Outpost

by Adam Baker

  She could sense the crew of the refinery. She could smell them on the other side of the hatch. Rich and sweet. She began to salivate.

  Fresh meat.

  The Killer

  Mal lay on the boathouse deck. His body had been stored in the unheated shed for a week. Too cold for decomposition. His shrouded corpse was completely frozen, rigid as a plank.

  Jane used to live near the River Severn and had, on a couple of occasions, stood on the bank and blessed bloated cadavers as they were hauled from the water. The Severn Bridge was a popular venue for suicides. Corpses swollen with rot-gas frequently washed up on mudflats downstream. They were pecked by gulls until police frogmen dragged them to shore.

  Mal would float south. He would probably wash up on the coast of Norway.

  Jane decided to wrap a Ziploc bag beneath his shroud. She bagged his signet ring, his medallion and his passport. She wrote everything she knew about the man. Information from his personnel file. Home address, next of kin. It was a long shot. Even if his body washed up on a European beach there would be no one left alive to find him. But it seemed like the right thing to do. An attempt to preserve his identity as they dispatched him to the afterworld.

  At some point during the funeral ceremony Jane would have to give an address. A summary of Mal's life. She would have to list his virtues, his enthusiasms, the struggles he faced and overcame. But she knew nothing about him at all.

  Jane crossed the ice to Hyperion. She took a wide detour to avoid infected passengers that spilled from the rip in Hyperion's side.

  Mal's room.

  The Magellan Suite. Red velvet and gilt fixtures. Lithographs of Napoleonic-era battleships. A senior officer's dress uniform hung in the wardrobe. Jane experienced a sudden rush of class hatred. She had been an underdog all her life. She instinctively identified with the ship's drone workers, east European immigrants who grovelled for tips. She wondered if junior members of the Hyperion crew, the cleaners, the waiters, the engine room staff, had been aware of the luxury enjoyed by the ship's officers. Probably not.

  Mal's clothes lay in a heap by the bed. She prodded his long- johns with her boot.

  Jane browsed the cupboards and shelves for any personal artefact that might give her an insight into the man's life. An open book, a stack of CDs, a family photograph. Something that might reveal who Mal had been.

  Nothing. A couple of empty vodka bottles. Socks soaking in the bathroom sink. She wanted to believe everyone had value. Everyone had a rich internal life, everyone was a little universe. Not this guy. He was empty.

  She had asked around. What was Mal actually like? What went on in his head? Nobody knew. He was Nail's shadow. Nail pulled deadlifts, and Mal pumped weights next to him. Nail watched TV, and Mal pulled up a chair.

  Jane asked Nail for his opinion of the man. He shrugged.

  'He didn't say a whole lot. I think he supported West Ham.'

  She sat on the bath. She would have to talk to the other crewmen. Maybe Mal had confided his dreams, his great disappointments, to a friend during some late-night heart-to-heart.

  There was something on the floor next to the toilet brush. A twist of foil dusted with brown powder. Jane held the crumpled foil in the palm of her hand and examined it from all angles.

  Jane and Ghost took a suite near the bridge. Most nights they sat in silk bathrobes and watched a movie. They took turns to cook.

  Jane felt self-conscious each time Ghost saw her naked. A lifetime of fathood had left her with sagging skin. Ghost didn't seem to mind. He had a paunch and a hairy back.

  'All the supermodels are dead, baby,' he told her. 'Let it go.'

  'What do you make of this?' asked Jane.

  Ghost paused Annie Hall and took the foil from her hand.

  'Silver paper. What of it?'

  'My old church. Holy Apostles. There were little scraps of foil in the porch each morning. They were left by junkies.'

  'So where did you find this?'

  'Mal. His old suite.'

  'Some kind of drug deal gone bad, is that what you're saying? You think Mal got involved in a big argument. A trade. A dispute over money, or whatever counts for money these days. Maybe someone pulled a knife.'

  'You used to sell weed, didn't you? Your little hydroponics lab.'

  'I shared it around, swapped it for magazines and stuff. It was never an actual business.'

  'Were you ever offered anything hard in exchange?'

