Merfolk

by Jeremy Bates

“It’s not,” he told her curtly. “Look, whales as you think of them started inhabiting the oceans forty to thirty million years ago, okay? They were solitary animals, and there were some damn big predators in the oceans then. Being large helps an animal keep warm, but it’s also a good deterrent against getting eaten. That’s perhaps the most important reason why whales grew so large. Merfolk, on the other hand, are presumably intelligent and social, like us. A more fitting aquatic equivalent would be dolphins, which are intelligent and live in pods with strong social bonds. They work together to hunt and deter threats. They don’t need to be the size of a house to get by.”

  The flight attendant parked the service trolley in the aisle next to them. Rad ordered a coffee with sugar and cream, while Marty demurred.

  “Yes, he’d like a coffee too, please,” Rad insisted.

  “No, I would not, thank you,” he said.

  “Okay, two for me then.”

  The flight attendant poured two coffees, set them on Rad’s fold-down tray, and moved on to the next row of passengers.

  “I told you I don’t want one,” Marty told her.

  “Ow! Too hot!” she said, sipping one of the coffees and setting it back down on her tray. “I ordered you one because I know you too well, Marty. You’re going to see me enjoying mine, and you’re going to ask for a sip. I’d rather you just have your own.”

  “I’m not going to ask for a sip.”

  “You always take food off my plate when we’re out for dinner.”

  “That’s different.”

  “You also finish my alcohol if I don’t want it.”

  The looming headache began to throb, and it wasn’t solely from being tired and hungover. Rad could be maddening sometimes. Still, he probably should have asked the flight attendant for a glass of water.

  “Are you my fan, Marty?”

  “What?”

  “Are you my fan?”

  “Of your show?” He shrugged. “I watch it…sometimes.”

  “So you’re my fan?”

  “Sure, Rad. I guess. I’m your fan.”

  “Well, I take care of my fans.” She nodded to the second coffee.

  He eyed it apprehensively, at the same time realizing he was parched.

  “Take it,” she pressed. “I got it for you.”

  “What the hell,” he said, and took the coffee.

  Chapter 8

  MARTY

  They landed thirty minutes later at Koggala Airport, an Air Force base that served both military and domestic flights. The runway was a thin strip of tarmac in a large field. They followed a path to a World War II-era terminal, where Rad and Jacky popped into the restroom and Marty purchased a bottle of water from a vending machine. When they regrouped in front of the building, they hailed a small yellow taxi, Marty getting in the front with the driver, the girls in the back. Thankfully the car was air-conditioned, and the planned roughly thirty-minute drive to Mirissa Beach was pleasant—until the driver was forced to pull over due to a flat tire. He didn’t have a spare and walked with them along the oceanside, two-lane highway for nearly a kilometer until they reached a strip of residences and stores with cracked and crumbling walls and corrugated iron roofs (or in some cases, no roofs at all). A few people were sitting in front of their shops doing not much of anything, while wild fowl scratched around in the dirt and stray dogs stretched lazily on their sides in the shade. The only available transportation for hire, it turned out, was a red auto rickshaw that incongruously flew an American flag. Like all the trishaws (as they were colloquially referred to), it featured three wheels and three seats, one in the front and two in the back. Jacky and Rad climbed into the passenger cabin. Marty insisted he could fit on the bench seat with them, but they said he was too sweaty from the long walk.

  Which left him no other choice than to stand on the trishaw’s back bumper and hold onto the metal luggage bars that spanned the canvas roof.

  The driver pushed the two-stroke engine up to sixty kilometers an hour on the two-lane road. The wind blasted Marty’s ears and tore at his clothes as he hung on for his life, alternating between curses and prayers. When they came upon a herd of cattle blocking the road, the driver slowed to navigate through the oblivious beasts.

  Marty leapt off the sheet-metal contraption, grateful to have his feet on solid ground once again.

  The trishaw continued onward without him.

  “You bloody idiot!” he shouted. “Stop!”

  It pulled over on the dirt shoulder. Jacky and Rad tugged back the curtains and stuck their heads out the windows.

  “What are you doing, Marty?” Rad called.

