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Templemer, planet Hoarfrost, Lupasha System, Coro Region, Tolo Arm
April 5th, 2038
Of course, committing to doing something wasn’t the same as actually doing it. Terry found out his injuries were more than just most of his left leg. His pelvis had been punctured by several of the 10-centimeter Oohobo teeth. Luckily, they’d missed his groin, which he was incredibly grateful for. However his pelvic bone had two hairline cracks. In addition, a tendon had been severed in his lower left arm, so his ring finger didn’t work.
When taken as a whole with his lost leg, it all added up to several surgeries being necessary before they could deal with his missing leg. Because their medical staff was minimal, and Dr. Jaehnig wasn’t a normal Human surgeon, the operations took two weeks.
As he recovered, several of the staff he’d come to know visited, as well as the other four high school age kids. They told him how Pōkole was doing. It was meant to make him feel better, but instead it made him feel sad, because he missed the baby orca.
“Quit feeling sorry for yourself,” Doc said when he heard Terry say as much.
Terry gawked for a second, then frowned. “I wasn’t.”
“Yes, you were. Pōkole misses you, everyone knows, but the adults are keeping him safe, and he’ll be waiting for you. Concentrate your energy on getting better and not worrying about feeling sorry for yourself.”
Terry was mad at Doc’s attitude for a while, then realized the man was right, and worked hard to stop pitying himself. He could be dead. A lot of the questions Dr. Jaehnig had for him revolved around the fact that he had been dead for 22 minutes.
“Do you have any memory from the time?”
“Something about a voice talking to me,” Terry said.
“Talking to you? How?”
“I could hear someone speaking to me. That was why I came back, the voices made me.” The more he tried to remember exactly what had happened, the hazier his memory became.
The cetacean physician wasn’t impressed by his answer and gently pushed Terry for more details every chance he got. Eventually Terry confronted him about why the man kept pushing for more details if he didn’t believe it.
“Because there simply must be another explanation,” Dr. Jaehnig said. “Our equipment isn’t the best. I’m leaning toward a sensor failure. You never did flat line. Damned good thing you woke up on your own, too, considering we’d terminated life support.”
Terry didn’t care what the doctor thought; he knew what he’d felt. The voices had been there. He was sure of it as if they were next to him, even though he couldn’t remember what they’d said. He remembered the voice clearer than he remembered Yui’s face. The thought threatened to drag him down again, so he dropped the entire idea.
After the last surgery on his hip to fix a lingering issue of the pain he’d been suffering, he was rewarded with a souvenir—one of the Oohobo’s knife-like teeth. It was only a small one, 5.2 centimeters long; it had been embedded in his left hip socket where the scans hadn’t discerned it from his own dense bone structure. Despite the pain from the incision, after waking from the anesthesia, the persistent pain was gone.
“Little something to remember the dead dinosaur by,” Doc said and handed him the tooth. They’d drilled a hole in it and put a metallic necklace through the thick point.
“I think it’s morbid,” Terry’s mom said. She’d continued to be morose at her son’s injuries, though she was getting less so as he made continuous improvement.
“It’s embracing the power that almost took your life,” Doc explained. He pulled a necklace out of the neckline of his shirt and showed them a deformed bullet.
His mother shuddered. “I still think it’s morbid.”
Terry took the gift and immediately put it on.
In the last surgery, Dr. Jaehnig had also fitted his stump with a port. In the months since his injury, the colony had made great strides in getting on its feet. One of those strides was reactivating the abandoned ancient Selroth manufactory, a highly advanced automated 3D printing machine capable of producing all manner of parts and equipment, albeit slowly. They had also made the first trips to explore the mines responsible for Templemer being on Hoarfrost in the first place.
Dr. Jaehnig split his time working with the cetaceans, monitoring their progress in adapting to Hoarfrost’s oceans, and studying the vast database of medical knowledge they’d brought with them to aid in Terry’s treatment.
For his own part, Terry spent his time continuing his studies of programming and Union pinplant technology, which in turn led him down avenues of studies including biology, neurology, and physics. He didn’t even notice how his studies seemed to be going so much better, even with picking up basic high school classes as well.
On the morning of the 5th, he was finally well enough to join class for the first time. His friends applauded when he rolled up in the motorized wheelchair Doc’s people had put together for him. It was painted in gray and blue with shark’s teeth, in honor of his battle with the Oohobo, and they all thought it was super cool.
The teacher, one of the institute’s old educational team members who now handled most of the school programs, allowed everyone a few minutes to ask Terry questions. She carefully reminded them he wasn’t a curiosity for their amusement, which Terry actually found funny. The questions weren’t bad, mostly about how he’d been brave enough to stab it in the eye, and how much they’d enjoyed helping take care of Pōkole. He told them he hadn’t been brave; he’d just done what he thought was right. He also agreed Pōkole was awesome, and he couldn’t wait to see the calf again.
He only got caught off guard once. Katrina Long was a new member of the high school group. She was from a mainlander family and had long blonde hair, like many on Hawaii. He’d seen her before, of course; their population was quite small. She’d kept to the back of the class and asked her question last. The teacher pointed to her. “Can you go with us to see Pōkole after class?”
