Chapter twelve

People are People

Sudor swam to the river mouth shortly after introducing Dasaye to Ballena and her son. Landra enthusiastically welcomed the strong and formidable new person to their team. Sudor told Kevin and Grace all that had transpired while they had patiently waited in the canoe. He then swam upriver to retell the story to those waiting at the river cove, where the sailboat was moored. He had warned them to watch the weather as he left.

"You will find our friends a little more than a kilometer straight out," he had said, "but remember, the island is in the middle of a huge ocean and you are land creatures who will be far at sea in a small canoe."

Grace surveyed the ocean's broad expanse. She recalled Sudor's warning as they approached the whales and delfinians, who were completely at home in the sea. Even at the short distance of one kilometer, slightly more than half a mile, the island was starting to appear only a small safe haven in a vast horizon filled by large deep ocean swells. Gentle tropical clouds drifted lazily across the sky so she had no immediate concerns about the weather, still, she remained alert and watchful.

Kevin pointed to Pito, who had goaded Dasaye and Landra into a game of tag. "You were telling me how disappointed you are by being here at Earth Base One instead of at the university," he said excitedly. "But think of this, Grace, no one at the university has ever seen a young sperm whale playing with a delfinian and an orca, plus our quiet little hideout has become a full-fledged pioneer base for saving the world."

Grace smiled. Kevin was right, and, most exciting to her, they had been given Delfinian translation devices. The primitive experiments she had planned as small steps toward understanding cetacean speech were now entirely unnecessary. She and Kevin were about to become the first humans in history to talk with whales. The magnitude of this thought made her suddenly shy; she wondered if she was worthy of such a wonderful gift, and whether she was even smart enough to know the right things to talk about. Her strong emotions welled into a teary-eyed smile as they joined the seafaring band.

Dasaye quit the game with Pito as soon as he saw them. He swam to the canoe and introduced himself. "Do you understand me?" He asked.

"Perfectly," Kevin responded. "Do you understand us?"

"I do, so far," Dasaye said. "Are you the kind of humans who do not war against ocean people?"

"We have worked all our lives to stop the killing of Cetaceans, er... Ocean People," Grace answered. "I study Ocean People at the university. We brought equipment here to try and learn your language while we are hiding on the island. Delfinians gave us these translation collars so that is no longer necessary. Now I'd just like to talk and learn as much as possible so I can tell other people, er, I mean humans."

"We are one People," Cecric interjected. "Eddy and I once had this exact same conversation, and concluded people are people."

"What is a university?" Dasaye wanted to know.

Universities are where people go to study about subjects which interest them," Grace answered.

"We call them recitals," Dasaye said. "Why are you hiding on the island?"

"A friend and I showed those who are damaging the environment how to stop doing it," Kevin said. Leaders of those destroying our planet hunted us, before we were able to finish our work."

Dasaye was genuinely puzzled by what Kevin had told him. "But why would anyone want to destroy the planet they live on? That is so exceedingly absurd I'm not sure I am understanding you. Though I'm sure you are trying to tell me something you believe," he added hastily. "I mean, I don't think you are lying. I must be missing something."

"The reason is very simple," Kevin said, "though it might not be easy for ocean people to understand because you do not need homes and the many other things humans do."

"Try me, "Dasaye retorted. "You're telling me humans are destroying our planet and their leader ordered you killed because you were showing them a way to stop killing themselves by killing Mother Earth. That's almost to twisted to think about. Am I hearing you right?"

"Yep. That's it in a nutshell."

"A nutshell?"

"A seed with a hard shell."

"Okay. I get that part. So, why are people destroying the planet they live on?"

"They don't know any better."

"Obviously, if they're really doing it, which I find difficult to believe."

Grace was listening quietly and concentrating on writing in her field notebook. "What are you doing?" Dasaye asked her interestedly.

"I'm writing the words you say and noting my observations," Grace replied showing him her notebook.

Dasaye studied her notebook thoughtfully. "Those marks you have made are words?"

"Yes"

"Tell me something from the words that is what we have said."

"We call the telling, reading."

"And making the marks is writing?"

"Yes"

"Read."

"Okay. Though you must understand that I am writing for people who have never talked with an orca."

"Orca?"

"Our word for an ocean person of your specie."

