The Emissary (21 page)

Sam was flippant. “Is this a recurring dream?”

“Turn it all off!” Jamie ordered.

“Turn what off?”

“Everything. Cut the motors, turn off the radar. Now!”

Sam sighed. “Well, what will it be, Jamie? Off, on … on, off—what?”

“There is a huge pod of Orcas ahead of us—there are at least a hundred, and they have babies. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“Yeah, funny thing about the ocean. Whales live here,” said Sam, dryly.

“Don’t you understand? There’s a pod with their young out there—how dare you turn on all this equipment against my express wishes—turn it all off!”

“Turn what off? Do you even know what you’re talking about?”

“We need to steer away from this pod, that’s what I know.”

“I have nothing to do with navigation—didn’t we already have that conversation? Go to the bridge—the captain should be up there now.”

“I went there first. Nobody was there.”

“Listen, Jamie, you can’t go ballistic every time you see a few whales in the water. This is the open ocean.”

“This isn’t a ‘few’ whales. There is a community of them out there—maybe hundreds. I want proof we’re not in the sanctuary.”

Sam turned on the intercom. “You there, Captain?”

“And a good morning to you,” he replied.

Upon hearing his voice, Jamie raced out of the room and went right to the bridge to find Jimbo. The intercom was open, and Sam could hear the whole conversation come down.

“I thought it was beyond clear that we were to avoid this sanctuary, Jimbo. Don’t tell me we’re not in it. I don’t believe it.”

“And a good morning to you, too,” he said.

“Sorry. Good morning, Jim. We’re in the sanctuary—yes, or no?”

“Just passing through. Cutting through these waters saves us a ton of time and fuel, and we’re no threat to any whales.”

“How much clearer did I need to be about this? Did you or did you not get briefed by Mat Anderson?”

“You’re going to have to chill out about this—it’s no big deal. We’re just passing through.”

“Can’t you see the whales ahead?”

“Yeah, I see them. Not unusual to see whales in the ocean, Miss Jamie—and they know how to swim out of the way, imagine?”

“How can you sit there and tell me ‘it’s no big deal’? You live on the water. Have you become so detached that you can’t feel what’s going on out around you? There are mothers and babies out there!” Jamie was almost hysterical. “And what has Sam turned on? All the equipment—what’s going on?”

Jimbo had had just about enough of Jamie and her histrionics.
“Look, Jamie. I can’t have you interfering with the navigation of this vessel. I have my orders. They come from headquarters.”

“All right,” she said, snapping at him. “They’re going to have to change, or you can drop me back at the harbor. Get me Mat on the radio, right away.”

“Call Mat at this time of the morning? On a weekend?”

“Do it anyway,” Jamie insisted. “I’ll take full responsibility.”

Laid back in his chair, eavesdropping on Jamie and the captain, Sam saw a large object shooting across the radar screen. He sat up attentively, tracking it, and quickly froze the image and ran a printout. From nowhere, another appeared on the same trajectory as the first; but faster than he could hit the key to print again, they both vanished without a trace—a virtual impossibility.

He grabbed his radar print, and burst into the bridge, interrupting them. “Captain,” he asked, “have you got a minute?” It was clear from Sam’s sense of urgency and the sideways glances that he wanted to speak to Jimbo in private.

Looking past Jamie, Jimbo said, “Talk to me. What you got?”

He walked up to Jimbo and spread the printout on the desk.

Jimbo looked at it, showing no expression at all. “Hmm,” he said, nonchalantly, “What the hell is that—a sub?” He looked up at his own screens, but there was nothing visible.

“You got me, sir. It’s nothing I’ve ever seen before—just picked it up on radar.”

“What’s its position?”

Again, Sam looked over at Jamie uncomfortably. “The thing is, it just disappeared off the screen, as fast as it came on.”

Jamie stepped in between them to see the printout.

“Exactly where was this, in relation to our coordinates?” Jimbo asked.

“It was about two miles ahead, then another showed up right behind it—before they both disappeared off the radar screen.”

“God, Jimbo, that’s right in the middle of the whales,” she said.

“Yeah, we’d be having a much bigger problem than upsetting a few whales if there were a couple of submarines ahead of us, now don’t you think? Relax. Probably a malfunction in the equipment—it happens … a false reading, most likely.”

