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Hoarfrost, Lupasha System, Coro Region, Tolo Arm
January 13th, 2038
Life gradually got better in the habitat as more and more systems were made operational. The mechanical team under Melissa spent less time racing between urgent jobs and more time concentrating on long-term goals. The temperature and humidity settled into something more to the liking of the staff, who’d spent many years in Hawaii.
The orcas never found Shool, which was no surprise to their Human wardens. They also never stopped looking. Terry thought they were incredibly patient. If anything, they seemed more convinced Shool was out there, somewhere.
“Maybe Shool is beyond,” the bottlenose Hula suggested one day.
Again with hyperspace, Terry thought. “What do the orcas think of that idea?” Terry asked her.
“They say we crazy.”
School wasn’t as lame as Terry had feared it would be. As one of the 12 kids who were high school aged, they were largely self-paced in their studies. He was assigned objectives and could complete them as quickly as he wished. He also got to work on his pinplant research and got credit for that as well, which was cool.
Despite missing Yui, he found himself making friends. He only recognized one of the boys from his age group; they’d played on different summer baseball teams. They all seemed to know him. Suddenly he was the cool kid, and he had absolutely no idea why.
Some of the things they got to do was help out around the habitat on work projects. The air was no longer filled with the smell of rotting fish, but a lot of junk had been left behind by the Selroth when they’d abandoned the place. Tons of it, actually. First the kids helped gather it in assigned areas. Next they helped clean, which wasn’t as fun. Then they initiated a beautification project, which meant painting. The Selroth hadn’t bothered with anything more than priming the metal buildings. Compared to the big ruby dome, the rest of the place was lame.
The adults handled the majority of the painting project because some heavy equipment was involved. Where the kids got involved was putting up murals on some of the buildings’ larger walls. By the end of the second week, a dozen different designs were coming to life. The high schoolers’ mural was on the side of the CC building, a stylized habitat inside its ruby dome with orcas and dolphins playing outside.
“Reminds me of that Captain Nemo movie,” someone said. A short time later the movie in question was located. Captain Nemo and the Underwater City. Along with exabytes of data from Earth, they also had thousands of movies; the one in question was included. The same evening after dinner, a new tradition was born—movie night.
Some popcorn was produced, and the autochef made soda pop and candy for the kids. The main administration building still had a four-story wall painted white, and the movie was projected on the wall.
Terry found the special effects of the mid-20th century laughable, as you might imagine they would be. Still, having nearly the entire group together sharing snacks and watching the film together was a fun experience. Doc and his mom sat on either side of him, and he pretended not to notice when they held hands behind his chair. It felt good.
“Hey,” Doc said about halfway through the movie. A giant manta ray was menacing a submarine. “I think we have the name of this place.”
“What’s that?” Terry’s mom asked.
The view on the screen changed to show the underwater city. Sure enough, it looked a lot like what Terry and his fellow high schoolers were painting. “Templemer,” he said. It was pronounced Temple-mere. She looked at him, then slowly nodded.
“I like it,” she said, “not as pretentious as Atlantis would have been.”
Terry had heard a few people joking about living in Atlantis. He had to think what would make Atlantis pretentious. Unable to figure it out, he decided he liked Templemer. “I think it’s a great idea,” he said. By the next morning, everyone was calling their home Templemer. The head doctors voted on it later, but there was really no need. They could’ve called it Mount Olympus, and everyone would have kept calling it Templemer. Their home had a name.
The next morning was the 13th, and a big day. All the head doctors met Terry in the moon pool, where Pōkole was swimming excitedly, around and around. Outside the lock, his pod floated, watching and waiting. Moloko was front and center.
Terry was already wearing his drysuit, as were his mother and Dr. Jaehnig. Both of them were already in the water trying to corral Pōkole.
“Can you help?” his mother asked in frustration. “The little guy is all worked up.”
“Just excited about the big day,” Terry said.
“How would he know?” Dr. Orsage asked. “The calf is only 7 months old.”
“Oh, he knows,” Terry assured her. “His mom wants him to get the pinplants now.”
“We’ve been over this,” Dr. Jaehnig said. “We want to make sure the calf is acclimated to Hoarfrost before undergoing the procedure.”
“I know,” Terry said, grabbing a rebreather and sliding into the water. “Explain it to them.” He pointed out through the lock where the four massive orcas were watching intently. Terry smacked the water several times. “Come on, Pōkole,” he said gently.
The baby orca, who was already 3 meters long and over 500 kilograms, spun around and shot toward Terry. His mother gasped in alarm. Terry turned sideways and reached out with a hand, catching the orca’s dorsal fin as it slipped by, allowing himself to be propelled along with the powerful strokes of the calf’s flukes.
“Atta boy!” Terry cried, smacking the young orca’s side affectionately. “You know what’s going on, don’t you?” The orca slipped out of Terry’s grasp, dove down, then shot straight up. Not quite managing to clear the water, he crashed down on his side with a huge wave. It was a pretty good approximation of the adult cetaceans’ spyhopping, a behavior meant to get a look around the surface.
“Wow!” Dr. Hernandez said.
“Indeed,” Dr. Patel agreed.