"Oh. Okay, please read."

Grace glanced at Kevin. She cleared her throat and licked her lips.

"Go ahead," Kevin urged. "I'm sure you haven't written anything that will hurt this guy’s feelings."

"Here goes," she said clearing her voice again.

"Orca intelligence is far greater than previously suspected. Dasaye is interested by complex ideas about human society which even many humans are too involved to consider. Additionally, he uses very subtle facial expressions, which are at least as varied ours. His face showed incredulity at hearing my brother was a hunted person for explaining how to stop hurting Mother Earth. His face then turned to scorn when asking why people would harm the planet which supports and nurtures their own lives."

"Those little marks say all that?" Dasaye interrupted.

"There's more, and I didn't read your actual conversation."

"This writing has shown me humans are not all bad," Dasaye said softly. It was clear he was being politely complimentary to a specie he had always seen as an enemy. He turned his attention back to Kevin. "Please continue," he said.

"Continue?" Kevin asked. His attention had been absorbed by listening and trying to see the orca facial expressions Grace had written about.

"You told me the reason why humans were destroying the Earth is they don't know any better. That doesn't sound like a reason to me. Anyway, I'm still not convinced humans are mighty enough to destroy the planet."

"They've killed a lot of whales."

"Yes, that's true. Human war against ocean people has killed almost all of us. For every one hundred who once swam in the sea there are now only two or three. But we only live on the planet, we are not the planet itself."

"Oh. I see what you mean," Kevin said. "The planet itself will still be here, it's living things that humans are destroying. Are you sure about the number of cetaceans who have been killed? Our records don't include nearly as many deaths as you say happened."

"Your records are wrong," Dasaye shot back. "Who did the counting?"

"The records are mostly from those who did the hunting," Kevin answered, uncomfortably. He definitely wished he had not brought up the subject.

"No wonder your records are so wrong. How would those barbarians know how many of us there were before the slaughter began? They couldn't even guess how many wounded ocean people escaped only to die later."

Kevin was growing anxious about the direction of the conversation. Dasaye was obviously becoming quite angry, the canoe was beginning to feel like a small and not very safe place. Kevin stood up and stretched. "It's hot in the sun," he said, completely changing the subject. "I need to come into the water with you and cool off."

Perko and Landra swam to Dasaye's side and asked him if he was okay with Kevin's answers, to which he mumbled a grumbling, "Yes."

"Do orcas surf?" Grace asked trying to help her brother change the subject.

"Surf? What's that?" Dasaye asked, genuinely interested.

Perko and Landra quickly explained how humans ride waves.

"Yes. I've done that. My smaller cousins do it more than me, though I have surfed for fun when the waves are my size."

"These swells seem large today," Kevin observed, continuing to keep the conversation away from whale hunting.

"You are right. They are larger than usual," Dasaye answered, his voice calm.

They all looked at the sky in the direction the waves were coming from. The peaceful horizon showed only large slow moving swells and small tropical clouds.

"We're here to take pictures of Ballena's injury for mother to examine on the computer," Grace mentioned, happily remembering a job that needed doing. She and Kevin excused themselves and paddled around Ballena to take pictures of her wound. which was periodically exposed by the rhythmic raise and fall of passing ocean swells.

"I'm glad we got out of that in one piece," Kevin whispered.

"Me, too," Grace replied. "I don't think he was going to hurt us, yet he is a hunter, and way to strong to be around when he's not happy."

"The mother whale is facing into the swells. Do you think it would be impolite to ask her to let us tie the canoe to her tail and go swimming," Kevin wondered.

"I can hear you," Ballena said. "I don't mind if you tie the canoe to my tail. That's about all I'm good for right now, anyway."

"Does your wound hurt?" Grace asked with concern. "Are you comfortable here?"

"I'm sore but the pain is subsiding," Ballena answered. "Thank you for asking. And, yes, I'm comfortable. These big swells are flexing my body and it feels good. Thank you for tending to my injuries."

"You only have one wound," Kevin said. The cut on your other side is where our mother removed some good skin to graft over the center of your wound."

"I wouldn't have thought that possible," Ballena responded. "Your mother is very talented."

"She's a good doctor," Grace agreed. "I'm going to dive in and tie the rope to your tail. I won't make it too tight."

"There's one more thing you should know, Child."

