pistol. He didn’t aim, kept it at his side, but he made sure the man saw it.
“Are you sure about that? Give the order, man. You know it’s the right thing to do.”
“I’m not allowed to evac except in the case of a catastrophic emergency,” Smith said.
“What do you think this is? Fucking Christmas?”
“It would cost me my job if I do.”
“It could cost you your life if you don’t.”
Banks hadn’t meant it as a threat, but he saw that the man had taken it that way. Either way, it had worked, for Smith quickly saw sense and an evac order went out over the tannoy.
“I’ll go with the first chopper,” Smith said, not looking Banks in the eye.
“Aye,” Banks replied quietly. “I thought you might.”
The man’s cheeks reddened but he kept his mouth shut, wisely, for Banks’ mood was darkening by the minute and it was starting to show. If he’d stayed there much longer, he couldn’t guarantee keeping his temper. He holstered his weapon and turned to Seton.
“Make sure he doesn’t do anything that’ll get anybody else killed, Sandy. I’ll go check on the sarge again.”
The doctor was working frantically packing a medical bag when Banks entered the small infirmary.
“The first chopper’s on its way,” he said. “Can we get him on it?”
“Your man’s still out cold, and it’s for the best if he stays that way if he’s to be moved. But I’m not going to have him ready to go in twenty minutes,” he said. “I need more time.”
Operation: North Sea (S-Squad Book 10) Page 5