Page 7 of Clive Cussler Desolation Code (The NUMA Files #21)
Reunion Island
Gamay Trout crouched beside a bloated pilot whale that had died during the night. Running her rubber-gloved hand across the whale’s skin, she noticed small pockmarks on the upper half of the animal. They clustered near the dorsal fin and around the blowhole, parts of the whale that would break the surface the most.
Her first impression was that they were bites of some type, though she couldn’t be sure. Stranger still, they oozed with secretions that should have dried and coagulated by now, even though the whale itself would take weeks to decompose.
She broke open a sample kit and began collecting tissue, blood, and a healthy amount of the secretion running from the wounds. As she worked, the wind kicked up, blowing sand across the beach and pulling strands of her wine-colored hair free from the ponytail she’d done it up in. They whipped around, tickling the front of her face. She wrinkled her nose. “A little help, please?”
A pair of strong but gentle hands deftly gathered the hair, pulled it back, and reclipped it into her ponytail. Gamay glanced back to see her husband, Paul, his six-foot-eight frame blocking out the sun.
“You managed that quite nicely,” she said with a smile. “You might have a future in the salon business.”
“You’re the only woman whose hair I desire to touch,” he replied.
“The only correct answer,” she joked.
Gamay was a marine biologist with NUMA. She and Paul had joined the organization years before after graduating from Scripps Institute. They often worked together, though Paul was a geologist and more interested in rocks than soft-bodied animals and slime molds teeming with bacteria.
They’d been in South Africa working on a project to breed modified mosquitoes that wouldn’t be able to carry malaria or other diseases. The project was a controversial one, and Gamay was glad to be off it, even if it meant examining dead whales.
An early-morning flight had brought them to Reunion. By midafternoon they were on the beach, examining the dead and dying animals.
Gamay worked with Chantel and the other volunteers from the university, setting up a makeshift lab and beginning the collection process for samples and data.
With no rocks to examine, Paul did the heavy lifting and was apparently also in charge of Gamay’s hair. “I expect a full credit in the group photo later. ‘Gamay Trout’s hair by Le Paul .’”
She laughed lightly. “I promise to assist the next time we have a geological emergency.”
“Be careful,” he said. “A geological emergency usually means a large earthquake or dodging molten lava from an active volcano.”
“That doesn’t sound fun,” she replied.
“And plucking goo from smelly sea creatures is?”
“Better than working with mosquitoes in Africa,” she said.
It had been meant as a joke, but they shared a knowing look. That project had ended with a dark secret being buried and hopefully destroyed.
“It’s okay,” Paul whispered. “Pandora’s box is not only closed; it’s been deleted and destroyed.”
She pointed to her head. “It’s up here.”
“Keep it there.”
Gamay took a deep breath and turned back to the whale. Finding a fresh scab, she retrieved, capped, and labeled one more sample. “Mark this one for burial or removal. I’m going to get more sample jars.”
Paul took a can of spray paint and marked a large red X on the whale’s side, then motioned to a group of island officials who wanted to discuss how best to dispose of the animal.
Gamay knew there was some controversy going already, as some people on the island wanted the dead creatures dragged out to sea, while others wanted them burned and buried. The burn group had won and were now bringing in jugs of kerosene and other flammable liquids.
Carrying the samples across the beach, she and Paul came to a large canopy that had been set up to provide shade for the operational command center and the makeshift lab. Stepping inside, they found Kurt, Joe, and Lacourt. The men looked a little haggard after a night of strenuous effort trying to save as many animals as possible, but neither of the three gave the slightest indication that they were ready to slow down or take a break.
“Find anything yet?” Kurt asked.
“Nothing to hang my hat on,” Gamay replied. “We’ll run a few tests on the blood and tissue samples here, but we’ll have to send them to the university lab for a deeper analysis. I wouldn’t hold your breath, though. Plenty of whale strandings happen without the slightest clue as to what caused them. A few years ago, nearly five hundred pilot whales beached themselves on various islands around New Zealand over a span of two weeks. Despite extensive research, a cause was never found.”
