The Whale Song Translation: A Voyage of Discovery To Neptune and Beyond (41 page)

Bogan turned toward his executive officer. “What do you think we’re looking at?”

The XO hesitated. “The signatures indicate they’re probably whales, sir.”

“So many? Come on. Forty whales swimming in circles?”

Bogan stared at the screen. He’d never seen anything like it. The targets appeared to be arrayed in a circular formation. Sixty seconds later, after the transmission of the third active sonar pulse, the brightly lit targets had vanished. In all the years of testing the ultra-tech, billion-dollar tracking system, this had never happened. Once the sonar had locked onto a target, the tracking process was one hundred percent reliable.

“Emergency systems check!” bellowed Bogan.

“Aye, sir,” answered the XO.

The engineers barked out the sequence of commands and responses corresponding to the reliability tests for each of the software and hardware subsystems. Flashing digital displays at multiple workstations churned out colorful plots and pulsed with tables of numbers. Despite the razzle-dazzle, Bogan neither saw nor heard any evidence of a component failure. He waved at the display. “What the hell are we looking at now?” He observed the faint smudge of a spherical object pulsating in the center of the screen.

“Unidentified bogey, sir,” the XO sighed, “maybe just a false positive echo?”

“This new-fangled sonar is supposed to be foolproof. How am I going to explain this malfunction to headquarters?”

For one of the few times in his career, Bogan was befuddled, yet his superiors expected a summary report ASAP. The damned bogey had persisted for the duration of the test. It couldn’t be dismissed. He sat down at the nearest workstation and opened a new report-template file. He stared up at the ceiling and scratched his head. Five minutes later, the file was still devoid of text.

* * *

Six time zones to the East of the Straits of Lahaina, Ned Perry, still ensconced in his Pentagon office, monitored the events transpiring in Hawaiian waters. Cupping a hand to his face and muttering to himself, he heard the klaxon ringtone of an incoming phone call.

“I was afraid it might be you, Richard,” answered Perry, seeing the “SoCalSci”
caller-ID tag on the phone’s display. “I have both good news and bad news to report. Fortunately for you, the good news is that the occupants of the PICES vessel have been taken into custody and the vessel has been impounded.”

“That’s splendid news, Ned, splendid indeed. So whatever happened out there will never see the light of day. You’ll see to it, of course, that their computer disk drives are wiped clean?”

“Of course, Richard.” But not, he thought, until the files have been subjected to the intense scrutiny of my own staff of experts. “And their entire team, except for Gorman, has been transferred to a local jail, charged with assault and battery. Since it’s the weekend, I estimate we can keep them incarcerated for a couple of days, until bail is set.”

“Excellent,” replied Prescott. “I’ll notify the chair of the academic senate.”

“Huh?”

“The arrest of any university employee automatically triggers sanctions levied by a jury of peers. Based upon the severity of their charges, I’d say our SoCalSci professors face, at best, a vote of censure and revocation of research funds.”

“And the worst?”

“Their positions at SoCalSci could be in jeopardy.”

“Ouch.”

“I wouldn’t worry. Once this blows over and the experiment is forgotten, I’ll do my best to have them reinstated.”

“That’s civil of you, Richard.”

“I hear your sarcasm, Ned, but I do have a conscience. So what’s the bad news?”

“Well, according to the report I just received from the commander of my sonar test vessel, there’s a new problem with my system. Since you’ve decided to bug me at such a late hour, I’m not letting you off the hook. I’m going to read you every frigging detail of his dispatch.”

After Perry’s tedious recounting of the U.S.S.
San Fernando
’s status report, Prescott sounded exasperated. “I’m sorry, Ned, but why don’t you translate the technobabble into something I can get a grip on.”

“Well, the ‘sub-targets’ he refers too are the humpbacks, and the ‘bogey’ is probably the whole pod. So far, so good. But then, apparently, the entire pod disappeared from our screens after a couple of minutes.”

“And?”