"What's that?"

"I was listening to your conversation with Dasaye, he did not mention that many of the wounded whales who escaped would have recovered if they had not been killed and eaten by orcas. They actually followed along with the human hunters, though they kept out of sight and stayed far enough away to save their own sneaky skins."

"I wonder why he became so angry, then," Kevin mused.

"His kind is a rather gruesome sort of hunter," Ballena answered. "Still, he is a Cetacean and his Family does attend Recitals. Orcas had no way to know how many of us would be killed, they are as upset by the war against Ocean People as everyone else is."

"Thanks for telling us. I was feeling worse than I usually do about people killing whales. Here I come!" Grace finished her last words as she dove into the water with the canoe rope firmly clasped in one hand.

Ballena held her tail flukes motionless as Grace's diving loop went under and then over them. Kevin followed Grace into the water when he saw her secure the bow line. He was totally surprised when he crashed onto Pito's back. Pito had timed his move perfectly so that his speed matched the speed of Kevin's dive, which wasn't fast since he had jumped from the light, unstable canoe.

"Take a breath and hang on," Pito called over his shoulder. "I'll swim you down by my mom's eyes so she can get a good look at you."

Kevin did as the young whale said. In a split second he was eye-to-eye with Ballena, a being larger than the sail boat.

"Can you talk in the water?" Ballena asked.

"Not really," Kevin burbled and bubbled.

Ballena chuckled her low tone, which Kevin felt rather than heard. Pito rubbed against his mother's cheek. Kevin stroked her skin before gathering his legs beneath him and pushing of Pito's back to the surface. He broke through with enough speed to rise out of the water to his waist, where his happy expression and normal breath turned to shock and a gasp.

Dasaye was blasting straight at him going full-speed. All Kevin could see was his dorsal fin. A wave spread from the fin which looked exactly like the bow-wave of a speeding boat. His mind ran a gauntlet from blank disbelief to terror, and then to amazed surprise. Grace appeared from nowhere behind Dasaye's fin; she stood up like she was riding a surfboard. The fin looked taller than she from water level.

Dasaye turned away from Kevin at the last possible instant and aimed toward a large approaching swell. He pumped for additional speed and accelerated up the sloping face of the swell, reaching awesome speed. Grace arched her back and planted her feet exactly as she would surfing, her forward hand rested lightly on the fin, she was communicating by touch. Dasaye dove when they reached the peak of the swell. Grace went straight up, a long way. She went so high she seemed to be flying in slow motion.

The ocean swell passed on by as Grace was still going up, she was suddenly very high above the wave's following trough. Kevin watched her tuck at the top and do a perfect one and a half somersault before opening up for her long plunge to the water. He admired the raw athletic skill of his sister and guessed her height at seven or eight meters, she had been somewhere between twenty and twenty-five feet above the water.

Grace entered the water cleanly, with barely a splash. She popped to the surface and was greeted by applauding delfinians, who had gathered behind Kevin watching the fun. Their clapping churned up a frothy splash but didn't make much noise. Everyone wanted a turn when Dasaye rejoined the group. He was happy to oblige. One delfinian after another rode Dasaye's speeding back up a swell and leaped for the sky, each trying to out-do the other.

Pito got into the act with Kevin on his back. He couldn't swim as fast as Dasaye but when he reached the top of the swell he hurled himself into the air, then, with the arching back motion of a bucking bronco, and a well timed human leap, Kevin went almost as high as the others had gone. The delfinians immediately wanted Dasaye to do what Pito had done with Kevin. They were soon flying twelve to fifteen meters above the deep trough between passing wave tops. The recent argument with Dasaye slipped into the past and was never mentioned again. Land People and Ocean People played together until they were totally exhausted. Nobody had an ounce of energy to spend on keeping track of who was who.

When Kevin and Grace were back in the canoe and had rested a little, they decided it was time to return to shore. Grace invited Dasaye to come with them to meet their parents and the others.

"It's time for us to go home," Kevin said to Dasaye. "These swells have grown even larger and this little canoe is beginning to feel like a ride on your back."

“And there’s a high altitude thin glint of an ice cloud to the northwest that looks worrysome to me.” Grace added, pointing skyward.

