Maisy and her mum arrive and bring Harry, Maisy’s little brother, with them. He has a cardboard box full of dinosaurs in his arms. Just what we need. More dinosaurs. They can’t wait to show us all their healthy babies.

‘Look at the size of them now!’ laughs Mum as Maisy holds up Lambchop, Lucy and Ruby. Their little bulging black eyes peer curiously at all of us as they hang onto Maisy’s fingers. She snuggles them into her chest. ‘Lambchop weighs 250 grams already,’ she announces proudly.

‘Thank you all for doing this,’ Mum says as she peeps into a pouch at a tiny brushtail possum, ‘I don’t know what I would’ve done without you all.’

‘Actually, Helen and I have decided to become registered wildlife carers,’ Chelsea’s mum announces. ‘We feel like this is such a worthwhile thing to do and with so many animals dying in the fire, we have to all work together to rebuild the populations.’

‘Does that mean we can become carers too?’ Chelsea says excitedly.

‘Not until you and Maisy are older,’ says Mum, ‘but if both your mums are carers, they’ll always need help. And you have proved yourselves to be very capable in this emergency.’

We all go over to Chelsea’s house to see how her mum is going. She is still sewing little pouches to send to the other carers in the area.

‘Muuuuuuuummmmmm!’ there is a loud cry from Max in the backyard. We all rush out to see.

‘We were just taking Killer out for a walk on the grass with our other dinosaurs and he took off and went under the woodpile. Can you catch him, Mum? Can you get him back?’

‘I think Killer might be trying to tell you something, Max. I think he is ready to be free.’

‘But he hasn’t eaten all his crickets yet,’ he wails, ‘or his mealworms!’

Mum bobs down and pulls Max close. I start to worry that I am going to cry too. Max loves Killer like I love my babies. ‘You know what would be really nice, Max? If you got some crickets and mealworms and put them with a bowl of water out here near the woodpile for Killer. Then he won’t have to go too far away to hunt for his food.’

‘We can put some snails under there for him too,’ Harry adds.

Max brightens. ‘He’d love that,’ he sniffles as they head inside to get the mealworms. ‘I just really liked having him in my room.’

Chelsea, Maisy and I walk over to the surgery to look in on the animals Mum is caring for. We stand at the cage quietly and watch the tiny koala. He keeps struggling and trying to push his way out of the pouch.

‘He’s taking a little more milk, but it’s such a struggle. He’s so unsettled and he’s losing weight,’ sighs Mum.

‘He looks like he’s looking for his mum,’ says Chelsea sadly.

‘Chelsea, you are brilliant!’ I whisper. ‘You really do have a talent with animal behaviour and you have just given me a great idea.’

I race back inside and start pulling stuff out from under my bed.

‘Didn’t you just shove all that under there?’ says Chelsea, confused.

‘Yep,’ I say, trying to find what I’m hunting for. Then my hand touches something. ‘Got it!’

I pull out a large brown teddy. ‘One koala mummy,’ I smile.

We race outside and carefully open the door to the cage. All we can see is the top of the little koala’s head. I gently put the pouch against the teddy’s tummy and we all wait.

A tiny hand comes out and curls around the teddy’s fur. Ever so slowly the little koala emerges from the pouch and nestles in under the tummy of the large bear. Their furs seem to blend together and all we can see is his little black button nose poking out from under the bear’s arm. We all look at each other and smile.

‘I think your name should be Button,’ I whisper.