Page 91 of Echo and the Homicidal Sea Panda

“I’d hoped you, Storm, Ravage,andHavoc would go,” his mother said.

Mael frowned. “All four of us?”

“You know full well that Kaiden’s father isn’t the sharpest tool in the shed. He’s all brute strength, little brain power,” his mother said. “He’ll be more of a liability than anything else. Sending all four of you might be overkill, but we don’t know where they’ll end up holding him and how difficult it’ll be to get him out.”

“Are you waiting until his father contacts you with the destination?” Echo asked.

“No. It’ll take at least three weeks just to swim there,” Mael said. “We need to go now.”

“How would you even know where to go?” Echo asked.

“The shipping lanes,” Mael replied. “A few start in Washington State and travel north, passing Alaska where their pod is, then they arc down toward Asia. The freighters likely on one of those. Kaiden’s father will have hopefully left messages along the way. Other pods he passes… other shifters. Even if he doesn’t, whales are great at sharing information. They’ll send us on the right path.”

“You speak whale?” Echo asked, eyes wide.

“Yeah. Don’t you?” Mael asked.

“No,” Echo said. “We don’t travel far from Dolphin Bay, clearly. We haven’t picked up those skills, I guess.”

“Most wild dolphins tend to stick close to home. Because of that, they can no longer sustain the kind of speed we can, not as long as we can,” his mother said. “Even though we’ve made a home here, orcas are natural migrators, built for distance. We have systems in place to remain as safe as possible when we travel distances.”

“There’s a chance we can catch up to them before they dock,” Mael added. “Freighters usually only travel between twelve and twenty knots and usually on the slower end if they want to save fuel. We can move at more than twice that.”

“Yes, but a boat doesn’t need to sleep,” Echo said.

“Unhemispheric sleep. We don’t stop swimming,” Mael said. When in orca form, only half their brains shut down for sleep at a time to prevent them from drowning. “Youdohave that when you shift, right?”

“Of course,” Echo said. “But we barely move when we’re asleep.”

“We slow, but we don’t stop. If we take turns, those awake can guide the sleeper and keep a faster pace. We won’t lose much time at all.”

“How long will you be gone?” Echo asked.

“I didn’t say I was going,” Mael murmured. “I’m just thinking out loud.”

“Mael,”Echo said. He smiled softly. “You’ve already decided to go. I can hear it in your voice. And youshould. You didn’t save Kaiden once for him to be taken again.”

Mael eyed his mother, who was staring at Echo.

He turned to Echo and smiled. “Three to four weeks there. Whatever time we need to get him out. With a young calf in tow, the return will be slower, so closer to five or six weeks, I’d guess. All total, ten to twelve weeks, give or take.” He winced. The pain of being apart that long was almost physical. “I won’t be able to take a cell phone to check in, either.”

“I realize that. My parents are off on their extended holiday and they didn’t take theirs, either. They call in from their stops, though.”

“I can try, but calling from Asia might not be so simple,” Mael murmured.

“I think we can manage a few weeks without one another,” Echo said. He rose on his tiptoes, and Mael lowered his head. He pressed a kiss to Mael’s lips. “Save the boy and then come back to me.”

Mael grinned down at his little dolphin. “Is that an order?”

“It is,” Echo said, grinning back.

Mael rested his forehead on Echo’s. “I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

He leaned down and captured Echo’s lips. The brief kiss he’d planned deepened… until his mother cleared her throat, reminding him they weren’t alone.

Mael pulled from Echo and eyed his mother, his face burning with embarrassment. “I need to get Echo back to Dolphin Bay. Can you tell my brothers to start mapping out a route. I’ll return as soon as I can.”

---