“Malfunction? How curious,”
Sam thought. He studied Jimbo, trying to figure out what his game was. Radar doesn’t malfunction by showing distinct objects in the field. He figured the captain was making light of the information because Jamie was present … and yet he could just as easily have had Sam hold off until they were alone. What bizarre behavior—it wasn’t like the captain. He looked at Jimbo quizzically, unsure how to respond. Jimbo told him to keep tracking it and to keep him informed if it showed up again. Sam left the room, befuddled. Things were backwards—it should have been Jamie leaving the room with no answers, not him. Jimbo just nodded at him and then he folded the paper in half and placed it in the desk drawer, giving it relatively no importance.

“Wait—do you mind if I take a look at that?” she asked.

Reticent, he reached back into the drawer and handed the paper to Jamie, who placed it on the desk next to Jim, running her fingers over the image.

“Are you going to tell me you can get a hit off that?”

“Possibly.” She closed her eyes and held her left palm over the blip on the graph.

Jimbo kept his gaze fixed on her, anxious for her to open her eyes. After several minutes, he interrupted her: “What do you read?”

Jamie opened her eyes, slowly. She looked a bit dazed. “Do you believe there’s an extraterrestrial presence on this planet, Jim?”

He was nothing short of flabbergasted, but he held back, hiding it from her. “Should I?” he replied. It was all he could muster as a response.

Jamie knew she had to be careful about what she shared. She
wasn’t going to give away anything more than what she thought he would be able and willing to hear. “Shouldn’t we all, Captain Jim?”

“Well now, my dear Jamie, if you can run your hands over a map and tell us where the oil is, I’ll believe in just about anything—even little green men!”

Static from the intercom interrupted their discussion.

“Captain, can you hear me?” It was Philippe.

“Yeah, I hear you, Phil. What’s up?”

“Can you come down on main deck, sir? We have a situation down here.”

“What kind of situation?” Jimbo asked. He turned to Jamie and said, “This is one crazy way to start the morning.”

“I think you’d better see for yourself, Captain.”

“Talk to me, Phil. What’s the problem?”

Philippe hesitated. “We’ve got about fifty whales up close around the ship, and more are swimming in, from every direction.”

Jimbo replied, “I’m well aware of the Orcas. I’ve got Jamie up here already screaming about it.”

“No sir. These are Humpbacks. The ship is surrounded by a huge pod of humpback whales.”

“Humpbacks in Orca territory? C’mon, man, you’re the biologist! You know that’s not going to happen.”

“Captain, I’ve walked the whole deck, stem to stern. I’m telling you we are surrounded by humpback whales. You need to come down and take a look at this, with your own eyes.”

“They’re just changing shifts up here. I’m waiting on Brady and then I’ll be down.”

“What in god’s name is happening?” Jamie headed out the door. “Are you or are you not running sonar?”

Jimbo looked guilty, but said nothing.

“Tell Sam to cut the damned sonar, Jimbo—now!” She ran out the door, down the stairs, and out to the deck. There was Fin,
crouched down at the drain, where he could look out at the ocean. She could not believe what she was seeing. Swimming up alongside the ship, several huge humpback whales appeared to be almost closing in on them. As she stood there, in utter astonishment, Philippe approached her. He looked completely bewildered.

“Never in my life have I been witness to any whale behavior like this.”

One whale in particular, a big female, was slapping her fluke at the surface, spraying so much water over the ship it reached the height of the main deck.

“This is dangerous!” Jamie said, looking down at her. She could feel the great mammal’s anguish, which projected Jamie, once again, back to the beach. She felt the spirit of the mother whale in New Zealand, in the mighty being below, reminding her of the voice from the other side:
“Go deep. Listen to the messenger. Find what’s hidden.”

Philippe pulled her away from the railing, where they were both getting drenched in the spray, and walked her closer to the doorway. He unzipped the walkie-talkie from the inside pocket of his waterproof parka. “Captain, are you there?”

Fin stayed up against the railing, fixated.

“Yeah, Brady is on his way up, and then I’ll be down.”

“You need to come down here now.”

“I said I’m coming! Hold your horses.”

Jamie grabbed the walkie-talkie out of Philippe’s hands and shouted into it. “It’s the sonar! The whales are screaming … they can’t bear it! Tell Sam to cut the sonar immediately!”

