Prose

They are barely half an hour in the air with the ‘bosbok” military light aircraft, when an Angolan Mig-21 appears from the naught telling them in broken English to change direction to where Luanda is situated.
 
Beneath them there are broken veldt with trees and some hillocks and the “bosbok” does not stand any chance against the fighter jet and the South African aircraft turns into the direction of Luanda.

They fly for a while in the direction of Luanda, with the Mig staying threatening in the background and time passes nerve-racking slowly.

Suddenly the South African pilot says:  “Let’s see if you can fly...”  With the small aeroplane he dives down on to a higher hillock.  The fighter jet follows them and starts shooting with its cannon.

The windshield of the “bosbok” shatters and the pilot is hit and struggles to keep control of the aircraft.  Suddenly he throws out the flaps of the small plane, before he pulls it up and they just barely miss the hillock.

The Mig is flying much too fast and avoids colliding with them and ploughs into the hillock where it explodes in a ball of flame.   The engine of the “blesbok” sudden stutters, before it cuts out and they start to descend and the pilot tries to make an emergency landing.

The small aircraft stops in a big cloud of dust on a large open piece of veldt and Ryno has only a few light bruises and cuts, but the pilot is dead behind the joystick of the plane.   It does not seem as if the aircraft is going to catch fire, although the smell of aircraft fuel hangs strong in the air.

There are no provisions in the aircraft and Ryno wants to bury the pilot, but knows that he has got no time to linger, if he wants to escape.   Ryno gets a first aid kit, his backpack, the Heckler and Koch 417 rifle and a small bag that Maria had given to the pilot and he walks away from the aircraft into the direction of Luanda.  He knows that the Mig and the “bosbok” is going to draw the enemy like a angry nest of hornets and draws a match that he flings to where some fuel is leaking.  The small pool of fuel flares up and immediately the light aircraft is ablaze.

He is way to far from where they had left Maria to try and return to her and he wonders if by this time she is in utter danger?

Somewhere jackals are whining and hyenas are laughing in the veldt and a distance away at some mud huts he can hear a dog barking.  Unnoticed he sneaks past.

Later the sun rises and Ryno is tired when it starts to get hot.  Time after time he avoids enemy patrols and lives from wild fruit and he drinks water from some small streams.  During the day he finds shelter in some undergrowth where he tries to sleep.

He dreams of the short time that he had spent with Maria and the dream only goes up to the snake that he had found at the ruins.

Suddenly the snake in his dream becomes a python, that gets hold of Maria and tries to press the life from her and he is powerless to help her.

The dream changes once more and Ryno notices how the snake changes into the KGB officer that he did not shoot in the enemy camp.  In the dream the Russian gets hold of Maria and he tries to drown her, before Ryno awakes and is wet with sweat.

Ryno lies motionless when another patrol of enemy soldiers is passing him and one of the soldiers comes nearer to urinate close to him.   He smells the Cuban cigarettes that they are smoking; before they walk on to disappear into the bushes.

At dusk he catches a rock rabbit and dares to fry it, after he had skinned the animal with his knife and later he walks on into the direction of Luanda and keeps direction using the Southern Cross stars.

He recons that he might be able to find a way of leaving the country and that it could be possible to sail into the ocean with a fishing boat, but it’s just a wild chance that he wants to take.  Still it’s as if something is driving him towards an unknown destination and a determination of fate.

Early on the next evening he catches a stray chicken, while he is sneaking past some mud huts and he later fries the chicken on sticks that he erects as a type of roasting spit.  He knows that his fire is going to attract attention, but he does not feel like eating raw chicken.

Time and again he avoids people, animals and enemy soldiers and Ryno keeps on walking into the direction of Luanda.  Later he can smell the salt odour of the sea on the wind, but he is still quite far away from it.