"Follow The Whales"

FOLLOW THE WHALES

by Carl L. Biemiller

Published by Doubleday & Company, Inc., Garden City, New York.

Winter was nibbling at the temperate zones. Far to the north, along the escarpments of what had once been the Aleutian island chain, and westward, into the Bering Sea, the icy floods of the Arctic Ocean were choking in new ice, locked bergs, and fresh snows.

The gray whales had begun their annual migration to the warm waters of the southlands. They were stuffed and fat with north Pacific plankton, the pteropods that looked liked sea butterflies, the calanus called the “water flea,” and all the krill or whale food they had grazed under the summer sun.

They were headed south to frolic, to mate and give birth to babies whose natal blubber was so thin they would surely have died from the chilled seas of the northern ranges. They were headed south in pairs, pods, and herds because a biologic clock set forty million years ago said it was time to move to bluer, greener, and sunnier ocean areas and calving lagoons. It was time to butt and sport, to sound and breach, to blow water from their twin blowholes—water that looked like water instead of iced mist as they breathed.

And it was time to scoop trenches in the near shore shallows with huge jaws that engulfed bottom worms, clams, shrimps, small fish, and even plain mud. Everything would be strained through their hairy baleen filters before the yummies were swallowed and the rest ejected by a surge of whale tongues.

The grays were not among the prettier beasts. These, larger than their pre-nuclear-war ancestors, measured some sixty to eighty feet along barely tapered, comparatively slender cylindrical bodies, which were powered by horizontal flukes some fifteen feet across their trailing edges. Their heads were long and nosy. Almost a third of their bodies were marine ghettos inhabited by colonies of barnacles and crablike whale lice, which contributed to the mottled gray color of the skin. That skin was crisscrossed with old scars. It looked as though it had been tacked to the whale’s underlying blubber in patches.

The hydronauts had been among them nearly a month, Kim and Toby Lee in the work sub Adam I, and Tuktu and Genright in Adam II. Their sailing from Olympia Base had been almost casual after another series of craft operational tests and supply and equipment loadings.

Commander Brent had appeared, been curt with a few last-minute good luck grumbles, handed over an envelope of orders to each crew, and had vanished again. A variety of senior Service types had arrived, apparently just to say hello and mumble about kids being given the newest and best of the fleet work subs. And Genright had collected a clutch of what appeared to be school children who did mysterious things to the communications systems of both boats while laughing wildly and jabbing themselves in the ribs as they played. But when the children had finished, Adam I and Adam II obviously had their own talk-between-ships arrangements, and exclusive ones.

“Very tight beam stuff,” said Genright. “Range up to infinity.”

“You know what you’re talking about?” asked Tuktu.

“All done with the buttons,” explained Genright loftily.

Kim and Toby Lee had found some time to spend in the huge Base library files, with Kim particularly interested in the low sound frequencies which traveled farther than the high frequencies, and Toby Lee fascinated by some musty knowledge of human languages that were once whistled instead of spoken.

“Look,” she told Kim. A language called Mazateco once used in a place called Mexico, a language called Silbo-Gomero used in the Canary Islands, and a third called Aas used in the Pyrenees mountains of some place named Spain. No words. All whistles…much like dolphins. Give you any ideas?

Tuktu, his broad brown face impassive, had a present printed on a large roll of shark parchment for Genright. It said anything done for the cause of compatibility is not only condoned but required. It had a cartoon picture of Genright with big knives sticking out of his chest, knees, and shoulders, and a fat lump on his head.

“It’s a nice likeness,” said Genright.

Kim chuckled at the thought, and he watched the sea, calm and mirror-like before the bow of Adam I. The sub was riding high, its gray-green weld-glass hull bobbing like a lazy cork. The boat, he thought, never seemed to bother the whales. Why should it? Its thirty feet was just little more than the size of a nursing calf as far as the herds were concerned. And once the roving pods had satisfied their members that the work craft was not a predator like the killer whale, the orca, and was too large to be strained through baleen, it was ignored—mostly.

Not a predator? Not exactly, thought Kim, amused.