Jamie and Philippe watched in consternation as the scene beyond the railing of the ship became more threatening by the minute. Huge humpback whales swam menacingly close to the ship, and more were coming in, joined by their natural enemies—the Orcas: side by side, united, in some sort of rebellion against the ship. As
impossible as that seemed, against everything that is known about Cetacean behavior, there they were, holding the ship hostage.

First Liz and then, moments later, Sam appeared on deck, stunned by the scene that surrounded them. Sam went over to the railing, to see for himself. He couldn’t fathom that he was looking out on at least fifty humpback whales, all swimming alongside the ship. “What the hell?”

“Are you ready to listen to me, yet?” Jamie snarled, brushing past him on her way back up to the bridge. As she approached from the upper-deck hallway, she caught Jimbo in conversation, talking on the ship’s radio.

“… I had to, sir. I have a situation out here.”

Mat’s unmistakable voice came through loud and clear. “How could you lose it, Jimmy boy? Turn the damn sonar back on.”

“Boss, we’ve got about fifty pissed-off Cetaceans encircling the ship, and there’s another fifty coming in. I have never seen anything like this in my life.”

“Do what?”

“The ship is surrounded by five thousand tons of distressed whales. We still don’t have a clue what’s going down.”

“I don’t give a goddamn about a bunch of whales—do you read me? What part of this don’t you understand?”

Jamie listened, stealthily, from the hallway.

“I don’t think you’re really getting the picture here, Mat. I’m talking we are surrounded by, and I repeat: about five thousand tons of agitated whales, up close and uncomfortable. The ship is big, but it ain’t that big! It’s already an emergency.”

“Am I really hearing this? Don’t forget what you’re there for, Captain.”

“Gotta go, incoming from the Coast Guard—I’ll keep you posted.”

“Wait a min …”

“Over and out.”

Jamie took her cue to enter. “Please, Jimbo, you need to cut the engines.”

“Jamie, I don’t have time for this right now.”

He dialed the Coast Guard. “This is
The Deepwater
, do you read? Over.”

The radio reverberated with the sound of static, but no one replied. “This is the captain of
The Deepwater
, do you read me? Over.”

“Yes, we read you. Over.”

“I’m passing through the Orca sanctuary at 128 degrees and I’m in a little trouble out here. Over.”

“Hold on, I’ll get navigation,” the first voice said. “Hey there, Captain Jimbo, it’s Tom here—what can I do for you?”

“Tommy, you better sit down for this one. I’m surrounded by a pod of about fifty big Humpbacks out here, right up close on all sides. Can’t even count’m. And I’ve got a huge Orca congregation ahead. Don’t know how to move. We’re in some serious trouble out here. Over.”

“Did I hear you correctly, Captain? Over.”

“Yeah, you heard me all right. I’m completely surrounded by estimate fifty or so whales, maybe more, and there’s a bunch more swimming towards us. They’re in some strange, aggressive behavior mode. Seems directed at the ship. Over.”

Tom started laughing. “Jimbo, did you have too much to drink last night, or is this another one of your practical jokes? Over.”

“This is no joke, Tommy. These boys are in a wild frenzy like I’ve never seen before, and they’re closing in on the ship. What’s the best course of action? Over.”

Back in the Coast Guard office, Tom and two other officers were seated in front of their computer monitors. As the conversation ensued, the two other men rolled their desk chairs back to listen
to what was transpiring. “Jimbo, there simply is no protocol for a ship being attacked by a gang of whales. Over.” Tom looked at his colleagues, and winked. He was still convinced Jimbo was joking with him.

“Well, dang me, Tommy—you think I don’t know that? There’s no punch line here, if that’s what you’re waiting for. This is an emergency. Over.”

It was the first time he’d ever heard fear in Jimbo’s voice. It made him realize, at last, that, however unprecedented the situation was, it was real and the situation seemed to be accelerating rapidly. “Get yourself out of there, Jimbo,” he said. “What’s holding you up? Over.”

“If I try to navigate out, I could have a mass kill on my hands, at the very least. If I cut the engines and try to wait it out … hell … there’s enough whale muscle out there to capsize the ship. This is a first for me, my friend—I don’t know how to move. Over.”

“Stand by,” Tom said, taking time to consult with his fellow officers.

Jimbo and Jamie looked at each other, both aware of the danger. He waited nervously for instructions, while Tom and his colleagues conferred. Jimbo was a skilled captain. Though it made no sense at all, if he was talking “emergency,” then
The Deepwater
was in trouble. That was all they had to know.