Whale Shark Jack

Sarah, you want to help?

Yeah!

- This one? - Yeah.

In the eDNA vial.

There you go.

I bet there's a fish that we've never found before.

Wouldn't that be something.

[light wondrous music continues]

Mum! Dad! I found a baby whale shark.

What's that?

Oh, it's probably a juvenile catshark, Sar.

It's not. Look!

- Sarah! - Wow!

You're right.

It is a whale shark pup.

Look at him, he's tiny.

What happened to his fin?

It could have been a boat propeller.

Jeez, he's lucky to be alive, isn't he?

He looks a little terrified.

We should give him some food.

Ah, we can't darling.

Mum's right, he's got to learn to survive on his own.

It's not fair.

- Dinner's ready. - I'm not hungry.

You gotta eat.

Do you think he'll be okay?

Yeah. I think he will be.

[Marcus and Nita lightly snoring]

It's okay.

I'll look after you.

Ah...

You gotta eat.

I think you need a name.

What about...

Jack?

Hello, Jack. I'm Sarah.

Coffee, coffee, coffee... Where are you, coffee?

Come on, Marcus.

I couldn't just leave him!

Well, you could have.

And you should have. He belongs in the wild.

We're going to have to put him back.

No!

- Marcus? - Yep.

Isn't it your job to save the whale sharks?

They're endangered.

Through our research, not like this, okay?

And SarBear, seriously, a band-aid?

Please!

His name's, Jack. Can't he just stay here for a little bit?

Hey, you know how this is our home.

Well, out there is his.

Both Dad and I think that he wants to go back.

Don't you?

It's a shame he's not big enough for a tracker.

Yeah, imagine everything we'd learn.

We'd be the first people in the world

to find out where these little guys grow up.

Just put one on him next time.

You know, the ocean's so big, bub.

I don't know that we're going to see little Jack again.

Of course we will.

We'll always find each other, won't we?

Smile you two.

- Beautiful. -

Ningaloo's that way.

There's an awesome reef and lots of yummy food.

Good?

Hey... Look!

Bye, Jack.

Bye, Jack.

What do we need from the lab?

Um, well, I don't think anything.

- Mum! Dad! - Alright, cool...

It's Jack! It's Jack!

He's back, he's back! I told you, he's back.

He's bigger now. Can I go in?

Yeah, I'm going to come with ya, okay?

This has to be a coincidence, right?

Wow! Yeah, has to be.

But it's him!

I'm going to go in.

Come on, Dad.

- I don't know. - It's him!

Look at his fin.

- Hurry up! - Okay.

["Island Home" by Christine Anu playing]

Oi! Captain S.

Are you going to steer this thing, or what?

Can she take the mark? There it is!

Oh! So close.

Such a dorkface, Dad!

So, with this new tracking technology

we've designed,

we should be able to get even better data,

and once we see how it goes with Jack

then we can scale up to the others.

Wow!

- So Jack's going to be famous? - Maybe.

We're going to see.

Hey, look, there he is. That's him. See, it's working.

- No way. - Wow!

See, this is going to be able to tell us how deep he dives,

how fast he swims, the pollution levels in the water.

All sorts of really cool stuff.

We'll tag those other sharks this week

and then when Mum and I collect the data

then we can share it with other researches.

And then we can protect Jack.

We can protect Jack.

And every other whale shark in the water.

Okay, smarty pants, what are they called in Madagascar?

Um, marokintana, because it means 'many stars'

and whale sharks look like

they're carrying the night skies on their backs.

What is that?

Kale, banana and cayenne pepper smoothie.

Hmm...

Don't knock it 'til you've tried it.

Okay, here's a really, really hard one.

Vietnam?

Easy, Cá map voi. Which means 'elephant shark'.

And where you are, Aunty Dot, they're called Gudjawari,

because the ancestors thought

they looked like giant floating rocks.

Hey, Gudjawari...

How about doing some actual school work.

Dad, I don't think the fish care if I can identify prepositions

or conjugate verbs in the past-perfect tense.

Well, you're not helping.

Jack's here! Gotta go. Bye Aunty.

Bye.

There she goes.

Hey, sorry about that Aunty Dot.

You can talk - when you were her age

no one could drag you away from your friends.

So we're calling whale sharks friends now, hmm?

I don't know about that.

Miss you guys. When are coming to visit?

I mean, weather permitting,

I'd say we'll be in Exmouth early next month.

That's great to hear.

Take care, all of you.

- You know we will, love ya. - Bye, Dot.

Hey! Sprout?

I know, I know. I'll be careful.

Do you ever feel, small?

Like, nothing we do

really makes a difference for the whale sharks.

There's only three of us.

Yeah, but never, ever think of yourself

as too small to make a difference, ever.

I reckon every one of us can make a difference.

Love you, Mum. Love you, Dad.

Do you think we should send Sarah to school?

I'm worried that she won't have any friends, you know,

friends that don't eat plankton.

Come on, you know what the kids at school are like.

Yeah...

There's this position that - that just opened up

at the research centre in Exmouth.

She's going to be a teenager soon.

She loves it out here. This is her idea of heaven.

Hers or yours?

I'm sorry, that came out wrong.

We made choices to be here, but she didn't.

She didn't choose this.

What about our research?

We could outsource data collection

or we do it in her school holidays.

Marcus, I want to behere. This is what I want to do.

I want to make a difference. This is important.

You know that.

I just think we need to think about it.

Sure.

Should we be worried about that?

I read the forecast. It's blowing east.

I mean, we could change course

and then we just arrive at Cocos a couple of days late.

We don't need to. We're going west and it's blowing east.

The reports are on the table if you want to read 'em, Marcus.

Come in, babe. We've got to get going.

I'll take first watch tonight.