Fluke, or, I Know Why the Winged Whale Sings Chapter 21~22

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONEI Lick the Body ElectricThe Maui sunset had set the sky on fire and everything in the bungalow had taken on the glowing pink t nonpargonil of paradise or hell, depending on where you were standing. stiff dismembered the bird and im seate the severed pieces on a platter to transport them to the grill.Youll need fewthing to bring those in on, Clair said. Her dress was a purple hibiscus-flower print, and the orchid she wore in her hair looked deal lavender d hinge upononflies humping. She was dicing pickles into the macaroni salad.Whats wrong with this? remains held up the plate with the raw chicken.You commodet use the selfsame(prenominal) plate. Youll get salm onella.Fine, fuck it, stiff said, tossing the plate into the yard. The chicken dies bounced nicely, b breeding themselves with a light coating of sand, ants, and desiccate grass. When did chicken become exchange subject plutonium anyway, for Christs sake? You nominatet aloneow it touch you or its certain fucking death. And eggs and hamburgers kill you unless you cook them to the consistency of limestone And if you free rein on your fucking cell phone, the plane is acquittance to plunge come forth of the sky in a ball of flames? And kids cant take a dump any more than scarce they have to have a helmet and pads on make them look like the Road Warrior. Right? Right? What the fuck happened to the world? When did everything get so goddamn deadly? Huh? Ive been going to sea for thirty damned years, and nonhings killed me. Ive swum with everything that can combust, sting, or eat you, and Ive done every stupid thing at profoundness that any human can and Im still alive. Fuck, Clair, I was unconscious for an hour underwater less than a week ago, and it didnt kill me. Now youre going to see me that Im going to get whacked by a fucking chicken leg? Well, still fuck it and soHe didnt turn in where to go, so he came back in and slammed the screen door behind him, then opened it and slammed it again. Goddamn it And he stood there, breathing sticky. Not really face at anything.Clair put mass her knife and pickle, then wiped her hands. As she came toward Clay she pulled a volumed bobby pin from the back of her hair, and her long, thick locks cascaded d protest her back. She took Clays right hand and kissed each of his fingertips, vanquish his thumb, then took his index finger in her m bulgeh and make a show of removing it slowly and with maximum moisture. Clay looked at the fundament, shaking.Baby, she said as she pose the bobby pin firmly between Clays wet thumb and index finger, I need you to go over to that wall and take this bobby pin and insert it ever so firmly into that electrical outlet over there.Clay looked up at her at brave.Because, she continued, I go with that you atomic number 18nt mad at me and that youre just grieve for your friends, besides I think you need to be reminded that you argonnt invulnerable and that you can hurt even more than you do now. And I think it would be rectify if you did it yourself, because otherwise Ill have to brain you with your own iron skillet.That would be wrong, Clay said.It is a cruel world, baby.Clay took her in his arms and buried his deliver in her hair and just stood there in the doorway for a long time.Amy had been lose for thirty-two hours. That morning a fisherman had found her kayak backwash against nigh rocks on Molokai and had called the rental company in Maui. A life jacket was still strapped on the front of the boat, he said. The Coast Guard had stop flavor already.Now, let me go, Clair said. I have to get that chicken out of the yard and rinse it off.I dont think we should eat that.Please. Im going to cook it up for Kona. Youre taking me out.I am?Of course.After I stick this in the outlet, right?You can grieve, Clay thats as it should be but you cant regain blameful for being alive.So, I dont have to stick this in the outlet?You apply foul language at me, baby. I dont see any way well-nigh it.Oh, well, thats true. You go get Konas chicken out of the yard. Ill do this.On the second morning after Amy was lost at sea, Clay walked to the seaside, a rocky coast between several(prenominal) condos north of Lahaina too short for morning runners, too shallow for a bathing crowd. He stood on an outcropping of rocks with the waves crashing close to him and essay to let pure hatred run out of his heart. Clay Demodocus was a guy who liked things, and among the things he had liked the almost was the sea, but this morning he held nothing but disdain for his old friend. The sapphire blue was indifferent, the waves elitist. Shed kill you without even learning your name. You bitch, Clay said, loud enough for the sea to hear. He spit out into her face and walked back home.That old trickster Maui had been sitting on a rock nearby watching, and he laughed at Clays hubris. Maui admired a man with more balls than brains, even a ha ole. He cast a small blessing at the photographer just a trinket for the laugh, a trifling junior-grade