Dr. Clara Mendoza had always felt more at home in saltwater than on dry land. As a child, she'd spent long hours on her father's fishing boat off the coast of Monterey, listening to the mournful echoes of distant whale songs and imagining what wisdom they carried between the notes. By adulthood, Clara's fascination with cetacean communication had eclipsed every other ambition. She earned degrees, fellowships, and the nickname "Whale Whisperer," though she always dismissed it with a laugh. Her work was serious?years of painstaking observation, translating clicks and harmonies into a lexicon, and finally, building a rudimentary digital interface to communicate with her oceanic counterparts.

Today, standing at the bow of the research vessel Poseidon, Clara felt a flutter of anticipation as they approached the coordinates where a pod of humpbacks had been tracked for the past week. The morning sun glinted off the water's surface, creating a tapestry of dancing light that reminded her of the first time she'd successfully established a two-way exchange with a juvenile female she'd named Aria.