(fictional story, wm/bf, nc)
Foreword: No whales were harmed during the writing of this story. This is a work of fiction. None of the people in this story are real. None of these events ever happened. This story is nothing more than words that came from my imagination. Any similarity to any real people, places, or events is purely coincidental.
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Andrea walked up to the whale tank at Oceanic Research Labs in southern California. She trilled three short whistles. A moment later, a huge sperm whale jumped out of the tank and flopped back into the water with a huge splash that drenched Andrea.
Jill walked up behind Andrea, "She got you good, Andrea."
"Yeah! I'm soaked. So what's the diagnosis?"
"I still think she has some kind of parasite. There's traces of fecal matter coming from her blowhole that suggests something we've never encountered before."
"Ewww! Poor Jane!"
"I'm still puzzled at that cut just below her lung under her body. It's too clean and straight! It looks almost like someone had performed surgery on her at one time. I just wish there was an x-ray machine big enough for a whale."
Later that day, Andrea returned from lunch to a commotion in the whale tank. The whale was partly out of the tank on the walkway that surrounded the tank.
"What happened?" Andrea asked.
"Jane tried to jump the tank. She landed with a _smack_ on the walkway."
"Oh dear! Jane! She'll suffocate under her own weight if we don't get her back in the water quickly!"
"Don't worry! We're prepared for this. We're lowering the walkway into the tank. Jane will be fine!"
They lowered the whale into the tank without fuss, and Jill examined her and proclaimed her unhurt from her escape attempt.
The following day, when Andrea arrived for work, she saw blood stains surrounding Jane's blowhole. She immediately ran back to Jill's office yelling, "Jill! Jill! Come quick! Something's wrong with Jane! I think she really got hurt yesterday!"
Jill jumped out of her chair spilling veterinary records all over her desk. She grabbed a whale kit and ran with Andrea out to the whale tanks.
Exiting out to the tanks, Jane was swimming blissfully around the edge of the tank. Andrea reached out and patted Jane on her dorsal fin while Jill held a stethoscope up to different parts of Jane's body.
"Jane's fine, Andrea. Let me take a sample of that blood and send it off to the lab."
While Andrea continued to calm Jane, Jill used a long cotton swap to take a sample of the blood around her blowhole.
"We won't know for a couple of days, but Jane seems fine. Probably just a bloody nose, er, blowhole," Jill said with a laugh.
The following two days were uneventful until Jill walked into Andrea's office. Andrea was going over some dolphin migration charts when Jill said, "We need to take another blood sample from Jane."
"Why," asked Andrea.
"Oh, the lab screwed up! They say we sent them human blood. From two different people, at that."
"Idiots! Also, I've noticed that Jane has become more sluggish since her accident. I really think there's something wrong with her."
Jill and Andrea returned to the whale tank. Andrea called Jane over while Jill stuck another swab into Jane's blowhole.
"There's still plenty of blood in there," Jill said. Jill took the swab back to her office and Andrea returned to her work.
The following day Jill returned to Andrea's office.
"Andrea!"
"Oh, Hi Jill! Did you get Jane's blood work back yet?"
"Yes, and you're not going to believe it. A different lab reported the exact same results as the first lab. Exact same! Human blood -- a mix of Type O and type A."
"How is that possible? Could Jane have eaten anyone?"
"No, whales don't eat people. Even if she could have, the blood wouldn't be coming from her blowhole!"
The following day, Jill scheduled surgery for Jane. Several marine biologists and veterinarians arrived at the day of the surgery. Andrea asked Jill, "What's going on?"
"We're going to perform exploratory surgery to see what is behind that scar under Jane's lung. My hunch is that we'll find the answer to Jane's health problems in there."
Jane was raised partially out of the water and on her side ad she was given anesthesia. As Andrea watched, one of the doctors made an incision over Jane's scar.
"This is interesting," Jill called out. "There's an identical incision on Jane's ling directly beneath the incision on her skin."
The team of doctors cut into Jane's lung and probed the incision with their medical instruments.
"Oh my God!" the team of doctors shouted in unison.
"What?" Andrea asked back.
"Stand back, Andrea," Jill answered, apparently quite flustered.
The doctors reached in and pulled out -- a human body.
"Urp! I'm going to be sick!" Andrea choked as she ran off to the nearest trash bin.
A few minutes later, a steeled Andrea returned to the scene to see two, relatively undamaged, human remains, and a few of other unidentified mangled masses of tissue, lying on the floor next to Jane.