by Mo O'Hara
‘Ummmm, it looks like an ordinary goldfish?’ came the voice of what I guessed was one of the reporters.
‘Does it?’ Dr McDoom asked.
‘It doesn’t look anything like the image of the fish that you showed us at your talk at the excavation site this morning,’ another voice said.
‘No, I suppose it doesn’t,’ Dr McDoom replied.
The reporters all started mumbling about having their time wasted.
‘Not the front page news we were after,’ said one voice.
‘Yeah, I’ll be lucky if this gets a mention in the paper at all,’ grumbled another.
‘This is exactly what we were hoping for,’ Dr McDoom whispered into the mic under her breath. ‘OK, Mark, you can drop the boat back now,’ she added.
‘This totally ends me helping you now, morons,’ Mark said as he started up the motor. ‘It’s me and Fang back to normal evil business as usual – right, Fang?’
Fang hissed at us as the boat sped away towards the stage.
I looked through the binoculars at the stage where Dr McDoom was standing with some other scientists.
‘Dr McDoom?’ one of them said to her. ‘We’re worried that you’ve been under too much stress with this project. Have you thought about taking a break?’
‘Take a rest from your research for a bit,’ another voice said. ‘You’ll come back to it refreshed in a year or . . .’ He trailed off.
‘Maybe in two or three years?’ another voice chipped in.
‘You know,’ Dr McDoom said. ‘That’s exactly what I was thinking.’ She took a specimen jar out of her pocket and leaned over the tank with Frankie in it. ‘I think I’ll take him with me to keep me company,’ she said, scooping him up. Then she walked over to the side of the lake where Mark had just pulled up in the motorboat.
‘Thanks, Mark,’ she said, getting behind the controls while Mark and Fang climbed ashore. ‘You know . . .’ She paused. ‘You are a really good scientist. If you ever decide to stop specializing in evil science, let me know and I’ll try to get you some work experience in a non-evil lab.’
‘Cool,’ Mark said. ‘I’m good with the evil stuff for now though, but thanks for asking.’
They both laughed a loud ‘Mwhaaa haaa haaa haa’.
Then Dr McDoom pulled away from the side of the bank and drove the motorboat back towards the dino-fish.
As Dr McDoom’s boat pulled up, the wake splashed over our feet and the dino-fish circled the boat, zooming around and bouncing on the waves.
‘Big swishy fishy want to play more,’ Sami said.
‘And I hope that’s what he’ll get the chance to do,’ Dr McDoom said as she stepped off the boat. ‘I can take the next few years to just observe and study the dino-fish in its natural environment. I’ll get to see him eat and play, and possibly see how he interacts with other animals!’
Frankie jumped up out of the specimen jar in her hand and splashed into the water. ‘There’s one animal he already seems to have developed a relationship with!’ She smiled as Frankie and the dino-fish played chase.
‘I’m sorry that we, umm . . . you know, thought you were . . . evil,’ I mumbled.
‘Yes, I will never judge someone on their evil name and evil laugh again,’ Pradeep added.
‘That’s all right.’ Dr McDoom smiled. ‘Thank you, boys. Oh and please apologize to your school on my behalf as well. We left so quickly that we left your school lab in a wee bit of a state.’ She handed Pradeep a letter addressed to the head teacher. ‘This explains what happened and also has a cheque enclosed to pay for any damage. I hope it will prevent any bad feelings.’
‘It will definitely prevent a week of bad detentions for us!’ Pradeep answered. ‘Thanks.’
‘And thank you, Sami, for helping me to realize what was best for the dino-fish, and for me too.’ Dr McDoom splashed the water with her hand and the dino-fish poked his head out. ‘I think we’d better head out to the river before anyone wanders over to take a closer look,’ she said to the giant fish.
Frankie popped his head out of the water too and Sami scooped him up in her cupped hands. She immediately got the zombie stare.
Pradeep grabbed Frankie while Sami took out her crayons and paper and speedily drew a big fish playing with a little fish. Then she drew the big fish swimming away and a tear in the big fish’s eye.
I looked up from the drawing to the dino-fish. I could swear he looked sad. Not that you can really tell when a giant fish is frowning, what with all the scales and teeth and stuff, but his eyes looked sadder.
Then Sami added another cave drawing of me and Pradeep and Sami, but with fins.
‘Do you think that’s supposed to be us?’ Pradeep asked.
Sami added some pandas and cupcakes to Pradeep’s top in bright pink crayon.
‘That’s definitely us,’ I replied.
