Chapter 25
TWENTY-FIVE
B laine glanced up as Xanthe appeared at the top of the boulders surrounding the spot where Zephyr was trapped.
Her black wetsuit clung to her long, sleek body like a second skin, a black knit cap covering her hair.
The way she’d handled all this so far, taking charge of the rescue effort while calmly and decisively coordinating everything, was fucking amazing.
She would have made one hell of a military officer.
He would follow her into battle any day.
“How’s he doing?” Xanthe asked, climbing down toward him. She’d brought two others with her, both carrying medical kits.
“He’s been quiet and hasn’t moved much.” It worried him.
“He’s exhausted. The marine vets are going to check him, see if there’s anything more we can do for the moment.
The good news is, the tide’s starting to come back in.
Should only be another five or six hours until it reaches us.
We’ve got slings, ropes and other equipment on site if we need to lift him off the rocks.
But hopefully, he’ll just rest and conserve his strength.
He’s young, he’s strong. That’s going to help him.
” She picked up a bucket. “Either of you need a break?” she said to him and the other man working with him.
“I’m okay,” Blaine said. He was soaked head to toe, his feet and hands like ice from the cold water and wind, but he’d been through much worse. He would stay at his post for as long as Xanthe and Zephyr needed him to.
“Sorry, but I need to rest a bit,” the other man said, wincing as he straightened. “Just a few minutes. My stupid lower back’s not as strong as it used to be.”
“You rest as much as you need,” Xanthe said to him, pouring water carefully over Zephyr’s head, staying well clear of his blowhole. Zephyr gave a little high-pitched cry that would have tugged at the toughest of heartstrings. “I’m right here, buddy, and I brought more friends to help you.”
They kept tending to the whale while the vet team looked him over. There wasn’t anything they could do for the lacerations he’d suffered except give him an injection of antibiotics, but at least he didn’t appear to be severely injured or have major internal damage.
Xanthe took only occasional breaks to check on the other teams. “Tide’s reached Triton, and will get to Onyx in the next half hour,” she said when she returned from the latest briefing.
“How is she?” Blaine asked. He’d been thinking about her. Those images of her holding up her dead calf in the water were seared into his memory.
“She’s weak. But Triton’s been moving a bit.
Once they’re re-floated we’ll assess them, make sure they can surface and breathe on their own, then turn them out to sea and reorient them.
Once we get Zephyr ready, we’ll release them all at the same time.
Hopefully they won’t try to swim back to shore again. ”
“Do they do that?”
“It’s pretty common after a stranding. They’re weak and disoriented, groggy. We’ll just have to hope for the best. As long as Onyx can swim out, they’ll follow her.”
“What about the rest of the pod?”
“They’re in a kind of holding pattern two miles out.
Lachlan and a skipper from the response team will follow these guys, herd them in the right direction.
They’ll need to be monitored closely for the next few days to make sure they don’t re-strand.
” She took a filled bucket from a volunteer perched on a rock several feet away and handed over her empty one.
“This is a kickass bucket brigade, by the way.”
“Right?” They now had enough people to form two lines.
One to pass filled buckets, and another to send empty ones back to the water.
An elderly female volunteer had said she estimated there were well over three hundred people down on the beach assisting with the rescue efforts and several hundred more waiting outside Rafe’s perimeter up top.
An amazing response from the tight-knit community.
Conspicuously absent were Don and the other members of the development project still on island.
Not that Blaine was surprised given their views on environmental protection and how unpopular they were here.
Views he’d shared until very recently. Seeing all this firsthand, and especially through Xanthe’s eyes, had made him care.
It seemed like forever before the water finally crawled back to their spot, and then it was almost another full hour before it rose enough to crest the rocks and fill the natural shallow Zephyr was trapped in.
“Okay, everybody get back to higher ground,” Xanthe ordered.
Blaine grabbed her hand and helped pull her up onto a tall boulder as the water lapped at their knees.
She moved in closer to him, her fingers as red as his own from the cold as she watched Zephyr closely. “Come on, baby. You can do it.”
Blaine couldn’t look away from the young male, adding his silent encouragement. Come on, man. You got this.
It was like the water rushing in around Zephyr reanimated him. He began to move his body slightly, his tail slapping at the surface.
“Oh God, just wait,” Xanthe begged. “Just wait, buddy, don’t struggle yet. He’ll cut himself more,” she said to Blaine, one hand going to her mouth.
