In the water, in a coral reef off the coast of Hawaii, a few unusual friends lived together. One of them was a dolphin named Olivia. She is a normal dolphin in many ways, except for her crystal blue eyes. She came from the other side of the island, searching for a rightful home, since the coral reef on the other side of the island had been invaded by another pod of dolphins. When she found her way to the other side, though, she met Katie, a manta ray who was born right there in the coral reef, who was also different and unique because she had a colorful body. The two became friends right before an orca, Amelia, joined them. At first Amelia was a little grumpy because she missed her home where she’d been born, in the open ocean where there was food big enough to feed them. Amelia was exceptionally smart, and she became happy with her new home after she used her intelligence to save her friends from a storm, and then a cruel fishing party. Soon after, a whale shark named Sarah joined them after escaping from a net. Before discovering her new friends, she had also saved a beluga whale, Bella, from a disastrous oil spill. They quickly made their new team better by sharing with Olivia, Katie, and Amelia about their skills in how to escape things by being quick and agile.
It was then that they found the pod of dolphins who had first driven Olivia out of her home were now planning to attack their coral reef, too! But now that they had learned the importance of friendship, they weren’t going to give up so easily. First, Olivia gathered the scattered remains of her own pod who were willing to fight: the twins Laila and Laura, and Rebbecca, Melissa, and Olivia’s older sister, Elizabeth, who also had Olivia’s unusual traits. Katie met up with some old friends, including Maddie, Mariah, and even her twin sister Kate and their mother, Luna, and planned a surprise attack using their camouflage. Amelia grabbed some friends in the area: Aili, Ailia, Maranda, and Rosa. When Olivia, Katie, Amelia, Sarah, and Bella had found enough friends and family members, they all decided to rest until they were ambushed, or when they ambushed the other pod.
The next morning, everything was peaceful in the coral reef as everyone woke up. Suddenly, Olivia started bolting around like lightning. “Oh no!” she cried. “I can hear something.” “What?” asked Amelia, who had just returned from a lookout above a water cave. “What did you hear?” Now everyone was asking about the strange thing. Elizabeth raised a flipper to calm everyone down, then swam to the edge of the resting site and listened, making clicking sounds. “Wait, I think I can hear it too…” she said. “It sounds like a lot of flippers churning together… no… it sounds like a whole pod of dolphins swimming together, heading for… us!” Amelia used her sharp eyes to scan the distance. “They’re coming into view now,” she reported. “Then that must mean they have planned their attack now, in the morning, when we are not alert!” Katie said. She looked very calm. “I know what to do, because I remember our family has dealt with them before. Back then, it was just our family. Now, we have so many skills combined!” “You’re right…” Sarah said thoughtfully. “I guess, then, we just have to go for it!” Olivia joined in. “We’ve already lost enough time talking. We have to use everything we planned to attack them!” With the new friends in the lead, the Marine Team, as they called themselves, swiftly and silently swam towards the approaching pod of dolphins. And then they crashed together and met.
Amelia dove for an approaching dolphin. She had seen this one before, when she hadn’t met her friends yet. The dolphin tried to snap at her, but she quickly dodged the attack, and swept in her own bite on Snapper-Dolphin’s flipper. Meanwhile, Katie and her team of rays were zigzagging around, with Maddie and Mariah, the stingrays, stinging every cruel dolphin they met. Sarah and Bella used their shared skills to split the enemy pod up, while also acting as messengers and calling for reinforcement.
Olivia stared at the whirl of bodies around her as she led her dolphin allies into attack. In the short days the whole Marine Team had spent together, they had each learned all the other animals’ most basic moves so that they could use them to trick their enemy if they ever were trapped. The sound of snapping jaws close to her dragged Olivia out of her thoughts. For a moment, she forgot all those months of training Elizabeth had given her. But when she saw a dolphin charging at full speed towards her older sister, who was already in the midst of the fighting, Olivia was filled with energy. She swam, quick as lightning and smooth as the waves, she bolted for the dolphin who was just a short distance away from getting to Elizabeth. She clamped her jaws around the cruel dolphin’s flipper and began tugging at it. Swim-Dolphin turned around and started frantically trying to break free of Olivia’s grip. But the harder Swim-Dolphin struggled, the harder Olivia pulled, until the enemy dolphin finally gave up and cried for help instead. “Oh no,” Olivia thought. What had she done?
Elizabeth was still struggling with a dolphin four times her size, when she heard a cry. “Oh no!” she thought. She broke away from the dolphin she was wrestling with and used her echolocation to find and locate Olivia. “Elizabeth! Elizabeth!” It was Olivia. Elizabeth tried to swim to her younger sister, but was blocked by a blur of gray. Another dolphin from the enemy pod was in front of her! Suddenly, a flash of black and white spun in front of Elizabeth. “Another dolphin from the enemy pod?” she wondered. But, using her crystal blue eyes, she saw the flash was an orca! “I’m here now, Elizabeth!” A voice called. “Amelia!” Now Elizabeth knew who this lightning-fast creature was. It was her best friend Amelia, the orca! Elizabeth slipped away while Lightning-Dolphin was distracted by Amelia, and almost bumped into her sister. “Elizabeth!” Olivia gasped, her voiced muffled by the fin of another dolphin. “You’re finally here!” Elizabeth snatched a glance up, and the sight horrified her. Dolphins from the enemy pod were crowding in towards the sisters. For the first time, Elizabeth realized that Olivia had bitten deep into the fin of a dolphin. Blood spiraled from the injury and down onto the sand.