Pradeep leaned out over the water and stroked the dino-fish behind the gills, just the way that Frankie likes. The dino-fish rolled over on his side and kind of fish-purred.
Dr McDoom had got out a notebook and was scribbling in it. ‘Very interesting,’ she mumbled.
‘Goodbye, dino-fish,’ I said, patting him on the head. ‘I hope you find lots of yummy green food out in the big water.’
He rolled back over and splashed his tail, soaking us all.
‘I guess I’ll have to get used to that,’ Dr McDoom said, shaking water off her shoes.
Sami snapped out of her zombie trance. She smiled at the dino-fish, took her green crayon out and held it out. ‘Green snack for big fishy!’ She giggled. The dino-fish gobbled it down in one. Then Sami leaned down and gave him a big kiss right on the end of his nose. I could swear that giant monster fish blushed.
Frankie jumped from Pradeep’s hand back into the water and led the dino-fish out of the way so that Dr McDoom could start the boat again and pull out.
She waved to us as she steered the motorboat towards the barrier where the reservoir met the river. She circled a couple times to pick up speed and then aimed for a launch ramp off to the side, and with a final gun of the engine . . . she jumped. The motorboat cleared the land barrier and she splashed down in the river on the other side.
‘That was pretty cool driving for a non-evil scientist,’ I said.
Frankie led the dino-fish in a wide arc towards the barrier to pick up speed. At the last second he stopped, while the dino-fish leaped up and out of the water. It landed in the river just behind Dr McDoom’s boat, waved its tail at us and then disappeared into the water.
Frankie sped back over to us and I scooped him back up in his water bottle. ‘Well done, Frankie,’ I said.
As the hum of the motorboat died away we saw the dino-fish leap out of the river in a back flip. His eyes flashed bright green as he hit the water again.
Pradeep and I shared a look. ‘I guess Mark was right,’ I said. ‘There’s a little zombie in that dino-fish after all.’
‘Bye-bye big fishy!’ Sami yawned as we walked back towards our bikes to meet Mrs Kumar. Pradeep bent down and I boosted Sami up so she could have a piggyback.
‘I guess being chased by a genetically engineered prehistoric fish in a swimming pool, helping to rescue a drowning evil kitten, fooling an entire audience of press and scientists and doing a zombified fish-to-cave-drawing translation session can really take it out of a toddler,’ I said, as Sami’s eyes fluttered closed.
‘And a zombie goldfish,’ Pradeep added, pointing to Frankie, whose snores were creating bubbles in his water bottle.
‘They both definitely deserve a nap!’ I whispered.
‘You’re right,’ Pradeep replied. ‘Just in case.’
I smiled. ‘After all. You never know what evil plan might be lurking just around the corner . . .’
Mo O’Hara grew up in Pennsylvania, USA, but now lives in south-east London. She began her writing and acting career by touring theatres and schools across the UK and Ireland, working as a storyteller. As well as writing
books for children Mo has written comedy sketches for Radio 4 and performed her own material in London and Edinburgh. Mo and her big brother once brought their own pet goldfish back from the brink of death.
Books by Mo O’Hara
My Big Fat Zombie Goldfish
My Big Fat Zombie Goldfish: The SeaQuel
My Big Fat Zombie Goldfish: Fins of Fury
My Big Fat Zombie Goldfish: Any Fin Is Possible
My Big Fat Zombie Goldfish: Live and Let Swim
My Big Fat Zombie Goldfish: Jurassic Carp
Quotes from My Big Fat Zombie Goldfish readers
‘This Franktastic story was so much fun it blew my socks off!’ Sharif (aged 8)
‘I wish I had a swishy fishy!’ Robin (aged 7)
‘Don’t look at Frankie! He’ll zombify you and you won’t be able to stop reading!’ Adil (aged 8)
‘My Big Fat Zombie Goldfish is a zombitastic book you won’t be able to put down’ Leon (aged 9)
‘It’s really funny and Frankie makes me laugh lots’ Spike (aged 7)
‘It was awesome. I read all day when I got it and I couldn’t put it down until I was finished’ Becky (aged nearly 9)
First published 2015 by Macmillan Children’s Books
This electronic edition published 2015 by Macmillan Children’s Books
an imprint of Pan Macmillan
20 New Wharf Road, London N1 9RR
Associated companies throughout the world
www.panmacmillan.com
ISBN 978-1-4472-6384-5
Text copyright © Mo O’Hara 2015
Illustrations copyright © Marek Jagucki 2015
Cover illustration by Marek Jagucki
The right of Mo O’Hara and Marek Jagucki to be identified as the author and illustrator of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
You may not copy, store, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
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