Free Afterlight by Alex Scarrow Page B

that.’
    They’d had trouble before; a young man they’d encountered in Bracton harbour, foraging for things nine months ago. They’d taken him in and assigned him a cot on the drilling platform. A fortnight later he’d sexually assaulted a woman there. They’d nearly tossed him over the side. Instead Jenny decided he should be taken back to Bracton and left to fend for himself. A year before that there’d been a couple of younger men with guns who’d buzzed the platforms in a motorboat, demanding to be let on and firing off a few wild shots in anger when she’d refused them. And before them, there was the wild and ragged twenty-something lad they’d found living on scraps in Great Yarmouth. He’d ended up nearly beating Dennis to death because the old boy had complained about the lad’s language in front of the young ones. Men of a certain age, in their twenties or thirties, seemed to be either dangerous predators who viewed this quiet world as their personal playground, or were unbalanced and unpredictable.
    ‘This French chap was being pursued by the others,’ added Walter with a cautionary tone to his voice. ‘There could be any number of reasons for that.’
    Jenny nodded. ‘True.’ She pursed her lips and took a moment. ‘When he’s well enough, I want to interview him, though. If he really is from France or further afield, I want to know what he’s seen.’
    ‘Of course,’ said Walter. ‘And then?’
    ‘And then, yes . . . when he’s fit enough that he can look after himself, maybe we’ll send him back. I’ll just have to see for myself. I really can do without worrying whether we’ve picked up another nut or some sort of an axe murderer.’
    She realised an interview was very little on which to make a judgement. But, to be honest, she couldn’t be entirely certain of any one of the men already on the rigs. There was no way of knowing if at some time in their past they’d been violent, abusive; perhaps taken advantage of the chaos and anarchy and done unpardonable things. She couldn’t know that. All she did know was that the few men living here had behaved themselves thus far. More importantly, that these few men were vastly outnumbered by women.
    Best to play it safe, she decided, and assume this man was potentially a danger until he could prove himself otherwise. After all . . .
    After all, it takes just one fox to get into the hen house . . .

Chapter 12
    10 years AC
    ‘LeMan 49/25a’ - ClarenCo Gas Rig Complex, North Sea
     
     
     
    H annah watched the man; his chest rising and falling evenly beneath the sheet. She felt sorry for him. He looked so thin and frail, his olive-coloured skin almost grey by the light seeping in through the round porthole above the bed.
    Dr Tami told her the man was not to be pestered. She could look at him, but she wasn’t to be a nuisance. Dr Tami was gone now, left the sick bay to visit someone who’d had a fall on one of the other platforms and possibly broken something.
    The man’s dark hair tumbled down in lank ringlets onto the pillow. He looked like the picture of Jesus Martha had shown her once; a peaceful, kind face, not etched with angry lines around his eyes, but kind lines . . . a man used to smiling.
    A coil of limp hair was curled into his beard and stuck in the corner of his mouth. She reached over the bed and pulled it away from his dry lips.
    ‘You poor, poor thing,’ she uttered softly as if this sleeping man was a baby griping and mewling with wind. His eyelids quivered ever so slightly, then a moment later flickered open.
    ‘Oooh,’ whispered Hannah.
    Brown eyes, unfocused and dazed, darted around the cabin walls, the ceiling above him, the small porthole opposite, then finally onto Hannah.
    She smiled. ‘Hello, my name’s Hannah.’
    He stared at her silently.
    ‘You’re sick,’ she added, ‘you got shot by bad men and you’re poorly. Dr Tami said you have to stay in bed and I’m not to be a nuisance.’
    His eyes