‘This is impossible!’ whispered Bernie, his mind reeling. Despite what he’d heard Meier saying on the ship, he still found it almost too difficult to accept.

‘And yet . . . here we are,’ responded Ivy.

They watched in silence.

It’s like being in Jurassic Park, thought Bernie. He loved that film, even though it was, scientifically, a bit silly.

A large pale green creature was drinking at the shore. From head to tail, it was about the length of two cars. Bernie recognised it from the dinosaur books he had read. It was a muttaburrasaur. An Australian ornithopod – a herbivore that usually walked upright on its hind legs, although it was down on all fours now, lapping up water.

There were some smaller creatures beside it. Another ornithopod, he was sure, but he couldn’t remember what it was called. And there was a strange, brightly coloured one with feathers. It looked more like a scrawny chicken than a dinosaur. Off to the side was something large and furry. Not a dinosaur, but a creature as equally unbelievable. A giant wombat! Diprotodon! Bernie remembered learning about them and other species of Australian megafauna in school.

Bernie’s eyes were drawn across the water. The jungle vegetation grew right up to the water’s edge on the other bank, but a portion of it had been pushed aside. Hunkered down in the greenery was a much larger dinosaur. A brachiosaur. Its giraffe-like neck was bent down to the water so it could drink.

‘Wow!’ Bernie breathed out the exclamation. ‘Just . . . wow!’

Ivy nodded her agreement.

They continued to watch in silence. Time stood still for Bernie as his eyes darted from one impossible creature to the next. How could dinosaurs exist here? What strange quirk of fate had allowed them to escape extinction?

Bernie gasped as something rushed through the undergrowth near him, then out into the open. The dodo ran with an odd waddling gait, across the grass towards the lake. It began guzzling the water.

A squawk made Bernie look up. There was something circling in the sky. A bird? As it swooped down, Bernie saw that it was not a bird. It was a reptile – a pterosaur.

‘That’s Pterry,’ said Ivy casually. ‘We caught and tagged him yesterday. He was released this morning.’

‘Uh-huh,’ was all Bernie could manage to say. He watched the pterosaur fly low over the lake to scoop up a beak-full of water, before soaring back up. He marvelled at the long, antler-like protuberance on its head. It was so ungainly, and yet the creature flew with elegance and ease. ‘Pterry?’

‘Yeah,’ said Ivy. ‘We have a palaeontologist here who likes to name the animals after we tag them. Dippy the Diprotodon is probably the silliest of them.’

‘Don’t tell me the muttaburrasaurus is called Mutty?’

‘Mutt.’

‘Oh . . .’ Bernie drifted off into silence. He could watch these incredible creatures all day.

‘Notice anything about them?’ Ivy’s question broke into his thoughts.

‘What? You mean apart from the fact that they shouldn’t be here?’

‘Okay, none of them should be here,’ admitted Ivy. ‘But even more importantly – they shouldn’t be here together.’

‘Oh!’ Bernie suddenly realised what she meant. ‘Brachiosaurus is an American dinosaur, while muttaburrasaurus is Australian, and –’

‘More than that,’ interrupted Ivy. ‘Brachiosaurs are from the Jurassic period. Muttaburrasaurus, weewarrasaurus and kakuru are from the early Cretaceous period.’

Weewarrasaurus, thought Bernie. That’s the ornithopod I couldn’t remember the name of. Which means that chicken thing must be a kakuru. He hadn’t heard of those.

‘And then there’s the diprotodon.’ Ivy pointed at the animal. ‘It’s a marsupial from the Pleistocene. And there are loads of other animals from all sorts of different regions and time periods. A great auk. A mastodon. You’ve seen the dodo. And there are probably others that we haven’t found yet.’

‘What does that mean?’ asked Bernie, finally tearing his eyes away from the creatures to look at Ivy.

‘No one’s sure,’ she answered. ‘Dad thinks this island is some kind of haven. Sitting outside of regular time.’

‘But you don’t?’

‘No.’ She looked at him intensely. ‘Firstly, there’s only ever one of each animal. Then there’s the problem of food. The herbivores are fine. Lots of plants for them. But what do the carnivores eat? If there’s only one of their natural prey, their food’s gonna run out pretty quick. And then there are animals here that, well . . . that don’t fit in to any time period. Animals that shouldn’t even exist.’

‘What do you mean?’ asked Bernie.

‘A couple of weeks ago, we found a Leaellynasaura amicagraphica – an Australian ornithopod from the early Cretaceous period. But . . .’ She hesitated.

‘But what?’ prompted Bernie.

‘I know this is going to be hard to believe, but she has opposable thumbs.’

Bernie’s eyes widened. Opposable thumbs! Like humans! That was a bit hard to accept. ‘Wow!’ An opposable thumb was one that could be positioned opposite the other fingers. It’s what allowed people to grasp and handle objects. But it was a characteristic of humans – and apes and monkeys. Dinosaurs were not supposed to have had them.

‘Wow, indeed,’ said Ivy. ‘Do you want to meet her?’

‘Um . . . sure.’

‘She visits the research centre most days,’ said Ivy. ‘I’ll make sure to introduce you.’

‘Are there any other animals with opposable thumbs on the island?’ asked Bernie.

‘The only other one is a gigantopithecus.’

Bernie nodded. Gigantopithecus was a prehistoric ape from the Pleistocene era.

Ivy took a deep breath. ‘There are even stranger things here.’

Bernie was about to ask what when he heard a distant droning. ‘What’s that sound?’ he asked, assuming it must be some kind of strange animal or bird. ‘Sounds like a giant bee.’ For a moment he scared himself with that thought.

‘There are no giant bees.’ Ivy stood very still and cocked her head, listening. ‘At least, not that we’ve found so far.’ She smirked at him. ‘That’s just a drone. We use them to search for new species.’

The sound was definitely getting closer. ‘Better get down,’ she suggested. ‘You don’t want to be spotted.’

Ivy dropped to the ground and Bernie followed. He noticed the tiny mushrooms that dotted the area, poking their little round umbrellas out from under the leaf litter.

‘I didn’t realise they were sending any drones out here today,’ said Ivy. ‘I assumed it would be safe to bring you without being discovered.’ She crawled forward, under the bushes, and peered out towards the water. Bernie did the same, crushing some of the mushrooms as he went. Pterry flew off as the black drone came zooming across the treetops from the left.

Ahead of it, something came crashing through the jungle and out into the open. The creature jumped across the clearing, sending the kakuru squawking and flapping and the dodo waddling in panic. Then it came to a stop, looking from side to side. Bernie’s eyes felt like they were bulging. This creature looked like a toad. A giant, white toad! It was about the size of a labrador.

It was impossible!

As the drone swooped down into the clearing, the toad creature jumped up onto its hind legs and ran. RAN! It moved in a most un-toad-like way . . . as if it was trying to be a human being.

Bernie gasped. Not only was the creature running, it was heading right for them, its large goggling eyes almost glowing pink.

‘What do we do?’ squeaked Bernie.

‘We get out of here!’ cried Ivy. ‘I don’t want to be trampled by a toad!’

The two of them scrambled to their feet and raced off.