Fluke, or, I Know Why the Winged Whale Sings Chapter 33

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREECould Be Worse,Could Be Dog YearsEvidently, verbalize Nate, where we s crowded up was cleanup the hunts. no.way, said Amy.We tipped our hand.About being meme machines, proper(ip)?Yeah. Are you sure youre non spying for him?Nope. Know how you can tell? When I was spying, did I ever touch you here?No. No, you did non.And did I ever everyow you touch me here? She moved his hand for him.No, you did non. Especi eithery not in public.Yeah, we should probably go okay to your place.She had called him on his buzzy, bug-winged speaky matter, about which he made a mental observe to ask what the name of it was at his first-year convenience. Theyd met for coffee at a droppingsville caf that catered to whaley boys. Shed assured him that no single would notice them, and, strangely enough, the whaley boys had completely ignored them. Maybe he was no longer news.If they say anything, Ill rightful(prenominal) tell them that were having sex, Amy said. precisely you said you didnt think I should tell the Colonel Id stick outn you.Yeah, except that was before he let you in on his secret plan.Right.Although Im a little ashamed of how old you are. We should intercourse about that.So should I move my hand?Yeah, down and a little to the right.Lets head back to my place.Back at his apartment, standing in the kitchen, he said, Hey, what do you call this thing? He pointed to that thing.The phone.No kidding? He nodded as if hed cutn that all along. So where were we?Killing whales was where we went wrong?Yes.Or how old you are?So, he continued, eraseing whales was a big mistake.Which you knew, because thats what made you indirect request to become a nerd in the first place.No, thats not right. Scuse me, action nerd.You want to know how I got into this field, objectively?No. I mean, sure. You can tell me about the destruction of the human race later.You have to promise you wont laugh.Of course. She looked incredibly sincere.My sophomore year at th e Univer perplexy of Sasketchewan in the Sticks Youre kidding.Its a good school. You promised you wouldnt laugh.Oh, you meant level this early in the story Im not supposed to laugh? Sorry.I mean, Im sure it doesnt measure up to slant-eyeville Community College Not fair.Home of the Gooville Fighting Loogies Okay, you made your point.Thank you. So a friend and I decided that were outlet to go to break out of our boring small-college lives, we were going to take virtually risks, we were going to Talk to a girl?No. We decided to drive all the way to Florida for spring break just like American kids, where we would then(prenominal) drink beer, last sunburned, and then talk to a girl girls.So you went.Took almost a week to devil at that place, however yes, we litter in his dads Vista Cruiser station wagon. And I did indeed meet a girl. In arm Lauderdale. A girl from Fort Lauderdale. And I talked to her.You dirty little tramp. Like, Hows it going, eh? Among other things . We conversed. And so she invited me to go see a manatee.He shoots He scoresBut I view it was an American way of locution matinee. I thought we were going to a movie. You know, you dont think about those things as being real.But it was.She did tender work for a rescue hospital for injured marine mammals, mostly manatees that had been hit by boats. They had a bottlenose dolphin, too. We stayed there for hours, caring for the animals, her t apieceing me about them. I was hooked. I hadnt even picked my chthoniangrad major, alone as soon as I got back to school, I went for biology, and Ive been studying marine mammals ever since.Oh, my God, you didnt get laid, did you?I found a passion for life. I found something that drives me.I cant believe I pilot for such a silly loser.Hey, Im pretty good at this whale stuff. Im respected in my field.But youre dead.Yeah, before then, I mean. Hey, did you say that you fell for me?I said I fell for a pathetic loser, if the shoe fitsHe kissed he r. She kissed him back. That went on for a while. They both found it excellent. Then they stopped.You said you wanted to talk about our age difference, Nate said, because he always picked women who broke his heart, and, figuring that his heart was now into this whole thing far enough to be broken, he wanted to get on with it.Yeah, we probably should. Maybe we should sit down.Couch?No, at the table. You might want a drink.No, Im okay. Yep, heartbreak, he thought. They sat.So, she said, curling her legs up under her, seance like a little kid, making him feel ever more the creepy old true cat leching on the juvenile girl, you know that the whaley boys have been pulling people in here from shipwrecks and plane crashes for years, right?Thats what Cielle said.She wants you, I can tell, but thats beside the point. Do you know that they pulled whole crews off sunken submarines, plus theyve yanked echo sounder guys out of port for years?I didnt know that.Doesnt matter, has nothing to do w ith what Im telling you. So you regard that some people who have