“Richard!” snapped Perry. “No bogey has ever ‘winked out’ in the middle of a test. It’s beyond comprehension that so many large whales could have suddenly vanished without a trace. There should at least have been evidence of their individual signatures as the formation dispersed. There’s either a new glitch in my very expensive system or worse yet, some unknown force has compromised the functionality of our new secret weapon. I need to get to the bottom of this.”

“How will you do that?”

“Something peculiar happened beneath the PICES vessel, and the only souls who can shed light on the matter are currently in a Maui prison. The one thing I’m certain of is that Dr. Dmitri’s obligatory first phone call was directed to a Professor McPinsky.”

“No surprise there,” replied Prescott. “McPinsky is the mastermind behind all of Dmitri’s shenanigans. In fact, if I were you, I’d focus your investigation on the distinguished professor at Ivy Tech University. If anyone knows why your system failed, he’s your man.”

“Thanks, Richard. You’ve been very helpful. Sorry to run, but I need to make another phone call.”

Perry depressed the security-mode button on his wired phone. When the party answered, he asked, “So what did you discover?”

“A Skype voice and data connection between the boat and a fellow named McPinsky in New York.”

Perry heard the robotic voice and wondered whom he was conversing with. In secure mode, these phones invoked real-time, voice-changing firmware to preserve the anonymity of both speakers.

“How about the data files?” replied Perry.

“The disk was wiped clean. Someone knew what they were doing. The files aren’t recoverable.”

“Damnation,” replied Perry, ending the call. He stabbed the handset back into its docking port.

Perry checked his watch. No wonder he felt so tired. It was already past midnight. He dragged a hand across his chin stubble, sighed, and came to a decision. He grabbed the secure mobile phone on the desk and punched the speed-dial key. Two rings later, Perry delivered his terse message. “Cancel all previous orders and proceed to the next objective, Professor Theodosius McPinsky of Ivy Tech University. No need to remind you. This conversation didn’t happen.”

“Bloody Hell!” With a loud thump, Perry slammed his expensive phone onto the desk.

J
AIL
H
OUSE
B
LUES

Maui Police Department, Wailuku—March 1

“Seema, watch out!”

Andrew’s voice cracked like a gunshot, breaking into Dmitri’s fitful predawn slumber. He lurched upright to a sitting position and saw Andrew writhing on the cot, eyes still shut. Dmitri felt mentally and physically spent, yet restful sleep in this Hawaiian prison cell seemed as elusive as his hope of freedom. He lay back down and stared straight up, searching for answers in the recesses of the rough-hewn ceiling and listening to the restless murmurs of his cellmates.

Only twenty-four hours had elapsed since yesterday morning’s commando mission had launched the voyage of astonishing discoveries. In the wake of their adventure, the Coast Guard
had confiscated all of their equipment, and the telltale data files had been obliterated. Dmitri prayed McPinsky had received the climactic Speakeasy data before the communication lines had been shut down. The revelations of a lifetime might be a passing dream if he had not.

Dmitri tussled with the institutional bed, yearning for his memory foam mattress back home as he replayed the calamitous concluding events in an otherwise spectacular yesterday. Tony’s jazzy blues harmonica tunes were the only pleasant memories of their Coast-Guard-chaperoned, jail-boat ride. Immediately after docking in Kihei, they’d been transferred into the custody of the local police, who paid no heed to their protests. During the recital of their Miranda rights, Dmitri had watched the inauspicious arrival of a Maui police van. The short drive to Wailuku had passed in sullen, hand-cuffed silence. It was late evening by the time they’d been hustled inside the local jail and, since Dmitri’s internal fuel gauge was pinned on empty, the subsequent booking and incarceration gauntlet had happened in an anti-climactic blur. At the conclusion of the fingerprinting and mug-shot sessions, the four men and three women had been herded into separate group holding cells. Dmitri’s quartet shared theirs with a local teen sleeping off a DUI.

