LJ Idol Season 9 Week 7 - No True Scotsman
The continuing story of Kara and Keelie. The stories are, chronologically:
Week 5
Week 4
This week, and
Week 6
It wasn't as if Kara had never gone swimming with Eekeelie and her pod before; quite the opposite, in fact. Most of the pod was used to Kara tagging along, floating off to the side if they were fishing or doing other activities Kara couldn't take part is due to her appalling lack of adequate appendages. But by the fifteenth time another group member swam along with them and chattered while Eekeelie ignored them, Kara was curious.
'Keelie...' started Kara.
'No talk now Kara. Must think. Must swim. Hold on. Almost there.' Eekeelie's response was abrupt in tone, not normal at all.
Kara swam along beside her, holding her dorsal fin for speed and kept her thoughts to herself. Or almost to herself. Soon her surroundings changed. There were more dolphins around her, more than just Eekeelie's pod. More than any pod she had ever seen. Hundreds of dolphins, ones Kara had never seen, maybe even thousands, joined the pod all heading the same direction.
Eekeelie kept swimming the same direction, but she moved obviously away from the ones who ventured close to her and Kara, telling the other dolphins through her body language alone that contact was not desired right now. The water was churning all around them, though, and Kara could barely catch her breath even with the regulator. No human had ever been a part of a superpod, but it looked like she was about to be, possibly even already was.
Kara noted all of the behavior they had been studying for so many years. The playfulness, the touching, the vocalizations. She saw pods meet, dance together and break apart, all within the larger group of the superpod. The patterns were mesmerizing. She followed them with great interest, noting that even through it all, they all kept headed in approximately the same direction.
Suddenly their speed slowed to a near stop. Kara's head broke the water and she dropped the regulator from her mouth to display a dazzling grin. Her little corner of the ocean was calm enough to breathe without a splash of salt water thrown in. Eekeelie was still non-responsive to her thoughts.
A splash close enough to make her turn her face, and Dr. Hiller's smile joined hers. Eekeelie and Dopey swam slowly enough that Kara dove under Eekeelie and came up on her other side to grasp the fin again, and looked at Dr. Hiller with the same awe he was looking around at the spectacle they were the first humans to see from the inside.
“We're in a superpod.”
“I know, Kara, I know!”
“This is....” she tried to come up with a world to express what she was feeling. Somehow amazing or awe-inspiring just didn't even cut it.
“I know!” The grin still hadn't left Dr. Hiller's face.
“Has Dopey told you what's going on?” She hated to use the silly dwarven name she'd given the bottlenose before they'd been properly introduced, but none of the humans could even come close to replicating his signature whistle, not like they could Eekeelie's.
“He doesn't talk in my brain you know, not like Eekeelie does you, but the images were of a big important meeting.... I had no idea how big. This is so far beyond my expectations.”
“Did he give you an idea of what the meeting was about at least?”
“No. He was worried, I caught that much. I felt like it had something to do with us, but that was about all I got.”
Kara's forehead crinkled into a frown. “I hope they're not still mad about the implants.”
“Years later and you still feel responsible, don't you Kara? We would have found a way to trap them and implant the devices. You just happened to help... speed things along a little. Besides, Eekeelie forgave you.”
“She's not the one I'm worried about,” sputtered out Kara as Eekeelie sped up again.
Kara quickly checked the seat of her mask and popped her regulator back in her mouth as they dove under and around the mingling pods. She looked around to make sure Dopey and Dr. Hiller were nearby as the water became a deeper blue, signifying their movement to deeper water. Their movement was also now different than it had been before. Instead of moving in the same direction with the other pods, Eekeelie was now cutting across their movement aiming towards what seemed to be the center they had all been circling. The eye of the storm.
A large old dolphin, female to Kara's eye, held herseslf still in a vertical position chattering with the dolphins around her. Kara reached to re-grasp Eekeelie's dorsal fin but was shrugged off.
'Keelie?'
But Kara's question was left unanswered. Eekeelie and Dopey left her and Dr. Hiller floating in the sea and went to the large female. They stood nose-down in the water for a moment and then brushed against her pectoral fins, nuzzling her as they would a mother.
'A greeting ritual,' thought Kara. 'Formal, but not too formal, or they wouldn't be nuzzling her.'
She looked over at Dr. Hiller and could see him making mental notes of the behavior as well. The gears were clearly turning inside his brain.
'Kara Martin.' If Kara could have jumped with surprise in the water, she would have. She'd gotten used to being alone with her thoughts on the trip here, with Eekeelie being so silent.
'Yes, Eekeelie.' Formality seemed to be called for with the use of her last name.