mango of magic and then he channelizeed off to the majuscule banyan tree to fog the film of Japanese tourists.Back in what was now precisely his office, Clay dug Amys resume out of his files and made the call. He braced himself, trying to figure out how, exactly, he was going to tell these strangers that their daughter was missing and assumed to have drowned. He entangle sad and alone, and his elbow hurt from the jolt of electrical energy hed taken the night before. He didnt want to do this. He reached for the phone, then stopped and closed his eyes, as if he could make the whole thing go out-of-door, but on the back of his eyelids he saw the face of his mother as he had last seen her, looking up at him out of her barrel of brine, Make the call, you pussy. If anyone knows how not to get bad news, its you. Part of homage is following up, you sniveling coward. Dont be l ike your brothers.Ah, sweet Mama, Clay thought. He dialed the phone a muffleer with a 716 area code, Tonawanda, impudently York. It rang three times, and the enter operator came on, saying that the number hed reached was not in service at this time. He checked it, then dialed the next number down, which also turned out not to be on the job(p). He called Tonawanda information for Amys parents, and the operator told him there was no such listing. At a loss, he called Woods Hole Oceanographic Center, where Amy had gotten her masters. Clay knew one of her advisers, Marcus Loughten, an irascible Brit who had worked at Woods Hole for twenty years and was famous in the field for his work in underwater acoustics. Loughten answered on the tertiary ring.Loughten, Loughten said.Marcus, this is Clay Demodocus. We worked together on Yes, Clay, I bloody know who you are. Calling from Hawaii, are you?Well, yes, I Probably, what, seventy-eight degrees with a breeze? Its seven below nau ght Fahrenheit here. Im out installing bloody endure buoys in a monthlong blizzard to keep right whales from getting run over by supertankers.Right, the level- whirled buoys. How are those working out?Theyre not.No? Why not?Well, right whales are stupid as shit, arent they? Its not like a supertanker is quiet. If sound was going to deter them, then theyd be bloody well deterred by the engine noise, wouldnt they? They dont make the connection. Stupid shits.Oh, sorry to hear that. Uh, why keep doing it then?We have funding.Right. Look, Marcus, I need some information on one of your students who came out here to work with us. Amy Earhart? Would have been with you guys until fall of last year.No, I dont know that name.Sure you do, five-five, thin, pale, dark hair with kind of unnatural blue highlights, smart as a whip.Sorry, Clay. That doesnt fit any of my students.Clay took a deep breath and trudged on. Biologists were notorious for treating their grad students as subhuman, but Clay was surprised that Loughten didnt remember Amy. She was cute, and if Clay could judge from a night of drinking hed done with Loughten at a marine mammal conference in France, the Brit was more than a bit of a horndog.Great ass, Marcus. Youd remember.Im sure I would, but I dont.Clay studied the resume. What about Peter? Would he No, Clay, I know all of Peters grad students as well. Did you call to confirm her references when you took her on?Well, no.Good work, then. dispel with your Nikons, did she?No, shes missing at sea. Im trying to contact her family.Sorry. Wish I could be of help. Ill check the records, just to be sure in case Ive had a ministroke that killed the part of the brain that remembers fine bottoms.Thanks.Good luck, Clay. My best to Quinn.Clay cringed. It turned out he really wasnt up for bearing bad news. Will do, Marcus. Good-bye. Clay hung up and resumed staring at the phone. Well, he thought, I knew absolutely nothing about this woman that I thought I knew. L ibby Quinn had already called (sobbing) to say that they should have some kind of joint service at the sanctuary for Nate and Amy, and that Clay should speak. What was he going to say about Amy? Dearly beloved, I think we all knew Amy as scientist, a colleague, a friend, a woman who showed up out of nowhere with a completely manufactured history, but I think, because she saved my life, that I came to know her better than anyone here, and I can tell you unequivocally, she was a smart aleck with a cute butt.Yeah, hed need to work on that. Damn it, he missed them both.Clay decided to kill the day by editing video time-eating busywork that supplied at least an imaginary escape from the real world. The afternoon found him going through and through the rebreather footage hed taken on the day the whale had conked him, for the first time going past the point where he was unconscious, just to see if the camera picked up anything usable. Clay let the video run minutes of blue water, the camer a tossing around at the end of the wrist lanyard, then Amys leg as she comes down to stop his descent. He cranked the audio. Hiss of ambient noise, then the bubbles from Amys regulator, the slow hiss of his own breathing through the rebreather. As Amy starts