Wheee
Word Count → 716
Neela opened her jaws wide, taking a deep breath of the salty air that greeted her, letting the familiar smell swill around in her mouth and nostrils. The collie had been itching for a swim for a while now but had been stymied by the lack of appropriate water. The inland rivers were far too cold in this weather and something seemed… wrong about the water around Halifax. Even though the humans had been dead and gone for nearly three decades now, their dirt long washed from the waters, Neela still felt uncomfortable swimming around in the water.
The old human ships didn’t help either. Decayed by rust and stripped of most of their useful metal long ago the old, rusted skeletons were quite frankly creepy in the collie's opinion. So rather than brave the eerie waters Neela had headed south, into the area of land known as the Shattered Coast, searching for somewhere to swim. Neela's equipment had been hidden up a tree, which had been strongly scent marked, so the woman was ready to swim whenever she found a suitable place.
Unfortunately Neela hadn’t had much luck here. It seemed that this part of the coast was appropriately named, the shored dominated with high cliffs and jagged rocks. While the collie had spotted one place that would be suitable for swimming, a small beach that was located across a cove from the cliff where she now stood, when she had tried to make her way to it she had encountered a pack border, the scent line almost seeming mocking to her.
Still despite her failure to find a place to swim Neela had enjoyed the walk. While impractical the rough terrain of the coast had a certain beauty to it and it was nice to walk again in the spray of the sea after nearly a week cooped up in the city. Neela was just about to walk away from the cliff and retrace her steps to her belongings when she caught sight of something moving on the beach.
Neela squinted and a small puppy came into focus, the shape climbing up onto a rocky outcropping. Neela narrowed her eyes at the sight, surely it isn’t going to… Unfortunately the puppy had decided that it was going to swim, jumping into the water. Neela waited for a moment, wondering if the puppy actually knew how to swim, before it surfaced, spluttering and struggling.
Neela was moving before she had even registered the sight, instincts drilled into her by years of living in a settlement by the sea jumping into life. The collie sent a bark echoing across the cove to the puppy, spared a brief moment to check the sea below her, the cliff was dizzyingly high but the water clear, and then launched herself off the cliff in a dive.
The cold of the water hit her with almost as much force as the actual impact, air being forced from her lungs in great bubbles as the winded collie sunk under the water before she regained control of herself, forcing her way to the surface and gulping in greedy lungfuls of air before she started swimming.
Neela, an experienced sea swimmer, cut quickly through the water towards the floundering puppy. Water almost immediately began to trickle down her nose, the speed and force of her movements combining with the unfortunate placement of her nostrils; while the muzzle of a dog was useful for scenting, it wasn't particularly built for swimming and Neela didn’t have time to lift her muzzle into the air as swimming canines often did.
As she reached where the puppy had been Neela lifted her head out of the water, coughing and spitting out the water her nose had let into her throat as she desperately scanned around. Evidently the tides had moved the puppy and Neela could no longer see it. Treading water furiously Neela let out another bark, trying to get the puppy to sound his or her location."Where are you?!" The words were as loud as the collie, winded from the jump and her mad dash across the cove, could make them. Even as she spoke Neela was scanning her head around, looking for a golden flash in the water that would signify the puppy's location.
