Second Nature

Chapter 39

39 

All cetaceans were once land mammals who long ago returned to their original ocean home; now Gen repeated that ancient path. With powerful kicks of her flukes, she swam beyond the mouth of Cool Bay, heading out into the deep waters of the gulf. 

The pectoral flippers that steered her sleek dolphin body contained hand bones, complete with five fingers, akin to the human hand that had lately entwined with Cade's. Her dolphin heart ached with the same sadness as her once-human heart; her dolphin eyes wept the same tears of parting. Wansalawata. One saltwater. 

For the sake of her human friends, she had put up a brave front when she'd said good-bye. She'd claimed she was returning to her pod. In fact, she was unsure if she'd be able to find them. Dolphin pods range over hundred-mile wide territories. The loudest sonar pings could travel only a mile or so and back. Already, her clicks had bounced off two different pods; she had approached them until their signature whistles told her neither pod was hers.  

The full moon rose in the east like a glass fishing-net float. Gen headed farther offshore, pumping out clicks from the air sacs in her sinuses, amplifying the sound waves through the oil-filled bulb on her forehead and shaping them into narrow beams that carried farthest. She broadcast steady volleys of clicks as loudly as she could, searching the deep, wide waters for her friends. 

Something large and dense to her left. She turned and bombarded the target with clicks. The echoing pings vibrated an acoustic bone in her lower jaw as she made out a detailed picture of a shipwreck the dolphins called "Ghost Whale." The ship had sunk long ago with a large air space trapped inside the hull so that it never plunged to the sea floor. It hung suspended underwater on its side, doomed to drift with the tides and currents until its hull rotted enough to let the air bubble escape and send the hulk to its sandy grave. 

She swam on, whistling a two-note distress call and clicking in slow circles, repeatedly. A small pod swam close enough to whistle, "Lonely sister, come join us." It was not her pod, but a gang of adolescent male dolphins eagerly pinging her. She thanked them for the invitation and asked them to pass on her message: Eyes-of-Sunrise seeks the pod led by Races-the-Waves. 

It was getting late. She was going to have to spend the night alone. That was dangerous, because schools of hammerheads and tigers plied the warm gulf waters at night, hunting. She felt tired and pinged more slowly. Her pings bounced off two shrimp trawlers working a grid to her southeast; the steady thrubbing of their diesel engines carried a long way underwater. The boats were no problem at a distance, but up close, their drag nets could be deadly. 

Gen rested in dolphin-sleep. She glided below the surface languidly, in the same meditative state as a napping cat, shutting down one side of her brain at a time, but keeping one eye open and staying awake to scoot up to the air to breathe. 

The breeze had died to a dead calm and the smooth plane of the water reflected the moon and stars like an obsidian mirror. Gen thrust her head high above the water and looked around. Aside from the red and green running lights of the distant trawlers, the gulf seemed as empty as the space between galaxies. 

She missed Little Squirt. But if she couldn't locate her pod by tomorrow night, she might join the pod with the horny males; they were still a half-mile to her north, circling slowly in their nighttime rest period. Maybe if those big boys had sex with her, the pleasure they gave could trigger her metamorphosis.  

That's what she wanted now. But she blinked with fear. It was a terrifying process, to completely lose control and transform into something unknown. What would she become? Would the new form retain anything of her present self? Or was she to be a sacrifice, annihilated in the transformation into a wholly new creation? If only she knew what to expect, then at least it would not have to be a blind leap into the abyss. 

On the other hand-or flipper, whatever-nothing felt as oppressive to her as being alone. The military lab had forced upon her enough isolation to last a lifetime; she just couldn't endure any more. Her heart felt honeycombed with cracks, leaking sorrow with every beat. She'd rather vanish into a radically new form than have to suffer this loneliness. 

She pinged and picked up chaos to the north-northwest; a group of hammerhead sharks slicing like whirling blades through a school of mullet. Gen panicked. Her heart boomed in her skull and drowned out the return-pings. Where did the sharks go? 

She knew the Abundance could repair terrible physical damage, but surely that did not include being torn to strips of meat and gulped down by a school of sharks in a feeding frenzy.  

She thrust her head above the water and twirled in a complete circle, crying out in whistle language, "Little Squirt! Races-the-Waves!" Red and green lights from the trawlers bobbed in a black void under the sparkling frost of the Milky Way. Her ears caught the faraway sounds of men's voices, laughter.  

What am I doing? This is stupid. If I can't find my pod by whistling underwater, they sure won't hear me whistling in the air. 

She calmed herself. The hammerheads were busy feeding; she was okay, for now. 

I did the right thing. Leaving was the only way. Her friends on shore were safe from Eberhard, and that lent some comfort. But it hurt too much to dwell on them, especially Cade.  

Cade. 

Don't think about him now. You'll never see him again. 

Her thoughts returned to finding a way to speed up her metamorphosis. Get this loneliness over with. But she doubted sex with the dolphins would work. Both times the transformation had occurred, it had been impelled by emotional, not merely physical, gratification. Heart fulfillment. True passion. 

Oh, Cade! You sweet man.