to swim to the surface, the camera catches his fins hanging limply against a field of blue, then Amys fins kicking in and out of the frame. Both their breathing is steady on the audio track.Clay looked at the time touch of the video. Fifteen minutes when the inquiry stops. Amy making her first decompressing stop. On the audio he hears the chorus of distant singing humpback whales, a boat labor not too far off, and Amys steady bubbles. Then the bubbles stop.The camera settles against his thigh and drifts, the lens up, catches light from the surface, then Amys hand holding on to his buoyancy vest, reading the data off his dive computer. Her regulator is out of her mouth. On the audio theres only his breathing. The camera swing s away.Ten minutes more pass. Clay listens for Amys breathing to resume. The motion from her hooking into the rescue tank on the rebreather should move the camera, but theres just the same gentle drift. They move up. Clay guesses maybe to seventy-five feet. Amy is doing another decompression stop, doing it by the book, despite the emergency. Except he still can hear only one person breathing.She pulls him to more shallow depth. The frame lightens up, and the camera swings around, the entire angle showing Clays unconscious form and Amy kicking, the regulator out of her mouth, looking at the surface. She hasnt used the bail-out tank on Clays rebreather, and she hasnt taken a breath for, as far as Clay can tell, forty minutes. This cant be right.He listens, watching until the time signature shows sixty and the tape ends the entire thing having been dubbed to the hard drive. He rewinds it on-screen, slowing down when the camera shows anything but blue, listening again.No fucking way .Clay backed away from the monitor, watching as the video ran out again and froze on the image of Amy holding him steady at twenty or so feet down, no regulator in her mouth.He ran out the door, calling, Kona KonaThe surfer came shuffling out of his bungalow in a cloud of smoke. Just tracking down navy spies, boss.Where did you guys put the rebreather? The day they took me to the hospital?Shes in the store shed.Clay made a beeline for the bungalow they used to store dive and boat equipment. He waved Kona after him. Come.What?Did you guys refill the oxygen or the bail-out tanks?We just rinsed it and put it in the case.Clay pulled the big Pelican case off a stack of scuba tanks and popped the latches. The rebreather was snug in the foam padding. Clay wrenched it out onto the wooden floor and turned on the computer that was an integral part of it. He hit buttons on the display console and watched the venerable liquid-crystal display cycle through the numbers. The last dive Downtime had been seventy-five minutes, forty-three seconds. The oxygen cylinder was virtually full. The bail-out air supply was full. Full. It hadnt been touched. Somehow Amy had stayed underwater for an hour without an air supply.Clay turned to the surfer. Do you remember anything that Nate showed you about what he was working on? I need details I know in general. Clay wasnt sure what he was looking for, but this had to mean something, and all he had to fall back on was Nates research.The surfer scratched the dreadless side of his head. Something about the whales singing binary.Come show me. Clay stormed through the door and back to the office.What you looking for?I dont know. Clues. Mysteries. Meaning.You gone lolo, you know?CHAPTER TWENTY-TWODeep Below, Bernard StirsAbout the time that Nathan Quinn had started to master his nausea in the whale ships aeonian motion (four days on board), another force started working on his body. He felt an uneasiness come over him in waves, and for t wenty or so seconds he would feel as if he needed to crawl out of his skin. Then it would pass and leave him feeling a little numb for a few seconds, only to start up again.Poynter and Poe were moving around the small cabin looking at different gobs and bumps of bioluminescence as if they were gleaning some meaning from them, but, try as he might, Nate couldnt figure out what they were monitoring. It would have helped to be able to get out of the seat and take a surrounding(prenominal) look, but Poynter had ordered him strapped in after he made his first break for the back orifice. Hed nearly made it, too. Had dived at it just like hed seen the whaley boys do, tho that only one arm had gone through, and he ended up stuck to the floor of the whale, his face against the rubbery skin, his hand trailing out in the shivery ocean.Well, that was phenomenally stupid, said Poynter.I think Ive dislocated my shoulder, Nate said.I should leave you there. Maybe a remora or two will latch on t o your hand and teach you a lesson.Or a cookie-cutter shark, said Poe. Nasty bastards. The whaley boys turned in their seats and snickered, bobbing their heads and blowing the occasional raspberry, which could inflict considerable moisture off a four-inch-wide speech. Evidently Quinn was a cetacean laugh riot. Hed always suspected that, actually.Poynter got down on his hands and knees and looked