Chapter 21

Both women were now beginning to appreciate the tremendous advantages of this new means of travel. Verla even admitted the next day that she was no longer afraid of the great heights to which the Rumar took them. They were now covering over two hundred miles each day and the warming of the temperature was beginning to be quite noticeable.

By the end of the second day they were still drifting almost straight south, but always at the whim of the different air currents. On that day they left behind them the last of the snow. Vincent was aware that the next time they would see snow again would either be at the top of a high mountain on their way south or when they reached the far southern lands of the planet.

As long as they were moving over plains and while the weather - especially the wind - remained relatively calm, he knew that they were quite safe. Both of these conditions prevailed until the fifth day after their departure.

It was just about noon and they were still moving over the grassy plain observing the different herds of grass eaters under them when the wind began to pick up. Previously, Vincent had checked on his map and it had shown that less than twenty miles ahead of them they would drift over a forest, while far to their right was a huge body of water. Since the southern winds were taking them in a general southerly direction, Vincent did not pay too much attention to the great sea directly to the west of their present path.

Then, in a matter of a few minutes, the Rumar entered a new air mass and its direction changed from almost directly south to directly west. Vincent did change altitude to try and find another air current moving in a more favourable direction, but it now seemed that the whole air system was moving in the same direction - directly toward the west.

By the time that Vincent became aware of the danger they were in, it was already too late to land. They were by then over the forest and with the windy conditions it would have been very risky for them to try landing the craft. There was nothing else to do but to let the wind take them in the direction it was blowing.

It felt very strange to be in the Rumar under these conditions. For one thing, they could see and feel the balloon itself over their heads as it was shoved this way and that way - but it created just a mild swinging in the gondola. Stranger still, even though they could tell that the wind was blowing hard, judging by the bending and swaying of the branches on the trees under them, they did not feel the wind that much in the gondola since they were moving at almost the same speed as the air mass itself.

Vincent sent his two women into the small cabin to rest while he remained on lookout for the next three hours. Later, Nika replaced him on observation duty for a couple of hours. Then, before darkness fell completely, the rain began to fall and they were able to see the last of the trees below them. Their altitude at that time was about a thousand feet. After that they were moving over the sea and it became difficult to judge how high they were since they had no point of reference and it was getting too dark to see much below them.

Once last time, Vincent tried to change the Rumar's altitude to find another air current that would take them south again - but he had no luck. By then it was completely dark and he no longer could see the waves below. As a last resort, he took the Rumar to a much higher altitude to minimize the risk of crashing into the water below in case they should happen to lose altitude without realizing it.

During the night, Nika came out to replace him on lookout, but he didn't want to go into the cabin. Instead he told her to take charge of the "on" and "off" control of the blower while he leaned over the side of the gondola to try and detect the water below so he might determine their altitude.

This went on until early dawn. By then the winds had not diminished much but the rain had stopped. Still, the Rumar continued to shake from gusts of wind blowing in different directions. Then as the first signs of dawn appeared on the low clouds, while Vincent had his head bent over the side trying to judge their altitude, he was hit by the splashing of cold water.

In those few seconds he learned the answer concerning their height above the water. They were no more than ten or twelve feet above the water and the gusts of winds were blowing cold and salty water over his face. Of course he shouted at Nika to turn on the blower as he prepared himself for another impact with the waves. On the first impact, the Rumar had bounced up a dozen feet but now it was coming down again. How hard they would hit the water this time he could not tell - but he knew that this would be the end of them all if the gondola were sucked in by the waves.

It took another five or six seconds before they hit the crest of a wave again. This time a lot of water poured over the sides and into the gondola. With the increase in weight, the buoyancy of the hot air in the balloon was not enough to lift the gondola plus its new load of water. The gondola suddenly became a boat floating on the surface. For ten to fifteen seconds the gondola seemed to remain on the rough waters as it rose on one crest to fall next into the deep depression between two crests. Then after reaching another crest, the gondola did not fall all the way down to the bottom of the trough. When the following crest came, it hit the gondola sideways and shook and splashed everything inside. But by then the flow of hot air into the balloon was increasing their buoyancy. They slowly began to gain altitude as the water leaked out through the many holes in the floor. In so doing it created dozens of rivulets and thus it was decreasing their weight still further as the surface tension of the water helped pull more of it out through the holes.