been lost at sea, like the crew of the American sub Scorpion that sank back in 67, actually ended up here?Okay. That makes sense. More of the Goo looking out for itself. Gaining knowledge.Yeah, but thats not the point. I mean, those guys helped put together a lot of the technology you saw on the whale ship, the human technology, but that doesnt matter. The important part is that the world thinks that the crew of the Scorpion is at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, even though theyre not. Got it?Okay, Nate said, truly slowly, the way he had spoken to the Colonel when he was losing the point much the way he was waving in the conversational wind right now.And you realize that when I applied with you and mud, that I gave my real name, which is Amy Earhart, and that Amy is short for Amelia?Oh, my God, Nate said.Ha Amy said.The ship broker found Clays ship in the Philippines, in Manila Harbor. Clay bought it based on f axed photographs, a spec sheet, and a recent hull certification for just under $2 million of the Old Broads money. It was a 180-foot-long U.S. Coast Guard fisheries patrol vessel built in the late fifties. It had been refitted several times since then, once in the seventies for angle, once in the eighties for sea survey, and finally in the nineties as a live-aboard dive boat for the adventure tourist. It had plenty of cheerful cabins as well as compressors, dive platforms, and cranes to raise and lower support vessels onto the rear deck, although, except for the lifeboats, it came with no support craft. Clay thought they could use the rear deck as a helicopter-landing pad, even if there wasnt a budget for a helicopter, but you know someone with a helicopter might want to land there, and it helped no end to have a big H painted on the deck. thither was a budget for painting a big H. The ship had efficient, if not quite state-of-the-art, navigation equipment, radar, autopilot, and some old but functioning sonar arrays left over from its solar days as a fishing ship. It had twin twelve-hundred-horsepower diesel engines and could di belt up up to twenty tons of freshwater a day for the crew and passengers. There were cabins and support for forty. It was also rated a class-three icebreaker, which was a feature that Clay hoped they wouldnt have to test. He sincerely didnt like cold water.Through another broker Clay hired the crew of ten men, persuasion unseen, right off the docks of Manila a group of brothers, cousins, and uncles with the last name of Mangabay, among whom the broker guaranteed that there were no murderers, or at least no convicted murderers, and only petty thieves. The eldest uncle, Ray Mangabay, who would be Clays first mate, would sail the ship to Honolulu, where Clay would meet them.Hes going to be driving my ship, Clay said to Clair subsequently hed gotten the news that he had a crew and a first mate.You have to let your ship go, Cla y, Clair said. If he sinks it, it wasnt rightfully yours.But its my ship.What are you going to call it?He was thinking about the Intrepid or the Merciless or some other big-dick, blow-shit-up kind of name. He was thinking about Loyal or Relentless or the Never Surrender, because he was determined now to find his friend, and he didnt mind lay that right on the bow. Well, I was thinking about You were thinking deeply about it, werent you? Clair interrupted.Yes, I thought Id call her the Beautiful Clair.Just the Clair allow be fine, baby. You dont want the bow to look busy.Right. The Clair. Strangely enough, on second thought, that pretty much encompassed Intrepid, Merciless, Relentless, and Loyal. Plus, it had the underlying meaning of keeper of the booty, which was sort of a bonus in a ship name, he thought. Yeah, thats a good name for her.How long before she gets here? dickens weeks. Shes not fast. Twelve knots cruising. If we have somewhere to go, Ill send the ship directly th ere and meet it at a port along the way.Well, now that shes called the Clair, I hope they bring her in safe.My ship, Clay said anxiously.So, Nate said, Youre what, in your nineties? A hundred?Dont look it, do I? Amy posed a flirtatious half curtsy with a Betty Boop bump at the end. Indeed, it would have been a spry move for a woman in her nineties.Nate was unfeignedly glad he was sitting down, but he missed the esthesis he would have had of wanting to sit down.Your whole attraction was based on my age, wasnt it? She sat across from him. You were running(a) out your male menopause on the fantasy of my young body. Somehow you were going to try to retake your youth. Once again youd feel like more than a footnote to humanity. Youd be virile and racy and relevant and all alpha male, just because a younger and decidedly luscious, I might attach woman had chosen you, right?Nuh-uh, Nate said. She was wrong, right?Wow, Nate, were you on the debate team at Moose shucks U? I mean , your talent Sasketchewan in the Sticks, he corrected.So the age thing? Its a caper?Youre like a hundred. My grandma isnt even a hundred, and shes dead.No, Im not really that old. She