"Thanks for the invitation," Dasaye said, glancing in the direction Grace pointed. "I will come with you. First, though, I want to go see the submarine you captured, it won't take me long. I'll catch up with you somewhere along the way in the river."

"See you there," Grace said as she and Kevin started paddling for shore.

Dasaye told the Delfinians what he was going to do and then sped away toward the submarine. He had seen submarines before and was curious to see one close up. He had always assumed there were humans in submarines and that they were underwater versions of the ships he had seen which rode on the surface with humans walking about on deck. He felt self satisfaction and pride at having figured out what submarines were by himself. His excitement about seeing the submarine did not detract him from his whale sized appetite, which had been stimulated by all the strenuous play. He snacked on a few tuna which had strayed from a larger school further out from the island and topped off his meal with a medium-sized shark. The submarine came into his view shortly after munching down the shark.

Close inspection revealed that he should never have doubted his conclusion that submarines were of human origin. One touch told him it was made of the same hard material he had encountered when feeling shipwrecks he had occasionally discovered during his travels. Dasaye was inspecting the cables which the delfinians had woven around the propeller when he heard a sound transmission. He listened carefully. The transmission was not understandable to him yet the sounds were arranged in a pattern similar to cetacean speech.

Though far less complex than speech, the acoustic signals coming from the submarine definitely indicated to him an intelligent and purposeful design. He was certain the humans inside the submarine were responsible and tried mimicking the patterns with his own voice.

The transmission stopped instantly, then resumed after a few moments pause. He copied the signal again and the transmission stopped again, briefly.

"It hesitates when they hear me," he thought excitedly, "this is interesting." Another try brought the same result, the transmission definitely stopped when he mimicked it. He swam back and forth searching for the exact source and discovered a small metallic protrusion on the upper part of the submarine hull. He tried his experiment again and was able to make the signal momentarily stop.

Dasaye was absolutely thrilled by the idea of controlling humans rather than being controlled by them. Then it dawned on him that he was in the middle of a deadly serious game, definitely not play. 'The humans in this war machine are attempting to contact humans in another war machine, maybe they already have,' he thought, while mulling over what he should do next.

An idea was slowly taking shape in his mind, he let it grow until he felt confident enough to take action. Dasaye hummed a low chuckle and moved a little further from the submarine. Then he sang from old Ocean People Recitals, taking care to keep the story line details of his acoustical song as simple as the submarine signal. When he finished the recital song he turned and raced to tell the delfinians what he had discovered. He hoped his new colleagues would be proud of him.

He let the exhilarating sensation of water flowing against his streamlined body guide him as he thought over what he had done. Swimming at high speed always cleared his mind and this time was no exception. As Dasaye approached the delfinians he realized he had been dimly aware of the submarine transmissions while they were all playing.

Dasaye knew then that his hunter's senses were in some ways more observant than some other ocean people. He hadn't paid attention to his own senses because he was having so much fun and nobody else had brought up the subject. It hadn't occurred to him that orcas might have some extra-keen abilities. "I am a guard and a scout and must keep this lesson in mind", he mused as he joined in with the others, who right away wanted to know why he was back so soon.

"I went to see the submarine," Dasaye told them. Then he quickly related the entire story of what he had done, including his meal of tuna and shark. "If you listen carefully you will be able to hear it, too", he concluded.

The group floated silently and listened for what Dasaye had described. "He's right," Cecric said at last. "The submarine is sending an acoustical signal."

"Is it stronger near the sub?" Perko asked.

"A little," Dasaye responded humming a very precise example.

Perko did some quick mental comparisons. "That signal probably won't travel more than one or two hundred kilometers. Still, it will make finding the submarine much easier."

Cecric turned to Dasaye. "You go tell Sudor and the humans. He can swim to the sub and tap a message on it using a human code the submarine crew will understand.

"Also, the ocean swells have grown larger; tell them we're taking Ballena and Pito to the sheltered side of the island."

Dasaye excitedly agreed and sped toward the river mouth.

"He sure is an enthusiastic fellow," Landra commented. "How old is he, Ballena?"

"He's almost full grown," Ballena answered, somewhat groggily.

"Are you feeling worse?" Cecric asked with aroused concern.

"I'm very tired, that's all."

"Will you be able to make it to the lee side of the island? We'll move you."

"I think so. Let's go."

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