The Polar Bear Express

by Debbie Dadey

  “You were right about polar bears,” Kiki told Shelly. “They can’t breathe underwater, but they can hold their breath for about two minutes.”

  “Did you know that they are in danger because of something called global warming?” Shelly told the other mergirls.

  “What’s that?” Echo asked.

  Shelly shrugged and read further. “It has to do with exhaust pollution by humans, but I’m not sure what that is.”

  “Maybe it’s what people breathe out,” Kiki suggested.

  “It says here that polar bears live in the Arctic Ocean,” Echo said, pointing to a map in her book.

  “Where’s that?” Kiki asked, looking over Echo’s shoulder.

  Echo gulped. “It’s a long way from here.”

  “The poor baby,” Kiki said with tears in her eyes. “That little bear is far from home, and his mother doesn’t know where he is.”

  “We have to help him,” Shelly said.

  “But what can we do?” Echo asked. “We’re only in third grade.”

  Kiki didn’t know, but she was sure of two things. First, they were going to find Nestor. Then, somehow, some way, they were going to get him home!

  Puffer Fish

  AN HOUR LATER THE THREE mergirls were still looking at books at the Trident City Library, but they weren’t any closer to figuring out how to get Nestor home.

  “What if we got a whole bunch of puffer fish and tied them to Nestor’s feet?” Echo suggested. “That way if a gust of wind came, maybe the puffer fish could blow the little bear home.” Puffer fish could take in big gulps of water and puff up to several times their regular size.

  “I think you have the right idea,” Shelly agreed. “Maybe we could even tie a big bird to Nestor, and the bird could pull him home.”

  “But what if the puffer fish or the bird took Nestor the wrong way?” Kiki asked. “Then he’d be even more lost.”

  “Shhhh.” Lillian the librarian swam up beside them and put her finger to her lips. “I don’t want to have to tell you again to be quiet.”

  “Sorry, ma’am,” Shelly said. “We were just leaving.”

  Lillian raised her hand. “Not so fast.”

  Kiki held her breath. Were they in trouble? How would they be able to help Nestor if they couldn’t leave the library?

  “Aren’t you the mergirls who gave Mendel Fangtooth the old letter he wrote to me years ago?” Lillian asked.

  Echo slowly nodded her head.

  Lillian surprised Kiki by breaking into a big smile. “Then I need to thank you,” the librarian said. “That letter reunited me with my true love! Because of you, Mendel and I are to be married.”

  “Married!” Shelly exclaimed.

  “How exciting,” Echo said.

  “Congratulations,” Kiki told Lillian.

  “Since you merladies played such a big part in helping us find each other again, you will definitely be invited to the wedding,” Lillian told them. “But right now, let me know if you need help finding anything in the library. We’ll be closing for the day soon.”

  “We’re trying to figure out how to get a lost baby polar bear home,” Kiki explained. “There’s one near the Manta Ray Express Station.”

  “A polar bear in Trident City!” Lillian exclaimed. “Isn’t that dangerous?”

  Kiki explained that Nestor was just a baby and would never harm a merperson. “Well, I never! I have to see this!” Lillian said. “Can you show me?”

  “We’ll show you where I last saw him,” Kiki answered.

  After Lillian locked up the library, she followed the mergirls out the door toward the Manta Ray station.

  “There he is!” Kiki pointed to a big white form diving above them.

  “What’s on his back?” Echo asked.

  “It’s Rocky!” Shelly yelled.

  Kiki couldn’t believe that Rocky was riding the bear. “Oh my Neptune!” she cried. “Rocky, get off Nestor before you hurt him!”

  Rocky floated off Nestor and swam over to the mergirls. “I wasn’t hurting him. He seemed nice, so I thought we’d have a little fun.”

  Kiki frowned at Rocky, then turned to Nestor. “These are my friends Shelly, Echo, Rocky, and Miss Lillian. We’re trying to find a way to get you home.”

  “Thanks for your help, Kiki,” Nestor said with a smile. “But I have to get back to the surface now. I need some air.”

  Shelly grabbed Kiki’s arm. “You know how to speak polar bear?” she asked. “Will you teach me?”

  “Of course,” Kiki told her friend. Kiki knew Shelly loved learning ocean languages almost as much as she did.