Suddenly a colorful whirl surrounded the watching dolphins. Katie was swimming at high speed around the enemy pod, distracting them! Amelia joined in, picking out a dolphin and tossing it effortlessly back into the swirling battle. Soon, the only dolphins left around Elizabeth, Olivia, and their victim were drawn away to help their friends. Finally Olivia let go, and the frail dolphin struggled away.
The battle raged on for a few more days. The Marine Team was exhausted, and so was the enemy pod. Sarah and Bella had found another pod of dolphins who were willing to offer reinforcement, because the most experienced dolphin in the pod was Olivia and Elizabeth’s mother, Eliza! On the way back, they bumped into a family of orcas that were looking for something to do. When Bella told them they needed help in battle, the family eagerly found their friend Nora the narwhal and swam ahead to help. Meanwhile, the exhausted messenger of the Cruel Pod was gathering a few dolphins that had been separated from their pod and brought the meager help to the battle, where the new additions to the Marine Team were already using their skills to help.
When Amelia saw her narwhal friend Nora, closely followed by her own family, she joyfully motioned for them to join her. Together, they drove the messenger and the reinforcements for the Cruel Pod away, injuring the messenger and scaring the scattered dolphins. The Marine Team was so close to winning, until they realized that the Cruel Pod had invited a neighboring ally pod, the Fight Pod, to join them. With a dolphin leader from the Fight Pod named Lonaro in the lead, the Cruel Pod and Fight Pod began driving the Marine Team back, and one by one, they were pushed into the Friendship Coral, the coral reef they had started out in.
Just when it seemed like nothing could be undone, Sarah and Bella burst out of nowhere with the pod they had recruited, the Friendship Pod. The two enemy pods were so startled by the Friendship Pod’s appearance that the Marine Team and friends had enough time to injure and drive away half the dolphins in the enemy group.
Katie was giving orders to her friends in a secret language they had created when they were young. Shouting in the secret language, she cried, “Yes! Yes! Thanks to our friends, we are winning! Go for the fin or tail so that it is hard for the enemy to swim away!” As Katie and her mother, Luna, shouted out reminders, the rest of their team were at work fighting. All of a sudden, she remembered she had friends that had grouped together after being attacked by just this pod. They lived in a sheltered cave at the edge of the coral reef, and if she could find them, they would have an advantage of winning, since her friends had dealt with the Cruel and Fight Pods before. Could the Marine Team be as lucky as Katie thought?
Katie hurried along a trail that wound through tall corals, and finally came to a halt at the cave her friends lived in. One of them were taking the daylight watch, and when Katie came closer she saw it was her closest friend in the group, Katherine. Katherine turned around and a look of joy crossed her face. “What are you doing here?” she called. “I’m here to ask for help,” Katie replied, “Because we are in a battle against the Cruel Pod and their neighbor, the Fight pod. We know, or at least I know, that you have dealt with these evil dolphins and have skills against them.” When Katherine just stared at her blankly, Katie realized that this wasn’t going to be hopeful. Suddenly, a stingray appeared around the corner. She swam over to Katherine and whispered to her. Katherine whispered back, and the stingray nodded, understanding. “So you’re Katie, and you and the Marine Team are in a battle against the Cruel Pod and their recruits?” When Katie nodded, she went on. “My name is Melinda, and I would be happy to help with my skills that have improved ever since spying on them in other battles.” “Thank you!” Katie cried. “Can you help me pass the news?” she asked hopefully. “Sure! I would be happy to do so!” Melinda replied. Then, fast as lightning, she turned and disappeared behind the cave.
Olivia had been fighting her best for days, and it still seemed like the battle would never end. The Marine Team had just realized that Katie had gone missing, but Kate had assumed she had gone to get help, because it was almost always what she would be doing if she slipped away in a battle. Olivia hadn’t been convinced, though. She used her echolocation to search for Katie to see if she was anywhere around, and to her relief she found that Katie was swimming back at top speed with plenty of help behind her. She quickly spread the signal to Sarah and Bella, who at once began quickly swimming around, spreading news to the Marine Team. Olivia glimpsed Amelia looking into the distant waters, and nodded approvingly. The Marine Team had driven out three fourths of the Cruel Pod and half of the Fight Pod, and injured or exhausted the rest. Suddenly, Lonaro, the Dolphin Leader of both the Cruel and Fight Pods now, was facing her. “Do you want to have a match with me? I will gladly do some of my superior kill skills on you,” he bellowed. Olivia swam confidently up to him. “I would like to, if you allow me a test on my skill,” she replied bravely. By then, Katie and the rest of her group had arrived at the scene. “Olivia, don’t!” Elizabeth cried. But she was too late.
Lonaro was already zigzagging toward her, and Olivia had no choice but to fight back. She clamped her jaws over Lonaro’s dorsal fin and pulled as hard as she could. “Hey! Let go of me! Let go! Let go!” Lonaro cried. He pulled away and fled into the waters, with the Cruel Pod and Fight Pod following him. The battle was over. The Marine Team had won.
“Well done!” Katie congratulated Olivia on her success, and many others joined in. “Thanks, everyone.” Olivia breathed a sigh of relief that the enemy pods wouldn’t be back anytime soon. Now everyone could rest in peace, and try their hardest to stay in peace. But for now everything would be fine.