Adam I and Adam II were merely very dangerous under special circumstances. They carried pulsars, which could be sonic weapons, hand lasers, and fixed installations of the same heat-light beams. There were small arsenals of nerve gases in drop sizes which could kill or stun for miles over open ocean. There were small round algin containers of chemicals, tiny enough to fit into one of Toby Lee’s palms, that could thump out a blast, which would make a frappe out of a sizable iceberg.

The seed-size A-power plant, which supplied the boat’s inner comforts and general sea efficiency, was designed for life use of the compact vessel. And the sensing equipment and communications systems, properly used, brooded twenty-four hours daily, using light, heat, chemical, visual, aural analytical techniques to supply a steady flow of information of all environmental surroundings. That equipment was the tools of the trade.

“Toby,” he said. “Dead ahead.”

He saw her nod slightly.

A female gray breached from the still sea and rolled over in mid-air so her back would take the impact of the inevitable wallop landing. She was followed by two males in mating pursuit, and she was obviously ready to be caught. One of them surged over her head and forced her to the surface in a giant swirl of agitated sea. As they joined, belly to belly, sides tilted upward to the sky, the third male gray skidded over the foreparts of their bodies and stabilized them. His weight held them firmly in position during their brief act of leviathan love, then his comradely assistance no longer needed, he dived away, leaving husband and wife to their own monogamous future. It would be a year and another trip north before the pair would return and the cow would give birth.

“Some process,” said Kim inanely, to hide the fact that he had been truly impressed by a wondrous act of nature among giants.

“Well,” said Toby Lee tartly, “from some points of view the show would have been improved by fewer characters. One less, at least.”

“The female,” said Kim and swayed out of the reach of her swatting arm.

“Hardly,” she snapped.

Tuktu’s voice on the Adam-only intercom filled the con area.

“We’re clearing for permission to leave the boat,,” it said. “You can see us half a mile south lined to our own ring buoy right now. Seems to be a lot of dolphins playing around the herd. They may be working, of course. But we thought we’d take a look. We’re using heavy shield suits just in case we get bumped a bit, but the water’s right quiet and all the big animals are docile. What do you think?”

Kim was snappish.

“Stay in the boat. That’s an order. You get mixed up in a mating ritual, and you might find trouble.”

“That’s what I told Genright when he left twenty minutes ago,” Tuktu said calmly.

“You stay put,” said Kim. “We’ll be along. We’re under orders not to interfere with regular herd operations, and those dolphins may be cutting out an animal for a reason that doesn’t concern us.”

“That’s what I told Genright before he said his com unit wasn’t working very well.

“How’s it working now, Genright?” asked Kim suddenly.

“Fine, Ooops!”

“Back to the boat,” ordered Kim.

“Soon as I finish with old Tube Steak,” said Genright.

“Only be a minute.”

“Old what?” asked Toby Lee.

“He has a pet, an old bull. Calls it Tube Steak,” explained Tuktu. “And I forgot to tell you, I’m in the water too, and the dolphins are cutting out a yearling bull from the procession.”

“Wait a minute. How does he know Tube Steak is a pet?” asked Toby Lee, throwing up her hands.

“He has kind eyes,” interrupted Genright’s voice. “I’m looking into one of them.”

“Am returning to boat,” said Tuktu, “but will watch over the dark one.”

“You’re both going on report for discipline anyhow,” Kim snapped irritably.

“Might as well finish up here then,” rattled Genright’s voice.

“Up here” was not a figure of speech. It was a fact of literal action. When Toby Lee arrived in Adam I, Genright, mask and helmet tilted on the back of his head, was on his hands and knees just behind the twin blowholes of the biggest, hoariest old man of a bull gray whale they had ever seen. Genright had a huge clamshell in a two-handed grip of his gloved hands. He was scraping patches of cog-shaped barnacles off the monster’s back, pausing now and then to brush them into the sea.

The whale, some seventy feet of him, was motionless in the placid ocean, some fixed dream in his open eyes, and a silly delphine grin, more pronounced than the usual, on his long snout. As Genright worked, the skin along his back rippled, bunched, and folded.

“Tickly, tickly, kitchy, kitchy,” shouted Genright.

“That’s ridiculous,” said Kim. “Insane!”

Toby Lee’s laughter tinkled up the sonic scales to near-hysteria. She nearly rolled off the stool before the bank of visual scanners.

