Dolphin Tale

Chapter 24

So we're picking up from where the last one left off. In it Shawl and Bailey discovered a wounded seal out by the pier of Clearwater Marine Aquarium. So they're gonna try and take care of it in this one!

The other kids ran over to see what Shawl and Bailey discovered. And they were surprised. "Its eye infection doesn't look too good huh." Bailey said as he continued examining. "What is this?" One of the girls asked as the other kids ran over. "It's a seal that Shawl and I just discovered." Bailey said. "Looks to have a bad eye infection, might require a bit of surgery." He finished. Shawl stood up "I just hope he's okay. It's not so often that animals are like this." He said as he stood too close to the dock. "What is this?" a shocked voice asked from behind. This startled Shawl so much that he shook and fell off the side of the dock and into the water with a loud splash. He resurfaced and saw some of his rookies leaning down and Bailey offered him a hand back up. "You okay son?" Hazel asked, "Yes I'm okay mom." Shawl replied dripping wet. "Here one of ye kids go get him a towel." Sawyer said turning to the rookies. "So anyways tell us what happened here lads." He then turned his attention to Bailey and Shawl's discovery of the seal. "Well Shawl and I noticed this seal in the water, and we attempted to recover it from the water and we did. Also it's got an infection in its right eye." Bailey explained.

"That's quite a nice thing for you two boys to do." Sawyer said, "Well hopefully we can find some room for this seal in our aquarium." He concluded. "Great! Thanks dad!" Shawl said as he was handed a towel to dry off from his sudden visit into the water.

Sawyer booked up a small area that they previously had the otters in the aquarium for Shawl and the gang to take care of the seal. About an hour later, Shawl and Bailey were throwing fish into the pond for the seal to catch and eat. "Anyways my mother booked an operation for it tomorrow." Shawl was explaining. "Great! Hopefully its eye will be better soon!" Bailey said. "Anyway, come on let's see how the girls are doing with Winter." Shawl suggested, his mother and the girls were taking care of the dolphin. "Sure alright" Bailey said. They dropped their buckets and ran up the stairs to find Winter's pool area empty except for Winter thrashing about madly. However screams could also be heard. Looking suspicious the boys went closer and saw one of the girls thrashing madly about in the water as if drowning. "I think that's Sarah" Bailey said in shock. "Come on!" Shawl said. Kicking off their shoes, both boys ran over and dived straight into the pool. Shawl took Sarah's body and swam it all the way back to the side of the pool and helped her out while Bailey kept distance between them and Winter. He then retreated and joined the others on the side of the pool. Sarah was spluttering and coughing as she lay down. "I'm not even gonna try mouth to mouth." Shawl said. "Neither am I" agreed Bailey. "What happened anyways?" Bailey asked he threw Shawl over a towel who handed it to Sarah. In between her spluttering and coughing, she coughed out the words: "Myself and the rest of the girls were all helping your mother take care of that mammal. They all went off looking for equipment leaving me to take care of Winter. But I didn't know what to do." She said as she dried herself and let her hair down from the ponytail she was wearing. "I agree, you nearly could have gotten drowned" Bailey said. "Totally big mistake" Sarah agreed.

Just then Hazel and some of the girl rookies returned. "What's going on here?" asked Hazel when she saw the kids sitting at the side. 'You left a kid with no experience with a dolphin in a pool alone. The dolphin nearly went berserk on her." Shawl said. "Very dangerous too" Bailey added. "Oh my God. Are you alright?" Hazel asked "I'm okay, thanks." Sarah said. "Maybe you can come help me and Bailey with Dale" Shawl suggested. "Dale?" asked Hazel. "Oh yeah, remember that time when I was eight, we had that seal with the bad flipper, we named him Chip?" Shawl said. "Well we decided to name this one Dale, in honour of that" "Oh well good." Hazel just replied.

Sometime Later

Shawl was sitting in a local diner near the aquarium with his friends on a lunch break. They were all chatting. "Yeah so me and Bailey came up with the name Dale for the seal" he said "Because when I was eight we had one in the aquarium named Chip!" "Really cool mate!" Jaymin said. Bailey laughed with the crowd before turning around to see a group of kids their age who seemed to be giving dirty looks at his group. He turned away not wanting to start anything and then continued with "Oh yeah and Shawl and I actually saved Sarah from nearly drowning too!" "And I thank you boys both for that" she giggled. Bailey turned and saw the group of kids rolling their eyes, and then turned around again. "Yeah I guess." Shawl said as he turned around.

