"I'm Dixon. Jonas told me he was sending his new Hands to meet me. He's all excited about you. Told me the story of how you got out. I'm impressed. And they say no one makes it out alive?"

Widening her eyes, she gave me a Cheshire cat smile.

"Way to beat the system. You know you're the first to do that. Let's go upstairs, you'll feel a lot warmer."

She looked back toward the Narwhal and opening her mouth wide let out a piercing call, similar to the chirping whales. Then she tossed the last of the fish to them. She looked pretty much like me, except for the breasts, which were more decorative than functional. She had the same skin, clothing, and spiky black hair. I understood that we were designed to be completely humanoid, that we could have sex for pleasure, but that we couldn't reproduce. We have half cloned biologic material after all. 

It was nice to know there were females. And she was once a human too, sort of.

Dixon had been a Harvard professor, a breakthrough leading feminist scientist, and a Radcliffe girl with a life spanning all of the twentieth century. Her Echo-1 life and career were impressive. Unlike me, she lived out her entire life. Jonas tagged her for extraction upon her death.

We passed through a pressure chamber and climbed a spiral staircase to a room with a glass wall that looked into the frigid sea. The whales were all playfully swimming about outside. Dixon went over to a counter and blended a hot smoothie type beverage. We stood at the window drinking and watching the whales.

"It's energy-packed, you won't need to ingest anything for several days. We don't really eat much." 

I sipped and nodded, I wasn't really hungry but it tasted good.

"Jonas brought me here fifteen years ago to grow mollusks and structure an ecosystem for these two pods. I ended up recreating Earth's polar shallows. These may be the last of these whales. Removed from Earth thousands of years ago but failed as navigators; they were dumped on a water world in the 5th system. They had trouble adapting to the new environment. There was a good size group of each but they were dying.

"Jonas selected this group to breed future generations. We're taking them with us to a water world very similar to Earth. Jonas negotiated the rights to an outer rim planet with pretty stellar natural resources in exchange for doing two runs on the Banga. The planet is mostly a frozen ball. The equator is warmer and I'm told the central landmass is comparable to Canada with a short spring and summer season. The southern continent has a huge pristine pine forest with massive trees that defy the long winters. I'm going to stay there, live with these whales, and see if I can help them make it. 

"I've been altering my vocal processor through a series of surgeries. I understand both whale languages and am nearly able to speak them. My range is still off a bit."

She coughed to clear her throat. 

"The Belugas are songbirds. I'm sure you heard them coming in."

I had indeed.

"The two species are closely related even though they look different. They shared the same environment on Earth, often traveling and feeding together. They're social butterflies with complex relationships. They call me 'Mother D' in their language. I think they're making fun of me half the time?

"Anyway, these whales don't like technology. If we try and attach a transmitter they freak out. They'll talk to us for about ten minutes, mostly a bunch of swearing, then they break off the device. We tried surgically implanting one and the Narwhals stabbed at the whale with the implant until it came out. Needless to say, that whale died. The funny thing was, the whole time he kept asking them to do it. Don't get me wrong, they're intelligent, sophisticated mammals. They just have a primitive, more simplistic nature."

Outside the window, the whales spun round and round. From within her submarine tower, Dixon schemed a great future for these species from a world she never really lived on but knew oh so well. 

I tried to wrap my mind around the idea that these whales were actually from Earth and I wasn't.

Dixon continued.

"If I knew what I knew now when I was a human, I would have spent my whole life working with these whales. Jonas opened my eyes. He's going to stay with me for the first season on the new world, then he's driving the Banga back on a round trip and bringing back the rest of the whales. Assuming there are still some alive in two hundred years.

"I've never had a connection to beings like these before. Our technology is so advanced that we can communicate with them. I think I like them even more because they don't use technology. I envy them. 

"In this new body, I'm young again, and strong, and swim like nobody's business. I feel like I'm in scientist heaven."

She finished off her drink in silence watching as the whales glide gracefully through the water.

I wondered if they were the last of their kind?

"Would you like to go topside? We built a surface environment to live symbiotically with the underwater world."

We went to the rear of the room and took a lift up to the top of the submarine. It was a circular elevator that could alter its orientation to match that of the ship. I had no info on this ship. It was all new to me. I accessed the Banga's computer but it only gave vague examples of similar vehicles.

"Can you tell me about this ship?" I asked. 

As the lift shot up Dixon grabbed my body and hugged me, her plated black hair stood on end like a big cat. She purred and nuzzled me. I felt warm all over. She let go and stepped back, giggling.

"I'm a teenager in this body with the mind of a 105-year-old woman. It's a strange experience. You seem much nicer than the others Jonas has pulled out of the simulation. But I guess you came out on your own, didn't you? 

