B27C19/20 - Echolocate

The ocean was no longer a cold and hostile place.

It was home.

I knew its temperatures and depths, its floors and crevices.

I fired off a blast of pulsed clicks and received a "picture" of everything around me. Like a black-and-white sketch that traced across my mind and was erased like an Etch-A-Sketch.

I was echolocating. I had natural sonar.

I "saw" the dolphins and they "saw" me.

And then another large creature was moving toward me.

<Rachel, I sure hope that's you,> Tobias called.

Oh. Right.

(...)

We arched our backs and sounded, slipping silently down into the living sea.

We descended quickly, echolocating past shelves and hollows, our sonar drawing us sketchy, uncertain pictures.

Murky shadows and then, total darkness.

Total. Like being blind. Like having your eyes taped shut and being locked in an underground vault.

Lightless.

The whale's senses quickened. The whale did not hear, but it did anticipate. We'd soon be entering the hunting grounds.

Where my prey sometimes fought me and won.