First published in paperback in Great Britain 2017

by Egmont UK Limited

The Yellow Building, 1 Nicholas Road, London W11 4AN

Text copyright © 2017 Sam Watkins

Illustrations copyright © 2017 Vicky Barker

The moral rights of the author and illustrator have been asserted

First e-book edition 2017

ISBN 978 1 4052 8423 3

Ebook ISBN 978 1 7803 1757 1

www.egmont.co.uk

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

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CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Week 1

Attack of the Zombie Crab

Week 2

Pebble Pals

Week 3

A Little Bit of Magic!

Fishy facts!

Fishy Funnies!

Back series promotional page

lovely humans! That’s dolphin for ‘hello’ – just in case you forgot. I know you probably didn’t forget, because human brains are nearly as big as dolphin brains. We dolphins have super-big brains, which is why I’m really good at writing and stuff. Dad said today I have verbal diarrhoea. I asked what that meant and he said it means I talk a lot and use a lot of words. Yay! So I’ve decided to try and use at least one new word every day from now on!

I wrote so many words in my last diary that I filled it right up, so Mum bought me this new one. It is very shiny and lovely – and I already have some mega-exciting news to start it off . . .

Week 1:

Attack of the Zombie Crab

MONKFISHDAY

Tomorrow my new pen pal, Coral Crab, is coming to stay with me for three weeks! She lives in a place called Rockpool. Our head teacher, Mr Snapper, told us that because summer has been so hot, all the water in Rockpool School has dried up! So the pupils will come to our school until they get their water back. It’s too far for them to go home every day, so everyone in my class has someone staying with them. It will be THE MOST FUN!! We’ve been writing sea-mails to get to know them.

Our teacher, Miss Carp, asked us to suggest ways we could make our visitors welcome. I was bubbling with ideas.

‘A parade,’ I said, ‘with music and a synchronised swimming display . . . and I could do a welcome speech . . .’

Miss Carp said that sounded nice but really she meant little things like being kind to them, and asking what food they liked, what games they liked to play and stuff like that.

‘I asked Melvin those things in my sea-mail,’ my friend Ozzie Octopus said. ‘Melvin’s a mudskipper. He likes mud. So I’ve made a mud corner in the shipwreck, to help him feel at home.’

‘Very thoughtful, Ozzie,’ Miss Carp said. Myrtle Turtle put her fin up.

‘My pen pal, Gloria Goby, likes painting and eating plankton,’ she said. ‘So Mum’s bought plankton pasties and paints.’

‘Excellent.’ Miss Carp beamed. ‘How about you, Darcy? What does your pen pal like?’

‘Um . . .’ I said. Luckily right then the bell rang. ‘Oh – I just remembered – I have to go to the library.’

I shot out of the classroom. Flippering fishsticks, I wished I’d thought to ask Coral all those things! I was so busy telling her about me that I didn’t think to ask about her!

In the library Miss Angler, the librarian, was sitting at her desk polishing her teeth. Miss Angler’s teeth are razor-sharp and she is very strict, so I’m always very polite to her.

‘Excuse me, Miss, and sorry to bother you but do you have any books about crabs?’ I said, nervously.

Miss Angler glared at me, then swam off between the shelves, her little light dangling in front of her. A few minutes later she came back with a book. There was a scary-looking crab on the cover.

‘Attack of the Zombie Crabs,’ I read, ‘by James Halibut.’

‘A marvellous author,’ said Miss Angler, smiling wickedly. ‘I have all his books.’

Hmm. I wasn’t sure if it was exactly what I needed – but I took it because it said ‘A FIN-TINGLING READ’ on the back.

I read the first chapter in bed and am now too scared to come out from under my bedcovers. Can crabs really come back to life as zombies? I really hope Coral doesn’t do that sort of thing.

Word of the day: FIN-TINGLING

This means scary and exciting. I have to say that Attack of the Zombie Crabs is loads more scary than it is exciting.