However he and Bailey looked over and saw the other kids scowling angrily. Two of them both seemingly older then he was, then got up carrying two jugs of steaming hot coffee and walked over. Before anyone can say anything one kid walked over and poured one of the jugs of coffee over Sarah's head. She gasped and turned around in her chair. She then saw two older boys, one had blonde spikey hair and the other had shoulder length black hair. "Oops my bad here let me help you" the black haired kid said and he proceeded to pour his jug of coffee all over Sarah's face, barely missing her eyes. Sarah screamed and covered her eyes, Shawl and Bailey stood up angrily while the two boys laughed at Sarah's suffering. "Excuse me boys do you mind telling us what your problem is?" asked Bailey as he walked over and tried not to be intimidated by their height. "Well we overheard this tramp here saying she nearly drowned and well we're like why didn't she?" Shawl stood up while some of the girls gave Sarah some napkins as she had tears cascading down her blotchy face. "For your information she is our friend." He said "How dare you insult her. She has trouble fitting in with us, do you know how hard that is?" he said. "Don't care" the blond boy said as he pushed Shawl onto the floor. Hazel stood up "You know its people like you who make me sick, bullying and abusing my friend" she said. "Who are you guys anyway?" Jaymin asked. The boys laughed and turned to Sarah "recognize us sleazy?" she looked up and suddenly got scared. "Garth? Joe?" she said in surprise. "Damn right you little sleazy." Garth said. They were bullies in her school. However Shawl saw her stand up and face them angrily. 'You know what, you two fellas have made my life a living hell for God knows how many years now. You tease me so much I had recent thoughts about not going to school anymore." "That is just low" Bailey said. "And no one that teases her regrets it one bit" Joe said. "Listen here you pathetic bullies. You don't want to get in the way of Bailey over there." Shawl said "Whatever like we care." Joe replied. Sarah turned to Shawl who nodded his head at Bailey. While Garth and Joe were laughing evilly, Bailey launched forward and tapped them on the back. "Leave them alone or your both gonna pay. "The boys laughed even further. "Let's teach you a little lesson," Joe said "Yeah, the hard way" Garth replied. Bailey was quick with the hands as he grabbed Joe by the arm and threw him in an arm lock and launched him towards the balcony. They were on the top floor. "Punch him Garth" Joe said as he struggled to get up. Garth lunged himself forward, only for Bailey to duck the punch and boxed Garth clear in the face. When Garth was taken back and dazed from the punch Bailey grabbed him by the shirt and pulled him close so they were face to face. "By the way, her name is not Sleazy. It's Sarah." He then pushed him back against Joe so hard that both boys fell through the balcony, breaking the wooden railing. They screamed as they fell down below onto the ground where a waiter nearly hit them so hard that he had dropped his tray of food on top of them. Bailey looked down at the damage and laughed down to them "and she's a good mate to us too!" Shawl and the others joined him and laughed at the boys covered in food. "What's going on here?" the manager asked. "Those boys messed up our lunch and purposely spilled coffee on one of our friends." Shawl said. "Is that true?" the manager asked the boys as they were helped up by the waiter. The look on their faces revealed everything. "Take them out." The manager insisted. 'I think we should get going as well, before anyone else bothers us." Shawl decided. And with that the group paid for their meal and went back to the aquarium.

Later that day Shawl was telling his parents about the incident. They were shocked. "Why do you always get in danger being out in town?" Hazel asked. "I do not know" Shawl said as he hugged his mother admittingly being scared. "It's scary for a 12 year old out in the world." "Is Sarah going to be okay?" Sawyer asked. "I hope" Shawl said "Even though coffee is very harmful I suppose."

The next day Shawl and Bailey were in the aquarium working with their new seal friend Dale. "I have to say you did well to defend yourself against those meanies the other day." Shawl said to Bailey. "Yeah, you never know who might come across.' Bailey agreed. "Hey guys" a voice said behind them. They turned around and it was Sarah. Her face was still a bit red from the other day. "How are you feeling?" Shawl asked. "I'm alright" Sarah said, she then turned to Bailey. "I just wanted to say thanks for getting those bullies out of our way. You did great in that fight against them" Bailey just smiled. "Sure what are friends for right Shawl?" "Yeah!" Shawl said as he fist bumped Bailey.

And I'll leave it there! Thanks for reading and keep reviewing! I haven't had a review I think since chapter 18! See yeeees!