He was surprised, not only because he hadn’t expected the question, but also because she was particularly pretty. “Sure,” he eventually said. Then they went back to work.
Despite being out for two months, he found he wasn’t behind. They’d continued the self-paced learning, and the teacher gave Terry a couple of quick quizzes on math and English. Satisfied, he was once again turned loose with the recommended lessons and reading list, which suited Terry just fine.
With the mobility his chair gave him, after classes he met with Katrina and three others; Colin, Dan, and Taiki. Together they went down to the moon pool. He sent a message to his mom through Templemer’s new comms network, something they’d finished while he was out, and let her know where he was going. When he rolled into the CC building, she was waiting.
“Are you sure you’re ready for this?” she asked.
“Oh, sure,” he said. “Why?”
“Well, you know,” she said and gestured vaguely toward the moon pool room.
“I’m fine, Mom.”
The other four stood back quietly and waited. His mom glanced at them curiously, her gaze lingering for a second on Katrina, the only girl among them. “Okay,” she said, and they went inside.
It was one of the assigned feeding times. Moloko and Pōkole were outside the dome swimming back and forth. Terry stared in amazement. Pōkole was at least a meter longer, and much thicker as well!
“He’s gotten so big,” Terry said.
“Yeah,” Katrina said. “He eats like a horse.”
“He’s up to forty liters a day,” Colin said.
“It takes all four of us,” Dan agreed, and Taiki nodded.
Terry frowned slightly as he watched the four go into the changing rooms and come out in drysuits, wishing he could join in. His unhappiness was decreased slightly by the sight of Katrina in her drysuit. It fit her quite well. She grinned at him, and he caught himself grinning back.
The four each took a 10-liter bottle and slipped into the water. At the same time, Terry’s mom activated the moon pool door control. Terry felt his ears pop as the pressure pushed the moon pool up a few centimeters before equalizing.
Both Pōkole and Moloko swam in, the calf quickly, and his mother more carefully. The door opening wasn’t much larger than she was, and her mass took up at least half the volume of the moon pool. Her bulk entering the pool caused further water displacement, some running over the lipped sides into the runoff channels.
“Terry!” Moloko said. “Pleased I am seeing Warden calf well.”
“Hi, Moloko. I’m still healing, but better.” He was interrupted by Pōkole doing a pretty good spyhop, standing on his tail briefly to see out of the water better. A series of snapping clicks were caught by Terry’s translator.
“Tear, Tear!” It wasn’t his name, but it was unmistakably the first syllable.
“Holy crap, he can talk?” Terry gasped.
“Sort of,” his mom said. “I was saving it as a surprise. Dr. Orsage’s beside himself. They’re more like the vocalizations of a young child, but it’s way ahead of when a Human baby would be forming more than baby talk. We’re having to rethink how their brains develop.”
“You did the surgery, too,” he said, noting the telltale waterproof plug on the side of the calf’s head in the white region called the eyepatch, which was, of course, located behind their eyes.
“Yeah, it went well. He’s not using it yet, though. Dr. Jaehnig does downloads once a week to check how everything’s going. He asked if you could look at the data when you felt up to it.”
“I’ve felt up to it for days,” Terry said. He wheeled his chair closer to the moon pool. “How you doing, little guy?”
“Tear, Tear, good, good!”
“A real word,” his mom said, and pulled her slate from its bag around her waist. She quickly began making notes.
“Attaboy,” Terry said.
Katrina offered her bottle to the calf. Pōkole instantly came over, and she activated the feed. Liters of thick milk substitute flowed, and he quickly emptied the bottle.
Wow, Terry thought, he’s a chow hound! The little guy would probably be drinking milk for more than another year, though he was also likely eating some fish by now. Katrina’s bottle empty, Dan took over, and the milk flowed. He finished it and rolled onto his side to look at Terry.
“Pōkole want you feed,” Moloko said.
“I can’t yet,” Terry said.
Then Pōkole slid up the angled side of the pool and made a grab for Terry’s motorized chair. He might well have grabbed it and pulled him into the water, chair and all, if Moloko hadn’t in turn grabbed Pōkole by the fluke and gently pulled him back.
She issued a sonar beam at Pōkole. It was strong enough to disturb the water, and Dan yelped in surprise. Pōkole jumped and dove back into the moon pool, swimming down to the bottom and staying there.
“Food later,” Moloko said, and turned and dove, pushing Pōkole out the door and the dome.
“What just happened?” Katrina asked.
“Yeah,” Dan said. “It felt like I was hit by a huge bass-boosted speaker on 100!”
“What you felt was a direct sonar attack from Moloko,” Terry’s mom explained. “It was turned way down, though. It can kill at close range. They use them to hunt small fish.”
“She was mad Pōkole tried to grab me,” Terry said. “It’s not his fault, he’s just a baby.”
“Agreed,” she said, “but just the same, I want you a bit further back during feedings for a while.”
Terry nodded. “Probably a good idea.” He pointed at how Pōkole was swimming around outside, keeping a little distance from his mom. “I think we just saw the orca equivalent of a spanking.”
* * * * *
