Somewhere In The North Atlantic

It had been 10 days since the Killer Whale attack. They had been idyllic, quiet days feeding and resting. The young bull had spent the time learning from his father. For a while they separated from the two cows and their calves to explore the depths of the ocean. His father had taken him down to see a strange object beneath the sea. It was black and long with a protrusion on the top. Using their sensing systems, the two whales explored the object. It was of a hard material and was propelled by two turning objects at the rear. Silently, it traveled through the water with a menacing, almost sinister appearance.

The young bull questioned what it was. His father explained that it was a product of the creatures that lived on the surface. He had seen many of them in his twenty-five summers. They are not dangerous to us, he explained to his son, but I do not like them and I stay away from them. As they slowly glided through the depths, they watched the object as it moved off into the distance, eventually fading from view.

Although now two miles from the pod, they were in constant communication with their family. Their communicating sounds were capable of traveling many miles through the ocean. As long as everything was all right, they would continue their exploration away from the pod. Without signaling each other, the two slowly swam to the surface for a breath of air. The movement of the two large animals was more ballet than swimming. Their movement was slow, methodical as they glided through the ocean depths in absolute unison. To the observer their movements would appear to have been choreographed, but they weren't, it was simply the way of the whales, at harmony with each other and the environment in which they lived.

Approaching the surface, the ocean lightened as the rays of the sun penetrated the water. No longer was the water shades of blue, gray, and black. The closer to the surface, the more colorful the ocean around them became. The myriad of jellyfish they passed showed colors of yellow to brown. A school of mackerel, had tints of bright yellow, green and red as they scurried out of the way.

Reaching the surface they exhaled through their blowholes, clearing their massive lungs in preparation for inhaling fresh oxygen-rich air. Their bushy blow expelling the oxygen-depleted air occurred at such a rapid rate, that it sprayed a white mist 8 to 12 feet in the air. After the third inhalation, scrubbing out all the carbon dioxide in their lungs, the two animals again explored the depths. As they glided down into the sea, it again darkened to shades of blue, gray and black. Now drifting silently, the young bull studied his father. When he compared him to other males he had seen, his father was enormous. He dwarfed all of them, including the older bulls with many more summers. He silently wondered why.

They continued their private exploration for another hour. Then, as suddenly as their private forage had begun, it ended. With a signal from his father, they turned and headed back to the pod.