The big bull moved ever so slightly forward and submerged about five feet, ducking Genright but apparently taking pains not to dislodge him.

“He’s just washing of the dust and stuff,” explained Genright. “I got to work out some kind of scraper or a rake or something to do his belly right. He’s pretty crummy.”

The whale rose slowly, water rolling off his back. Where Genright had scraped his skin was sleek and pearly.

Genright stood up, adjusted his mask and helmet, immediately improving communications with the two nearby craft. “Whee!” he yelled, sat and slid, rump first, down the whale’s side into the sea. He swam around to the nearest eye and patted the area behind it.

“Be back later, Tube Steak.”

“You forgot to get paid,” said Tuktu’s rich voice.

“Well, when I first met him I thought he was going to eat me. I pumped a real low note of pulsar at him, and he changed his mind—just from surprise, I guess. So he’s got credit with me. Besides, there’s no pay for anything in the Service. All the job materials are free too. Thirty feet under old Tube Steak the bottom’s full of big shells.”

The gray made a slow turn and followed Genright’s swimming form back to Adam II. It nosed at the boat, gently and tentatively. Then it sculled over to Adam I and did the same thing. Without haste it moved off toward the south, angling out to the horizon line.

“Tuktu, you still suited?” asked Kim. “If you are, join us in Adam One. You hear that, Genright?”

“Right. Coming.”

“We’ll crack the stern pressure bubble, and we can talk without your coming all the way in and slopping up our housekeeping. Handle the bubble, please, Toby. I’ve got a small idea.”

He moved toward the bow communications board as he spoke, and poked a finger at the area range band. “This is Adam One, Rockwell.”

“You’re on, Rockwell,” said a soft voice. “This is Herd Base Area C. Knew you were around. What can we do for you?”

“Keep me from being too ignorant mostly,” said Kim. “What I want to know is, well, do any of the grays get disturbed maybe even nasty, at divers operating near or around them?”

“Swimmers are forbidden anywhere in the sea near or around the herds unless under specific emergency conditions and direct operating instructions. Benthic samplers work the in-coast areas occasionally, or biologists may be tagging special animals for migration records. Once in a blue moon there may be a predator emergency, which might necessitate swimmers in the waters. But your answer is that the grays could be difficult and react as unpredictably as any animal that finds something new and strange in his environment. You may see our power kayaks around, but we don’t encourage swimmers. And you know it.

“None of you have been swimming, have you?”

The voice was syrupy, yet firm.

“Yes,” said Kim steadily, “and I’ll so report.”

“The dolphins ratted on you, you know.”

“Real gossips, aren’t they? But I think we’ll be back in the water again from time to time—with caution, of course. Thought you ought to know.”

“Your orders don’t come from us,” said the voice, “but thanks for checking in, and anything you see that’s interesting or possibly helpful to us, cut us in.”

“Thank you,” said Kim.

He went aft. The uplifted faces of Genright and Tuktu smiled from the water held level in the hatch well by the in-boat pressure, like two beaming vegetables in a clear soup. Toby Lee squatted beside them, a barefooted idol in shorts and a nondescript halter.

“Discipline first,” said Kim. “As long as I wear one more stripe, you check in first when you have your whims. You’ll both be on report and it’ll look nasty on your records. Too bad. Shouldn’t have been swimming.”

He paused, but before they could speak, he went on.

“When the three of you go out again tomorrow, wear silco skin suits and use the mantles just in case you need a lot of sudden speed.”

Kim was talking about the silco-membrane diving suits, which literally fitted like a skin with an inner lining of pore-penetrating hair follicles, which converted the oxygen in the water directly into the blood stream and simultaneously removed the carbon dioxide so the wearer could breathe as a true fish. The mantle, patterned after the natural ones of the squids, was a flexible armored tube which contracted and expanded by power units that “inhaled” and ejected” water for bursts of jet propulsion.

Tuktu looked stunned.

“You put us on report for swimming in the herds, foul up our Service records, then you send us out again?”

“Wait a minute, chunky buddy,” said Genright thoughtfully.

Toby Lee merely smiled quietly.

