Offshore Read online

  OFFSHORE

  by

  Lucy Pepperdine

  A Wild Wolf Publication

  Published by Wild Wolf Publishing in 2015

  Copyright Jillian Ward / Lucy Pepperdine 2012

  All rights reserved under the International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review to be printed by a newspaper, magazine or journal.

  All characters and locations appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  www.wildwolfpublishing.com

  Edited by Poppet, cover designed by Poppet

  This ebook is licensed for your personal reading only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the law.

  Massive thanks to the boys and girls over at the Drilling Club; to Bob at Schlumberger, and to Colin and Graeme roughing it out there in the Beryl Field in the North Sea.

  You’ve all been brilliant. Stay safe.

  For Derrick ♥

  Chapter 1

  LONGDRIFT INC

  WELCOMES YOU TO

  FALCON BRAVO

  ENJOY YOUR STAY

  The enamel rectangle had once been a pristine white, the letters bright blue. Now the edges were nibbled by rust, the letters peeling.

  Falcon Bravo’s official notice of welcome shuddered against its fixings as it suffered a severe beating from the helicopter’s downdraft. Beneath the greeting some wag had taken a permanent marker and added;

  May God have mercy on your soul!

  Under which someone else scrawled;

  If you’re here, he obviously didn’t.

  Both sentiments were now barely legible, eroded by saline spray.

  Project Leader Eddie Capstan was having trouble standing upright, one second taking a blast to his front from the gale whipped up by the chopper’s blades, the next being struck from behind by a wind blowing straight from the arse of the Arctic circle; sharp enough to bite to the bone.

  Not unusual at this time of the year when it was known to rain, hail, snow and fog, often all at the same time; while simultaneously being knocked sideways by katabatic winds blustering in three directions at once. At least the flat slabs of sleet were not horizontal … yet.

  Those same disordered winds took it in turns to stir the encompassing iron-grey mass of the North Sea to a roiling maelstrom, heaving and thrusting against Bravo with the mighty threat of ripping her from her moorings to toss her to the Fates. Eddie could already feel the structure moving disquietingly beneath his feet.

  The anchors would hold he told himself, looking around for wood to touch in the traditional gesture of wishing for good luck.

  He waited at the sign while the rest of his crew disembarked from the transport, encumbered by their thick orange survival suits and life jackets, descending the steps carefully, bowed by the downdraft, weighed with drop bags.

  In single file they slipped and skidded across the helipad, each keeping their eyes on their feet lest they vanish from beneath them, avoiding looking at the sea beyond the safety rail, none of them smiling, more than one of them swallowing down motion sickness.

  Including himself there would be nine souls in all, eight men and one woman - not so much a skeleton crew as an accident waiting to happen - and until two and a half hours ago at the pre-flight checkin, breathalyser test and safety briefing, Eddie had never before laid eyes on any of them, even though they all worked for the same company.

  Their introductions were short and snappy to say the least. No more than name, rank, and serial number. No time for niceties or a get-to-know-you session before they were ushered onto the chopper and on their way, the noise in the cabin rendering conversation on board impossible.

  He would have to rely on what he’d read from his brief glimpses into their personnel files. Now as they approached him with grim expressions he mentally ran through the sketchy details he could remember.

  John ‘Jock’ McAllister led the way. Subsurface surveyor and diver, mid forties, single, quiet-spoken, stockily built, and by all accounts a fairly dependable worker. Distinguishing feature - under his hood he had the reddest hair Eddie had witnessed on a living man, a colour so intense it gave him the look of an unstruck match. The giant lumbering frame of general roughneck Lonny Dick followed. He looked older than his twenty eight years, with coarse rubbery features, close cropped blond hair, and at six foot five and twenty stone, built like a brick shithouse.

  Almost as broad as he was tall, he was there to be handy, to provide muscle power and little else. Not so much the house mouse as the house moose.

  Not well blessed in the brains department, and taciturn with it, he had accrued the unfortunate epithet Lummox. Not that anyone would be careless enough to say the name out loud within his earshot; not unless they fancied being punched in the mouth with a fist the size of a lump hammer.

  Eddie nodded acknowledgement to the next crew member, Lawrence Brewer, PhD, MSc (Hons), and noted the paleness of the middle aged man’s cheeks and chin, a blatant indicator he had recently shaved off a full beard and whiskers to comply with the company’s strict clean-shave regulations.

  He mouthed something to Eddie, possibly a greeting, but with the deafening racket from the helicopter drowning his words, Eddie tapped his ear, shook his head, and sent him on his way.

  Matthew Shaw pootled on behind. With his tall lat-thin frame and sharp angular face topped with a shock of dark spiky hair, he had earned his nickname - Dipstick. Also in his late twenties, this one had a mind like a razor. He was clever but unstructured, and Eddie felt sure that with the right guidance he had the potential to do well in the business, possibly attaining a senior supervisory role before his mid thirties. He already had plans to start working on him. Eddie waved a gloved hand at the rest of them to get a move on.

