The Platform Read online

  THE PLATFORM

  by

  J Noah Summerfield

  Copyright © J Noah Summerfield 2017

  Editing by Lisanne Cooper

  Cover Design © Eric Schnee/ericschnee.myportfolio.com 2017

  Published by Dark Serpent

  (An Imprint of Ravenswood Publishing)

  Names, characters and incidents depicted in this book are products of the author's imagination, or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of the author or the publisher.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means whatsoever, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher and/or author.

  Ravenswood Publishing

  1275 Baptist Chapel Rd.

  Autryville, NC 28318

  http://www.ravenswoodpublishing.com

  Printed in the U.S.A.

  ISBN-13: 978-1543017311

  ISBN-10: 1543017312

  Library of Congress Control Number - 2017949787

  For my parents.

  And for my beta readers.

  THE PLATFORM

  'And I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and their daughters, and every one shall eat the flesh of his neighbour in the siege and in the distress, with which their enemies and those who seek their life afflict them.'

  – Jeremiah 19:9

  We unconsciously retrace the thoughts of our remote ancestors.

  – Carl Sagan

  PROLOGUE

  HANI KATHARDA

  Hani Katharda hid beneath a stairwell next to the drill. Rain trickled over the nape of his neck. “I don't know anything about drilling for oil,” he mumbled. Wind circled under the stairwell, pelting his face with bits of hail from a passing rain cloud. He shielded his face with his forearm.

  He’d worked the oil platform's main deck on just eight other occasions. Eight times in over twenty years. During each of those, his task consisted of chipping away at layers of ice that accumulated on the pressure gauge and temperature sensors. Even though he didn't know much about the equipment, he was still supposed to stabilize any shifts in the system. Hani usually spent his days on the ocean, distributing chum on the fishing boats to replenish the platform's fish supplies. This was different. He found himself adjusting the flow of pressurized water that lubricated the drill.

  “What the hell do these things even do?” he cursed. Two dozen circular gauges stuttered in front of him. Each movement in a gauge required an adjustment in the pressure in some pipe. Hani knew vaguely what gauge corresponded to what pipe. But he could never make the right adjustment. Everything he did seemed to require three or four additional changes.

  How long had he been at this? Six hours? Seven? A blue light brightened the horizon. Dawn. Seven hours.

  The Alpine was a wet and muddy mess, an oil platform lost in the middle of the southern Atlantic Ocean. Its four massive tension legs plunged into the ocean. The platform was surrounded by an expanse of water, the only man-made object in over a thousand miles in every direction. And it was smothered by an imposing storm system.

  Acid rain battered the steel columns. Sodium hydroxide wore away the joints connecting the steel and copper pipes, causing sections of brittle steel to peel away. Excess steam hissed into the open air. A piece of falling iron punctured a storage tank, leaving a layer of shimmering oil on the main deck.

  The platform swayed from the intense storm, despite the moorings drilled into the ocean floor. Those moorings were maybe two hundred years old by now. How many more storms would it take before the lines snapped? When it happened, no one could help the Alpine’s population.

  One day.

  Hopefully not today.

  Hani caught a sour stench in the air. Sulfur mixed with something else. Maybe ammonia? He couldn’t place whether the smell came from the rain or if it originated on the platform. The friction from the hail and the sulfur was bad enough. But ammonia is corrosive. And he could see it accumulate across the main deck in the icy fog. Frozen bricks of water and nitrogen, ammonium and sulfur lit with sporadic specks of fire. The floor sparked like bits of stray fireworks. Other Roughnecks tried to quickly snuff out the flames when the wind didn’t do the trick.

  Hani recalled Sycamore Johnston’s articulate voice ringing in his ears: “It appears that we are short-handed and will require your assistance on the derrick today, to keep the drilling equipment in working order. We appreciate your devotion to the people on this rig, Mr. Katharda. I can trust this job to no one else, not today. Remember, we have but one home and we must take great care of its many moving parts, for if we allow our home to crumble, we leave our entire community stranded and helpless. And please, do not mistake my intentions here. I would volunteer myself, but it is difficult for someone such as me, who is in such a delicate condition, to manipulate such machinery with true conviction and resolution.”

