Adam Baker - Outpost

Sian found Simon watching DVDs in his hospital room. Goodfellas. He was pale. His hands and feet were bandaged. Sian held a cup so he could sip from a straw.

‘Can you help me up a little?’

Sian pressed the Elevate button to raise Simon’s head.

‘Where’s Nikki?’ he asked.

‘Eating in the canteen. Eating and eating. Can I bring you any food?’

‘No thanks.’

BBC News was still showing slow-motion footage of a fluttering Union flag and a list of refuge centres.

‘It’s been that way for days,’ said Sian. ‘The refuge list doesn’t update. I suppose the studio has been evacuated. We’ll be watching that image until the satellite fails.’

‘Are there no other channels?’

‘North America is totally off air. All the Russian and Euro channels are long gone.’

‘Jesus.’

‘See that BBC logo in the corner? I like to look at it. It’s comforting. A last little piece of home.’

‘I killed my best friend to get here,’ said Simon. ‘And I’m just as stuck as before.’

‘We’ve got heat, we’ve got light, we’ve got food for months. Look around you. This rig is one giant construction set. It’s packed full of survival equipment. I promise you, one way or another, we will get you home. We’ll get everyone home.’

Rye changed Simon’s dressings. She unwrapped his right hand. The smell of necrotic flesh made Sian want to retch.

Sian sat on the edge of the bed. She wanted to distract Simon from the sight of his rotted hand.

‘So what’s the first thing you will do when you get home?’

‘Fuck knows. Doesn’t sound like there is much waiting for us. And what can I do? I’ll probably never use a knife and fork again. I’ll have to lap food from a bowl like a dog.’

‘You’re exhausted, hungry and dehydrated. You get two days’ self-pity, all right? That’s your allocation. Wallow. Whine all you want. But after those forty-eight hours are up, you are officially a malingering twat.’

‘I need a shit.’

‘Is that why you haven’t been eating? Worried about using the toilet?’

Sian lowered the bed and helped Simon stand. He shuffled to the bathroom. Sian helped tug down his pyjama bottoms.

‘Call me when you are done.’

Sian helped Simon wipe, then walked him back to bed. She found Rye checking the drug cupboard.

‘What are you giving him for pain?’

‘Codeine. He’ll get a couple of cycles. After that, he has to tough it out.’ Rye gestured to the pill packets and bottles. ‘We don’t have much of anything. Once his share is used up, he’s on his own.’

Jane knocked on Nikki’s door.

‘Who is it?’ Nikki sounded groggy. She was probably dozing on her bunk.

‘It’s Reverend Blanc. Do you have a moment? I need your help.’

Jane led Nikki to the observation bubble.

‘How have you been?’ asked Jane, as they climbed the spiral stairs.

‘Standing by every heating vent I can find. Just can’t seem to get warm.’

Jane showed her the radio console.

‘We’ve been trying to hail any passing ship by short-wave. We man the radio round the clock. We were hoping you could pull a few shifts.’

‘What should I do?’

‘Sit here. Press to transmit, yeah? Kasker Rampart. That’s the name of the platform. So you say something like: “Mayday, mayday. This is refinery platform Kasker Rampart requesting urgent assistance, over.” Then you release the switch and listen for a reply.’

‘Okay.’

‘Do you like Monopoly? We’ve been holding a tournament.’

Sian walked Simon to the shower. She set the water running, took Simon’s dressing gown and helped him into the cubicle. She sat on the bed and waited for him to finish. ‘How’s Nikki?’ he called.

‘Seems okay. They’ve got her helping out in the radio room.’ ‘Keep an eye on her. Make sure she’s all right. She seems tough, but she’s not. We left Alan to die. She may act casual, but on some level it will be eating her up.’

‘Jane is looking after her. Jane’s good with people. She has an instinct.’

‘I’m done.’

Sian wrapped Simon in a bath towel and led him from the shower.

Jane took the elevator down to the docking platform. She found Punch in the boathouse. The boathouse was a steel cabin with a wide hole in the floor. The zodiac was suspended above the water by chains. The walls were racked with survival equipment.

‘What’s this?’ asked Jane, inspecting a big plastic pod.

‘A weather balloon. Don’t mess with it.’

‘Maybe we should build a boat. A raft or something. Give everyone a job. For morale, if nothing else.’

Punch had found a golf club. He putted scrunched paper into a mug.

‘Do you think Tiger Woods is dead?’ he asked.

‘He’s probably sipping martinis on a private island somewhere. Times like this, the rich buy their way out of trouble.’

‘But imagine if we were the only people left. The last men on earth. I’d be the best golfer in the world right now. You’d be the only priest. And Ghost would be the only Sikh. Imagine that. A four-hundred-year religion terminating in a dope-head grease monkey.’

‘I thought you liked the bloke.’

‘I do. But think about it. All the people that made you feel worthless and small down the years. The bullies and bosses. All gone. It’s exhilarating, if you think about it. Freedom from other people’s expectations. We can finally start living for ourselves.’

‘We can’t be the only survivors. There must be others like us. We just need to find each other.’

Jane found a yellow Peli case on a shelf: a crush-proof, watertight plastic container about the size of a shoe box. She turned the box over in her hands.

‘Do you mind if I take this?’ she asked.

The crew ate dinner in the canteen. Mashed potato, a sausage, a spoonful of gravy.

‘Eat it slowly,’ advised Punch. ‘Make it last.’

Rawlins lifted his plate and licked it clean of gravy. The crew copied his lead.

Jane stood on a chair and called for attention. They looked up, wondering if she were about to say grace all over again.

‘Okay, folks. Here’s the deal. We’ve got a bunch of helium weather balloons downstairs. A week from today I am going to launch one of the balloons with this box attached. The prevailing wind should carry it south to Europe. If any of you want to write a letter to someone back home, then drop it in the box. Million-to-one shot? Maybe. Even if the box lands in the sea, one day it will wash up and one day someone will find it. You may think it’s a stupid idea, but do it anyway. Put it down on paper. Put a message in the bottle. The things you wished you’d said but didn’t get a chance. I’m going to leave this box in the corner. It’s a good opportunity to unburden yourselves. Make use of it.’

Sian sat in the corner of the canteen, pen poised over a sheet of paper.

She had a stepfather. Leo. A carpet fitter. He was a nice enough guy. He cared for Sian’s mother during that last year of ovarian cancer. Sian spent each Christmas Day at his little terraced house, ate a turkey dinner in front of the TV, but they never progressed beyond superficial pleasantries. It had been three years. Sian often wondered if he had a new girlfriend. A divorcee with kids of her own. Maybe he wanted to drop Sian from his life, but didn’t know how.

Leo was a fit, capable man. He kept a bayonet beneath the bed in case of burglars. He would be all right.

Sian screwed up the paper. Better this way, she thought. No one to worry about but me.

The coffee urn. She filled a Styrofoam cup. Punch no longer supplied milk powder or sugar. Everyone took it black and bitter.

Jane sat in her room with a pad on her lap. She wrote love-you letters to her mother and sister. Then she wrote on behalf of the crew.