At last they were gaining altitude at a faster rate and now they were high enough to see the spread of the sea under them. The water was very rough and the huge waves seemed to be trying to reach for them, while the wind kept on blowing droplets of salt water at them. They had narrowly escaped the fate of being pulled into the sea by the huge waves. Only then did they all realize how close they had come to being swallowed by the sea, which would have meant certain death. By now Verla was out of the cabin and as the three looked down at the rough sea no one dared to say a word.

All through that day they drifted rapidly over the water. By mid-afternoon the wind did decrease a little thus making the sea much calmer. At dusk, the wind was almost non-existent, judging by the calm condition of the water below. Before it became completely dark, Vincent took the Rumar to a height of well over six thousand feet. Even though it was much colder at that height, he didn't want a repetition of what had happened the previous night. All through the night he did his best to keep the Rumar at that altitude.

As soon as it was light enough the following day, he retrieved his map and checked their position by means of the blinking light. As expected, it confirmed that they were now well out over the huge sea. On the map, there were symbols and words here and there and it was written in a strange language that Vincent could not understand. He knew that some of these words were most probably the names given to the sea below them, but he couldn't read any of it since the symbols used in the writing were all new to him. One thing was evident to him when he examined the map. While the storm had lasted, the Rumar had drifted almost directly west and they were now still moving in that general direction.

Before encountering the strong winds, he had predicted their path to be in a southwesterly direction and had they continued in that general direction, they would have missed the sea completely. But the storm had changed all that. They were now over a section of the largest body of water on the planet and judging by the map, it seemed to rival the Atlantic Ocean on his world in size. Furthermore, the flashing spot of light on the map indicated that they were well over three hundred miles out to sea now. Vincent knew that it was quite impossible to turn back. Furthermore, there was no way to predict which direction the winds were going to take them once the air mass began to move again.

He was in deep thought outside the small cabin when Nika came to join him that morning.

"Do you know where we are exactly?"

"According to the map, we are far over a huge sea and I don't think that the winds will take us back toward the coast from where we came."

"Well at least we did not drown when we hit the water. We can always move south again when the winds are favourable to us."

"Yes, I suppose we should be grateful that we are still alive, but we are still not out of danger. How much food and water do we have?"

"Water will not be a problem since the two large containers from the underground complex are almost full from the last rainfall; but we will run out of meat in three days. After that we must reach land so we can gather fruits and hunt."

"Well this is the problem. On the map here, the nearest land is behind us and there is no way we can get there again. Then, depending on the direction of the winds, if we are lucky we could reach the continent on the other side in five or six days."

"Then we'd better ration what little food we have left."

"Yes. Go into the cabin and make an inventory of the food we have left. You must then figure how much we should be eating each day if we suppose it will take us another six days to find land again."

The next four days were not so bad. The Rumar was being carried in a southwesterly direction and the temperature was getting noticeably warmer every day now. The winds were ideal for them, not too strong, and they were moving high over the waves. Things went bad for them when on the fourth day the winds changed again and the Rumar began to drift directly south again.

When Vincent checked his map, he was shocked to discover that there was no land ahead of them. Had they continued to move west they would have reached the other side of the sea in a day or so. But now the closest land he could see ahead of them on the map was at least another week away. There was no way that they could survive that long with the little food they had left.

Even if the winds were to change and blow west again, it was now too late since the huge sea was much wider at this more southerly latitude. He checked the map carefully to see if there was an island on their predicted path, but it seemed that either there were no islands on this sea or the maker of the map had neglected to mark them.

The days that followed were sad days for them all. By the end of the sixth day, their food was all gone and they were all very weak since they had been eating very little. For two more days they drifted south and by then even their water supply was getting low as it had not rained since the last storm.

Both women spent much of their time sleeping in the cabin - coming out once in a while when they felt strong enough. Vincent would fall asleep in the shade of a small tarp outside the cabin and even though he did try to remain awake he sometimes would pass out for a couple of hours at a time. He knew that the end was near now. At one time he even contemplated asking his women if they would not prefer to end their suffering quickly and let the Rumar fall into the sea below them.