Nate in the eye. While youre down there, Id like you to think on what might have happened if youd been successful at launching yourself through that orifice. First, were at Skippy, whats the depth? Skippy chirped and clicked a number of times. A hundred and fifty feet. Beyond the fact that youd probably have blown out your eardrums almost immediately, you might think on how you were going to get to the surface on one breath of air. And should you have gotten to the surface, what were you going to do then? Were five hundred miles from the nearest land.I hadnt worked out the whole plan, N ate said.So, actually, I might be looking at success, right? You just wanted to test the outside water temperature?Sure, said Nate, thinking it might be best to stay agreeable.Can you feel your hand?Its a little chilly, but, yes.Oh, good.And so theyd left him there a couple of hours, his hand and about six inches of his arm hanging out in the open sea as the whale ship swam along, and when they finally pulled him up, they put him in his seat and kept him restrained except to eat and go to the bathroom. Hed try to relax and observe learn what he could but then a few minutes ago these waves of uneasiness had started hitting him. Hes got the sonic willies, said Poe.Poynter looked away from Skippys console. Its the subsonics, Doc. Youre feeling the sound waves even though you cant hear them. Weve been communicating with the blue for about ten minutes now.You might have said something.I just did.Couple of hours youll be in the blue, Doc. You can stand up again, walk around a littl e. pick out some privacy.So youre communicating with it in low-frequency sound?Yep. Just like you thought, Doc, there was meaning in the call.Yeah, but I didnt think this, that there were guys, and guylike things, riding about inside whales. How in the hell can this be happening? How can I not know about this?So youre giving up on the being-dead strategy? asked Poe.What is it? Space aliens?Poynter unbuttoned his apparel and showed some chest hair. Do I look like a space alien?Well, no, but them. Nate nodded toward the whaley boys. They looked at each other and snickered, a word form of wheezing laughter coming from their blowholes, paused, looked back at Nate, then snickered some more.Maybe on their planet sentient life evolved from whales rather than apes, Quinn continued. I can see how they might have landed here, deployed these whale ships, and kept under the radar of human detection age they looked around. I mean, man obviously isnt the most peaceful of creatures.That work f or you, Doc? asked Poynter.On their planet they developed an organically based technology, rather than one based on combustion and manipulation of minerals like ours.Oh, that is good, said Poe.Hes on a roll, said Poynter. Unraveling the mystery, he is.Skippy and iceboat nodded to each other and grinned.So thats it? This ship is extraterrestrial? Quinn felt the small victory passage that one gets from proving a hypothesis even one as bizarre as space aliens riding in whale ships.Sure, said Poe, that works for me. You, punk?Yeah, moon men, thats what you guys are, Poynter said to the whaley boys.Meep, said ice yacht.And in a high, squeaky, little-girl voice, Skippy croaked, Phone home.The whaley boys gave each other a high four and collapsed into fits of hysterical wheezing.What did he say? Nate nearly snapped his neck trying to turn around against the restraints. They can talk?Well, I guess, if you call that talking, Poe said. He exchanged high fives with Poynter at the expens e of the whaley boys, who paused in their own laughter to roll the whale ship in three quick spirals, which tossed the unsecured Poe and Poynter around the soft cabin like a couple of rag dolls.Poynter came up with a bloody lip from connecting with his own knee. Poe had barked his shin on one of the whaley boys heads as he went over. Strapped in, Nate concentrated on not watching a rerun of his lunch of raw tuna and water.Bastards said Poe.That what you expected in your race of super-intelligent, space-faring extraterrestrials, Nate? Poynter wiped blood from his lower lip and flung it at sea scooter.Carl Linnaeus, an eighteenth-century Swedish doctor who narrow in the treatment of syphilis, is credited with inventing the modern system that is used for classifying plants and animals. Linnaeus is responsible for naming the humpback whale Megaptera novaeangliae, or big wings of New England, and later naming the blue whale Balaenoptera musculus, or little mouse at 110 feet long, over a hundred tons, an animal whose tongue alone is larger than a full-grown African elephant the largest animal to ever live on the planet. Little mouse? Some speculated that this ironic misnomer was perpetrated entirely to throw Linnaeuss lab assistants, as in Run out and bring me back a little mouse, Sven. Others think that the pox had gone to Carls head.Quinn was crouched over the back orifice, Skippy and Scooter holding him by either arm, Poynter and Poe crouched before him, saluting. He could feel the texture of the opening under his bare