The Rig 3: Eye of the Hurricane (9 page)

The blood pooled on Wes's shirt and hit the floor in large quantities still. They ran. They ran down stairs and through corridors as fast as they could. There was no time now to tend to the wound. If they stopped, they would all surely die.

They went fast, but the structure around them seemed to be collapsing just as quickly. With every hundred yards they covered, they could feel the floor under their feet grow more unsteady. They felt they were now running up and down slopes, where there had been levels earlier.

And just as they reached the dock, the noise reached its highest peak, and suddenly the rig around them was no more.

Epilogue

Commander Lovell had tears in his eyes when he saw ‘The City’ collapse. Two of the pillars had been slowly falling apart for a while now and finally, they crumbled and gave way. The whole structure tilted and the strain was too much on the other pillars, which also shattered. The whole thing disappeared into the waves in a matter of seconds. He knew then there would be no use looking for the lifeboats. They would not have been launched.

He looked across the faces on the bridge of the USCGC Hurricane and saw the same sadness and disappointment there. There was only devastation on board. He ordered the USCGC Hurricane to be sailed closer to the wreckage, in the hope to find some people still escaping from the wreckage, but he had very little hope that would be the case.

They saw nobody at all. There was simply nobody. Maybe divers could be sent out when the storm was over to try and rescue the few possible survivors who managed to find a spot with air. But they could do nothing; that much was obvious.

“Sir?” A junior officer pointed at something large and orange that rose from the waves. It was a research sub. Immediately the order was given to sail up to them and to help.

***

Elly felt deflated. She felt cheated as she sat in Helen's living room. She was glad she had done it because of the peace of mind it gave Helen, but it had made precious little difference. Earlier in the day she had gone to her editor with the audio of Senator Jacobs's confession.

The man had laughed at her and fired her on the spot. He did not doubt it was all true, but, he said, they could not make anything like that public. Those men were powerful; Portis was even an important contributor to the network. It could not be made public and Elizabeth Boukhari was suddenly a liability to the station.

A journalist has to do what her bosses tell her. She had stepped over a mark with her investigation and approaching of Senator Jacobs. They could not trust her to do the work they wanted her to anymore, so she had to leave.

The editor kept a hold of the USB drive that contained the audio file when she demanded it back. As she reached for it, he dropped it to the ground and put a heavy boot heel on it. The file would never be heard again, he said.

He had not counted on Elly having copies of the file on other drives and on her computer. And the copy that was now being played on Helen's speakers. Between them, they did not know what they should do. Helen's first instinct was to go to the police, but she realized she could not count on them. The evidence was too thin to sue, and there was no authority to turn to.

Elly suddenly realized there was something to be done. There were some people who might be willing to give some money for this information, or give her another chance. She would attempt that. It was the only thing she could attempt. Her career was ended on the basis of her having done the work of a journalist. So she would try and make the truth pay another way.

***

Wes woke up in the hospital. He had no idea how he had gotten there. All he knew is that his chest hurt and that he could barely move. He tried to lift his left hand, but found someone was holding it. He looked over and saw Sheila Briggs there. She looked exhausted. She still had obviously showered and had been provided with some clothes, but she looked exhausted.

On the bed stand, he saw his phone and he picked it up. He looked at the date and shook his head. It was two days after the events on ‘The City’ and he must have been unconscious ever since he was shot.

He checked to confirm that the audio file was still on his phone and when he found it was, he sank back into the plump pillows of the hospital bed. He had no energy left and he felt like the gunshot had drained all the life out of him. He supposed it had nearly done so for real, but he felt like he was a shell.

***

A month later, Wes and Sheila walked through the house on the shore by Pago Pago where Joy and Dave had taken up as their base. A little pressure from Wes had ensured new funding for the project Joy had wanted to invest her time in.

Sheila and Wes were visiting from California. Wes had been recovering from the gunshot wound at his parents’ vineyard and Sheila had stayed with him. Joy and Dave had traveled to Samoa and began work on a research project on the reefs around the archipelago there. They did not speak about what happened on the rig. There was nothing to say. There was nothing to do.

Wes had written to several newspapers, even sent the file along, but nobody published the statements made by Agent Smith. He had found a letter on his doorstep one day telling him never to try and make that public again. He had not done so. For a moment he wanted to delete the file, thinking of Sheila, too, but he decided against it. He wanted to keep it, just in case.

But there was no way he could stay in the US. He knew it, and Sheila knew it. She had refused to let him go off alone. They had traveled to Samoa to meet with Joy and Dave and then would go on to some of the other Pacific islands, in the hope of escaping any danger.

Because they were in danger. They were in danger because they
were
a danger. They knew something about what was going on in the world around them. And thus they had two choices: opt out or let themselves be shut up.

Portis had personally contacted them and threatened them. An FBI agent had come by as well and when Sheila's car suffered from Boston Brakes, they knew they had to go. But going away was not something that scared them. Not now. Because what was left to be scared of?

The End

Also Avilable:

The Jade Dagger

by

Steve Rollins

(read on for a sample)

Chapter One

No feeling that he had ever experienced in his life was as exhilarating as the breakneck ride on the back of a painted pony along the rim of the mesa. The wind rushing by his face and the plunging ledge to his right made him feel like he was aloft and he cried out. He was free. Nothing was holding him back. And then the panic hit him.

