Humanx - Cachalot Part 27

Where were Rachael and Merced? Had they sneaked off somewhere? "Rachael!"

"Over here, Mother!"

She turned a circle. "Where?"

"I esppy thhemmmm." Wenkoseemansa swung his seemingly weightless ma.s.s around, presented a black and white wall to her gaze. It occurred to her that he was offering her a ride.

"Theyy are a modest distance, byy your standards.

I will convey you to yourr offspring."

She hesitated only a second before locking her gloved palms over the front of the towering dorsal fin.

Then the water was rushing past her so fast it put pressure on her suit. In an instant (or so it seemed) she had traveled several hundred meters through the clear water.

Rachael was swimming alone beside a crystal cas- tle. It looked like an interlocked series of colored, spi- raled sh.e.l.ls that rose to within two meters of the surface. Several smaller constructs, miniature versions of the larger, grew from the reef base farther down.

"Isn't it grand. Mother?"

"Isn't what grand? Yes, it's beautiful, but-"

116 CACHALOT.

"I'm sorry. How could you know? Listen!" Rachael held a small metal sampling tool. She used it to tap one side of the growth. A distinct, mellifluous tone ran through the water. "It must be partially hollow."

Yellow and blue stripes ran around the sh.e.l.l spirals, a collection of unicorn horns. The sh.e.l.ls were pale green to transparent. In the center of each sh.e.l.l pulsed crimson organs, sending colorless fluid throughout the individual organisms.

"Okay, it's grand." Cora glanced around, relieved to find that Merced was nowhere in sight. She still couldn't keep herself from asking, "Where's Pucara?"

"Off somewhere, investigating on his own. Think he follows me everywhere?"

"Doesn't he?" Cora quickly added, "I'm sorry, that's none of my business."

"That's right. Mother," Rachael agreed with dis- arming cheerfulness. "It's none of your business." She swam up a meter or so and tapped the spiral central cone where it tapered considerably. Again Cora heard the ringing, only an octave higher this time. "I'll bet several people working in unison could play these."

So that was it. For just a moment, Cora had be- lieved her daughter's scientific interests had been stim- ulated by the cone creatures. "Must you always be thinking of music?"

"I don't see any harm in combining my work with my music." Then, more seriously, "There's something else here you probably ought to have a look at." She arched her back, kicked downward. Cora followed.

Strewn between the crystal pinnacle and its lesser companions were several huge fragments of metal.

The battered pieces of coated stelamic still retained their sheen and even markings. The inscriptions showed that they had been components of some large structure; a warehouse, possibly. Several of them were a third the size of the Caribe.

Cora drifted over one, studying the torn edges. "It

117.

doesn't look as if this has been severed-by an energy beam, for example."

Rachael was inspecting another fragment nearby.

"Here's one that's badly dented, but it's still intact."

Cora joined her daughter, saw that she was right.

Torn supports were still fastened to an unbreached container. The tank itself was bent almost in half, flattened in the center by some tremendous force.

"A whale's tail could do that," Rachael murmured.

She looked behind her. "What do you think, Wenko- seemansa?"

The orca swam over, turned his head, and exam- ined the ruined tank with his right eye. "Howw frrag- ile arre the arrtificial constrructions of hummankind.

A whale's tail?" He sniffed, sending bubbles skyward.

"Could doo thhis little thhing a whale's brreathhhh."

"We've no evidence yet to support that hypothesis, Rachael. A weapon could do the same."

"What kind of weapon?"

"I don't know, dammit," her mother snapped. "I'm a marine biologist, not a munitions specialist. Pucara might know, and Sam surely will have some ideas.

Wonder where they've got to?"

"Sooon will thhey rejoin you." Wenkoseemansa let loose a sharply rising whistle that the translator could not refine into human terms, then vanished in a rush of displaced water.

He wasn't gone long before he returned with Pucara Merced clinging to his dorsal fin. Latehoht and Sam rejoined the others seconds later.

The four humans drifted, exchanging thoughts and theories while the two orcas waited interestedly near- by.

"What about the possibility of a rogue whale?"

Merced suggested. "A deranged one."

"One whale?" Mataroreva was properly skeptical.

"Well, what kind of weapons, then?"

"Any number of possibilities there." The peace-

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forcer eyed the twisted tank, which they had tenta- tively identified as a type used to store liquid protein.

"Let's not forget that the force of another, nearby ex- plosion could have caused this. Also, there are com- pressed gas weapons which could directly do such damage. Or a storm wave could have caused it. I'm afraid this isn't much in the way of evidence."

"And no hint that energy weapons were used,"

Cora added. "That's obvious even to me."

"Could someone," Merced continued, "be trying to make it look as if the whales are causing the destruc- tion, to cover their own activities? By using those compressed gas weapons, for example?"

"Could be," Mataroreva agreed. "It would add up with what the old catodon told us about the impossi- bility of any whales actually being responsible."

"There's more over this way." Merced had drifted off to their right, down a gla.s.s canyon. "Smaller stuff.

We might find something more specific."

"I doubt it." Cora moved to join him. "The local experts have undoubtedly sifted everything already.

Though you never know. What do you hope to find, Pucara?"