  Lillian watched Nestor swim upward before shaking her head. “A baby polar bear in Trident City! I never would have believed it if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes. I can’t wait to tell Mendel.” Lillian waved to the merkids and swam off to catch a manta ray home. Kiki watched Lillian drift away.

  Echo giggled. “This is a crazy day. Mr. Fangtooth is getting married and we met a polar bear. Can anything weirder happen?”

  “Old Mr. Fangtooth is getting married?” Rocky asked.

  “Yes,” Shelly said. “But the important thing now is to figure out how to save that baby polar bear. He’s lost and a long way from home.”

  Kiki nodded. “And Lillian just gave me an idea of how to help.”

  “How?” Echo asked.

  Kiki smiled. “Come with me and find out.”

  A Shell Wash

  HAVE SOME PARROT-FISH pancakes,” Echo told Nestor the next morning.

  “And some sea-squirt sausage,” Shelly said. Nestor gobbled the food down in one bite.

  Kiki wished she had more to offer Nestor than her tiny bowl of clingfish cereal. Nestor swallowed that quickly too, and he even licked the shell. Kiki was worried. How long would it be before Nestor’s block of ice melted and left him stranded? What if a big wave came along and took him even farther away? Living so far from home, Kiki missed her mother very much; she couldn’t stand the thought of the little bear never finding his mother again.

  “See you after school,” Kiki told Nestor.

  “And we’ll bring you a snack,” Shelly promised. Kiki translated her words.

  Nestor grinned as he swam back to the surface. The mergirls darted off to school, and Kiki told her friends how worried she was about Nestor.

  “But Kiki,” Shelly said, “you’ve already figured out how to get him home.”

  Echo nodded. “It’s a great idea to have the Manta Ray Express take Nestor to the Arctic. The conductor said he knew exactly how to get there.”

  “But it doesn’t matter,” Kiki said, “because we don’t have enough jewels to pay for his ride.” She’d been excited when she’d thought of the idea that Nestor could ride home on a huge manta ray. But she had been very upset when she’d found out how much it would cost.

  “Don’t worry,” Shelly told her. “We’ll figure out how to pay for it somehow.”

  Later in class, Kiki was supposed to be writing her poem, but she could only think about Nestor. She tapped her purple tail on the sandy floor of the classroom and wrote:

  My polar buddy

  So lost in the great ocean

  He needs a way home.

  Kiki smiled as she read her haiku to herself. Without thinking she put her feathery sea pen in her mouth and got a taste of octopus ink. “For sharks’ shake!” she sputtered, trying to spit the ink out of her mouth.

  “Kiki has purple lips,” Rocky teased.

  Mrs. Karp looked up from her marble desk and glanced around the classroom. “Are you all right, Miss Coral?” she asked. Everyone was hard at work on their poems except for Rocky and Kiki.

  “Yes,” Kiki said, sputtering out the last of the ink.

  All day Kiki worried about Nestor. As the class lined up for lunch, she thought about the bear’s cute black nose. As she went through the cafeteria’s food line, she remembered the bear’s tears. By the time she sat down at her corner table with Echo and Shelly,
Kiki was so sad that she felt like crying. She stared at her paddle-worm pizza in silence.

  “Guess what?” Pearl floated up to their table. “Tonight is the night I get to see the Rays in Poseidon! My dad said the tickets cost a bundle, but it will be so worth it!”

  Kiki knew the jewels Pearl’s dad had spent on Rays tickets probably would have paid to get Nestor home on a manta ray. It made Kiki so mad, she snapped at Pearl, “There are more important things in this ocean than seeing a silly concert!”

  “Sweet seaweed!” Pearl cried. “What’s wrong with you?”

  “She’s upset because we found a lost baby polar bear and we’re trying to find a way to get him home,” Echo explained.

  “A polar bear in Trident City!” Pearl screeched. “Is that safe?”

  “Of course it’s safe,” Kiki told her. “He’s just a lost baby.”

  Pearl frowned and drifted off to her own table of merfriends.

  “Pearl makes me so mad sometimes,” Kiki admitted.

  “Forget about her,” Shelly said. “Let’s think about how we can earn some jewels.”

