Fluke: Or, I Know Why the Winged Whale Sings

Nate could see nowhere for the water to come out. He pushed one of the nodules, and the basin started filling from a sphincter in the bottom. He pushed another, and the water was sucked out the same orifice. He tried to foster scientific detachment toward the whole thing but failed miserably: He was creeped out. Nate desperately needed a shave and a shower, but he didn't want to try to wash his whole six-foot-two-inch body in an eight-inch bowl with a… well, a butt hole at the bottom. He'd had just about enough of advanced poop-chute technology, thank you. He splashed some water on his face and dressed in the khakis, wondering as he did if the whale ship could actually grow a mirror for him to shave in if he needed it.
    The whole crew appeared to be up and milling about the bridge when Nate came in. There were four whaley boys at the table with the charts to the right of the hatch, the two pilots at their consoles. Nuсez stood by the table to the left of the hatch, where there were seated a blond woman in her thirties and two men, one dark, perhaps in his early twenties, and one bald and gray-bearded, a healthy fifty, maybe. Not a very military-looking bunch. Everyone turned when Nate came in. All conversations – words or whistles – stopped abruptly. The echo of killer-whale calls bounced around the bridge. Emily 7 turned away from Nate's gaze. Nuсez was leaning against the wall near the nook that housed the coffeepot, actively trying not to look at him.
    "Hi," Nate said, catching eye contact with the bald guy, who smiled.
    "Have a seat," said the bald guy, gesturing toward the empty seat at the table. "We'll get you something to eat. I'm Cal Burdick." He shook Nate's hand. "This is Jane Palovsky and Tim Milam."
    "Jane, Tim," Nate said, shaking hands. Nuсez smiled at him, then looked away quickly as if the coffeepot needed some immediate attention or she was going to crack up – or both.
    Everyone at the table nodded, sort of staring at the spot in front of them, like So here we are on a giant blue-whale ship, hundreds of feet below the surface of the ocean, with killer whales calling about us, and Nate fucked an alien, so…
    "Nothing happened," Nate said to the whole bridge.
    "What?" said Jane.
    "Your quarters satisfactory, then?" asked Tim, an eyebrow raised.
    "Nothing happened," Nate repeated, and even though nothing had happened, from the tone of his voice he wouldn't have believed it either. "Really."
    "Of course," said Tim.
    All of the whaley boys except Emily 7 were snickering. When he looked around, all the males were waving their willies back and forth in time in the air, as if swaying to a pornographic Christmas carol. Emily 7 put her big whaley head down on the table and covered it with her arms.
    "Nothing happened!" Nate shouted at them. Silence again on the bridge, just the echo of killer-whale calls. "Are we in danger?" Nate asked Nuсez, trying desperately to change the subject. "Are they going to attack the ship? Those are feeding calls, right?" Often, when killer whales found a whale that was too big to be taken by their family pod, or when they happened on to an especially rich school of fish, they would call to other pods for help. Nate recognized the calls from some work he'd done with a biologist friend in Vancouver.
    "No, these are residents," Nuсez said. "They're just excited about a bait ball they've found. Probably sardines." Resident killer whales ate only fish; transients ate mammals, whales and seals. Over the last few years scientists tended to refer to them as completely different species, even though they appeared the same to the layman.
    "You know what they are by their call?"
    "More than that," Cal said, "we know what they're saying. The whaley boys can translate."
    "All killer whales are named Kevin. You knew that, right?" said Jane. She had a slight Eastern European accent, Russian maybe. She looked a little amused, her blue eyes dark under the yellow cast of the bioluminescence, but she didn't appear to be joking. She patted the seat next to her, indicating that Nate should sit down.
    "Like all the pilots are named Scooter and Skippy?" Nate said.
    "Actually, they have numbers like Emily – their choice, by the way – but since there are never more than one pair of them on a ship, we don't bother with the numbers."
    Nate suddenly realize that in all his time on both of the whale ships, except when one of the pilots had gone outside to catch fish, the pilots always