“Herd Base Area C said the whales don’t like strange objects messing around,” continued Kim. “The dolphins they take because they are used to being banged around by them, I guess. Anyhow, what’s a one-ton slam when it bangs sixty-seventy-eighty tons? But you know what you were doing to that Tube Steak, and he didn’t seem to mind a bit. I sort of got the idea that he might be used to handling or used to being handled by something or body your size or your general shape,”

“That’s farfetched thinking,” said Toby Lee.

Kim exploded. “How farfetched do you think this whole mission is? Just what do you think our percentage of stumbling over any of the sea people is if they wanted to hide in all the world’s oceans? And I don’t care how many Service people are searching. Come on now. Just what do you think the real odds against us are?”

“Oh, I think our chances of finding them are fine,” said Genright. “Farfetched thinking, you know.”

“We’ll wind up back in the cities being brain scrubbed and working on a mushroom farm,” muttered Tuktu.

“Very good too,” said Genright.

“May I ask what’s very good?” asked Toby.

“Tube Steak and mushrooms,” guffawed Genright.

“With black marks on our records too,” continued Tuktu.

“If you had any brains, you’d know I had to put you on report. The working dolphins turned you in to Herd Command.”

“You just think of that?” asked Toby suspiciously.

“I’ll ignore that,” said Kim.

“Thought you would.”

“All right, Genright, let’s have the whole Tube Steak story, and without frills, just as it happened—what you did and what the bull did.”

Genright was succinct. He and Tuktu had noticed the dolphin activity, and Genright had decided to enter the sea and investigate although they knew it was doubtless a herd routine. The big bull gray had surfaced before him, swimming like an island conjured from thin air. It had opened its mouth. But, and Genright was sure, it wasn’t about to scoop him within it. He had touched off the pulsar tube, and it had emitted a low note just once.

“Sort of a nice moo real deep,” he elaborated.

The whale had closed its mouth and remained still and awash.

Genright had swum under it, around it, and noticing the barnacles, some of which had drawn blood from the whale’s skin, he had pulled a few loose. He had dived to the bottom—the water was comparatively shallow there—and returned with the big clam shell. It was easy climbing up on the whale even with his fins because the encrustations offered a foothold and a handgrip. He wasn’t sure, but he thought maybe the whale had lowered itself in the water a bit to make it easier for him. That’s when he told Tuktu he had a pet. And that’s all there was to it until Kim got nasty.

“Touch that low-frequency note on the pulsar for us,” said Kim.

Genright drew the tube from its contained slot in the thigh of his suit. It did make a sound, low and mooing within the confines of the boat. Sound is only a signal, and it would have not been that quiet in the water, which is a better conductor than air.

The pulsar tubes and their larger variations were used extensively for moving and guiding fish, all of which are sensitive to sound. They were used a lot in the shark pens, where they had a commanding effect on that strange band of nerves encircling the shark bodies and know as the lateral line.

But whales had no lateral lines. If anything, their entire bodies were huge baffles, sounding boards absorbing all sorts of noises.

Kim shrugged.

“I still think that gray acted pally as though he were at ease with a buddy,” he said. “As if he were used to being handled.”

“So we go out tomorrow at the same time and same place, which is right here, and see if he turns up again for another treatment? That’s a really magic idea,” said Tuktu bluntly.

“Toby goes too,” added Kim. “She’s still a different form in size and shape than each of you.”

“When did you first notice?”

“Not that whale vision is anything much. Those grays have to breach for a quick scan around them, although their eyes work better underwater. But if he gets you in sonic range with his echo system clicking away, he’ll notice the differences.”

“Suppose, Mr. Rockwell, sir, we decide that Tube Steak is used to being handled. What does that prove?”

“That something has handled him,” snapped Kim.

“Not another whale, nor a dolphin, nor a shark, nor a skate, nor an abalone, nor an urchin, nor a sea otter,” muttered Genright.

“Nor a cod, nor a tuna, nor an eel, nor a pilchard, nor Commander Brent, nor Toby Lee…”murmured Tuktu.

Their faces vanished from the wall.

Toby buttoned up the bubble and the hatch.

Chapter One	Chapter Two	Chapter Three	Chapter Five	Chapter Six
Chapter Seven	Chapter Eight	Chapter Nine	Chapter Ten

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