He stood at the stateroom doom, eyes fearful, and then took a deep breath before he knocked.
“Come,” said the familiar voice from within, and Trushin saw his hand quaver as he reached for the latch to enter. As soon as he knocked, the wolves began to snarl and growl, raising his hackles and sending a chill up his spine. He pushed the door open, and there they were, two great beasts, one dark and grey, the other tallow white, and their eyes glowed with wild, savage anger, their teeth barred.
Volkov was sitting at his desk, reading something, and then he shuffled some papers aside and snapped his fingers. At once the two wolves became silent, slinking away through the open iron barred door of their cage, and then lying down, though they eyed Trushin darkly, watching his every move.
“Close the damn door, Trushin,” said Volkov. “It’s drafty!”
Sealing the hatch, Trushin kept one eye on the wolves, the other on Volkov as he sidled up to the desk, waiting. Volkov had a thick sheaf of documents, and several books, things they had taken from the library at the Northern Shamrock.
“Well?” he said. “What news, Trushin. The wind is up, and it’s getting colder. What does the Weatherman say this time?”
“Sorry sir, there’s no danger of a storm just now,” said Trushin, hating to be the bearer of bad news to Volkov. “But the ground observation crews are a little confused.”
“Confused?”
“Yes sir, they say things have… well, they say things have changed, sir. I’m not entirely sure what they mean.”
That got Volkov’s attention, and he set down his pen on the desk, looking at Trushin for the first time. He inclined his head.
“The ground has changed? In what way?”
“The trees… the small lake we were using as a landmark is now completely forested over, sir.”
“Just where are we, exactly?”
“Well sir, we overflew the site as you wished. It was unmistakable, or so the spotters claimed. We’re over the Reka Khushma River now, bound for Vanavara, about 55 kilometers from the town. We should get there in half an hour at our present speed.”
“And the observation teams say the ground has changed? …. This I’ll have to see.”
Volkov got up, setting his papers aside, and starting towards the iron cage first. He smiled at his two wolf hounds, then closed the cage door and set the latch. The beasts tended to get curious if left uncaged in his absence, and should anyone enter the room while he was gone…. At times he would leave the cage door open for that very reason, knowing his preserve in the stateroom was perfectly safe with Greyback and Ghost on the watch.
“Come, Trushin, let’s get down to the bridge gondola.”
An airship was like a ship turned upside down. Instead of climbing the main superstructure to the bridge, one descended into the metal gondolas at the bottom of the great mass of the ship. The ground was always the surest reference for navigation, and observation teams would be posted at special nodes along the lower outer canvas ‘hull’ of the airship, peering through field glasses and noting the lay of the land as they compared it to their maps. They could call the bridge directly on the intercoms to report anything unusual, and that is what they just did, which sent Trushin to the stateroom with the news for Volkov.
They tromped down the metal stairway, and a ladder to reach the main gondola. There was Voronin, the security man Volkov had taken in tow, smoking a cigar, as he often did. Captain Gorev was at his post, saluting Volkov as he entered. The rest of the bridge crew were busy at their posts, and diligently so, now that Volkov was on the bridge.
“What’s this nonsense about trees in the lake?”
“See for yourself, sir,” said Gorev, pointing out the spot. Ground spotters called in the lake a few minutes ago as we were approaching the river. Then one called back to say it was gone.”
“Gone?”
“I took a look myself when they called the lake in, sir, but sure enough, I can’t spot the damn thing now—just trees, as far as the eye could see.”
“But you can see the river?”
“Yes sir, overflew that just a minute ago. The Reka Chamba is coming up now, about 40 kilometers from Vanavara. We turn due south and follow that to the next river, then turn to port for another ten kilometers to approach the town from the west.”
“Very well, let’s get there and sort this out.”
It was another twenty minutes before the spotters called in again, saying they could now see the gleam of wan sunlight on water ahead. The rivers they had overflown earlier were just thin wandering ribbons, but this was bigger, the Stony Tunguska, a watercourse that was 800 to 1000 feet wide in many places.
“River ahead, sir,” called the navigator.
“Come to 055 degrees southeast,” said the Captain. They would just keep the river off their starboard side now until it made another turn that became a sharp bend to the south. Minutes later, they could see the bend ahead, but there was no sign of the town.
“Ground observers, do you have Vanavara?”
Men in the forward gondola or the nose observation ports would have the best view ahead, but one by one they reported the disturbing news.
“Negative, sir. No settlement on the river.”
Volkov shook his head. “Navigator!” he growled. “What in God’s name are you about?”
“Sorry sir,” said the Navigator, “but there is no error. That’s the final bend in the Stony Tunguska up ahead. It will turn south now.”
“Well look, gentlemen,” said Volkov, clearly irritated. “Lakes and towns do not simply vanish! Captain, slow down and hover over the bend ahead, and if I find out this is the wrong hump in that river, I’ll skin you alive, Mister Delov.”
The navigator gave Volkov a nervous look, but he knew he had made no mistakes. The river was bending south ahead, just as it was on his charts, and yet, the town of Vanavara, 3000 plus souls, was simply not there.”
“My God,” the Captain breathed. “What’s going on here? The airfield is gone too. We should be able to see that easily enough, but the whole area is forested. It’s as if the city was never….”
Never there.
Volkov’s eyes narrowed. He reached into his pocket and took out a cell phone device, wherein he had stored the “Mobile Wiki,” an encyclopedia at his fingertips, quite literally. A few taps later, a dark light kindled in his eyes as he stared at the device.
“This can mean only one thing,” he said in a low voice. “I see no sign of distress in the woodland around that river bend, do you, Captain Gorev?”
“No sir.”
“No craters or any sign of war damage?”
“No sir, we’d spot that easily enough.”
“Then this can mean only one thing—we’ve moved again.”
“Moved? In time, sir?”
“How else can this be explained.”
“Then we’ve gone even farther forward? My God, sir. For the landscape to be completely grown over like this, why, we’d have to be decades farther on—perhaps centuries!”
“Perhaps,” said Volkov, “or decades in the past. It says here that Vanavara was an old hunting lodge site for trappers and fishermen on this river, and then a weather station, and the town started up here in 1932.”
“Mister Kornev,” the blond haired Captain looked over his shoulder. “Anything on the radio?”