  Lying sack of moldy fish guts.

  It’s not as though this was some kind of company or government. The world hasn’t seen any of those in over a hundred years. Not since the High Fires. This place only has to produce enough oil so that it can function. Not one drop more. Sycamore’s promises to any ships that survive this hell-storm be damned.

  So there was Hani, seemingly trapped within the hard underbelly of the complex drilling apparatus, below the main deck and derrick. Hani was a chum man, not a drill worker. He knew chum. It made him smell like fish, and he liked it. But now, he smelled like the back end of a motor boat and felt like the burnt edge of a rubber tire. The wind made it difficult for him to catch his breath. Sometimes, he could taste the raw tang of the chemicals swept up by the wind. All of this promised a life crippled by internal asphyxiation and cadmium lacing, accompanied by frequent bouts of disease and dysentery.

  Oil and water mixed into multi-colored rainbow sheens across the floor.

  There was a faint cry in the wind, but Hani couldn’t tell where it was coming from. He looked around and eventually spotted Buckminster Jackhammer, the Deck Quartermaster.

  “Step away,” Buckminster ordered.

  Hani took it as a cue to retreat deeper beneath the stairwell, away from any pump or tank or motor or centrifuge or any other piece of machinery. Hani clasped his blood orange hard hat and brought the rim over his eyes.

  A pair of goggles was strapped to his forehead. The lenses were shattered by hail, leaving plastic shards protruding from the frame. Hani pulled off the goggles and tossed them over the guardrail.

  When a nearby conduit fluctuated, Hani tried to rotate the hydraulic wheel to relieve the buildup of pressure in the medium grade sulfide tank, but it was frozen solid, the exterior surfaces were rusted into a rich pomegranate maroon. He tried to gain some leverage on the wheel with a crowbar, but it didn't budge, so he chipped away at the ice that accumulated on the iron oxide casings. It was the only thing he could think of to do.

  His hands tensed around the crowbar. “The world got along fine with the steam engine,” he muttered.

  Hani tried to step out from under the stairwell and immediately slipped on some ice that skimmed along the steel floor. He scraped his arm against a galvanized iron casing. A small gob of his blood stuck to the floor. He smacked the crowbar on the steel steps and returned his attention to the frozen wheel, banging the flat edge against the ice. His lips curled in frustration.

  The structure still held equipment for separating hydrogen sulfide gases from the petroleum that gushed from the drill pipes. Compressed gases ejected from vents in silt and gas separating pumps, and sent gases and steam into the air. The cold
rendered many of the controls inoperable without maintenance. Half of the glass gauges were cracked, the other half splintered inside an ice casing. The result was a bloated pit of toxic fumes. The exterior walls of tanks and pipes showed fractured strips of ice from the hours of chipping away by the ice breakers. Dragged out of the tundra and dumped into the ocean, the platform’s workings were a frozen mess.

  The surface structure held a dozen cranes with dangling cables of spindly steel. Vents jutted out and away from the platform. Flames periodically shot out of the scarred booms, venting the burn-off from excess gases.

  An entire drill crew worked to keep the platform in working order. Mud engineers, geologists, pump operators all moved and shouted among the pumps and motors situated on the dilapidated drilling deck. The screaming that cut through the incessant clatter was incoherent. The flood lights dimmed as the sun rose.

  Most of them were Roughnecks. The oil rig workers. Buckminster’s people.

  A Roughneck passed in front of him. It wasn’t Buckminster, wherever he was. It looked like Caribou “Crane” West. The man was huge. You couldn’t miss him.

  “Canopy squirrel runs circle fleet and shine! Place the rugs!”

  “What did you say?”

