Who is Lt. Hikahi from Startide Rising and what is their importance? Startide_Rising English & Literature Lt. Hikahi | Startide Rising

A small, light-gray, female neo-dolphin officer, third in command of the exploration vessel Streaker, Hikahi is first seen leading a search expedition for vanadium, a rare metal needed for ship repairs. She switches the focus to search and rescue for Phip-pit and Ssassia, crewfen who go missing. Informed about the outbreak of war overhead and ordered back to the ship, Hikahi surprisingly slips into the Primal dialect, a sign of panic. As an adept, Hikahi might have used Keeneenk to calm the others when they panic in a tsunami, but she beaches herself and is badly injured. Worried when Hikahi does not reply to communications, Dr. Gillian Baskin wonders what politics have made Takkata-Jim Vice-Captain rather than Hikahi, her best neo-dolphin friend. Hikahi is battered but survives and with Toshio encounters a pre-sentient species, the Kiqui. Hikahi is concerned that all trace of Earth visitors be carefully removed, including bodies of dead dolphins and all debris. Hikahi recovers from her wounds and resumes her duties, inflaming the captain's passions by flirtatious swimming during a meeting and scanning him with radar for clear evidence of his desire.