'This is my.... ur-mother...' A signature whistle echoed through Kara's brain, one she could never, ever hope to vocalize. 'She played with [Dopey] and I when our mothers hunted. She taught us much. She worries about us now. She wants to talk to you. Will you talk to her?'
'Eekeelie, I can't talk to her. You know it was the “big pinch” that makes it so I can talk to you. Will you be an interpreter?'
'No Kara. She wants to talk to you. No interpreter. Ask Doctor Man. He can make it so you talk to ur-mother.'
Kara squinted at Dr. Hiller and then motioned to the surface. She swam rapidly, not waiting to see if he would follow.
Spitting her regulator out, she started in on him. “Of all the lousy, no-good things to do. Kara and Dopey invite us for a swim and you bring more implants? Wasn't it enough that we betrayed these two?”
“Whoa! Not that I was planning to use them, but how in the heck did you know about that?”
“Keelie told me. You no-good, lousy, son of an ape. I thought we were colleagues, maybe even beginning to be friends. How could you...?”
“Stop it! Stop yelling at me like I'm some child caught stealing candy from the store. Not only am I nominally your boss, but I've also got about 10 years on you, in case you hadn't noticed.” When Kara seemed to have calmed down enough to let him continue, he did so. “I haven't used them, and I will not use them until Dopey or Kara explains what they are and gets consent. But they are a standard part of the diving gear now. If you're feeling so smug, why don't you check the pouch hanging off of your gear belt, the one on your left.”
Kara felt the pouch to her left and her mouth opened and closed like a fish out of water until a stray splash made her sputter.
'Eekeelie?'
'Kara?'
“Have you explained to the ur-mother about the “big pinch”?'
'Yes Kara. She wants to talk to you.'
'You know, she might not be able to talk to me right away, maybe not at all. The big brains still haven't figured out why I was the only one you could talk to.' And boy, are they still mad about that!
'Big brains stupid sometimes Kara. I could only talk to you because you the only one I want to talk to. Ur-mother want to talk to you. No problem.'
Kara's eyes widened. “Those absolute stinkers!”
“What did Eekeelie say?”
“Would you believe that either of these jokers could have talked to anyone who wore the devices? They just didn't talk until they found someone they wanted to talk to.”
“Are you kidding me?”
“No, and we're about to find that out for ourselves because Keelie's and Dopey's godmother, or babysitter, or some-such, wants to talk to me. Now.”
She didn't wait for his response, but re-seated her mask and regulator, and dove towards the ur-mother. Fumbling at the pouch on her left hip, she found the implant gun and pulled it out.
'Keelie, is she sure? I don't want to give her the “big pinch” and then have her - or anyone else for that matter,' Kara eyed the other dolphins swimming nearby, 'get mad at me because I hurt her.'
'She sure Kara. Ur-mother wants to talk to you. Now. Stop with worry. Give her big pinch and talk.'
Kara swam slowly towards the large female, feeling scrutinized from all sides. She held the little implant gun up for the ur-mother to see, then pressed it against her skin. Dr. Hiller swam up beside her, gently adjusted the positioning and angle, then moved away. Kara closed her eyes, held her breath... and squeezed the trigger.
The ur-mother darted away, barely missing Kara with her fluke. She spun around several times, swam back and forth, even leaped out of the water a couple of times before returning to her serene pose at the center of the eye. Eekeelie swam close and rubbed against the spot where Kara had implanted the device. The ur-mother seemed to be ignoring her.
'THAT HURT!'
The new voice in Kara's head startled her. She looked at Dr. Hiller with wide eyes and realized he was looking back with the same stunned expression. He nodded. They could both hear her.
'I am sorry, ur-mother. Eekeelie told me that she had explained the “big pinch” to you.'
'She had. I'm afraid to say that I did not believe it would hurt quite as much as she said it would. Children can be whiny about pinches and scrapes.'
Dr. Hiller chimed in. 'We don't mean for it to hurt. That's just the only way to get the device close enough to..'
'You will remain quiet.' The ur-mother thundered over Hiller's explanation in both of their heads. ' I did this to talk to the girl, not to put up with your babbling. That it also means I can hear you is of little consequence to me. So shut off your mind and let the girl and I speak.'
'Now, girl...'
'My name is Kara Martin. I am an adult human. I have treated you with dignity and as an equal, ur-mother. I would ask that you do the same.' Kara ignored Hiller shaking his head off to the side and stared down the ur-mother as best she could through her mask.
'Hmph.'
The ur-mother swam up for a breath, then around in a circle, nudging Kara from behind, poking her in the stomach, before resuming her spot.
'You are very rude, Ka-ra Mar-tin. Very few are rude to me. I think I like you.” The ur-mother's mouth opened in a wide grin.
Kara waited.
