GULF OF GUINEA, 18 MILES OFFSHORE NIGERIA
MONDAY, 6:35 P.M. WEST AFRICA TIME (1:35 P.M. EST)
Jerry took a sip of the bitter instant coffee and thought again of Louisiana. When he got home, he’d hug his two beautiful daughters, eat a heaping bowl of his favorite crawfish étouffée, and sleep in his own warm bed for at least twelve hours, cuddled next to his wife.
Jerry was nineteen days into his current 20/20. The oil company’s engineering teams worked on the platforms for twenty days straight in twelve-hour shifts. One more day and he’d be on a helicopter to Port Harcourt on the Nigerian mainland, a chartered airplane to Houston, and then a commercial flight to Baton Rouge. For twenty days off. The job was exhausting and often tedious. But it paid well enough to support his family back home. He’d worked like this in Brazil for Petrobras, in Indonesia for Total, in Kuwait for Chevron, and now in Nigeria’s Mega Millennium Field for the Chinese oil giant Sinopec. And after eighteen years in the offshore oil rig business, Jerry had gotten used to being a petroleum nomad. An engineering mercenary. It was his life.
Jerry refilled his coffee mug from the canteen and scanned the Quaker Oats instant oatmeal boxes for his favorite flavor. Still none. He made a sour face. If he had to endure eating breakfast at dinnertime, they could at least give him the oatmeal he wanted.
“Hey, Abdul, where’s my apple cinnamon?” he called out.
“No supply boat today” came the reply from the back room.
“Aw, come on. It’s already after six o’clock. I’m back in the box in, like, twenty minutes.”
“Aaay, oh,” said the impatient voice. “No boat.”
Jerry snatched a packet of strawberry Pop-Tarts and brushed past the other workers, an eclectic mix of Germans, Scots, the occasional American, and a growing number of Chinese sent from company headquarters.
Jerry headed outside with his coffee to catch the West African sunset one more time. He pushed the heavy door open and felt the pressured air woosh as he stepped onto the steel deck, sixty feet high over the open water. All the operational and residential cabins on the oil platform were kept at a pressure slightly above the atmosphere. This ensured any toxic gases that might have leaked would be quickly expelled rather than silently kill the crew. It was just one of the safety features of the high-tech offshore complex, which had been prefabricated in Shenzhen and hauled by ship for reassembly here offshore Nigeria at the recently discovered but highly productive Mega Millennium Field.
Jerry squinted at the orange fireball touching down on the horizon and drank his coffee, watching the sky turn from yellow to pink. As the last of the sun dropped out of sight, he spotted off in the distance a single bobbing light approaching the platform. His mood brightened. Maybe he would get his breakfast after all. He downed the last of his coffee and did a quick mental calculation of the time required for the boat to land, the supplies to be off-loaded and brought upstairs to the canteen. The oncoming boat was getting closer. Cooking time for his instant oatmeal was just two minutes. He noticed the boat was approaching more quickly than usual. Maybe they were running late, so they used a faster vessel? That might be good news.
Or maybe not. Jerry’s pulse quickened. It wasn’t one ship oncoming but three smaller boats in a triangular formation. And instead of the bulky shape of the usual cargo boat, these were low, sleek, and open-bow, with huge dual outboard engines. His spine tingled as he realized the lead boat had a tripod with a mounted weapon. The outlines of the shadows were unmistakable: Each boat bristled with heavily armed men.
Jerry spun and rushed inside. “Pirates!” he shouted. “Fucking pirates!”
A shrill alarm sounded, along with a monotone voice blasted over the loudspeakers: “Emergency procedures. Emergency procedures. Execute immediate lockdown. All crew report to secure room in sixty seconds. . . .”
Jerry raced down the corridor, where men were coming out of their cabins, one man hopping on one leg as he pulled on his pants. The seconds ticked by quickly.
“Safe room lockdown in fifty seconds. . . .”
As he scurried down a flight of stairs, Jerry wished he had his old Colt .45. He knew no weapons were ever allowed on an offshore oil platform. That would be suicide.
“Safe room lockdown in forty seconds. . . .”
Rat-tat-tat-tat! echoed loudly through the complex. “What the . . . !” Jerry yelled to himself. Live automatic-weapons fire? This was new. Not like last year, when a payment was quietly negotiated and the pirates never even came aboard the rig. This was serious. Don’t those bastards know live fire could blow us all up?
“Safe room lockdown in thirty seconds. . . .”
Live weapons on a platform filled with explosive oil and gas was an outrageous safety risk. But so, too, was sitting out here alone and unarmed. The oil company had dissuaded the Nigerian navy from patrolling too close to the facility for fear of stray fire or an accident. Friendly fire from the local security forces was an even bigger risk than pirates. But not today.
“Safe room lockdown in twenty seconds. . . .”
Jerry kept moving. He had to make it to the secure room where he and the rest of the crew could sit and wait it out. They had drilled for emergencies dozens of times and he knew exactly where he was going. He turned a corner and could now see the reinforced steel door.
“Safe room lockdown in ten seconds. . . .”
Jerry pushed his way in. He exhaled deeply. He was safe. It looked like everyone was there. Once the lockdown was complete, there was no way for the pirates to get inside. The security door would seal and they would all live.
“Five, four, three . . .”
The entire operation was designed to run remotely in just such a situation. The company could shut down production and call the authorities, and the sixty-four men on board would survive in the secure rooms until the pirates were killed, paid off, or just gave up. They could last for days in the bunker if necessary. Then a jarring thought hit Jerry: unless this was resolved quickly, he’d miss his flight home tomorrow.
“Two, one . . . executing lockdown.”
Jerry cursed to himself at the thought of being stuck there, in that box with all these men, while the airplane, his fucking airplane, flew back home to America. How would he explain it to his girls? Would they even believe him if he tried to blame . . . pirates?
Then Jerry had an even more frightening realization. Where was the lockdown confirmation? Where was the security officer instructing them what to do next? What the heck was going on?
That’s when the shooting erupted again.