6. The Bought Cop

The second day on Helix-9 began with a klaxon and the smell of diesel. Stone rolled off his bunk before the second blast, his boots already on, his body moving on instinct. Around him, the other men stirred and cursed and pulled on their work clothes, their faces slack with exhaustion. The bunkhouse smelled of sweat and salt and the faint chemical tang of the rig.

Stone worked the morning shift on the lower deck, hauling pipe and checking pressure gauges under the watchful eye of a driller named Cobb, a slab-faced man with forearms like bridge cables. Cobb didn't talk much, and Stone didn't push. He kept his head down and his ears open, cataloguing the rhythms of the rig, the shift changes, the moments when the walkways emptied and the administrative level went quiet.

The server room was on the second level, at the end of a narrow corridor behind the administrative offices. Stone had spotted the door during the previous day's orientation walk, a gray steel panel marked with a faded sign that read "AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY." It was locked, of course. But locks were just problems with simple solutions.

The harder problem was the corridor itself. It sat between the main office suite and the radio room, and there was always someone nearby. A clerk at a desk. A technician with a toolbox. A security guard making his rounds. The rig never slept, and neither did the men who ran it.

At midday, Stone took his meal break in the mess hall, a long low room with plastic tables and a serving line that dispensed gray meat and boiled potatoes. He sat alone in the corner, eating without tasting, watching the room. The men ate in tight groups, their conversations low. Now and then, one of them glanced at Stone, then looked away.

Greer sat down across from him, his tray clattering against the table. "You're being watched," he said quietly, not looking up from his food.

"I know."

"The man with the clipboard. His name is Mercer. He's Vane's eyes on the lower deck. He's been asking about you. Where you came from. Who you talk to. What you do at night." Greer took a bite of potato. "I told him you were just another grunt. But he didn't look convinced."

"Can you help me?"

Greer was quiet for a moment. "Depends what you need."

Stone looked at him. "I need to get into the server room. The offline backup system. Can you get me in?"

Greer's face didn't change. "The server room is watched. Cameras. Keypad lock. A guard makes rounds every twenty minutes." He chewed slowly. "But the cleaning crew goes in every three days. They have a keycard. The next cleaning is tomorrow night. Eight o'clock."

"Who cleans the server room?"

"A woman named Ada. She's been on the rig for years. Keeps to herself. But she owes me a favor." Greer paused. "I can talk to her. But it'll cost."

"I don't have money."

"Not money." Greer looked up then, his eyes hard. "When you find what you're looking for, I want to know what it is. I want to know what happened to Cole. And to the others. I want the truth."

Stone held his gaze. "So do I."

They ate in silence after that. When the meal was over, Greer stood and walked away without a word. Stone watched him go, then returned to the lower deck for the afternoon shift.

The hours passed slowly. The work was hard and monotonous, and Stone's body ached from the previous day's labor. But his mind stayed sharp, turning over the details. The cleaning crew. The keycard. The twenty-minute window. It was tight, but it was possible.

Late in the afternoon, Stone saw Vane again. He stood on an upper catwalk, looking down at the deck, his dark suit out of place among the yellow hard hats and oil-stained coveralls. Mercer stood beside him, pointing toward the lower deck, his head bobbing. Vane nodded slowly, his eyes scanning the workers below.

Stone kept his face turned away, his cap pulled low. He felt Vane's gaze move over him, pause, then move on. The moment stretched, long and tense. Then the catwalk emptied, and Vane was gone.

That night, Stone lay in his bunk, waiting. The bunkhouse was dark, the other men asleep. The rig hummed around him, a living thing of steel and fire. He thought about the server room, about the keycard, about Ada the cleaner. He thought about Raymond, floating in the cold water, his body broken and alone.

He slept in fragments, waking at every sound. At dawn he was up, his body heavy but his mind clear. The new day passed like the one before, a blur of work and sweat and the constant roar of the rig. Greer didn't speak to him again, but their eyes met once across the deck, a silent acknowledgment.

By evening, Stone was ready. He had scouted the corridor, memorized the pattern of the guard's rounds, noted the position of the cameras. The plan was simple. During the cleaning crew's visit, he would slip into the corridor, wait for the cleaner to open the door, and follow her inside. Twenty minutes. Maybe less. Enough time to find the backup system and pull what he needed.

At seven-forty, Stone stood in the shadows near the administrative level, watching the corridor. The cleaning crew arrived on schedule, two women in gray uniforms, pushing carts loaded with supplies. One of them was older, gray-haired, with a face like worn leather. The other was younger, dark-skinned, her expression distant.

The younger woman produced a keycard and pressed it to the pad beside the server room door. The lock clicked. The door swung open. The women went inside, leaving the door slightly ajar.

Stone moved. He crossed the corridor in three steps, slipped through the door, and pressed himself into a shadowed alcove behind a rack of servers. The room was cold, the air humming with the sound of cooling fans and hard drives. The walls were lined with metal cabinets, their indicator lights blinking green and red.

The two women worked methodically, dusting and wiping, paying no attention to the shadows. Stone waited, counting the seconds. The younger woman finished first and pushed her cart toward the door. The older woman lingered, humming softly to herself. Then she too left, pulling the door closed behind her.

The lock clicked. Stone was alone.

He moved fast. The backup system was a separate rack at the far end of the room, marked with a hand-lettered sign: "SAFETY AUDIT ARCHIVE — OFFLINE." He found a terminal bolted to the wall beside it, its screen dark. He pressed the power button.

The screen flickered to life, casting a pale light over the room. A login prompt appeared. Stone stared at it, his mind racing. He didn't have the password. He didn't have time to guess.

But the terminal was old, the kind of machine that had been installed years ago and never updated. Stone reached into his pocket and pulled out a small rubber device, a keystroke capture tool he had picked up years ago and never stopped carrying. He plugged it into the port on the back of the terminal, then pulled up the on-screen keyboard. The capture tool recorded the last login credentials, stored in a small internal memory.

He held his breath. The screen flickered. Then the password field filled with a string of characters. The system logged in.

Stone navigated the interface quickly, his fingers moving over the keyboard. The archive was organized by date and department. He found the folder for the week of Raymond's death. Inside were dozens of files, mostly text reports and safety logs. But at the bottom, hidden in a subfolder marked "SECURITY," was a video file.

He clicked on it. The player opened. The footage was grainy, shot from the same high angle as the partial recovery Marrow had shown him. But this file was longer. Much longer.

The video showed the lower deck at night. Raymond stood at the railing, his back to the water. Marcus Vane faced him, holding a length of pipe. The third figure stood in the shadows, watching.

Stone watched the full sequence play out. The argument. The raised voices. The swing. The fall. The body going over the rail. Then Vane turned to the third figure and spoke. The audio was faint, but Stone could make out the words.

"It's done. Get the story ready."

The third figure stepped forward, into the light. Stone froze.

The face was familiar. It was the same face he had seen on the news, the same smooth smile, the same carefully tousled hair.

Julian Cross. The owner of Apex Media.

Stone stared at the screen, his mind reeling. The man who controlled the largest media empire on the coast had been on the rig the night Raymond died. He had watched it happen. And then he had gone on air and told the world that Raymond was a drunk who had fallen.

The door behind him clicked.

Stone spun, his hand going to the knife in his boot. The door swung open. A figure stood in the doorway, backlit by the corridor light.

It was Vane.

"I was wondering when you'd find this place," Vane said, his voice calm, almost pleasant. "Mr. Stone."