In the distance, far across the smooth landscape of ice, there was a single sign of life. It was a huge steel platform. The structure was supported by pillars, but tilted so that half the platform was buried in the surrounding ice.
“What is it?” Jack said. He shivered.
“It looks like some sort of oil rig.”
“Yeah, you’re right. But I can’t see if there’s anyone on it. Maybe they have a telescope or something inside the lighthouse.”
They climbed into the large room which held the huge old light. The windows were broken, the fittings were rusted up and all the paint had peeled away from years of exposure.
“What about this?” Angus scratched inside an old cupboard and pulled out a pair of old binoculars.
“Brilliant.” Jack took the binoculars and rested them on the frame of one of the broken panes. He pointed them in the direction of the wrecked rig.
“See anything?”
“It’s definitely an oil rig. Completely messed up. Looks like there may have been a fire or something.” Jack adjusted the focus. “Absolutely zero sign of life…”
Angus stood next to him, staring out in the same direction. “Hold on Jack! Bring them down a bit… look! There are footprints in the snow.”
Jack lowered the glasses, “You’re right! I can see them. Maybe Dad is out there. Maybe the Fenton guy has followed him or something. He could be in trouble. We need to go and check it out.”
“I’m not sure, Jack, out there on the ice we’d be sitting ducks.”
“But we can’t just stand here and do nothing.”
Angus grimaced. “OK – but let me at least get some kit from the stores so we don’t freeze to death. Let’s see if there’s some outdoor clothing we can use.”
*
Their climb down from the main lighthouse door to the ice below was not easy. From the castle on the mainland, the rock had looked precipitous and craggy, but that was nothing to what it was like close up. There were massive cliffs on all sides and the concrete walkway had crumbled away. With trepidation, Jack took a final step from the rock down onto the ice field. They had been right. There were clear footprints in the crust of snow that covered the ice.
Walking was not too difficult using the boots they had found in the stores, and they quickly reached the middle of the glinting ice field. It was not long before they arrived at the rig. Snow drifts had built up around the bottom of the rig and they could see where steps had been cut into the ice leading up onto the main platform. They peered up at the huge structure that loomed over them.
“What a beast!” Angus said.
Jack was still breathing hard from their hike across the ice. “I know rigs used to come into the Forth here for maintenance but I’ve never seen one this size.”
He craned his neck up to stare at the rig. “Look at that – the lettering – up there at the top of the accommodation block…”
Angus followed Jack’s eye-line. “Yes, I noticed on the way over. It’s like a big sign… and it’s got that funny logo… but I don’t understand what it says; it looks like it’s written in Chinese.”
“I think you’re right,” Jack nodded. So how does a Chinese oil rig end up wrecked in the Firth of Forth in Scotland, forty years in the future and half a planet away from China… in a world that’s turned to ice?”
Gingerly, they clambered up onto the metal surface of the platform and crept forward towards the middle of the giant rig. Jack found that using the railings was not much help because the metal was so cold his gloves would stick. After a few minutes of slipping and scrambling it became apparent that the structure was older and more precarious than they had first thought. The cold breeze that whipped around the old steel towers and cranes caused an eerie whistling sound.
“Look – the footprints go that way.”
Jack pointed along a metal walkway which led to a block of dilapidated cabins built one on top of the other. The building was intact and seemed to have avoided the fire that had obviously torn through the rest of the structure.
They approached the door. It was metal and had an opening in its top half where there would have been a window – but the glass had long since fractured and gone. There was a sign on the wall next to the office that had been badly eroded.
“Some of this is in English,” Jack said.
There was a string of lettering in Chinese, but underneath was an English translation, although it was hard to decipher.
Jack rubbed a finger over the sign, trying to read it. “Think I’ve got it:
HEAVENLY KINGDOM INDUSTRIES
HYDROCARBON GROUP – ARCTIC DIVISION
ARCTIC HORIZON PRODUCTION PLATFORM
– CONTROL CENTRE B
Beneath there were more words in a strange italic script:
Jack was bewildered.
“Heavenly Kingdom Industries? Doesn’t sound like an evil global oil company,” Angus said.
Jack was deep in concentration. “It says Arctic. Arctic division… but we’re hundreds of miles from the North Pole. And how can it move around, if everything is iced up?”
“Maybe it came here for repairs or something and then all this ice came later? But is that possible? I mean, can an ice age happen that quickly… like just in a few years?”
“I don’t know, but I’ve heard stuff about ocean currents pumping warm water up from the equator into the sea around Britain. I read once that with global warming, ice melts and dilutes the salt content of the sea, so the water from the equator stops pumping up our way. Then because there’s no warm water, everything ends up freezing – it can tip the climate. Maybe that could cause a whole new ice age?”
Angus shrugged and pointed to the door of control centre, “You going to open it, then?”
Jack pulled open the door and then he screamed.
The body had been mummified with the cold. The lifeless eyes stared directly at Jack as he stood over the body in the doorway. Bizarrely the man was still wearing his blue overalls, and sitting in his swivel chair in front of two large computer terminals. But he looked like he had not moved for a very long time.
“That’s gross,” Angus said, turning away. “It’s like the poor guy is still at work…”
Jack felt his stomach turn. “And as if he’s staring at us.”
Angus pushed the chair gently away. It was only a slight movement, but it was enough to disturb the position of the body in the chair, so it slipped, disintegrating as it fell face down on to the floor.
“Nice…”
They looked around the tops of the desks and in the drawers. Jack tried to keep his eyes away from the body.
“What about this?” Angus held up a dusty looking report, “The title – it’s like the sign outside – half in Chinese but there’s an English translation as well…”
“What does it say?”
“Health and Safety Inspection. Thirty-first of January 1976.”
“But that’s impossible,” Jack said. “Look around… these computers – nothing like these existed then…. And the rig itself, all this technology, I’m sure it’s too advanced… North Sea oil exploration didn’t even start until the 1970s and I’ve never heard of anything going on in the Arctic.”
“Weird. Hey – look at that?”
Angus nodded to a painting on the wall. It was completely out of place with the rest of the office – a crude black line drawing of a Chinese man. He wore a loose-fitting robe with a dragon on it and a strange-looking hat. Underneath the portrait were the words:
HONG XIUQUAN – BROTHER OF CHRIST AND
FOUNDER OF THE HEAVENLY KINGDOM
“It’s the same picture!” Jack exclaimed, “Remember? At the museum in Edinburgh, the woman giving the presentation about the Taiping Rebellion… she showed a picture… it’s the same guy. I’m sure of it. He’s the leader of the Taiping.”
“Yeah – you’re right. The Chinese seem to be following us around.”
“Come on. I’ve had enough of this place and we still don’t know what’s happened to Dad. Let’s head back to the rock, before it gets dark.”