Chapter 6: Never Such A School
So, the five hungry friends set out for Silver Reef. There had never been such a school before. A clownfish, a butterfly fish, a flapjack octopus, a seahorse, and a sea turtle – all traveling together, all knowing that if they'd lose their way they would starve…or find themselves in Greenspot's shadow.
The five friends later found themselves along a strip of very fine sand, looking for food. "Kelp and coral grows where there's clear water and good sand." Nemo thought out loud as he observed the sand. "So if we follow this strip…"
Sheldon sighed. "Man, there's no food here and I'm still hungry!"
"I'm still hungry, too…" Pearl muttered and dropped down on Squirt's head.
Nemo sighed and his friends complaining. After a moment, he caught a scent on the water and sniffed. "Do you smell something?"
Squirt lifted his nose and started to sniff with Pearl still on his head. "Yeah…I smell an octopus."
Pearl giggled.
"It's pretty clear around here…" Nemo inhaled the scent. "I smell…kelp!!"
The friends looked down through a deep cavern. Beyond that was a wide valley of stone, and within that was a large, lush patch of kelp and coral.
"Hey, check it out!" Squirt yelled. "Food!!"
"Silver Reef!!!" Tad cheered. He danced back and forth tauntingly. "I found it! I found it!" he sang.
Nemo gave him a glare. "Tad!"
"I found it!" Tad grinned.
Suddenly, the ground began to rumble violently. Nemo and his friends had to hold onto the rocks to steady themselves.
"Earthquake!!" Pearl shouted.
"We gotta get outta here!" Nemo yelled and led them in a scramble towards the valley. "This way! C'mon!!"
The five friends scurried down the slopes for the valley. But before they could get very far, an enormous school of halibut came pouring out behind them and stormed for the valley. To avoid being stampeded, Nemo and his friends dove down beneath a rocky ridge and kept their heads down.
The rumbling ceased when the last of the halibut school passed over them. One by one, the five friends peeked over the rocks to look down at them. Tad shoved his way to the front and look down into the valley, gasping at what he saw.
The starving halibut were quickly gorging themselves on the entire patch of kelp. "They're eating our food!" Tad exclaimed. He glared. "Would ya just look what they're doing! They're so greedy!! What about me? I'm still hungry!!"
"Hah!' Sheldon glared. "You're hungry? I'm empty all the way to the top!" His frustration quickly gave way to dismay. "Now we're at Silver Reef and still have no food!!" He sighed and hung his head. "We'll be hungry forever!"
Nemo shook his head. "C'mon, Sheldon… Tad's wrong. This isn't Silver Reef." He looked down to the valley, where the school of halibut was departing from the now empty kelp patch. "Well…" he sighed, "guess we'd better go down and see if there's anything left…"
Later, the five friends went towards a lone-standing purple coral. It was very tall and high, but there were plenty of coral blossoms at the top.
"Sheldon?" Nemo looked at his seahorse friend. "You have a really good grip with your tail. Think maybe you could climb up there and--?"
"No!" Sheldon said quickly. "No! You know I don't like heights, man!"
"Aw, it's okay, Sheldon." Pearl reassured. "I can help get you up there."
Nemo went over to the base of the coral and looked up. The blossoms looked tempting and delicious, and everyone's stomachs were already grumbling. "Over here, guys," he called back.
Pearl led a nervous Sheldon over to him. She got up on Nemo's back, and then pulled Sheldon carefully up on top of her. Sheldon's teeth chattered as Nemo carefully tried to push them up towards the blossoms. All of the sudden, Pearl slipped and accidentally whacked Nemo in the face with her tentacles.
"Hey—Ow!!" Nemo shouted. "Pearl, no! Push Sheldon towards the blossoms!"
Sheldon whimpered and very carefully and slowly leaned back and inched his tail towards the blossoms. He barely got anywhere, however, before he started to slip, yelped and clung to Pearl for life.
Squirt swam up to them. "Here, Nemo, I got it, dude!" He went to help push Nemo up.
"Okay, Squirt…" Nemo glanced back. "Just don't bring your head up too-- Whoa!" he gave a startled yell as Squirt pushed his head underneath him and started to push him up. "O-Okay… Hey, not too fast. Hey, not too fast!"
Squirt wasn't paying that much attention and lifted his head up all the way. Nemo, Sheldon, and Pearl all yelled in surprise as they were suddenly pushed much higher up. Sheldon whimpered, and made the terrible mistake of looking down. His eyes widened and he started stuttering in terror. Then faster than anything, he clung to Pearl again, almost choking her.
"Ack!" Pearl coughed.
Tad was in a fit of giggles on the ground as he watched his friends. "You guys look so ridiculous!!!" he cackled.