TUNASDAY

Lots happened today! My pen pal, Coral Crab, is here. She’s asleep now, in my bed. I’m sleeping with Remy, my pet remora, in his cave – such fun! Coral isn’t quite what I expected – but I’ll start at the beginning . . .

The Rockpool pupils arrived at the end of school. Just before the bell a sea urchin from the year below bounced into the classroom squeaking, ‘They’re here! They’re here!’

‘Wait quietly, everyone!’ said Miss Carp, but no one did. We all rushed outside. The pen pals were in the playground, jostling about nervously.

Ozzie waved a tentacle.

‘Melvin!’ he called.

A mud-brown fish with googly eyes swam out of the crowd towards him. I saw a brightly coloured fish dart across to Myrtle.

‘Gloria! Wow, your colours are so pretty,’ Myrtle said. Everyone started rushing about, finding their pen pals. But I couldn’t see Coral, and the crowd of pen pals was getting smaller. Maybe she hadn’t come after all?

‘Darcy . . .’

I turned to see Miss Carp holding a large suitcase. Next to her was a small, red-brown crab with a scowl on her face as if she’d just trodden in sea-slug slime.

‘This is Coral, Darcy,’ Miss Carp said.

‘Phee-weeeee!’ I went to give her a hug, but she clicked her pincers at me. I stopped, looking nervously at the pincers.

‘She was hiding under a rock,’ Miss Carp whispered. ‘Be patient, Darcy. I think she’s shy.’ She handed me the suitcase. ‘Can you carry this for her? It’s rather heavy.’

I took the suitcase, feeling sorry for the little crab. ‘Come on, Coral. Let’s go home.’

We set off, Coral scuttling sideways along the seabed. I soon stopped feeling sorry for her. She moaned and groaned the whole way!

‘It’s miiiiles to your house . . . my claws ache . . . are we nearly there yet?’

Then she didn’t want to take Remy for his evening swim because she felt ‘too weak’. I was kind of relieved when she went to bed.

Dad winked at me. I pulled a face.

‘Don’t be crabby, Darcy,’ he said, smirking.

Mum gave him a Look. ‘Coral’s probably tired from her journey, sweetiefins. You wait – she’ll be a different crab in the morning.’

I really hope so – unless ‘different’ means ‘zombie’! I read some more Attack of the Zombie Crabs this evening, and there’s this one bit where the hero, Steve, thinks his best friend Zoe might have turned into a zombie crab because she moans and groans so much. This reminded me of Coral moaning on the way home and now I can’t help wondering . . .

Word of the Day: CRABBY

I looked up ‘crabby’ in the dictionary. I thought it just meant ‘like a crab’ but it actually means ‘bad-tempered’.

WHALESDAY

Mum was wrong. Coral was exactly the same as yesterday. Plus she clicked her pincers in her sleep, which kept waking me up.

Coral grumbled all the way to school. When we finally got into class, Miss Carp gave us ten minutes to talk to our pen pals and find out some things they liked to do. I looked around to see how everyone else was getting on. Ozzie was showing Melvin a trick with his tentacles, and Gloria was giving Myrtle fashion tips.

Coral sat next to me with her pincers crossed, looking grumpy. Maybe we could play a game, I thought. What games might a crab like?

‘Do you like Snap?’ I asked.

She shrugged. ‘Not really.’

‘How about I Spy?’

She shook her head.

‘Okay – what do you like to play?’

She flashed me a cheeky look.

‘Clam Up.’

Finally – something Coral liked! ‘Ooh, what’s that?’ I said.

‘Both players shut their mouths for as long as they can. First person to talk loses.’

‘Sounds fun!’ I said, checking the clock. ‘Ready, steady, GO!’

I shut my mouth. This was too easy! After a while I started feeling fidgety. My brain squirmed. My lips twitched. Words bubbled up in my mouth. I looked at the clock.