  A fog of mined mineral poisons hung in the main deck’s crucible, seeped into crevasses and skin and pores before the wind carried the toxins away. A flood of salt water spread through the system. Temperature spikes and variations brought disarray throughout the electro-hydraulic systems. Alluvial mud, fetid and cloudy, gushed from pipes that bashed and dug into the ocean floor. Brown sludge bubbled over the floor and splattered their faces, thick globs of goo, smeared over plastic goggles— a cesspool of Earth’s waste material.

  “Go in to gauge pressure dome to cheat the mole!”

  Hani was not sure if he heard what he thought he heard, but he did wonder how these Roughnecks accomplished anything. He pushed himself to his feet and continued to crack away ice with his crowbar. Hisses emanated from the pipes, a succession of booms and bangs. The occasional flare lit up the space around him.

  The fumes made his stomach churn. The helmet felt heavy on his neck.

  “High term velocity is true to burst!” What?

  He felt dreadful. His head was swimming among the befuddling mess of banging and steam jets. The clanging metal made it difficult for him to focus. He wanted to retreat further within the platform, but the interior levels were suffocating, deprived of circulating air, surrounded by vaporized chemicals.

  His gloves were soaked through to his skin. Blisters were forming on his fingers and palms, the raw skin dragging with the coarse material, and he tried to adjust how he held the crowbar to try to ease the pain. He lifted his helmet slightly and with his forearm, rubbed the sweat off his brow.

  A sharp pain stuck into his right eye—a bit of oil or some other chemical. He stumbled backwards, tried to find a clean spot on his shirt to rub it away. Doubled over, he blinked repeatedly until the sting reduced to a dull weight. Still blinking, he looked around for a place to wash his face. There should be an emergency station somewhere nearby, somewhere that he could flush his eyes.

  “This hull blast and furnace should rock the sun to the dry wall!”

  Ambient glow from the platform’s interior illuminated the Roughnecks’ feet. Flashes of outstretched lightning blinded Hani and drowned the main deck in white light.

  These Roughnecks must have a language of their own, Hani thought. He probably should have spent more time with them. He promised himself that he would figure out what these people screamed to each other when this was over. First was the stinging pain in his eye. He circled around, lost, confused and near panic. It felt like someone was trying to force out his eyeball with the back end of a hammer.

  “Crotchety turnip head fumigate the chemical shaft!” That didn’t sound right at all.

  Buckminster Jackhammer rammed Hani into a large conduit.

  Was Buckminster there the whole time? Hani wondered.

  The back of Hani's head smacked against the steel. The impact sent his head spinning. He winced and gently rubbed his head. I might have a concussion. How many more of these am I going to suffer before this ends?

  Buckminster blasted Hani’s face with the spray from a freshwater hose. Hani tried to regain his bearings. The sudden burst of water helped with the pain.

  “Can you see?” Buckminster shouted. He looked Hani over. “Can you see?”

  “Aye, Sir.”

  “Good. Then get back to it. I can’t baby sit you the whole morning.”

  Buckminster turned around to deal with the next problem. Something caught his attention. He cleared the glass over an analog gauge with his sleeve and ran off.

  The back of Hani’s head throbbed. He gently touched the wet spot through his hair, grimacing when he saw the blood on his fingers. He probably did have a concussion. It made sitting down sound very appealing. Of course, Buckminster wouldn't be too happy about that. He would probably yell and yell. Hani would never hear the end of it. Another long lecture on responsibility and lazing about on the job. Before he even realized what he was doing, Hani was on his feet chipping away at more ice so he could access the gauges.

  A mild discomfort still bothered his right eye, and it throbbed in time with his head. His clothes were sopping wet, and he was cold. It was always cold. He rubbed his eyes with a clean knuckle and looked past the Alpine’s edge. He heard shouts, muffled by the breeze. His eyes slowly adjusted. He went to his knees to get his bearings. He looked around, attempting to filter all of the noise. Lightning crackled on the horizon.