  'No, but it wouldn't surprise me if someone on board was dealing. It happens on a lot of offshore installations. A big bunch of guys, nowhere to go, nothing to do. If you smuggled a bag of pills or a brick of heroin on board you would find a ready market. Probably double your paycheque. Make everyone dance to your tune.'

  Jane thought it over.

  'Did Mal have a best friend? Anyone other than Nail?'

  'No. Just the gym posse. Nail's little muscle cult. He barely spoke a word to anyone else. He was wallpaper. A complete blank.'

  'Do you think they fell out? Him and Nail? What do you reckon? Could Nail slit a man's throat?'

  'Yeah,' he said. 'He's got a mean streak. A wife-beater's rage. Could he kill a man in cold blood? I'm not sure. But would he lash out if someone pushed him hard enough? Yeah, I think he might.'

  'Okay,' said Jane. 'I need to get it clear in my head. How does it fit together? What's the chronology?'

  'Nikki took the boat. Nail's been simmering ever since. He got angry, argued with Mal. He lashed out. Plausible scenario.'

  'He's been drunk for days. I thought he was pissed off at Nikki. Maybe it's guilt. Maybe it's Mal.'

  Ghost thought it over.

  'Punch cooked us all a meal. We sat in the officers' mess. I went looking and found the body.'

  'So Mal may have been dead and hidden before you all sat down to eat.'

  'Hard to credit,' said Ghost. 'Kill a guy then sit down for a plate of risotto? Talk and joke like nothing happened? If it's true, if this was murder, then we are dealing with a full-on psychopath.'

  'We need proof. We need to know for sure.'

  Next morning Jane and Ghost ran across the ice to Rampart and searched Nail's old room in the burned-out remains of D Module.

  They shone flashlights over the scorched walls and ceiling. A grille had been removed from the mouth of a wall duct and positioned neatly on the sprung frame of the bed. The melted foam mattress had been laid in the corner.

  'Someone was here,' said Ghost. 'They took something from the duct.'

  'Mal or Nail?'

  'Who knows? Maybe we're getting carried away. Maybe Mal cut his own throat, after all.'

  Jane kicked through the planks and slats of a smashed cupboard. She sat on the bed. Frame-springs creaked and twanged.

  Ghost sat on the burned chair and pulled Nail's personnel file from his shoulder bag.

  'So what do you think we should do?' asked Ghost. 'Say we find a smoking gun. A bloody knife, a shoe box full of smack.

  What then? Do we convene a jury? It's not like we can send him to jail. Take a vote? Hang the guy? He's still got friends. If we start throwing accusations around this could turn into civil war.'

  'If we have been passing the time of day with a killer, we need to know about it. We can't let it go.'

  'There is another option. Just so we understand the road we are heading down.'

  'Let's hear it.'

  'We're in charge. You and me. We didn't apply for the job, but we're holding the reins. If Nail is a problem, then it's down to us to deal.'

  'Go on.'

  'I'll take him on a trip inland. Find a pretext. Re-visit the capsule or something. I'd make sure he didn't come back. I'd tell everyone he fell down a crevasse.'

  'No.'

  'It's an option. That's all I'm saying.'

  Ghost thumbed through the file. He held up a sheet of paper.

  'Nigeria,' he said. 'Four years ago. He and Mal both worked for Chevron. I'm guessing that's where they met.'

>   Jane took a packet of beef jerky from her pocket.

  'I don't know what I hoped to find,' she said. 'There's nothing here. I don't suppose we will ever know for sure.'

  'Like I say, if Nail has been dealing, if he killed Mal in a fight, we aren't in much of a position to prove anything.'

  'No.'

  'So we might as well drop it.'

  'Yeah.'

  'Except for this.'

  He held up a sheet of paper. A crude photocopy.

  'Discharge papers. Private Edwin "Nail" Harper. Royal Engineers. He must have used it as a reference.' He handed the paper to Jane. 'Distinguishing features. Check it out.'

  'I can barely read it.' 'Tattoos.'

  'Second Battalion insignia right forearm. A lion on his back.'

  'I helped him out of a wetsuit once,' said Ghost. 'He and some guys were inspecting the seabed pipeline. Testing the shut-off valve. I helped them decompress. He has a big cross on his back, and a wolf on his arm. No regimental insignia.'

