Offshore (22 page)

She
couldn’t put what she suspected to be the truth - two men getting
on each others nerves and letting off a little steam by trying to
knock seven bells out of each other. Instead she opted to make a
side note regarding how she suspected these separate trips and
falls had been brought on by overwork, tiredness, and a shitty
dangerous working environment.

The men
had enough to cope with without being hauled up before a conduct
standards panel investigating their behaviour under pressure, and
from what she had seen on her tour of the platform – loose wires
trailing from the ceiling, wobbly railings on stairways and
gangways, sections of floor plating missing, etcetera, it was time
Longdrift’s approach to health and safety became the subject of a
little re-evaluation of its own. She did, however, make a note in
her personal journal about Reynolds’ disrespectful and discourteous
attitude towards Eddie, underlining the words ‘envious’,
‘resentful’ and ‘bastard’ several times.

Chapter 25

Four
days since the fight with McAllister, and Euterich had had enough
of Reynolds’ injured body.

He
looked like a panda with his two black eyes and bruised nose. The
pain in his ribs annoyed him, the bandage restricted him, and the
painkillers made him feel sick. Time for a change. But who would be
the lucky recipient of his attention this time?

A quick
study of the whiteboard in the Control Room helped him make his
decision, and he prepared to make his move.

However,
when he overheard a conversation between McAllister and Capstan at
lunch, he changed his mind. An easier option had presented itself,
but he didn’t have a lot of time.

The
light from the cutting torch was blinding and surprisingly noisy –
yellow white sparks fizzing and crackling, shooting off in all
directions like an out of control firework, belching smoke and the
smell of hot metal.

A piece of the metal detached itself and fell to the floor
with a
clang
, its cut end shifting colour from a bright cherry red to a
dull orange as it cooled.

The
flare died, yet the bright image remained, burned into Euterich’s
retina, appearing to hang before his eyes like a shifting purple
cloud. Slowly it too faded.

A gloved
hand laid the torch on the bench and raised a Cyclops windowed mask
over a mess of fiery red hair, revealing a grimy sweaty face with
three white stripes above an equally red eyebrow.

Euterich/Reynolds sidled into the room, pushing the door
closed behind him with his backside, both hands occupied with
carrying cardboard cups with plastic lids from which the sweet
smell of fresh brewed coffee emanated.

“
What do you want?” said McAllister sourly.

Euterich
offered McAllister one of the cups. “Peace offering,” he said.
“Haven’t got an olive branch. Will this do?”

McAllister grunted and wiped his glove over his damp cheek
leaving behind a sooty smear. “Took you long enough,” he sniffed.
“Bit late don’t you think?”

“
Maybe. I was having a bad day. Not enough sleep. Things got
a bit out of hand. I didn’t mean what I said, and … I’m sorry I hit
you.”

McAllister shrugged. “Yeah, well.” He took the cup. “Me too I
suppose. Thanks.”

“
No problem.”

While
McAllister drank his coffee and examined the cooling end of the
metal he just cut through, Euterich looked around this compact
utilitarian enclosure where cutting and welding could take place in
relative safety. Constructed of prefabricated fireproof concrete
panels, it wasn’t much larger than the average garden shed. Of its
four walls, two were plain panels, one had the door, another a high
up non-opening window inset with a rapidly whirring extractor fan.
The roof comprised sheets of corrugated tin dotted with holes where
salt water had eroded through it.

At the
far end of the enclosure, man sized oxygen and acetylene cylinders
stood side by side in a cage, their rubber pipes snaking from
rounded gauges to end in brass connectors, to which could be
attached any one of a dozen different heads depending on the
job.

Laid out
on the workbench were some of those heads, as well as a few other
tools a metalworker might need – hammers, pliers, wrenches, along
with various bottles and cans and containers.

What
really caught Euterich’s eye was a bright orange metal and plastic
device - a nail gun powered by a canister of compressed
air.

He
picked it up. “This looks like a serious piece of kit,” he
said.

“
Careful with that,” warned McAllister,
sipping from his coffee. “It’s loaded and it’s got a hair trigger.
The slightest twitch and
poof
, straight through your boot
and
your foot. You’ll find yerself pinned
to the floor, and trust me it bloody hurts.”

“
Wouldn’t want that.” Euterich laid the device back on the
bench with deliberate care. “So, you fixing something?” he
asked.

McAllister released the piece of metal he had been working on
from the clamp and examined the cut end, running a gloved thumb
along the smooth edge.

“
As if I haven’t got enough to do, our Lord and Master broke
his chair,” he said. “Base is shot so I’m cobbling up a new one
from some odds and sods. Shouldn’t take long.”

“
Mind if I watch.”

“
Suit yourself.”

While
McAllister worked at smoothing the edge of the metal with a rasp,
Euterich inched his way to the door.

No lock,
but with everyone busy elsewhere, they shouldn’t be disturbed.
Shouldn’t, but might.

There,
on the floor by the door, was a wedge; normally used to illegally
override the hydraulic auto-return mechanism on the door, holding
it open. And if it could hold a door open … it could keep it
closed. McAllister made adjustments to the cylinder outlet valves,
changing the gaseous mixture, before swapping the head on the
connector from destructive cutter to constructive
welder.

He
handed Euterich a spare mask. “You might want to put this on. Don’t
want sparks in your eyes, or your hair.”

Euterich
poked the triangle of iron with his foot, forcing the thin end
under the door, ramming it home until it wedged tight, and took the
mask.

There followed a period of intense
light, of crackling and fizzing, and
the stench of ionised air. The light went out and McAllister lifted
his mask and took a sip from his coffee cup.

“
Very interesting,” said Euterich, feigning interest. “I’ve
not seen much welding close up.” He pretended to examine the weld
closely. “Looks good. Nice job. You’ve got the touch.”