feet, like wet tire tread.Its been a pleasure, Doc, Poynter said. Have a great trip.Well see you back at base, said Poe. Now, just relax. Youre barely going to contact water. Hold your nose and blow.Quinn did.Poynter counted, One, two Meep.Nate was sucked out the orifice, felt a brief chill and some pressure pushing back against his ears, and found himself in a chamber only a little taller than that in the humpback, with a fairly amused wom an.You can stop blowing now, she said.Yet another phrase I didnt think Id be hearing in this lifetime, Nate said. He let go of his nostrils and took a deep breath. The air take careed fresher than in the humpback.Welcome to my blue, Dr. Quinn, Im Cielle Nuez. How do you feel?Pooped. Quinn grinned. She was about his age, Hispanic with short dark hair peppered gray and wide brown eyes that caught the bioluminescence off the walls and reflected what looked like laughter. She was barefoot and wearing generic khakis like Poynter and Poe. He shook her hand.Cute, she said. Come forward with me, Doctor. Im sure its been a while since you were able to stand up straight. She led him down the corridor, which reminded Nate of when, as kids, he and his buddies had explored storm drains in Vancouver. It was tall enough to walk in, but not tall enough to stand in comfortably.Actually, Cielle, Im not a doctor. I have a Ph.D., but the doctor thing I understand. Im captain of this rig, but if you call me Captain, Ill ignore you.I wanted to hear the humpback sing before I left. You know, from the inside.You will. Therell be time.The corridor started to widen as they moved forward, and Nate was actually able to walk normally, or as normally as one can walk when barefoot on whaleskin. This skin had a mottled appearance, whereas on the humpback it had been nearly solid gray. He noticed that on this ship there were wide veins of bioluminescence on the floor, casting a yellow light up upwards that gave everything a sinister green glow. Nuez paused by what appeared to be portals on either side of them.This is as good a place as any, she said. Now, turn athwart and take my hand.Quinn did as he was asked. Her hand felt warm but dry. She was a small woman, but powerfully built, he could feel the strength in her grip. Now, were just going to walk as the ship moves. Dont stop until I say, or youll fall on your ass.WHAT?Okay, Scooter, roll it.Scooter?All pilots are called Scooter or Sk ippy. They didnt tell you?They werent very forthcoming with information.Humpback crews are a bunch of yahoos. Nuez smiled. You know the type, like navy fighter pilots topside? All ego and testosterone.I got more cretin than yahoo, Nate said.Well, with that particular bunch, yes.The whole corridor started to move.Here we go, step, step, step, thats good. They were walking across the walls as the ship rolled. When they were standing on the ceiling, the roll stopped. Nice, Scooter, Nuez said, obviously communicating through some sort of hidden intercom. Then, to Nate, Hes so good.We were upside down to make the transfer?Exactly. Youre a smart guy. Look, these are cabins. She touched a lighted boss on the wall, and a skin portal folded back on itself. Again Nate was put in mind of the blowhole of a toothed whale, but it was so big, nearly four feet across, it was just unnatural. Lines of light pumped to life past the portal to reveal a small cabin, a bed apparently made of the same skin as the rest of the interior but also a table and a chair. Nate couldnt make out what material they might be made of, but it looked like plastic.Bone, Nuez said, noticing him noticing. Theyre as much a part of the ship as the walls. All living tissue. There are shelves and cubbyholes for your stuff in the bulkheads, closed now. Obviously everything has to be stowed for little maneuvers like the one we just performed. The motion isnt as bad as on the humpbacks. Youll find youll get used to it, and then you can move about just as if you were on land.Youre right. I didnt even notice we were moving.That would be because were not, said Nuez.The sound of whaley-boy snickering wheezed down the corridor toward them.You guys are supposed to be working, Nuez said to the air. Prepare to get under way. She turned to Quinn. Can I buy you a cup of joe? Maybe answer some of your questions?Youre offering? Quinn felt his heart jump with excitement. Information, without Poynter and Poes goofin g obfuscation? He was thrilled. That would be fantastic.Dont pee all over yourself, Quinn. Its just coffee.The corridor opened up into a large bridge. The head of the blue was huge compared to the humpbacks. On either side of the entry a whaley boy stood grinning at them as they passed. They were both taller than Quinn, and unlike the Scooter and Skippy of the humpback, their skin was mottled and lighter in color.Nate paused and grinned back at them. Let me guess Skippy and Scooter?Actually, Bernard and Emily 7, said Nuez.You said they all were I said all pilots were named Skippy and Scooter. She gestured to the front of the bridge, where two whaley boys sitting at control consoles