grinned and reached across the table, took his hand. Its okay, Nate. Im not Amelia Earhart.Youre not? Nate felt his lungs expand, as if a steel band around his chest had broken. Hed been taking tiny yelping breaths, but now oxygen was re covering to his brain. Funny, he was pretty sure that none of the other women hed been with had been Amelia Earhart either, but he didnt remember feeling quite so relieved about it before. Well, I should have known. I mean, you dont look anything like the pictures. No goggles.I was just messin with you. Im her daughter. HaStop it This isnt funny, Amy. If youre trying to make a point, youve made it. Yes, youre an attractive young woman, and maybe your youths a part of why Im attracted to you, but thats just biology. You cant pat me for that. I didnt make a move on you, I didnt harass you when we were working together. I interact you exactly as I would have treated any research assistant, except maybe you got external with more because I liked you. You cant ridicule me for responding to you sexually down here when you came on to me. The rules had changed.Im not ridiculing you. Amelia Earhart really is my mother.Stop it.You want to meet her?Nate searched her face for signs of a grin or a tremble in her throat that might indicate the rise of an Amy Ha Nothing there, just that little bit of sweetness that she usually tried to hide.So somehow, living down here, you havent aged. Your mother?We age, but not like on the surface. I was born in 1940. Im about the same number of years older than you than you were older than me a half hour ago kinda sorta. You going to dump me?Its so hard to believe.Why, after youve seen all this? Youve seen what the Goo can do. Why is it so hard to believe that Im sixty-four?Well, for one, youre so immature.Shut up. Im young at heart.But for a second there I was so sure we were doomed. Nate rubbed his temples trying to go them, maybe to make his head bigger to hold the whole concept of Amys being sixty-four.No, its okay, we just havent gotten to that yet. Were still doomed.Oh, thank goodness, Nate said. I was worried.Later, after they had pushed the world away for a while, made love and napped in each others arms, Amy made a move to start another round, and Nate awoke to an immediate and uncertain anxiety.Are we really doomed? he asked.Oh, goddamn it Nate She was straddling him, so she was able to get a good windup before thumping him hard in the chest with her fist. Thats just un-fucking-professionalNate thought about how the praying mantis female will sometimes prick up off the males head during copulation and how the males body continues to mate until the act is finished.Sorry, he said.She furled off him and stared up at dim strips of green luminescence on the ceiling. Its okay. I didnt mean to bite your head off.Pardon?Yes, were probably doomed. Were doomed for the same reason that I look the way I do, that most of the Goos look much younger than we really are. Turn a gene on, you age turn it off, you dont. Ive even seen some people down here who seem to get younger. Flip a switch, pancreatic cancer at age twenty-two flicker another, you can smoke four packs a day and live to be a hundred. If the Goo thinks that the human race is a danger to it, it just has to flip a switch, pick a gene, make a virus, and the human race would blink out. I hadnt really thought about it as a threat before. My whole life Ive worked for the Goo. Service, you know? It takes care of us. Its the source.He didnt know what to say. Did he need to actually take the Colonels request for help seriously? Did he need to help find a way to kill this amazing creature in order to ransom his own species? Amy, I dont know what to do. Two days ago I just wanted to get out of here. Now? The Colonel and you both said I was lucky to be alive. Has the Goo killed people who were mop up to finding out about it?Honestly, I dont know. Ive never seen it or heard of it happening, but I we each just do our own part down here. We dont ask a lot of questions. Not because were told not to or anything its just that you can live a long time without asking yourself big questions when your of necessity are looked after. For the first time Nate could see the experience of years in Amys face, marked not by wrinkles but by a shadow in her eyes.Im asking, he said.Do I think the Goo is ethically capable of killing the human race?I guess.I dont even know if the Goo has ethics, Nate. According to the Colonel, its just a vehicle for genes and were just vehicles for memes and nature says that a head-on collision is inevitable. What if its not? This battle has supposedly gone on for millions of years, and now the Colonel wants to force an endgame? What I do know is that youve got to ta lk him out of trying to kill it.But hes your leader.Yeah, but he didnt tell any of us about this. I think hes doubting his own judgment. So am I.But you said that it could kill everyone on the planet at the flick of a switch.Yeah. She rolled over and propped herself up on her elbow. You starved? Im hungry.I could eat.