In this hot, dank cell, the vapors wafting up from the open toilet seeped into his awareness and then leached back out on a wave of self-recrimination. It had been
his decision to launch the experiment that resulted in everyone’s imprisonment. How were the women faring in their wing of the prison? Melanie would be frantic about Mark. Could Gorman arrange a timely bail? Dmitri agonized over the precarious situation faced by Greg and his grad students, as well. His worst fear was that their fate at SoCalSci was a fait accompli, since Prescott now had free reign to smear their jailbird reputations all over the campus.

Since his brain and body were starved for rest, he knew he’d better stop obsessing. As Greg had often counseled, the best way to squelch vexing mental chatter was to think about favorite people, places, and things. What could be better than to focus on a pleasant reminiscence of Melanie? He closed his eyes and meditated on the indelible image of her sleek figure graced by a jade green cheongsam, and her radiant smile reflecting that brilliant, sunny day in the park. In his mind’s ear, he imagined floating on the cloud of her velvety voice, to the accompaniment of the mynah bird chorus. He yawned.

* * *

Jolted awake by a hideous screech, Dmitri soon realized he’d heard the fork-scraping-the-frying-pan squeal of the opening of an iron-barred cell door. Squinting into the light, he saw a uniformed guard slide trays of food into their cell through a slot near the floor. “Good morning. I heard a rumor about you guys having a visitor today.” After he’d brought two more trays of their morning meal, bowls of mush soaking in Hawaiian brown sugar, he left without sharing any more details.

“Hooray,” said Andrew, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “This could be our lucky day, right?”

“Or it could be one of Prescott’s lackeys and the beginning of the end for us,” said Dmitri, still lying on his back.

“Don’t give up hope, pal,” said Greg. “After what we experienced yesterday, we have every right to believe something extraordinary is still possible.”

Dmitri sniffed the air and turned his head to see their DUI cellmate sitting on the toilet. “It can’t get any worse than this, Greg,” he said, his tone laced with sarcasm.

After breakfast, they passed the time playing poker.

“What were you dreaming about, Andrew?” asked Dmitri, as he dealt the cards for Five Card Draw.

“No idea, boss.” Andrew looked genuinely surprised.

“I had my usual recurring dream,” said Greg, “flying through the air with a basketball, like in a Chinese martial arts film, and finishing a slam dunk. Last night I posterized LeBron. The time before that it was Yao Ming.”

“I envy you, Greg,” replied Dmitri, his voice listless. “I pretty much tossed and turned all night.”

“Cool, Greg,” replied Tony. “I’ve always wished I could dunk a basketball.”

“Reminds me of the way Uber posterized our boat yesterday.” Andrew’s cupped hand arced in a giant circle above his head.

“That’s a great insight, Andrew!” Dmitri’s sudden enthusiasm brought a smile to Greg’s face. “If humans think and dream about flying, then why not whales? Why else would a big-brained, fifty-ton creature breach with such apparent enthusiasm?”

“Just like big-brained hominids are compelled to pole vault,” added Tony, “or Evel Knievel leapfrogging twenty cars in a Harley.”

“Or skydivers jumping from airplanes,” said Andrew, “present company excluded, of course.”

“I often dream I’m a seagull cruising down the coastline,” Tony mused.

“It’s a pretty universal dream.” Andrew tossed three cards.

“Makes you wonder if humpbacks have flying dreams too?” said Greg.

“The dreams of the giant.” Dmitri replaced Andrew’s cards. “I’d give anything to solve that mystery. There’s no stopping us now, Greg. After we get out this mess, let’s plan the next experiment. We now have the tools to begin a legitimate dialogue with the Megapterans.”

“I’m happy to see you back in the saddle, my friend.” Greg traded two cards. “By the way, besides your infernal snoring, you talked in your sleep last night. Do you remember the dream?”

Dmitri just smiled. Revealing a straight flush, his comrades shook their heads in mock consternation. The poker game resumed with elevated spirits, everyone taking turns cracking jokes.