  'You're sure?'

  'Pretty sure.'

  'You're saying Nail Harper isn't Nail Harper?'

  'Most of the guys on the rig were running from something. Maybe he, whoever he is, was running from the law. Trying to build a new life under a stolen identity.'

  'So what happened to the real Nail Harper?'

  'Dread to think.'

  'You think we should challenge him?'

  'He'll say he got the tattoo lasered off. Bad memories of Iraq, or some shit.'

  'Christ,' said Jane.

  'The sooner we cut him loose, the better.'

  Nail's turn on patrol. Ghost kept him company. They walked the perimeter, the ring of barricades that kept the rabid population of Hyperion at bay.

  They checked locks. They re-stacked furniture against each door. They stood on deck and watched mutant passengers mill on the tiered decks below them.

  'They don't get any smarter,' said Ghost.

  'You'd think they would rot,' said Nail. 'They can't keep going for ever. Sooner or later, they have to drop dead.'

  Nail swigged from a hip flask.

  'So how are you doing?' asked Ghost.

  'All right.'

  'You must be pretty cut up about Mal.'

  'Fuck him. He was weak.'

  'Any idea why he would want to kill himself?'

  'Right now, every one of us has a dozen reasons to jump over the side.'

  'He was your friend.'

  'Nobody has friends. Not out here.'

  Nail proffered his hip flask. Ghost took it and pretended to drink.

  'Fancy a trip below deck?'

  'What for?' asked Nail.

  'The Neptune Bar. The guys want to hold a wake. We need to liberate a few supplies.'

  'Yeah. Why not?'

  Jane used a master key from the purser's office to let herself into Nail's cabin. She searched by torchlight. Ghost and Nail were out on deck. She didn't want Nail to see light at his cabin porthole.

  'What exactly do you hope to find?' Ghost had asked.

  'I don't know. Something incriminating. Some kind of contraband.'

  Dumbbells. Empty bottles of Scotch. Five years of Hustler.

  Jane tried to think like a junkie. Where would she hide her stash? Toilet cistern. Back of the washstand sink. Inside tubular, steel-frame furniture.

  She checked beneath the bed with a Maglite pen torch. She tugged at the side panels of the bath. She pulled up carpet.

  Nothing.

  She headed for the door. She was reluctant to leave. Gut instinct told her there was something hidden in the room, something significant, but she didn't have time for a thorough search.

  The crew took over the Tex Mex Grill. Ponchos hung on the wall, a plastic cactus stood by the door and a picture of Lee Van Cleef hung behind the bar.

  Ghost and Nail had rescued three cases of Veuve Clicquot from below deck. They filled buckets with ice chiselled from benches along the promenade, and set the champagne to chill.

  'Have fun, boys,' said Ghost. His turn on patrol.

  Gus put a CD player on the bar. Mal liked U2, so they played 'Joshua Tree'.

  Gus muted the sound for a moment and stood on a chair. He proposed a toast.

  'Mal. Here's to you, buddy. Via con Dios.'

  They all drained their glasses except for Jane. She resolved to stay sober. She sat by a brass radiator. She stooped to pick up a fallen coaster and turned up the thermostat. She popped a fresh bottle and refilled glasses.

  Nail took off his fleece. He stood on a table and clapped for silence. Another toast.

  'Goodbye to a good man. Goodbye to our friend.'

  Gus found bags of nachos in a back room. He filled bowls.

  Jane stood next to Nail at the bar.

  'You took off your bandages.'

  'Guess I'm all better.'

  'I spoke to Nikki on the radio,' said Jane. 'She says Hi.'

  'Tell her to eat shit and die.'

  'Did she leave a note?'

  'Bitch stole my knife.'

  The room was getting hot. Jane took off her fleece. She wore a black vest.

  'Been working out?' asked Nail.

  Jane pried the cap from a Corona.

  'I took over your gym.'

  'All right. Let's see what you've got.'

  They cleared a table. The crew formed a circle. Nail pulled off his shirt. He sat and put his arm out ready to wrestle.

  'Left hand, okay? I don't want to re-snap my wrist.'

  Jane got into position and gripped his massive hand.