  The derrick strained against the circling wind and the heaving whoosh of rainfall. The onrush of waves drowned the groans of aching steel. The storm system engulfed the platform, sent its hulk swaying and bobbing in the waves, hovered over it, and smothered it in a swirling black. The platform gave way to rising and shrinking tides over the steel mooring lines. Rain panged against the platform in echoes that resonated and rose into an angry tremolo. Steel rods on the upper crane bent like buckling tree branches, ready to collapse onto the levels below. Salt water chipped away at the exposed steel surfaces on the main deck. Debris kept Hani pressed to the ground.

  This time, he planned on staying down.

  Caribou “Crane” West scrambled to the base of the platform’s water silo, held up a thick pipe, and banged it against the pressure gauge, trying to pry the switches loose. Flamed walls spread across the main deck. Pipes shot flames into the sky. They needed a reprieve from the onslaught to regain control of the surface. With another violent thrust, he let loose the gauge, sending an onrush of fresh water across the deck. The water found its way through ducts and stair columns into the inner corridors.

  Like Hani, Crane outfitted himself with layers of heavy gear, stiff hides that shielded his skin from the chemicals on the Alpine’s main deck. His eyes were blockaded by wide goggles, his feet shrouded in thick boots. Hani looked on as Crane fought through slips and skids on the slick floor. Occasional pressure bursts from above the derrick sent strips of red and yellow fire through the sky. The flares left a few handfuls of ice-breakers frozen in their tracks. They stood on the uppermost levels as witnesses to flames, their vision blurred through their goggles.

  Hani noticed that Crane's goggles were still intact.

  Resonant explosions of tanks and pipes blew the Roughnecks above the surface into walls and railings. The successive echoes were like the felling of redwoods, and it was a sound that few had ever known. The blast blew outwards, the steel and concrete levels propelling the force laterally to the platform’s exterior, sideways mushrooms of gas and flame billowing beyond the railings and over the ocean.

  “There’s a crack in vat twenty-three,” Crane shouted.

  Crane had a big head of ruffled brown hair and a vest of material that turned stiff from hardened grime and sweat. Alluvial mud spilled out of the vat and sloshed around him. The mess of chemicals that poured out of th
e vat lit up in flames and washed across the deck. He swiped the nearest blowtorch out of a Roughneck's trembling hands. A white light sparked against the vat's exterior.

  The fire brought Buckminster back. “What happened!?” Buckminster’s attention focused entirely on Crane. He didn’t seem to notice that Hani was even there.

  Crane gestured to the blowtorch. “It won’t take. The shell is too far out.”

  He pressed against the metal panel, but couldn’t get it to lie flush against the vat. He tried shifting its orientation, but it still refused to flatten out. He kicked the surface to try to bend the steel inwards, but it didn’t budge. Mud continued to flow onto his arms and to the floor around him.

  A scowl passed over Buckminster's face. He pressed his hand over Hani's shoulder as he walked towards the punctured tank. “I thought you were stationed here,” Buckminster said, glowering at him.

  “Don't bother with him. This storm has him worked over,” Crane offered.

  “Can you feel it?” Buckminster shouted. “The puncture?”

  “It’s at the bottom. Three inches maybe, curved outwards.”

  Buckminster called across the deck. “Sledgehammer!”

  Crane cursed softly. Hail wore away the outer steel shell until it cracked. The pressure from the vat’s contents blew out a weak section. If it could happen to this vat, then all of the equipment on the derrick was vulnerable. They could deal with cracks. Some chemicals spill onto the ground. But in this place, with that kind of burst, gallons of valuable chemicals would spill into the ocean, and that sudden outpouring of combustible material could trigger a larger explosion on the main deck.

  Two Roughnecks scrambled to Crane’s side, each with a long pipe attached to a heavy iron block. They were outfitted with the thick hides shared by the other Roughnecks. Buckminster took one of the sledgehammers and handed it to Crane.