"Anyway, about my ship. Charlie's team designed it for me. They're Ursa Gnomes you know. Charlie is a mechanical wizard. I told them what I needed and they built it. They expanded on designs of few hardy amphibious spaceships, three decks thick and thirteen long with three entry docks and everything a small team would need to survive indefinitely in a frozen water environment. I call her the Unicorn. Her hull shape is modeled after the body of Narwhal. Do you know the story of Noah's ark?"

I nodded.

"And how he left all the unicorns behind. You know that old biblical god wanted to keep all the magic to himself. Anyway, the unicorns showed him, as the water covered the earth they changed themselves into whales and took to the sea. And now they are with me. I'm like a Noah who insists on taking the unicorns."

I hadn't heard her version of the great flood myth. 

We exited the lift and out onto a frozen observation deck.

"Welcome to the north pole."

It was a field of white as far as the eye could see. In the distance, the entire terrain was surrounded by snow-covered mountains. A spiral needle jetted out from the nose of the ship. It really was a unicorn ship.

"The environment is 20 decks of surface and 60 below forming the frigid sea. We're closed off from the rest of the ship. Here come some of the little blue guys, now." She pointed off to our left.

A flock of blue penguins waddled over a snowdrift. They were about a meter tall, similar in scale and stature to the emperor penguins of Earth. Before I could enjoy their oddball cuteness, a panic raced through their ranks. 

Penguins ran in all directions, flailing wings, and desperately diving for a nearby ice hole. Out of nowhere appeared a massive polar bear. It charged the penguins, grabbed one in its jaws, and ripped it in half with its claws. The ice was splattered with green blood and blue flesh.

"What is that thing! Are we even safe out here?" None of the information I recently acquired mentioned anything about giant killer polar bears.

"Don't worry, the outer hull is electrified. They're afraid of the Unicorn. If you go out there though... you won't hear them until you're in their teeth."

The beast was about twenty meters away and hunched over its meal, ripping off chunks and swallowing them.

"The bears are one of Veronica's contributions. She based on Earth polar bears in Jonas's simulation but they turned out bigger and more ferocious. She felt we can't make a new world for these whales without some kind of apex predator. Have you met Veronica yet?"

I hadn't. I knew she was third in command and our head scientific officer. She was a female Sperm whale and the matriarch of one of the pods. She had no offspring, yet.

"You'll hear all the ship rumors about whale love triangles when you meet the Save the Whales gang. They're a bunch of well-meaning crackpots. No scientific backgrounds, mind you, but true enthusiastic animal lovers. They're normally hanging around with one of the pods or doing odd jobs out on the Sea of Tranquility."

I wasn't completely paying attention to Dixon, I was fixated on watching a monstrous bear devour a penguin.

"The blue penguins always travel with Jonas. He plans on leaving them all on the planet with me, he assures me they will thrive there. He supposedly saved them from extinction, but the way they reproduce, I find it hard to believe they were in any danger. It's good we have the bears ]to keep their numbers in check. 

"There are caves built into each of the outer perimeter walls. They're meant to look like mountains sides. The bears are spending the journey there. We're on the second generation with new cubs out there, learning to hunt penguins. We have four adults and two cubs total. On the ice it's all blue penguins and polar bears. 

"Those crazy bears tried to pull a whale out of an ice hole once. Would you like to go out on the ice? We could track down the cubs."

I was saved by the bell, when Vronsky summoned me back to the dock he dropped me off at.

"Maybe next time," I said. 

We went back down the lift to the underwater port. I wasn't looking forward to that cold plunge back into the frigid water. My clothing had quickly dried, it was made of amazing material.

"It was great meeting you," I said.

She took my hands in hers and her hair stood up again. "Take care, Hands, go meet Veronica and watch out for the Zero-G's, they're crazy warmongers."

I told her I would and jumped into the freezing water. I swam out to meet Vronsky and climbed back into my seat between him and the cannon barrel. All the Beluga and Narwhals swam around us and escorted us to the exit from the secret frozen sea. 

I reached back for the breather as we entered the water ring again and headed toward the front of the ship.

"I'd like to meet Veronica if we have time?" I asked. 

We glided in the water stream and the feeling of not moving took over again. 

Vronsky rolled his eye back at me.

"I'm going to drop you at one of the airlocks, we'll pass her pod on the way. They're nursing around a nearby air bubble. Your next mission is to experience the ship from outside. Take this travel time to review the Zero-G commando profiles, particularly Major Uzi Anger, Lieutenant X, and Sergeant Death. They all have what they feel are cool new names."

I accessed the Banga's computer and the Echo-1 profiles of the three military officers.