  Gus counted them down: 'Three . . . two . . . one.'

  Nail had a snarling wolf on his bicep. No regimental tattoo on his forearm. No lion on his back.

  They wrestled. Nail nearly dislocated Jane's shoulder. He quickly pulled her arm over, but she kept her hand from touching the table. She fought and swore. She sweated and snarled. She refused to grant victory.

  Later that night Jane cracked a fresh bottle of beer and stood at Hyperion's prow.

  She looked towards Rampart. A couple of standby floodlights still burned, even though no one was home.

  Jane leaned over a prow railing and shone a flashlight downward. Half-frozen passengers stood far beneath her. She dropped her empty beer bottle. She watched it fall and smash on an infected passenger's head.

  Someone behind her. Nail, with a bottle. He leaned over the railing. He took a swig of champagne and spat spray. He watched the droplets freeze as they fell, and scatter on the shoulders of passengers below like hail.

  'Bored with singing?' he asked.

  'Karaoke at a wake. Doesn't seem right.'

  'Mal wouldn't care.'

  'How are the crew getting on?' asked Jane, groping for something to say. 'How is morale? They don't confide in me much.'

  'Pretty good. There are plenty of distractions aboard. Plenty of ways to waste time. We're all counting the days until March.'

  'You're doing all right?'

  'Fine.'

  'Heard you were in the army.'

  'Who told you that?' asked Nail.

  'I don't recall. Just something I heard. So how was it?'

  'Hot. Dull.'

  'Why did you leave?'

  'I'm not a follower. I don't like being told what to do.'

  'Coming to the service tomorrow?'

  'Dead is dead. Nothing we say or do will make a damn bit of difference.'

  'Guilty as hell,' said Jane, when she got back to Ghost's room.

  'You're sure?'

  'He killed Mal. I'm certain. Don't know why it happened. Drug deal gone sour, argument over a chocolate bar, whatever. But he killed him. Bet my life on it.'

  'You've got a shotgun. Maybe you should use it.'

  'I couldn't do a thing like that. Yeah, we killed a bunch of infected. But we have to draw a line. I'm not a killer.'

  'Of course you're a fucking killer. There is no higher authority any more. This is the way it is going to be. We have to sort this shit out
ourselves.'

  'Seriously? You'd do it? Pull the trigger on the guy? Take him out on the ice and shoot him in the back?'

  'The man isn't stupid. If you're right, if he genuinely offed Mal, then he's a dangerous motherfucker. You know his big secret. He'll have sniffed it out in a second. Right now we're safe, but once we get back to the world it'll be a different story. He'll consider us a serious liability. We'd better watch our backs from now on. That's all I'm saying.'

  Mal's funeral was scheduled for three in the afternoon. The crew gathered in the Rampart canteen. They kept it short, anxious to dispatch the man's body and quit the ice before Hyperion passengers surrounded them and attacked.

  They trained floodlights on the ice between the refinery's cyclopean legs. The crew, those who knew and liked the man, descended from the rig. They stood over the shrouded body while Jane intoned the old words:

  'Our days are like the grass; we flourish like a flower of the field; when the wind goes over it, it is gone and its place will know it no more. But the merciful goodness of the Lord endures forever . . .'

  Most of the guys didn't believe in God or heaven, but they liked the rhythm of elegiac prayers, the tone of resignation and acceptance.

  They smashed a hole in the ice, then slid his body into the sea. The men watched Mal dragged away by the current. Every one of them thought the same thing. Is this how it will end? One by one pushed into the ocean and carried away by the tide. What would the last man do? That final, lone member of Rampart's crew about to succumb to starvation or infection? They would break a hole in the ice then say a prayer at the water's edge. Conduct their own funeral oration. Maybe sing a hymn. Then they would cross themselves, close their eyes and drop into the ocean.

  The Voice

  Nikki curled foetal and covered her head. Waves slammed into the boat. She had sealed herself below deck. She rode out a series of impacts like one car crash after another. She wrapped herself in a sleeping bag for extra protection. She lay in the dark. Every couple of minutes she felt the boat rise like it was about to take off, then dive into a deep trough. She sang to calm herself down, but couldn't hear her own voice above the white-noise roar of the maelstrom.