almost relieved. The lamps on the sled’s display were mostly green, surprisingly, after the treatment the sled had received.
One of the telltales caught his eye—it indicated an airdome in operation. Suddenly Toshio noticed a faint, singing sound; it was a whistling of patience and reverence.
* The Ocean is as is as is—
the endless sigh of dreaming—
* Of other seas that are that are—
and others in them, dreaming—*
Toshio reached out and snapped on the hydrophones.
“Brookida! Are you okay! Is your air all right?”
There was a sigh, tremulous and tired.
“Fleet-t-t Fingers, hello. Thank you for saving my life. You flew as truly as any Tursiops.”
“That ship we saw must have crashed! If that’s what it was you can bet there will be aftershocks! Maybe we’d better stay down here a while. I’ll turn on the sonar so others can find us and come for air while the waves pass.” He flicked a switch, and immediately a low series of clicks emanated into the surrounding water. Brookida groaned.
“They will not come, Toshio. Can’t you hear them? They won’t answer your call.”
Toshio frowned. “They have to! Hikahi will know about the aftershocks. They’re probably looking for us right now! Maybe I’d better head back…” He moved to turn the sled and blow ballast. Brookida had started him worrying.
“Don’t go, Toshio! It will do no good for you to die as well! Wait until the waves pass-s-s! You must live to tell Creideiki!”
“What are you talking about?”
“Listen, Sharp-Eyes. Listen!”
Toshio shook his head, then swore and pulled back on the throttle until the engine died. He turned up the gain on the hydrophones.
“Do you hear?” Brookida asked.
Toshio cocked his head and listened. The sea was a mess of intonation. The roar of the departing wave dopplered down as he lay there. Schools of fish made panicky noises. All around came the reports of rockslides and surf pounding on the islands.
Then he heard it. The shrill repetitive squeals of Primal Dolphin. No modern dolphin spoke it when fully in command of his faculties.
That, in itself, was bad news.
One of the cries was clear. He could easily make out the basic distress call. It was the earliest Dolphin signal human scientists had understood.
But the other noise … at least three voices were involved in that one. It was a strange sound, very poignant and very wrong!
“It isss rescue fever,” Brookida groaned. “Hikahi is beached and injured. She might have stopped this, but she is delirious and now adds to the problem!”
“Hikahi…”
“Like Creideiki, she is an adept of Keneenk … the study of logical discipline. She would have been able to force the others to ignore the cries of those washed ashore, to make them dive to safety for a’t-time.”
“Don’t they realize there will be aftershocks?”
“Shockss hardly matter, Sharp-Eyes!” Brookida cried. “They may beach themselves without assist! You are Calafian. How can you not know this about usss? I thrash here to go and die answering that call!”
Toshio groaned. Of course he knew about rescue fever, in which panic and fear washed aside the veneer of civilization, leaving a cetacean with only one thought—to save his comrades, whatever the personal risk. Every few years the tragedy struck even the highly advanced fins of Calafia. Akki had told him, once, that sometimes the sea itself seemed to be calling for help. Some humans claimed to have felt it, too—particularly those who took dolphin RNA in the rites of the Dreamer Cult.
Once upon a time the Tursiops, or bottlenose dolphin, had been about the least likely cetacean to beach himself. But genetic engineering had upset the balance somewhere. As the genes of other species were spliced onto the basic Tursiops model, a few things had been thrown out of kilter. For three generations human geneticists had been working on the problem. But for now the fins swam along a knife edge, where
One of the telltales caught his eye—it indicated an airdome in operation. Suddenly Toshio noticed a faint, singing sound; it was a whistling of patience and reverence.
* The Ocean is as is as is—
the endless sigh of dreaming—
* Of other seas that are that are—
and others in them, dreaming—*
Toshio reached out and snapped on the hydrophones.
“Brookida! Are you okay! Is your air all right?”
There was a sigh, tremulous and tired.
“Fleet-t-t Fingers, hello. Thank you for saving my life. You flew as truly as any Tursiops.”
“That ship we saw must have crashed! If that’s what it was you can bet there will be aftershocks! Maybe we’d better stay down here a while. I’ll turn on the sonar so others can find us and come for air while the waves pass.” He flicked a switch, and immediately a low series of clicks emanated into the surrounding water. Brookida groaned.
“They will not come, Toshio. Can’t you hear them? They won’t answer your call.”
Toshio frowned. “They have to! Hikahi will know about the aftershocks. They’re probably looking for us right now! Maybe I’d better head back…” He moved to turn the sled and blow ballast. Brookida had started him worrying.
“Don’t go, Toshio! It will do no good for you to die as well! Wait until the waves pass-s-s! You must live to tell Creideiki!”
“What are you talking about?”
“Listen, Sharp-Eyes. Listen!”
Toshio shook his head, then swore and pulled back on the throttle until the engine died. He turned up the gain on the hydrophones.
“Do you hear?” Brookida asked.
Toshio cocked his head and listened. The sea was a mess of intonation. The roar of the departing wave dopplered down as he lay there. Schools of fish made panicky noises. All around came the reports of rockslides and surf pounding on the islands.
Then he heard it. The shrill repetitive squeals of Primal Dolphin. No modern dolphin spoke it when fully in command of his faculties.
That, in itself, was bad news.
One of the cries was clear. He could easily make out the basic distress call. It was the earliest Dolphin signal human scientists had understood.
But the other noise … at least three voices were involved in that one. It was a strange sound, very poignant and very wrong!
“It isss rescue fever,” Brookida groaned. “Hikahi is beached and injured. She might have stopped this, but she is delirious and now adds to the problem!”
“Hikahi…”
“Like Creideiki, she is an adept of Keneenk … the study of logical discipline. She would have been able to force the others to ignore the cries of those washed ashore, to make them dive to safety for a’t-time.”
“Don’t they realize there will be aftershocks?”
“Shockss hardly matter, Sharp-Eyes!” Brookida cried. “They may beach themselves without assist! You are Calafian. How can you not know this about usss? I thrash here to go and die answering that call!”
Toshio groaned. Of course he knew about rescue fever, in which panic and fear washed aside the veneer of civilization, leaving a cetacean with only one thought—to save his comrades, whatever the personal risk. Every few years the tragedy struck even the highly advanced fins of Calafia. Akki had told him, once, that sometimes the sea itself seemed to be calling for help. Some humans claimed to have felt it, too—particularly those who took dolphin RNA in the rites of the Dreamer Cult.
Once upon a time the Tursiops, or bottlenose dolphin, had been about the least likely cetacean to beach himself. But genetic engineering had upset the balance somewhere. As the genes of other species were spliced onto the basic Tursiops model, a few things had been thrown out of kilter. For three generations human geneticists had been working on the problem. But for now the fins swam along a knife edge, where
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