  Most things in Trident City only cost a few shells, but more expensive things cost at least one jewel. It took a lot of shells to equal one jewel. The Manta Ray Express trip to get Nestor home would cost a whopping four jewels—a fortune!

  “What if we had a bake sale?” Echo said. “I bet Crystal would help us make some crab popovers.” Crystal was Echo’s older sister.

  “That’s a good idea,” Shelly agreed. “And maybe we could have a shell wash, too.”

  “What did you say?” Kiki asked Shelly.

  “A shell wash,” Shelly explained. “We could offer to scrub scum off people’s homes in exchange for shells.”

  “A shell wash and a bake sale are great ideas, but we need a lot of jewels fast.” Kiki paused and glanced over at Pearl. She was waving her arms around, telling all the other merkids about the Rays concert.

  Kiki’s face lit up. “And I just thought of how to do it!” she squealed.

  She splashed away from the lunch table and over to Pearl. “Thanks!” Kiki said, giving Pearl a great big hug. “Without you I’d have never thought of a way to save the polar bear.”

  Pearl pushed away from Kiki and frowned. “What are you talking about?”

  Shelly and Echo swam up beside Kiki. “What are you talking about?” Echo asked.

  “Meet me in the front hallway after school,” Kiki said. “Pearl gave me a great idea. I know how to get the jewels to send Nestor home!”

  Last Hope

  ALL WE HAVE TO DO is convince the Rays to perform a mini concert,” Kiki explained to Echo and Shelly. “Everyone will pay for tickets to see them, and we can use those shells and jewels to send Nestor home on the Manta Ray Express. It’s called a fund-raiser! My mom had one to raise money for our local merhospital.”

  It was after school, and the huge front hallway of Trident Academy was filled with merkids. Some leaned against the shell walls and chatted with friends. Others scurried toward the exit or to their dorm rooms. One group of fifth-grade girls played jump rope with an olive sea snake.

  “There’s only one problem,” Shelly said. “How are we going to get the Rays to do that? We don’t even know where they are.”

  “Oh yes, we do,” Echo said with a big smile. “At dinner last night, my mom mentioned that the Rays are staying at the Trident City Plaza Hotel. They must be in town for the concert in Poseidon tonight.”

  “Really?” Kiki asked, her eyes getting wide.

  The Plaza was the fanciest hotel in the entire ocean—and it just happened to be in their city. Echo’s mom worked at the Conservatory for the Preservation of Sea Horses and Swordfish, which was inside the hotel.

  “Oh my Neptune!” Shelly exclaimed. “What are we waiting for? Let’s go find them.”

  The mergirls stopped just long enough to give Nestor a snack, leaving a trail of bubbles behind as they swam through the Plaza’s courtyard and entered the grand hotel. Kiki stopped short and gazed at the shining brass walls and polished green marble floors. Everything sparkled! But Echo and Shelly were used to the hotel, since they had visited Echo’s mother at work many times before.

  “Come on, let’s ask Leroy at the desk,” Echo said. “He knows everything.”

  “Hi, Echo!” a big, burly merman with a fat mustache said cheerfully. He floated behind an enormous brass-and-marble check-in desk.

  “Hi, Leroy! Can you tell us which room the Rays are staying in?” Echo asked.

  Leroy shook his head. “No wavy way. It’s top secret.”

  “But Leroy,” Echo said. “We need them to help with our fund-raiser.”

  “It’s a matter of life or death,” Kiki added.

  “Never mind,” Shelly said, pulling her merfriends away from the counter.

  “What do you mean, never mind?” Echo asked. “We need—”

  “I think I know where they are,” Shelly whispered. “Come on! This way.”

  Shelly led the mergirls behind a Big Rock Café delivery merguy.

  “Why are we following him?” Kiki pointed to the delivery merguy.

  “Remember at the beginning of the school year when we saw the Rays at the Big Rock Café?” Shelly asked.

  Echo grinned as she realized what Shelly was saying. “They were all drinking Big Swishes!”

  Sure enough, the delivery merguy they were following carried four Big Swishes. He led them down a hallway to a door that was guarded by two huge mermen.

  “Delivery for the Rays,” the merguy squeaked.

  “We’ll take it to them,” a guard said after paying for the drinks.