He wrapped his arm around her shoulders, pulling her tight into his side as they and the others all stood around the rocks in a semicircle, watching. There was nothing any of them could do at this point but stand back and hope for the best.
At last, the water was deep enough to cover Zephyr’s pectoral fins.
“He’s floating,” Xanthe said, her body tense against his.
Zephyr slapped his tail into the water. Tried to turn. Blaine winced as he imagined all the sharp edges of the barnacles slicing into the whale’s skin. If the fucking water would just hurry up and?—
A big wave crashed over the edge of the rocks. It landed on Zephyr, knocking him sideways. He thrashed his tail. Twisted his whole body as he threw his head to turn himself.
“Come on,” Xanthe urged, bouncing up and down. “Come on, ocean, help us out.”
A smaller wave rolled over the edge of the enclosure. Zephyr bobbed on the surface, thumped his tail in clear frustration. He wanted to be free.
Water continued to wash over the rocks, steadily filling the hollow.
Blaine squeezed Xanthe’s hand tighter, held his breath as Zephyr pumped his tail and started forward.
“Yes, yes,” she told him. “You can do it.”
The next wave forced him back. But he fought through it, struggled to propel himself forward with a mighty pump from his tail.
He shot forward and over the edge of the rocks, sliding back into the deeper water beyond.
“Yes!” Xanthe cried over the cheer that went up from everyone. She released Blaine’s hand to scramble over the boulders still exposed above the waterline. Zephyr was on the surface right against the other side of the rocks. “Is he okay?”
Blaine moved in behind her, one hand on her waist in case she slipped. He glanced away from Zephyr to look down the beach. What he saw stunned him.
A long human chain had formed between the two stranded adults, now in several feet of water, and the beach. A physical barrier stretching for more than three football fields, attempting to deter the huge animals from moving back toward shore.
Cold and tired as he was, a fresh wave of goosebumps rushed over him, having nothing to do with being wet. This was incredible. This moment. Being part of something altruistic. Helping free Zephyr. And getting to experience it all with Xanthe. She had shifted something inside him forever.
“There he goes,” she cried.
Blaine looked down in time to see a puff of vapor rise from the surface of the water. Just the top of Zephyr’s head showed above the surface, his white eye and saddle patches showing bright beneath the gradually deepening green of the water.
He swam away from them and the rocks.
“That’s it. Go, go,” Xanthe shouted, a giant grin on her face as she pulled away from him and followed Zephyr from atop the rocks.
Blaine stayed right behind her, heart pounding. Watching Zephyr swim away after being stranded for so long was a rush like he’d never experienced before.
She stopped suddenly, turned to face him and threw both arms in the air with an ecstatic shriek. “He did it! We did it!”
He grinned and met her palm-stinging high-five, slapped more with all the others as they gathered on the rocks with them to watch Zephyr swim to freedom.
“What’s happening with the others?” Xanthe asked, moving back toward the thin stretch of sand on the far side of the boulders they stood on.
The human chain stood firm, barring the two whales from shore. He thought he saw the male, Triton, moving. Wasn’t sure about Onyx.
Xanthe ran along the beach at a good clip, sand sticking to her soaked wetsuit.
Triton appeared to be gradually moving into deeper water. Zephyr seemed to be heading toward the two adults, his little blows visible against the sunset horizon.
“No,” Xanthe breathed in horror, and broke into a full run.
Blaine stayed with her, dread coiling in the pit of his stomach. Zephyr and Triton looked like they were going to be okay. But Onyx…
The team had set her right side up in the water and managed to turn her to face out to sea. But she wasn’t moving.
Xanthe ran up to a group of people forming the human chain behind the female orca and pushed through them to the members of the response team close to her. Lachlan was there, up to his waist in the water.
He caught sight of him and Xanthe and angled forward to intercept them.
“What’s happening?” Xanthe demanded. “Does she need more time to rest?”
Lachlan stopped in front of her, expression grave. “She was weak, Xanth. Too weak.”
“But…” Her stricken gaze slid past him to Onyx, lying on the beach.
Lachlan shook his head, and Blaine’s heart dropped. “I’m sorry, Xanth. She’s gone.”
Xanthe hitched in a sharp breath.
Blaine mentally cursed and took hold of her shoulders from behind. The instant he touched her, she whirled around and buried her face in his chest.