The calf calmed and allowed Terry’s mom and Dr. Jaehnig to come closer. He rolled on his side and looked at them with one of his big eyes.
“He’s thrived,” Dr. Jaehnig said, slipping a stethoscope against Pōkole’s middle. “Thanks to you, of course.”
“He’s strong and smart,” Terry said. “I just gave him some love.” He looked at his mom and winked. She beamed in reply. “Should I feed him real quick before he goes out? In case he doesn’t come back for a bit?”
“Good idea,” his mom said. Dr. Hernandez went over and got a bottle from the holding rack, and brought it to Terry. It took him a couple of tries to get the calf to eat—he was too excited— however, eventually food won out. The orcas outside continued to watch patiently.
Every few minutes a plume of bubbles would expel from their rebreather domes. The timing was good; the rebreathers would need new power cells within a couple of days. The nearest breathable air for the orcas was two kilometers straight up, a trip none of them would survive if they did it in less than a week to allow for decompression.
Pōkole only drank half of the fifteen-liter bottle before he wouldn’t sit still anymore. “Good enough,” Dr. Jaehnig said. “The little rascal doesn’t want to wait.”
“I can see that,” Terry’s mom said as the little orca did a quick lap, then stopped next to the lock. “Goodness, he knows how to get out.”
“I told you,” Terry said, “he’s smart.” He looked at the controls. “Can I do it?”
“Let’s doublecheck pressurization first,” she said, and Dr. Orsage walked over to examine the control panel.
“Am I late, Madison?” Doc asked. He was standing next to the moon pool entrance.
“Right on time,” she said. “We’re about to open the door.”
“Pressure is within 20KSI,” Orsage said. “Well within tolerance of the moon pool.”
“Okay, Terry,” she said, and nodded to him. “Go ahead.”
He grinned widely as he swam over to the lock. It was situated a meter below the surface of the pool. It used the natural pressure of the room to keep water from flooding in when the door was opened. He’d learned how it worked days ago in preparation for this day.
He turned the key, bringing the mechanism to life. A horn sounded, then a click as the room’s exit locked. If it were opened while the outside lock was open, the dome could partially flood. The status light turned blue, meaning all was well. He pressed the OPEN button, labeled with tape in English, and the lock ground into motion.
The door was a six-meter-wide iris valve. It began to cycle like an eye’s iris opening wide for a dark room. A stream of water came in from the outside, raising the moon pools level a couple centimeters. Then it stopped, the pressure sufficient to keep it where it was. Pōkole looked at Terry as the door opened. “Go ahead,” he said and pointed at the door. “Go see your mom.”
Pōkole gave a screeching click and flipped over, diving down and rocketing through the door. In an instant, nine adult orcas surrounded him as he nuzzled up against his mother. The pod was whole again. Terry was grinning from ear to ear when he popped his head out of the water and shook the hair and water out of his eyes.
“You’re not going out, too?” his mom asked.
“I can?”
“He’s your responsibility,” she said. “I think you’re half orca by now anyway. We haven’t seen anything dangerous, so just be careful.”
Terry laughed and grabbed his suit helmet from next to the moon pool. It only took a few seconds to connect the power supply and activate the integrated heads-up display. The helmet had its own built-in rebreather, two LED lights, and the drysuit’s integrated heater worked with it as well. Adding a pair of flippers and gloves completely insulated him from the bitter cold seawater outside. Doc handed him an equalizer belt for buoyancy and a dive knife.
He gave Doc and his mom a wave, flipped over, and dove down underwater. After hundreds of hours in the water, he was an incredibly powerful swimmer, and he was through the lock in a couple of seconds. Pōkole swam over and offered his dorsal fin. Terry took it, and he was quickly pulled over next to the other orcas. My god, they’re big, he thought. He’d forgotten how much larger they were than Pōkole. Moloko gently brushed him with the dome of her head, and he felt a slight bump as she used her sonar on him.
“Thank for care,” she said, Terry’s translator pendant speaking inside the helmet for him to hear. “Pōkole happy. Pōkole strong!”
“I’m happy to help. We all love him,” Terry said, again his translator booming the orca’s reverberating vocalizations through the water. “Thank you for trusting me.”
“Part of pod,” Kray said. He was Pōkole’s father. “Want to fast swim?”
“Not this time,” he said. He couldn’t explain that he wouldn’t be able to tolerate the bitterly cold water for long. Despite the drysuit, he was already shivering. “Soon, maybe.”
“Terry Warden welcome always,” Moloko said. Pōkole shoved him playfully, then the entire pod turned and swam away. The all-encompassing darkness of Hoarfrost’s ocean swallowed them in seconds. Terry turned to swim back and stopped.
Templemer was a shining, multifaceted ruby with a thousand glittering points of light. He’d never seen it from the outside like this. When they’d come down, it had been completely dark; Honcho had homed in on a solitary sonar beacon. All lit up, it was one of the most beautiful things he’d ever seen. Seeing through to the inside was kinda hard, but he could see his mother waving him back.
The cold was really biting, so he swam toward the dome. On the other side of the ruby wall, he could see Doc running toward the moon pool, pulling off his light jacket as he ran. What’s he running for? Terry wondered an instant before something slammed into him, and everything went black.
* * * * *
