Chapter 27

“Ninety eight,” Jian called over the sound of splashing water. “Ninety nine… a hundred!”

Beck and Ju-Long gratefully stopped swimming and clung to the edge of the raft. Against his better judgement, Beck looked back.

The old island was still disappointingly near. Even after only five minutes – and a hundred kicks – Beck’s legs felt like lumps of lead dangling from his waist.

With his head at sea level and the raft in the way, he couldn’t tell how close the next island looked. If at all. He decided not to bother. They would get there when they got there – if it took a long time then it would be what he expected, and if it was sooner then that would be a nice reward.

Jian passed a couple of water bottles down under the edge of the net that shielded the raft. Beck took his carefully to keep salt splashes out and drank a couple of mouthfuls, making sure that every drop washed around the inside of his mouth before swallowing.

“Okay, let’s get going again,” he said as he and Ju-Long handed their bottles back up. His legs still felt like dead weight, but maybe there was a little more life in them as he began to kick and the raft carried on in its journey.

“One.” Jian began counting again. “Two, three…”

They swam for two more hundred-kick stints without any trouble. Jian navigated from his perch on the raft, since Ju-Long and Beck couldn’t see where they were going. “Go left a bit… that’s it…”

They had their third break and drink of water, and resumed.

As Jian was reaching a hundred for the fourth time, Beck felt the raft jump suddenly. Instead of forwards it went up, then backwards, and he had to push it away to stop it hitting him in the face.

“Woah! What?”

“Rough water–” Jian began. The raft reared again, and Beck heard the gasp as Jian fell badly on his side.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes–”

Water broke over them all.

Beck looked to left and right, past the raft. The water that had been rising and falling in large swells had suddenly become choppy and agitated.

“It is the tide,” Jian reported. “There must be two currents colliding here. The waves are quite high.”

“No kidding,” Beck muttered. This was something they couldn’t have seen from the island, or even from very far away. Not until they were right on top of it. He kept a hold on the raft. It would be all too easy to become separated and unable to grab it again. They would be carried away by wind and currents.

“Is it going to push us off course?” he asked.

“Maybe not. But…” Jian clutched at the raft as it dipped again. “It could tip us over if we do not keep moving.”

Ju-Long and Beck glanced at each other.

“No break this time?” she said.

“I guess not,” he said grimly. “Not until we’re through it…”

Spluttering as water broke over their heads, arms now aching just as much as their legs as they grappled with the bucking raft, they continued on their way.

It’s only a kilometre, Beck kept telling himself. It’s only a stupid kilometre…

He could walk a kilometre. He could probably hop a kilometre without taking a break. He could definitely swim one – up and down the school pool ten times, no problem. But this was different. It used so many different muscles – your arm muscles to keep your arms up and push the raft, your neck muscles to hold your head out of the water, your stomach and waist muscles to keep your body straight, and of course your leg muscles to do all the heavy work. Kick, kick, kick… And the water itself didn’t help – its up and down motion only increased the distance they had to swim. The waves constantly knocked them one way or another, so they constantly had to adjust their direction, and although the tide carried them mostly in the right way, they kept having to alter course or they would have been swept right past the island altogether...

Beck had known it would be mentally and physically taxing. Anything to do with the sea always was, if you were relying on your own efforts. It had infinite strength and variety to throw at you, and humans only had the strength of their own bodies and the limits of their own minds to respond with.

But… this taxing…

Kick, kick, kick…

On their seventh – or was it eighth? – break, suddenly the island was looking much closer. Beck could see it ahead, even from his position with his head at the same level of the sea, behind the raft.

“Okay! One more go and we’re there!”

And, soon after they set off for that last final push with legs that felt like they would drop off at any moment, Beck heard the sound of surf. He began to feel the surges in the water, pulling on his body. The raft, and them with it, began to move smoothly and slowly up and down as it encountered the swell that would become waves. The motion become heavier and more urgent.

“Here we go…” Jian called.

Beck felt the raft moving of its own volition, no longer pushed by him but carried forward by water rushing towards the beach. The surf sounds grew louder and he felt the vibration carried through the water.

And suddenly they were on the top of a wave. There was no controlling the raft’s progress now. White water surged all around them as they rushed towards the new island. Beck braced himself for another rough landing…