Hell Rig Read Free Page B

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 warned.
    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