‘One minute?!’ I squeaked. ‘I think the clock’s stopped!’

Coral clicked her pincers in delight. ‘I win.’

‘That didn’t count,’ I said.

Coral just shrugged.

I felt more words bubble up in my mouth. Luckily before they could pop out Miss Carp clapped her fins.

‘Lovely to see you all getting on so well,’ she called and started handing out dictionaries.

‘Persevere, Darcy,’ she whispered to me as she swam past, putting a dictionary on my desk. I didn’t know what that meant so I decided to look it up.

Then I remembered that Miss Carp always says I have a Positive Mental Attitude.

I am the Positively Mental Darcy Dolphin!

I WILL MAKE CORAL LIKE ME. EVERYTHING WILL BE OKAY!

Word of the Day: PERSEVERE

The dictionary says that this means trying hard to do something even if you find it really difficult. Like being nice to someone who may or may not be a zombie crab.

TURTLESDAY

I persevered so hard at being nice to Coral yesterday evening that I nearly exploded. Then I read two chapters of Zombie Crabs before bed. And you know what – Steve was right about Zoe – she IS a zombie crab! Steve is now trying to make his house zombie-proof, as he’s scared Zoe will eat his brains! Apparently that is what zombies do. I peeked out of the toy cave at Coral and she looked fast asleep, but I put Remy on guard at the cave door, just in case.

In the middle of the night I was woken up by a fin-tingling noise.

Click-click, moooooan, click-click, moooooan . . .

It was Coral, clicking and moaning in her sleep again! Remy shot to my side and latched on, whimpering.

Maybe remoras don’t make such great guard-fish.

I got up early and told Mum about Coral’s moaning and clicking.

‘She was probably having a nightmare, dear,’ Mum said, trying to spoon prawnflakes into Diddy’s mouth.

I gulped. Should I tell Mum my fears? I decided I had to.

‘Mum . . . I think Coral might be a zombie crab,’ I said. ‘She’s been acting really –’

‘DIDDY! Don’t throw your food!’ Mum exclaimed suddenly as prawnflakes went flying. ‘Sorry, Darcy darling, what was that about Coral?’

I tried again. ‘I think – in fact, I’m sure – she’s a zombie crab. She’s going to try to eat my brains. That’s what zombies do. And I’ve got an especially big brain.’

Mum laughed. ‘Don’t be silly, Darcy. Now go and get Coral up or you’ll both be late for school – Diddy! Don’t put prawnflakes in your blowhole!’

Honestly, Mum doesn’t understand how serious the situation is – just like Steve’s mum in Zombie Crabs!

In class, Miss Carp had an announcement. ‘Now, I thought it would be an idea if we put on a little talent show at the end of the visit. I want you to work with your pen pals on a five-minute act for the show. Working together – that’s the important thing!’

I turned to Coral, who was making a pebble tower on her desk from pebbles she’d picked up on the way to school.

‘Any ideas?’ I asked.

Coral shrugged. ‘I dunno.’

Persevere, Darcy, I said to myself. ‘I know – we could do a dance?’

‘I don’t like dancing,’ Coral said, reaching up to put another pebble on the tower. Something snapped inside me.

‘Why are you so crabby?!’ I shouted. I pushed the tower and all the pebbles came tumbling down.

I felt bad as soon as I’d done it. ‘I’m sorry . . . I didn’t mean to do that. I just really want to be friends!’

I started trying to rebuild the tower, but Miss Carp had seen what happened and put me on Whale Cleaning Duty as a punishment. This means having to de-barnacle Walter the School Whale. Walter is lovely, but getting the cheeky barnacles off him is the worst job, and they call you rude names like ‘stinking scurvy-ridden slimehead’.

Word(s) of the Day: Stinking scurvy-ridden slimehead

A slimehead is a type of fish. I’m not exactly sure what ‘scurvy-ridden’ means, but it must be rude because the barnacles laughed themselves silly.

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