“This is different,” Kurt noted. “It’s not just whales.”
“That’s true.”
Lacourt spoke up next. “Have you found anything to suggest what might be going on here?”
Gamay slid a pencil behind her ear. “A fair number of the whales have clusters of small bites on the upper half of their bodies and around their blowholes, like something took dozens of marble-sized chunks out of their hides. I’d say they resemble piranha bites, but since piranhas don’t swim in salt water, we’ll have to look for another explanation.”
“Any chance the bites are postmortem?” Joe asked. “We’ve been chasing birds, crabs, and rodents away from the beached animals all morning.”
“I don’t think so,” Gamay said. “They appear to be infected, which suggests a longer time frame. Plus they’re too widespread. Unless this beach looked like a scene from a Hitchcock movie this morning, it would be impossible to record so many bites in such a short time. It’s more like something was chewing on them in the water. Or, considering where the bites are located, perhaps attacked them when they were on the surface.”
Kurt gazed off toward the water. Gamay had a sense of him being far away, perhaps visualizing the whales under attack. But whatever he was thinking, he kept it to himself. “I don’t remember seeing anything like that on the big sperm whale or any of the other animals in the first wave of strandings.”
“It was kind of dark,” Joe said, “and the rest of the night is kind of a blur, but I don’t remember seeing them, either.”
“Noted,” Gamay said. “Though I have no idea if that tells us anything.”
Paul spoke next. He’d studied the marks up close while Gamay took her samples. “Do you really think these bites could have affected the health of these whales? They’re quite small. More like nibbles.”
“True,” she said. “They barely penetrate the epidermis. And most of these animals have seven to eight inches of blubber underneath that. I’d call the bites an irritation more than anything else. Like ant bites at a picnic. Then again, if enough ants start chewing on you, you might end up running for the hills. Maybe the whales were dealing with some kind of parasitic infestation that drove them mad and onto the shore. The same thing could be said for that poor leatherback turtle you found.”
Lacourt rubbed his chin. “It would be good if you could give us something more concrete. Or perhaps rule out any form of disease. The crowds at the top of the beach are growing and becoming restless. This incident has gone viral on the internet and there are hundreds if not thousands of posts flying back and forth on social media, many of them suggesting the animals carry a virus, others insisting that you and the other biologists are harvesting it for your government.”
“Ah, the internet,” Joe said disdainfully. “Letting couch potatoes stir up mobs since 2003.”
Gamay laughed. “Careful, Joe. You sound like an old man with a hose warning all the kids to get off his lawn.”
“No need to,” Joe said. “They’re all locked inside, staring at their phones and becoming deficient in vitamin D.”
Kurt offered a sly grin, suggesting he agreed with Joe’s assessment, but he said nothing. Instead, he glanced up the slope of the beach to the crowd in the parking lot. The numbers had been growing since morning. Some held signs. Others were taking video with their phones. One man with a megaphone had been shouting something in French until the police took his instrument away.
Gamay watched Kurt’s eyes. He was counting, estimating, studying the postures of the people he could see. She knew him to be the type of leader who put his crew first. And she could see concern in his face.
“Might want to bring in some additional policemen,” Kurt said. “Your guys are outnumbered like Custer at the Little Big Horn.”
“The police chief fears that will only agitate them further,” Lacourt replied. “The heavy hand of government and all. We have no history of riots here. Let them make their statements. They’ll probably go home for dinner.”
Gamay hoped he was right. She moved to a laptop that was sitting up on a crate. Tapping away for a moment, she entered the data regarding the blood and tissue she’d just taken, tapped save, and then picked up a new test kit. “We should get more samples.”
Kurt nodded slowly. He had a grave look on his face. He’d been watching the gathering of protesters like a sailor eyeing dark clouds on the horizon. He spoke like a man who figured a storm was about to hit. “Do it quickly,” he said. “The sooner we get off this beach, the better.”