  “Did you fall off?” asked Jacky.

  He was too angry to reply and trudged silently to the vehicle. When he reached it, he said, “Move over, Rad.”

  “No way, Marty. You’re even sweatier than before!”

  “Maybe that’s because for the last ten minutes I’ve been trying not to die.”

  “Were we going too fast?” Jacky asked.

  “Yes, you were going too bloody fast!” He glared at the maniac driver, a young man with a peach fuzz mustache. “What the bloody hell were you doing? You must have been going sixty kilometers an hour!”

  He stared blankly, and Marty knew from his attempt to negotiate the fare earlier (which Jacky eventually settled in Tamil) that the kid barely spoke two words of English.

  “Rad, move over,” he said again.

  “Sheesh,” she said, but both she and Jacky scooted to the left. He squeezed in, so his thigh and shoulder pressed tightly against Rad. Her dog yapped in protest from the beach bag.

  “I feel like a sardine in a tin,” Jacky said.

  “Comfy, Marty?” said Rad. “Because we’re certainly not.”

  “Get moving,” he grunted at the driver.

  The kid stared, uncomprehending.

  “Go!” Marty barked, pointing straight ahead. “Drive!”

  ∆∆∆

  The sleepy roads of Mirissa were lined with bars, restaurants, surf rentals shops, pharmacies, a couple of tattoo parlors, hostels and guest houses, and a variety of residences, some of which were rather grand in size and structure (though just as dilapidated as everything else). The main street ran parallel to the beach and was livelier than the others, populated with loitering locals and tourists strolling at the leisurely pace of people with nothing better to do.

  “I like the laid-back vibe here,” Jacky said. “It’s romantic. Has Marty ever taken you here, Rad?”

  “I wish. He hasn’t taken me anywhere.”

  “But you’ve been dating for two years.”

  “I told you last night, Jacky,” Marty said, “Rad and I are not dating. We see each other every now and then.”

  “I don’t know about you, Marty,” she replied. “But if I eat a sandwich every now and then, I’m still eating.”

  The driver swerved across the road and stopped on a patch of gravel before a two-story white building. Marty couldn’t read the teal sign, as the white letters were written in Sri Lankan, but Jacky confirmed this was the Sharks Board Maritime Center, the NGO where the American oceanographer worked.

  They exited the trishaw, and Marty’s excitement bloomed.

  We’re here. The skull’s right inside that building.

  He dug some money out of his pocket and paid the driver what they’d agreed upon, including a little-deserved tip.

  He knocked on the building’s glass door. A short, pretty girl in her early twenties opened it. He supposed she was relegated to door duty because she was the youngest female in the office. Misogyny and patriarchy were still entrenched in Sri Lankan society.

  Then again, he thought, peering past her into the office and seeing a lot of young women, maybe her desk is simply closest to the door.

  The girl placed her palms together and bowed. “Ahyubowan,” she said, a customary greeting that meant Long life. “Can I help you?”

  “I’m Jacqueline DeSilva,” Jacky said. “I spoke to
Dr. Montero yesterday. She’s agreed to sit for an interview with me. Is she here?”

  “Welcome, ma’am. Dr. Montero is working in the shed. Follow me, please.”

  The girl led them through the office to a heavy wood door, and they stepped into a morgue-like room. The roller door that faced the beach was open, letting in bright sunlight and fresh air.

  The American stood at a stainless-steel necropsy table with plastic vials, a tin bucket, and a large three-ring binder. Marty was surprised by her stature. He was six-foot-one, and she was only an inch or two shorter. Blonde-haired and blue-eyed, she wore a mustard-colored blouse rolled up at the sleeves, baggy denim shorts, and a pair of white Reeboks.

  “Dr. Elsa Montero,” Jacky said, crossing the room and extending her hand. “Thank you so much for agreeing to see me.”

  “I must say,” she replied, plucking off a blue latex glove and shaking her hand. “I didn’t know you’d be bringing an entourage.” She gave Marty and Rad a brief smile.

  “This is Dr. Martin Murdoch and Radhika Fernandez. I’m sorry, I should have let you know others would be accompanying me.”