'I asked Eekeelie to bring you to me because she is young and inclined to do silly things like the young so often do. Before she was even weaned, her mother let her spend so much time in the air, she nearly dried out.' The ur-mother sent an image of a dried starfish, like some that Kara had on display in her bathroom at home. 'When we asked her why, she told us she liked to look at the sparkles of the above-water. Now she tells me you want to take her to one of the sparkles. I wanted to see if you could be trusted to take care of one barely off the teat.'
Kara gasped and choked on the water that came in around her mouthpiece. She could not breathe and, out of desperation, motioned to Hiller to take her to the surface.
'I'm sorry, ur-mother, I will return. I need to be out of the water for the moment.'
'I will be here Ka-ra Mar-tin.'
Eekeelie followed Kara to the surface to help support her, and to take a few breaths herself.
When Kara had cleared the salt water from her lungs she gasped, “She knows about the colony ship.”
“I heard.” Dr. Hiller replied with a wry smile. “Whether or not she wants to listen to me, she sure wants everyone to hear her.”
“How does she know about the colony ship?”
“Well, you read the report. You knew about the long-term goal of this experiment. Maybe it slipped through your thoughts to Eekeelie? Maybe it slipped through my thoughts to Dopey.” Dr. Hiller frowned. “Though I'm not sure he would understand such concepts.”
"So what do we tell her?”
“What do we tell her? Hell woman, we tell her the truth!”
Kara thought for a moment, and then nodded. Of course they would tell her the truth.
'Ur-mother?'
'Yes Ka-ra Mar-tin?'
'May I stay here while we finish our conversation? Dr. Hiller and I cannot talk like you and I can.'
'You may Ka-ra Mar-tin. Though I don't see what the Doctor Man has to do with our conversation. But if you feel more comfortable there, you may stay. For now.'
“Thank you ur-mother. Now, about what you said. Yes, we are building a ship, like the ones that go across the ocean. They are closed to keep us safe and will take us to the sparkles, the stars that you see in the night sky - the above-water. Specifically, this ship will take us to another planet, like this one, that travels around one of those stars. It has water and fish. The humans who explored it tell us that it is safe for both dolphins and humans.'
'Are there no predators? No sharks on this... other planet?'
She looked at Dr. Hiller with a question in her eyes.
“No large predators that they've found. But there's always the chance that they missed something. The Earth is 71% water - Valtameri is over 90% water. And you know we've only explored about 5% of our own planet's oceans. They couldn't possibly find everything in a quick survey.”
'We don't think so, ur-mother, but we don't know for sure.'
'Thank you for not lying to me. The Doctor Man was not talking directly to me, but he thinks quite loudly.'
The ur-mother swam to the surface and positioned herself eye to eye with Kara.
'When you take Eekeelie to the sparkles in the above-water - the stars in the sky - you will be careful of her. You will treat her like your own young and die for her if necessary?'
'Ur-mother, I would do that even if we stayed here on Earth.'
The ur-mother stared at her with the one eye for a long moment. 'Yes. I see that you would. Not just for Eekeelie. For any of us. How odd. Perhaps that is why Eekeelie chose you. You are odd for a human, she is odd for a doll-fin - what a funny name you have for us - but perhaps this is how it was meant to be.'
Another long stare. Kara held her breath.
'Eekeelie may go with you to the stars, Ka-ra Mar-tin.'
'But as for you, Doctor Man....' The large female swam over to eye Dr. Hiller as she had done Kara. 'You may not take [Dopey]. He would die even with you to take care of him. He may die without Eekeelie to take care of him but I will keep him close to me. No, if you are to take one of us to the stars, it will not be [Dopey]. I will find one such, and send him to you. Eekeelie will tell you when he comes. You may thank me now.'
'Thank you ur-mother,' began Hiller. 'May I make a request?'
'Hmph. You may, since you ask so nicely, Doctor Man.'
'Will you spread the word and let any come to us who want to go? We have more than one ship going to the stars. The one we will be traveling on is just one. Several of the planets have large bodies of water. We would like to take as many dolphins as would like to go. We would also like to continue working with you here, in the waters of the Earth, and would like dolphins willing to do that, as well.'
'I will share the news Doctor Man, but I do not think many truly of our kind will want to visit the stars. Eekeelie is unusual, not only for her coloring. I will send them to you, though, if I find them. And you will send the other humans to me. I will talk to them before any more of our children feel the big pinch.'
'Thank you ur-mother. You are very kind.'
'And you are very polite for a human, Doctor Man. I find myself liking you as well.' She grinned at him before diving below the surface again and they heard a chuckle in their heads.
As Eekeelie and Dopey led them back towards the shore, they heard one final thought from the ur-mother. 'How odd these humans are. How very, very odd.'