  Craig McDougal picked up his step. A tousle-haired man in his thirties with a deeply tanned complexion, quick dark eyes and an even quicker darker temper, he too carried a nickname. Spanner; so called because no piece of machinery yet existed that he couldn’t fix. A good worker when sober enough to put his mind to it, Eddie did not anticipate too much of a problem with him out here on Bravo where sobriety was mandatory.

  And then came Duncan Cameron, who answered to either Cam or Camshaft. Mid thirties, muscular, ruggedly handsome in an unconventional way, designated a general purpose roughneck, but he too had a reputation as a mechanical genius.

  He picked his way across the helideck alongside swarthy, foul mouthed troublemaker and master electrician, Desmond ‘Daz’ Reynolds.

  Eddie remembered his file well enough; not least because it had been the bulkiest he’d seen for a long while, and not in a good way, stuffed to bursting with disciplinary reports about his timekeeping, general conduct and all round hostile attitude towards anyone in authority. Short fused and hot tempered, this assignment was his last chance to prove his worth or be fired. His file recommended close supervision. And they had given him to Eddie? Thanks very much.

  Last, but by no means least, Lydia Ellis, thirty-five year old paramedic. A tiny woman, she made barely five feet in high heels and ninety pounds dripping wet, her small frame swamped by a suit at least two sizes too large, her drop bag almost as big as her. She might have te
n years skill and experience at onshore facilities, but this was her first time on a platform and it showed.

  She smiled wanly at Eddie from under her snug fitting beanie and he could not help but notice she looked especially green around the gills. No surprise there. It wasn’t the smoothest passage out here at 150 miles an hour, barely skimming the waves whilst simultaneously being tossed to and fro by near gale force winds; it was enough to turn even the most experienced of stomachs.

  He watched her waddle toward the stairs like she had been stuffed into a sleeping bag zipped up to her throat, clinging onto the safety rail for grim death as she descended out of view.

  A woman! Hell fire, what were they thinking sending her out here with this set of reprobates? Eddie could already smell rampant pheromones in the air, some of them his own. The scent of trouble brewing. Someone was going to have to keep an eye on her. Him maybe? He was in charge after all, and as such did have a duty of care.

  Pot. Kettle. Black.

  As soon as Lydia’s head bobbed out of view Eddie waved his all clear and farewell to the pilots, descending the steps from the helipad to the main work deck.

  Behind him the helicopter’s power and noise increased, rotor blades revved to maximum speed for lift off, whipping the sleet into aerosol mist and assaulting the sign further. It rose gracefully into the air, hovered, pirouetted, and moved off back towards shore. It would not return again until the end of their stint, or unless some kind of adverse situation arose which demanded speedy evacuation.

  At its departure Eddie’s heart sank into his rubber soled boots.

  Chapter 2

  A squat blue monster, with a snarling radiator grille and heat stained exhaust pipe curling from its diesel engine like an upturned elephant’s trunk, the gargantuan mud pump offered Eddie’s pinch faced crew some protection from the driving sleet.

  He urged them to leave their shelter and follow him past the concrete panelled welding enclosure to a weatherproof bulkhead door set into a blank steel-plated wall, gave the handle a jerk and pulled the door open on stygian blackness.

  “Mind your heads and mind the step,” he warned.

  Everyone ducked and stepped accordingly. Once they were safely indoors he slammed the door behind them, shutting out the howling tempest. Not much better inside; just as cold, just as damp, as dark as a lawyer’s soul, but least they were out of the wind.

  The batteries providing power for a string of back-up lights were running low and the team could barely see their own feet.

  “If you’re carrying a torch, now’s the time to use it,” Eddie said, digging in the side pocket of his drop bag for his Maglite, its harsh white beam lighting the way ahead while deepening the already menacing shadows. Two other weaker beams joined it.

  Eddie slung his bag over his shoulder. “If you’d like to follow me please.” Like they had a choice.

  In single file, like chicks trailing a mother hen, the others fell into line behind him, the random clumping of their boots against the metal grille plating underfoot settling into synchronous rhythm with his as he sloped his way down the tight corridor to the main locker room.

  A pair of gull-crap encrusted skylights provided sufficient gloom to see by … just.

  Black rubber matting lay on the floor like a burnt waffle, cut to fit round a pair of wooden benches, their slats worn shiny by countless backsides sliding against them, gouged by the soles of boots rested there while laces were done up.

  Banks of lockers lined three of the four walls, in various sizes according to use, their red, green and blue doors trying forlornly to add a splash of colour to the dreary grey. Most doors were closed, some stood ajar, others were so bent out of shape they would never do either again.

  A cynical person might think they got that way by the application of the business end of a size 9 boot - and they would be right.

  Adjacent to the door through which they had just entered a notice board hung askew, a few faded informative notices still attached:

  SAFETY IS NO ACCIDENT.

  SEE SOMETHING, SAY SOMETHING

  WEDNESDAY NIGHT IS MOVIE NIGHT

  MAIN LOUNGE 20:00 HOURS – DRESS CASUAL

  FEELING SUICIDAL – THE SAMARITANS ARE ONLY A PHONE CALL AWAY

  The pinups of the bare breasted beauties had been prudently removed.