“
Years of practise,” said McAllister. “Give it a minute to
cool and we’ll see how we’ve done. Open the door and let some air
in will you? Stinks summat awful and that fan’s
useless.”

Euterich
ignored the request.

McAllister removed the chair from the clamp, stood it on the
floor and swivelled it. It stood firm and spun freely. He then
seated himself and bounced in it, testing the loading on the new
joint. It held.

“
Suits you,” said Euterich, slipping his fingers around the
hand-grip of the nail gun. “Made to measure. Ever fancied being
Captain?”

McAllister turned a full circle. “Me? Nah?” He then sniffed
and wiped his hand under his running nose, picking up a silver
trail which he deposited on the leg of his trousers.

“
Argh, soddit.” Another wet sniff and he reached across the
bench to pull a square of blue paper towel from the oversized roll,
blasted his nose clear and wiped at it, leaving it rosy red at the
tip.

Euterich
hesitated, his hand still around the nail gun’s grip. If McAllister
was getting sick, even with an organism as simple as the coryza
virus - the common cold, he was leaving right now.

“
You getting a cold?” he asked.

“
Nah. I always get this way when I use the cutter or welder.
The bright light makes my nose run. Go figure.”

Good
enough.

“
I’m going to open that door before we both suffocate,”
McAllister said, but before he could make a move Euterich snatched
up the nail gun and pressed it against his temple.

“
What–”

Phut.

A short
sharp burst of air drove a full five inches of cold steel into his
right temporal lobe.

Pressure, a millisecond of exquisite pain, followed by …
nothing.

McAllister twitched. Gasped. Froze. Eyes open, mouth agape.
For good measure Euterich pressed the gun against McAllister’s
chest and squeezed the trigger again, three times in rapid
succession.

Phut. Phut. Phut.

In short
order a trio of galvanised spikes penetrated McAllister’s
heart.

A smile
of pure pleasure sat on Euterich’s face as he patted McAllister’s
cheek. “Well done, Jock. You died well. Clean and tidy. Thanks very
much.”

He
dragged the body to the floor, unzipped its overalls and pulled up
its T-shirt, revealing a chest and stomach as replete with red hair
as McAllister’s head.

“
Your pubes must look like the original burning bush,” he
said. From the hiding place in the collar of his boot, he took the
scalpel. “Now then, let’s see what you’ve got to offer.”

He took
a moment to measure out the perfect place to cut, before inserting
the blade into McAllister’s still warm flesh and proceeding to
slice, opening him up from sternum to pubis.

He
reached under the ribcage, felt around for the hot ball of heart,
and eased it out as far as it would go.

Deft
slices through the superior and inferior venae cavae, the pulmonary
artery and the aorta, freed the organ from its restraining pipework
to sit snugly in the palm of his hand. Then, using a pair of pliers
from the workbench, he gripped the heads of each of the nails and
extracted the blood smeared spikes as carefully as he would
de-skewer a spatchcocked quail.

He
teased off the fibrous layers of pericardium, and the naked organ
beneath glistened the colour of an oversized ripe plum – dark red
and juicy. The sight and smell of it flooded his mouth with saliva,
and so he did as anyone would do when presented with an especially
fine sweet fruit - he sank his teeth into it up to the gum line,
sucking so as not to waste a drop of the precious juice, ripping
out a satisfying mouthful.

This
tasty morsel was quickly followed by a hefty portion of liver, the
lower lobe of the left lung, the right kidney and the tastiest of
sweetbreads, the pancreas.

Half an
hour later Desmond ‘Daz’ Reynolds was nowhere to be seen. In his
place the newly created McAllister/Euterich chimera stood, rubbed
his satisfied stomach and let out a diaphragm rattling
belch.

“
Pardon me,” he said, to the glassy eyed shell staring up at
the ceiling. “Might have overdone it a bit this time.”

He
pulled a square of paper towel from the roll, used it to wipe his
red stained lips, folded it neatly and tossed it into the waste
bin.

What to
do with McAllister now.

This
change had been a spur of the moment decision; the opportunity
arose and he took it, so he hadn’t planned on how he would dispose
of the body, although one obvious route did present
itself.

Dangerous places these welding huts, what with all the
flammables, tanks of acetylene and oxygen, bottles of methylated
spirits, liquid paraffin, solvents. Accidents could happen,
particularly to people who are reckless enough to sneak crafty
cigarettes in places they shouldn’t.

A wicked
smile twisted his mouth.

He’d got
what he wanted, why not have some fun and give the rest of them, or
more specifically that pompous arse Capstan, something to ponder in
the process?

He
swapped identity badges with McAllister’s body and redressed it,
but not before he’d used the scalpel again, this time to make
subtle and interesting alterations which would have Capstan
scratching his head.

After
stowing the incriminating nail gun into the steel tool chest, he
used a pair of needle nosed pliers to root out and extract the nail
from McAllister’s temple, leaving a neat round hole.

He then
gathered together every piece of flammable material he could find –
cloth, wood, plastic, paper, and spaced them at strategic intervals
around the room, doused them all, including McAllister’s body, with
half a gallon of paraffin and a bottle of methylated
spirits.

Oil and
solvent soaked rags, twisted tightly, made an effective slow
burning wick. He tucked one end of it under McAllister, and faced
his first obstacle. He had no matches and no lighter - no naked
flames allowed on board - with the welding enclosure or the smoke
shack.

This
called for some improvisation.

The
merest amount of acetylene hissed through the hose. He applied a
spark from the flint striker and a tiny yellow flame no bigger than
a candle’s bobbed about at the end of the torch. He applied the
flame to the wick; it caught easily.