Someone was following him. He could hear the sound of the thundering hooves behind him and he could feel his heart racing faster within his chest. He urged his mount forward, willing it to go faster. Its ears were laid back and its neck stretched flat out as it put every effort into its speed. He did not dare look back over his shoulder. He knew they were coming.

Why were they chasing him? What had he done? He leaned into the flying mane of his mount, closed his eyes and tried to say a prayer, but none came to him; only a deeper sense of panic. They would catch him, he was certain of it. Something that sounded like a bee buzzed past his head. What was… the report of a pistol from behind him answered the question before it formed in his mind. They were closing in.

He searched the broad expanse of the mesa to his left hoping there was cover for him to dart into, but the space was wide open, with only a few juniper trees dispersed at random. There was nowhere for him to hide. It would all be over soon. The realization that he would take a bullet in the back was replaced by the sight of the edge of the mesa coming up toward him rapidly.

He wouldn’t die from a bullet in the back, he would die along with his mount as they plunged into the canyon below them. He leaned into his horse’s neck, squeezed his eyes tightly, let go of the reins and threw his arms out to his sides, accepting what was to come.

The sound of thundering hooves below him suddenly ceased and he felt weightless. He knew in an instant that they were airborne. He clenched his teeth together and waited for the impact that was sure to be coming. Any moment, he would be tumbling head over heels with the painted pony as they collided with rocks, juniper and the thick trunks of piñon pine.

When the collision did not come for a very long while, he risked opening his eyes. They were still in the air. It was impossible. He sat up and looked around him. Far below, he could see the traces of the canyons, mesas and the branching, tree-like pattern of the tributaries that plunged down from the jagged edges of the mesas.

He looked behind him and saw those who were chasing him plunging from the edge and tumbling down the steep slope. He had escaped, but how? He suddenly realized that it didn’t matter anymore. He had escaped, he was free and he was flying. There must be some sort of magic in the pony, because he, Parke Higgins, was flying.

He squealed as though he was a little boy once more. All of the worries, stresses and especially the nightmare of being chased disappeared behind him. With his arms spread and his face turned toward the sun, he let the feeling of the wind envelop his entire body, covering him like the waves of an ocean. He was alive and he was free. He closed his eyes once more and floated peacefully. And then he heard crying.

There could be no crying in his new world of freedom. It was impossible. When he ventured to open his eyes, there was a woman. There was no doubt that she was a Native-American woman by her dress and the long, jet-black hair flowing down her hunched back. Where had the pony gone? Why was he no longer flying? He looked around for the pony, but saw nothing but the chinked, log walls of an octagonal house and only the very basics for living. Why was he in a hogan? He wanted to go back to flying. A particularly gut-wrenching keening came from the hunched woman and his attention turned back toward her.

Hesitant, he moved toward her, perhaps he could comfort her. When he placed a hand on her back, her sobbing ceased and she slowly turned her head toward him. In spite of the trails of tears which had streaked the prominent lines of her cheeks, she was stunning. Her smooth, caramel skin, her full lips, proud nose and chin were all perfectly formed as though sculpted by a master; but it was the deep, haunting, black eyes that made his heart stop and then begin again in a rhythm he hadn’t felt since he had first tried to ask a girl on a date.

He started to speak and she was gone. He sat up in a panic. Where was he? Nothing around him was familiar. Had they captured him? Who were they? He looked at the figure lying beside him in the bed and everything came rushing back to him. No one had captured him. No one was chasing him. He was in a motel room, the Kachina Lodge, on the south rim of the Grand Canyon.

He looked at the lit numbers on the digital clock beside the bed. Its red numbers displayed 3:27. He had planned on getting an early start, but this was ridiculous. He briefly thought through the dream that he had just had. The flying, the woman, the wind, the freedom; it was all so real and yet, not real. Hoping to return to it, he settled back into the overstuffed pillow which made his neck hurt. Motel pillows always made his neck hurt. He had intended to bring his own, but had forgotten it in the rush to get out the door.

He closed his eyes and tried to draw the painted pony back into his mind. When that failed, he attempted to place the face of the woman back into his consciousness, but that wouldn’t work either. He finally turned to look at the clock again. It had changed to 3:31. He had set it for 5:30.
If I go to sleep right now, I can sleep two more hours
, he reasoned. He closed his eyes and tried to force sleep to come.

When he looked at the clock again, it read 3:47. He quickly did the math.
An hour and forty-five minutes of sleep
.
That’s not too bad
. He tried to force sleep again. He saw 3:53 pass by without sleep, 4:03 and 4:17 as well. Frustrated, he finally tossed back the covers and slipped out of bed. He glimpsed out into the darkness of the canyon below the rim where the Kachina Lodge was perched. The grand view that was there during the light of day was eerily absent when covered in a shroud of darkness. He turned toward the table and took a seat in front of his laptop; trying not to awaken his wife with the light of the screen, he turned it toward the window and repositioned himself in front of it.

He opened the web browser and clicked on the bookmark for the Dreams Dictionary. He’d been there before and found that often times; he gained insight into things whenever he visited it. He typed in a search for flying and read the interpretation; in general, it meant that he had a positive feeling of freedom in his life. As he typed in each of the other things that he could remember from the dream, however, the interpretation became much more confusing.

He closed the laptop and considered slipping back into bed, but noticed that the clock read 5:08.
Not much point in trying to sleep for 22 minutes
. He looked out the window again. This time, he saw a tiny glow from the rising sun, beyond the eastern horizon, though it would still be nearly an hour before it made a full appearance.