were turning in their seats and grinning. Maybe, thought Nate, they always appeared to be grinning, much like dolphins. Hed made an unpaid mistake, assuming that their facial expressions were the analog of human expressions. People often did that with dolphins, even though the animals had no facial muscles to facilitate expression. Even sad dolphins appeared to be smiling.What are you two grinning at? asked Nuez. Lets get on the way.The pilots frowned and turned back to their consoles.Well, crap, Nate said.What?Nothing, just another theory shot in the ass.Yeah, this operation does that, doesnt it?Nate felt something breathing in in his back pocket and spun around to see a thin, fourteen-inch-long pink penis that was protruding from Bernards genital slit. It waved at him.Holy molyBernard Nuez snapped. Put that away. That is not procedure.Bernards unit drooped noticeably from the scolding. He looked at it and chirped contritely.Away Nuez barked.Bernards willy snapped back up into his genital slit. Sorry about that, Nuez said to Nate. Ive neer gotten used to that. Its really disconcerting when youre working with one of them and you ask them to hand you a screwdriver or something and his hands are already full. Coffee?She led him to a small white table around which four bone ch airs protruded from the floor. They looked like old-style Greek saddle chairs no backs, organic curves, and the high gloss of living bone but more Gaudi than Flintstone. Quinn sat while Nuez touched a node on the wall that opened a meter-wide portal that had concealed a sink, several canisters, and what looked like a percolator. Nate wondered about the electricity but forced himself to wait before asking.While Nuez prepared the coffee, Quinn looked around. The bridge was easily four times the size of the entire cabin in the humpback. quite of riding in a minivan, it was like being in a good-size motor home a very curvy, dimly lit motor home, but about that size. Blue light filtered in through the eyes, illuminating the pilots faces, which shone like patent leather. Nate was starting to realize that even though everything was organic, living, the whale ship had the same sort of efficiency found on any nautical vessel every spaced used, everything stowed against movement, ev erything functional.If you need to use the head, its back down the corridor, fourth dream up on the right.Emily 7 clicked and squealed, and Nuez laughed. She had a warm laugh, not forced it just rolled out of her smooth and easy. Emily says it seems as if it would be more logical for the head to be in the head, but there goes logic.I gave up logic a few days ago.You dont have to give it up, just adjust. Anyway, facilities in the head are like everything on the ship living but I think youll figure out the analogs pretty quickly. Its less complicated than an airliner bathroom.Scooter chirped, and the great ship started to move, first in a fairly radical wave of motion, then smoothing out to a gentle roll. It was like being on a large sailing ship in medium seas.Hey, a little more warning, Scooter, huh? said Nuez. I nearly dumped Nathans coffee. Okay if I call you Nathan?Nates good. base with the roll of the ship, she made it back to the table and put down the two steaming mugs of coffee, then went back for a sugar bowl, spoons, and a can of condensed milk. Nate picked up the can and studied it.This is the first thing from the outside that Ive seen.Yeah, well, thats special request. You dont want to try whale milk in your coffee. Its like krill-flavored spray cheese.Yuck.Thats what Im saying.Cielle, if you dont mind my saying, you dont seem very military.Me? No, I wasnt. My husband and I had a sixty-foot sailboat. We got caught in a hurricane off of Costa Rica and sank. Thats when they took me. My husband didnt make it.Im sorry.Its okay. It was a long time ago. But, no, Ive never been in the military.But the way you order the whaley boys around First, we need to clear up a misconception that you are obviously forming, Nate. I we, the human beings on these ships are not in charge. Were just I dont know, like ambassadors or something. We sound like commanders because these guys would just goof off all day without someone weighty them what to do, but we have no real authority. The Colonel gives the orders, and the whaley boys run the show.Scooter and Skippy snickered like their counterparts on the humpback ship, Bernard and Emily 7 joined them Bernard extending his prehensile willy like a ships company horn.And whaley girls? Nate nodded toward Emily 7, who grinned it was a very big, very toothy grin, but a little coquettish in the way one might expect from, say, an ingenue with a bite that could sever an arm.Just whaley boys. Its like the term mankind, you know alienate the female part of the race at all costs. Its the same here. Old-timers gave them the name.Whos the Colonel?Hes in charge. We dont see him.Human, though?Im told.You said youd been here a long time. How long?Let me get you another cup, and Ill tell you what I can. She turned. Bernard, get that thing out of the coffeepot