  “Miss Fernandez, I believe I’ve seen you on the television?”

  “Mad Rad, that’s me,” she said, bobbing a curtsy.

  Marty was scanning the room for the skull but didn’t see it anywhere. He stepped toward the necropsy table and peeked into a large tin bucket. It was filled with what looked and smelled like feces. Wrinkling his nose, he backed away.

  “That’s excrement from a blue whale,” Dr. Montero told him. “Not very easy to come by, let me say.”

  “You never thought of collecting old coins or stamps instead?”

  “I don’t collect it. I study it.”

  Rad said, “You analyze whale feces?”

  Dr. Montero nodded. “To understand better how iron passes through the ocean’s food chain, yes. A blue whale’s favorite meal is krill. It will eat millions of them a day, up to three tons. Its iron- and nutrient-rich excrement feeds algae, which feeds more krill, which feeds other blue whales. It’s an amazing cycle, isn’t it? Hopefully, the more we learn about krill stock, the better we can manage and conserve it. Which in turn will help whale numbers begin to recover.”

  “Which is what we all want,” Marty said.

  Dr. Montero gave him a curious look. “Do I know you, Dr. Murdoch? You also seem familiar…”

  “He’s The Merdoc,” Rad offered happily.

  Marty shot her a look.

  “The Merdoc?” Dr. Montero said, frowning. Then understanding lit her eyes. She seemed about to slap her forehead before stopping herself. “Of course! Dr. Martin Murdoch. I watched your documentary a few years back.” The understanding turned analytical. She glanced at Jacky. “What kind of story are you writing exactly, Miss DeSilva?”

  “Just Jacky. And the story…well, that depends on what Dr. Murdoch has to say about the skull.”

  “You believe it belonged to a mermaid?” she stated flatly to Marty.

  “Given I’ve only seen a brief video clip of it, I’m not in a position to make a judgement. You’re still in possession of it, I hope?” The question came across as more fraught than he would have liked.

  “It’s lucky that Miss DeSilva called me when she did—”

  “Jacky, please.”

  “Then you can call me Elsa. And had you called an hour later yesterday, Jacky, I would already have turned the skull over to the authorities. However, I was able to talk them into letting me hold onto it for the time being. So to answer your question, Dr. Murdoch, yes, it’s still in my possession.” She went to the steel shelves lining one of the room’s walls and returned with a cardboard box. She set it on the necropsy table, peeled back the top flaps, and lifted out the bleached-white skull.

  Marty didn’t take his eyes off it. “May I?” he asked, holding out his hands.

  Dr. Montero passed him the skull. As he turned it this way and that in his hands, he experienced the same unfiltered wonder that he did when first viewing Fat Mike’s merfolk video. Yet that had taken him time to digest and to ultimately conclude that he believed what he was seeing. This was different. The skull was in his hands. It was tangible. There was no digital magic between him and it. There was no convincing himself this time, no wishful thinking.

  The skull was authentic. It was merfolk. He felt it with every fiber in his being.

  To nobody in particular, he said, “It’s so very much human, isn’t it? The bulbous cranium, the flat face. But it’s different too. Look here.” He drew a finger along the top of the skull. “A sagittal crest, which is only found in some early hominins. And here, the brow ridge is quite pronounced, one of the last traits lost on the path to modern humans. But, my God, look at that frontal bone! It’s not receding as it is in apes, and it’s not vertical as it is in humans. It’s protuberant. Look at it!” He glanced from one face to the next—they ran the gamut from delighted (Jacky) to skeptical (Rad) to plain unreadable (Dr. Montero)—and added, “To be clear, these are only my initial, visual observations… Dr. Montero, I’ve seen the look on your face far too many times from the orthodoxy to not know it well. You think I’m an out-and-out crank peddling cryptid pseudoscience.”

  “I’ve followed your work for many years, Dr. Murdoch,” she said. “I find your aquatic ape theory fascinating. However, to be perfectly frank, I have yet to see any evidence to convince me of the reality of mermaids and mermen, and this skull has not changed my position on that.” She saw that he was about to interrupt and held up a hand. “The enlarged forehead struck me as quite unusual, certainly. Indeed, it compelled me to do some armchair research last night, and my conclusion is the skull is that of a person who suffered from cloverleaf deformity.”