Sheldon finally got courage enough and reached his tail up to the top of the coral, and then started pulling blossoms off as quickly as he could. As he pulled them off, the blossoms slowly drifted downwards towards the ground. Poor starving Squirt watched them as they fell past him. If only he could reach one without slipping…
The little turtle reached out a flipper as carefully as he could to try and pull one of the blossoms in. He reached little by little until his other flipper slipped and he stumbled to the ground out from under Nemo. Nemo grunted and tried to hold on, but soon slipped as well and landed on Squirt's shell. Sheldon was left hanging upside down from the coral, hanging onto a branch by his tail. Pearl was holding onto him with a tentacle.
"Pearl, Sheldon, c'mon down!" Nemo called up to them with a smile. "We've got food!"
Pearl giggled and turned to Sheldon, giving him a big '"thank you" kiss on the cheek. Sheldon lost his grip, but Squirt was there to catch them on his shell.
Nemo smiled and swam over to Tad. "C'mon, Tad!" he urged. "We got food!"
"I can get my own food, thank you." Tad announced spitefully. He turned towards the coral and swam backwards a bit. Then, he lowered his head and rushed at the coral, butting into it. He scowled when no blossoms would fall. He rammed his whole body against the coral over and over again as if it were going to help.
Nemo sighed. He grabbed a couple of the blossoms in his good fin and waited. Tad backed up with a glare and took one more solid ram at the coral. When he did, Nemo threw the two blossoms down to him, making it look like he had succeeded in knocking them off.
Tad smiled proudly at himself and ate a mouthful of petals. Nemo rolled his eyes.
"See there?" Tad smirked. "I can take care of myself." He turned and swam off towards a sandy hill to bed down. "All by myself. And I ain't afraid of bein' alone."
The other four just floated there and ate, not very impressed by their friend's boasting.
"I know my way around." Tad continued. "And I'm not afraid of Greenspot!" He smirked at his friends. "…I sure hope he doesn't eat any of you," he sang.
Nemo gave him a glare, then leaned towards his friends. "Don't worry. There isn't any Greenspot," he muttered.
After another moment the friends started to find a spot to bed down. Tad was settled down on his sandy hill apart from the others. But one by one, Pearl, Sheldon, and Squirt all came to lie down next to him. Squirt came in first and rested on the flat next to him. Sheldon and Pearl followed and the four of them huddled together in a heap to keep warm.
A distance away, Nemo floated on his own underneath a coral arch. He stared at his friends for a moment, then sighed sadly and closed his eyes briefly. "…There isn't any Greenspot…" he muttered to himself, his voice faltering slightly. His head and tail hung low as he swam off towards another patch of sand, this one shielded a bit across the top by the branches of a fan coral. He suddenly felt very lonely as he lay down on the sand.
It was the first in a long time he truly felt his dad's absence. He had gotten so used to feeling the larger form resting beside him and the gradual rising and falling of gills alternating with his. Whenever Nemo was sick, couldn't sleep, or woke from a bad dream, he only needed to take one look around to be reminded that he was within the warm colors and atmosphere of his anemone home and completely safe next to his father. Tonight though, he was lying in the middle of a vast flat of sand, all alone without that familiar warmth and comfort. It was chillier out, and the dull, cold colors of the sand and rocks only added to the unwelcoming surroundings.
The young clownfish just lay there and stared at the ground, deep in thought and not very sleepy.
It didn't take long for Tad, Sheldon, and Squirt to fall asleep. Poor Pearl was startled awake by the boys' sudden, loud snoring. Irritated, she pouted a bit and tried to bury herself under Squirt's belly to drown out the noise. But that only made it worse. She glowered at her friends snoring like the men they were. Finally, she got up and began to swim over to where Nemo was.
Her clownfish friend was still awake and staring at the ground. Pearl came up right next to him and settled down into the sand, catching his attention. She leaned into Nemo and sighed contently, finally falling asleep. Nemo smiled and closed his eyes, happy to have someone there with him.
It wasn't too long before Sheldon, half-awake, drifted over to them and settled down on Nemo's other side, sprawling out on the ground with his head propped up on his clownfish friend's side. Almost immediately after that, Squirt came in and joined them, providing a majority of the warmth for his friends as he lay down next to them.
Tad's sleep was interrupted when he began to shiver a bit from the chill. His eyes barely opened and glanced over to his side. The young butterfly fish snapped his head up and gasped in surprise as he looked and noticed all of his friends were gone from his side when they had been they only a minute ago. He looked around for a moment, and then saw them over in the distance with Nemo. Tad frowned and lowered his head, feeling deserted and cold. He glanced at the ground, considering his options here. But finally he humbled himself some and got up. He slowly swam over to his friends.
Nemo opened one eye as he heard him coming and glanced over, smiling. Squirt smiled and lifted a flipper, allowing their friend to come underneath it into the warmth. Tad smiled and lay down with his friends, closing his eyes.
The five friends finally fell asleep in their huddle, comfortable in their collective warmth and sleeping the rest of the night through.
TBC…