  Kiki swam up to the other guard and said, “We’d like to see the Rays, please. It’s an urgent matter.”

  “No one gets to see the Rays!” the guard snapped. “Besides, they are getting ready for their concert in Poseidon.”

  “But it’s about a fund-raiser for a lost polar bear,” Shelly explained.

  “It doesn’t matter. No one gets to see the Rays,” the guard repeated, glaring at them.

  Echo asked, “Can you tell Alden that his friend Shelly is here?”

  Shelly turned bright red when Echo pointed at her. “Shelly actually sang with him. He will want to see her.”

  “Echo!” Shelly whispered. “What if he doesn’t even remember me?”

  “He will,” Kiki said. At least she hoped he remembered singing with Shelly at Pearl’s birthday party.

  The guard grumpily agreed to deliver Echo’s message. In just a few merminutes, the four cute merstars appeared in the hallway. Kiki’s heart pounded. It was hard to believe she was face-to-face with such famous mersingers.

  “Hi, Shelly. Good to see you and your friends,” Alden said. The other Rays—Teddy, Harmon, and Ellis—smiled beside him.

  Kiki was nervous to speak to the adorable merboys! But thinking of Nestor’s sad face gave her courage, so she took a deep breath and said, “It’s good to see you, too. We have a huge favor to ask you. A baby polar bear is lost, and we’re trying to raise money to send him home on the Manta Ray Express.”

  “We were wondering if you could sing a few songs to help us,” Shelly finished.

  Teddy looked at Alden. Alden looked at Harmon, and Ellis looked at Teddy. Kiki held her breath.

  The Rays were her last hope. If they wouldn’t help, she didn’t know how she could get Nestor home. Kiki couldn’t believe what Alden said next.

  The Best Idea Ever

  THE NEXT MORNING KIKI woke up early and went to see Nestor. But he wasn’t swimming in his usual spot near the Manta Ray Express Station. Kiki closed her eyes and tried to make a vision appear like Madame Hippocampus had shown her. Was Nestor still on his ice floating on the surface above? Or had the ice already melted? Nestor had said it had been getting smaller and smaller every day. But right now Kiki couldn’t see anything!

  “Oh, Nestor,” Kiki moaned. “Are you all right?”

  Just then a white pa
w with black toenails tapped Kiki’s shoulder. It was Nestor!

  “Kiki, my ice is almost gone,” he whispered. “What am I going to do?”

  Kiki gulped and looked into the bear’s big, dark eyes. “Don’t worry. I have the best news! We made a plan to get you home.”

  She hugged Nestor and gave him the parrot-fish pancakes she had saved from breakfast. He swallowed them down in one bite before lunging toward the water’s surface. Kiki thought the little bear looked awfully skinny. She was worried he wasn’t getting enough to eat, but it was hard to sneak food from the cafeteria without anyone seeing her. They had to get him home fast.

  Kiki raced to Trident Academy and almost bumped into Pearl right outside. “Hi, Pearl,” Kiki said. “How was the concert last night?”

  Pearl frowned at Kiki. “The concert was fantastic, but I couldn’t believe my ears when the Rays said they were performing tonight at the People Museum!”

  Kiki nodded. “Yes, isn’t it wavy? They’re helping us with a fund-raiser to send the baby polar bear home. Shelly’s grandfather agreed to let us have a Rays concert in the museum’s main hall.”

  Pearl’s face got really red. “But my father paid all that money so that I could see the Rays in Poseidon! Now anyone in Trident City can see them for a lot less.”

  Kiki shrugged. “Sorry.”

  “Sorry my tail!” Pearl snapped. “After school I’m going to go to the Shark Patrol and tell them all about that dangerous polar bear! They’ll have to lock it up! Then just try to have your silly fund-raiser.”

  “No!” Kiki gasped. “You can’t.”

  “Just you wait and see. They’ll put that nasty bear someplace where it can’t bother us merfolk. And the Rays will probably thank me for keeping our water safe! Then I can give them my poem song.”

  “But Nestor is only a baby! He would never hurt anyone. And we have to send him home, not lock him up,” Kiki begged.

  But Pearl wouldn’t listen. She soared past dozens of merstudents to her classroom.