  Each crew member plonked their allowed single piece of essential luggage onto the floor and planted their bright orange survival suited bums onto the benches to await the wise words of their not so esteemed leader.

  Eddie put his bag on a nearby chair, pulled out his notebook, and frowned.

  “Whatcha got there?” he asked, indicating the four foot long green cotton bag tied up with string that Brewer was hanging on to.

  “Sea fishing rod,” Brewer said proudly.

  “Really?”

  “Yep. I intend to take advantage of the good weather, if there is any, and hook a nice fat cod or three to take home. Believe it or not there are still some to be had if you know where to look, and out here is ideal.”

  Rather you than me.

  Eddie’s familiarity with anything piscatorial ended at a fish supper from his local chipper - a substantial slab of cod coated in batter, deep fried, and served in newspaper with fat greasy chips, the whole meal slathered in salt and vinegar.

  “And if do you hook the big one, what are you going to do with it?” he said.

  “Have you seen the price of cod lately?” said Brewer. “One good specimen to the right monger will pay my petrol bill for over a month.”

  “Depends what you drive, doesn’t it?”

  “For a Range Rover, it’s worth the effort.”

  A vehicle that size would drink a tankful of petrol at least once a week, at more than a hundred pounds a throw. An average cod weighed in at eleven kilos, a rare but still possible big ‘un could be over fifty kilos, and would change hands for around £12 per kilo. Eddie did the maths.

  “Bugger me.”

  “Quite,” Brewer grinned.

  Eddie took up position at the front of the room, waiting for the hubbub of conversation to subside enough to allow him to speak. It didn’t. He cleared his throat. “If I can have your attention folks, please.”

  The clamour continued.

  “HOY! Listen up.”

  Silence fell.

  “Thank you. Right ho, here we all are, lady and gentlemen, welcome to Falcon Bravo, your home for the next ninety-nine days.”

  “Yeah. Home sweet home, be it ever so ‘umble,’ piped up Daz Reynolds from the back of the throng.

  “Thank you, Mr Reynolds,” said Eddie. “Now, first and most important news of the day – if any of you have any regrets about signing up for this jolly, I’m afraid it’s tough tittie for you. Here you are and here you will stay.”

  “We in prison then?”

  “Kind of. I have to advise you that due to what Longdrift are calling ‘operational constraints’…” Pause for effect. “…There is no support vessel out there to sweep you away into the sunset and home to yer mammies.”

  “They can’t do that!” burst out Cameron, drowning out the other gasps of disbelief. “They can’t leave us out here without backup. It’s against regs, against the law. They have to provide a boat. There has to be a support vessel.”

  “You know that, I know that, the company knows it, yet look outside…”

  “But what if something goes tits up and we need to get us off sharpish?”

  “We use the lifeboats, call the coastguard and wait for someone to come and pick us up. I think we should all hope that never happens. Until the chopper comes back we’re out here on our own, so unless you sprout wings, or fins and a tail, you’re stuck here for the duration.

  His feeble attempt at levity fell on deaf ears as a grumble of discord rippled through the group; the first, Eddie suspected, of many.

  Only ten minutes on board and he had already poked a large stick into an angry hornet’s nest and given it a good stir
. This was going to be a long long tour. He pressed on regardless, flicking over the pages in his notebook.

  “I know you’ll all be keen to crack on and get started,” he said, “because the sooner we start the sooner we’re finished and on our way home in time for Christmas, but there are some details which the company insist I go over again in case you are a bit rusty.”

  Reynolds said, “Fuck the company if that’s how they’re going to treat us!”

  Eddie held up his hand to stem another low rumble of dissent. “So what I’m going to suggest is that when we have stowed our junk here, we migrate to the accommodation block and do it there. It will be a bit more comfortable. You can find a cabin that suits, change into your overalls, and then relax for a bit. Have a chat. Get to know each other. Okay?”

  At last, a murmur of approval.

  “Not for too long though” he said. “There’s a bit of work to do before we can eat, but if you put some effort into it, it shouldn’t take long and hopefully we’ll get it all done before it gets dark. Okay?”

  Silence.

  “Okey doke, now I suggest you get out of your survival suits and get them stowed properly over there—” He indicated a row of hangars on the wall to his left. “And hope to God we don’t have to see them again until we’re ready for the flight back. You’ll keep your outside gear in here, your hard hats, eye and ear protection and work boots. For those of you who are colour blind, the green doors are next to the red ones.”

  Dead air.

  “Any questions?”

  “Yes.” Lydia’s hand went up. “Where do I change?” All eyes fell on her as if she had just asked for a bucket of steam. “I’m assuming you do know the regulations regarding provision of separate facilities for women,” she said.

  “I do indeed, Miss Ellis,” said Eddie. “And there are dedicated female facilities available on Bravo.”

  “So where are they?”

  He grimaced. “Ah. Well. Unfortunately they are situated in a Portakabin on the other side of the main deck. If you want to use them, feel free, but to be honest I wouldn’t advise it.”