  Rad said, “Cloverfield deformity?”

  Marty said, “Cloverleaf. It’s a genetic disorder in which mutated genes cause the sutures on a skull to fuse together prematurely. The results are facial deformities such as abnormally formed eye sockets, flat nasal bridges, a small upper or lower jaw—and a misshapen head, often bulging at the front. However,” he added, “it’s usually noticeable at birth and corrected with surgery.”

  “Perhaps in a developed country it is,” Dr. Montero said. “But I should remind you, we’re not in a developed country.”

  “No, we’re not,” he agreed. “Yet while cloverleaf deformity may account for the protuberant forehead, it does not and cannot explain the other abnormalities I noted.”

  “I’m not familiar enough with the anatomy of the human skull to agree or disagree with you. I’m an oceanographer, not a forensic anthropologist—as are you, Dr. Murdoch.”

  Marty smiled tightly. Scientists could be some of the most obstinate people on the planet. They understood that disciplined methodology—the rational interpretation of observational evidence—was the only way integrity could be maintained during the scientific process; the only buffer between science and snake oil, so to speak. Yet when faced with observational evidence that was at odds with their worldviews, critical thinking and healthy skepticism all too often devolved into bias and stubbornness.

  He had hoped better from Dr. Montero.

  “I would be happy to hear the opinion of a forensic anthropologist,” he told her, finally setting the skull back in the cardboard box. “If you know of any in town, please invite them over. In the meantime my assistant is piloting my research vessel from Colombo to Mirissa as we speak. She should be here by noon. I have a DNA lab aboard that could settle the matter more definitely than the opinion of any medical examiner. That is, if you don’t object to a genetic test being performed on the skull, Dr. Montero?”

  “No objections at all. In fact, I would be very interested in your findings.” She turned to Jacky. “Now, Miss DeSilva—Jacky—about the interview. I’m still happy to sit down with you, but I want you to know beforehand that I won’t be speculating about anything outside of my field of expertise. Which is to say, I’ll answer any questions you have about th
e great white necropsy, but I won’t opine about the skull.”

  “That’s fair enough,” Jacky said.

  “Come inside the office with me then. It’s air-conditioned, and there’s a machine that brews passable coffee. Dr. Murdoch, Miss Fernandez, a colleague of mine filmed the necropsy. Perhaps you’d be interested in viewing it in the meantime?”

  ∆∆∆

  The necropsy was over thirty minutes long, and when Marty and Rad came to the dissection of the shark’s stomach near the end of it, they were fascinated as Dr. Montero removed the skull from what appeared to be a soup of putrefied whale blubber. Marty replayed this section of the video several times.

  He slumped back in his chair and said, “I think we can safely say that wasn’t a hoax.”

  Rad said, “Unless they force-fed the skull to the shark while it was alive, or shoved the skull down its throat when it was dead.”

  “You really believe that?”

  “Nope.”

  “Which leaves us with one of two scenarios. The skull either belonged to the unfortunate victim of cloverleaf deformity, or a fantastical creature that has populated the myths and legends of nearly every human culture since the dawn of civilization. Which do you think?”

  “Does it matter?”

  “No. But I’m curious.”

  Rad scowled. “You’re such a dick sometimes, Marty.”

  He blinked in surprise. “What? Why? I mean, your opinion matters to me. It just doesn’t matter in the big picture, does it? Neither does mine, for that matter. Science alone will inform us if it’s human or not.”

  “Smooth recovery, Merdoc.”

  Now Marty scowled. “All right. How about we address this Merdoc business once and for all? I’m sorry, Rad. All right? I’m sorry I wasn’t transparent with you about who I am. It wasn’t personal. I hate being known as The Merdoc. I hate it. I want nothing to do with that fool. I guess I didn’t tell you everything because I was afraid you’d act like everybody else.”

  “And how’s that?”

  “You’d ridicule me. You’d call me The Merdoc. You’d do exactly what you’ve been doing since yesterday.”