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First published in the United Kingdom by HarperCollins Children’s Books in 2026

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To Sal, I’m winning at wife

Startilogue

The planet Cognito was located in a secret, unchartered solar system, in a classified section of the universe. Even if I had the foggiest idea where it was, I wouldn’t be able to tell you. It was the perfect place to hide the headquarters of the Intergalactic Security Council (a secret intelligence service for the entire universe, run by dolphins). Which is probably why it was being used for that very thing. But of course, you can’t know that, because it’s top secret. Nobody can know it. Not even me.

‘Where’s Doctor Bonafide?’ asked Finn.

Finn was the head of intergalactic security and he took his job extremely seriously. He was always smartly dressed in a black suit, without so much as a hair out of place. Not that he had any hair that could be out of place. Every planet in the universe that had signed the Intergalactic Security Council’s peace treaty had dolphin agents assigned to them. Earth had them too. There were bajillions of planets signed up, which added up to cajillions of agents, and Finn was in charge of them all. That was a lot of responsibility on one dolphin’s shoulders. Not that he really had any shoulders to speak of.

‘Cutbacks,’ said Doctor Quack. ‘Do you have any idea how much it costs to have someone as qualified as Doctor Bonafide?’

Doctor Quack himself had absolutely no clue how much it cost to have someone as qualified as Doctor

Bonafide, but he imagined it was a lot. Doctor Bonafide had been through a hundred years of medical school and had served as a lead specialist for twice as long.

Doctor Quack, by contrast, only just scraped through his exams, despite having cheated. This was his first year on the job and he wasn’t finding it as easy as he’d hoped.

‘But she’s the best there is,’ said Bubbles, who, as Finn’s second-in-command, liked to think of herself as the real brains behind the operation.

‘Exactly,’ replied Doctor Quack. ‘That’s why your agency can’t afford her. You should be thankful you’ve got me.’

Neither dolphin was feeling thankful. They didn’t need this. Not today. Today was a momentous day. A long and gruelling undercover operation had finally led to the capture of Timmy the Timeworm, the notorious time terrorist. Timmy the time thief! Timmy

the clock controller! And to those who knew him well, Tim. Capable of plucking time out of existence and swallowing it whole. Considered impossible to contain. He’d been caught on numerous occasions –he was just a worm after all – but he would then eat that moment up. That small section of time when he’d been captured had made a nice little snack, though nobody else could even remember it had happened. Only Timmy remembered the time he devoured.

But Finn was not a space dolphin who knew how to quit. He’d found a special watchmaker who built a timecuff. A timecuff capable of disabling Timmy’s powers and allowing him to be imprisoned.

Timmy had been the number-one wanted criminal in the galaxy, so nothing was being taken for granted, now that he’d been caught. The whole planet was on lockdown. Every member of the Intergalactic

Security Council was on high alert and, as the head of intergalactic security, Finn was ultimately responsible for resolving any problems that might come up. But, at this precise moment, there was something even more important that needed taking care of. The Mother Dolphin was terribly unwell.

Finn and his partner in anti-crime, Bubbles, moved to one side, to let Doctor Quack examine the Mother Dolphin.

The doctor put a hand to her forehead. It was clammy. He licked his finger and tasted salt.

‘She’s sweating a lot. She must have a high fever. It looks like you called me just in time,’ he said to Finn and Bubbles. ‘She’s clearly very sick.’

The Mother Dolphin was, however, resting in a pool of seawater. Doctor Quack placed his hand back on her forehead.

‘On second thoughts, it’s tricky distinguishing

between sweat and seawater,’ said Doctor Quack.

‘She could be sweating or it could be the seawater.’

The Mother Dolphin emitted a painful series of clicking sounds that only another dolphin would have recognised. Finn pulled his sunglasses down and peered at Doctor Quack. He was a strange creature: tall and thin, like a yellow sausage, with two tiny farapart eyes and a mouth that appeared to belong to a much bigger creature.

‘I can assure you that she’s in a lot of pain,’ said Finn.

The doctor noticed that Finn’s eyes were salty and wet. Maybe tears – or just seawater.

‘Luckily, I have these pills that are perfect for this exact situation,’ said Doctor Quack.

‘You do? That’s amazing!’

‘Yes,’ said the doctor, swallowing a couple of pills. ‘They help keep me calm when I’m under pressure.’

Finn’s frustration didn’t show on his smiling face. Dolphins found it impossible to convey emotions with facial expressions, because their faces were permanently fixed into a grin.

‘Please, Doctor – how bad is she?’ said Finn.

‘I do have some extremely advanced medical equipment that can help with a diagnosis,’ said Doctor Quack.

He pulled a thermometer from the pocket of his lab coat.

‘Now open wide please,’ he said to the Mother Dolphin.

She opened her mouth to receive the thermometer. After a moment he removed it, stared in shock and tapped it a few times to check it wasn’t broken.

‘Crikey. There’s no reading at all. She must be dead . . . No, wait, that’s my pencil. My mistake.’

Doctor Quack put the pencil behind his ear and

inserted an actual thermometer into the Mother Dolphin’s mouth. After a few more tense moments he took it out.

‘Holy moly. She’s burning up.’

Finn gasped.

‘Although I probably shouldn’t have stirred my tea with it first,’ said the doctor. ‘That might have affected the reading.’

‘Doctor, may we have a quiet word?’ asked Bubbles. The three of them moved away from the Mother Dolphin.

‘How’s she doing? Give it to us straight,’ said Bubbles.

Doctor Quack was well practised in these situations. He’d been to planet Empathy for a training course and learned all about how to let people down gently. He’d slept through most it, but it was basically common sense.

‘She’s going to die,’ he said, a hand on Bubbles’ fin.

If Bubbles had knees, they would have given way.

‘That can’t happen!’ exclaimed Bubbles. ‘There will be universal chaos! The Intergalactic Security Council will collapse!’

As you may know, dolphins share a collective consciousness. Which means they feel emotions together as one. If the leader of the dolphins were to die before her time, the grief-stricken echoes of her loss would spread throughout the entire cosmos. Those that were closest to her could literally die from sadness. The highly trained undercover agency, which kept the universe safe, would grind to a halt until the mourning had passed. Opportunistic alien criminals would run riot.

Even the Defenders of the Universe couldn’t function without them. The space dolphin agents were their eyes and ears, and long bottle noses. Intergalactic terrorism would prevail.

You might be wondering if there is any visible

difference between a space dolphin and a normal dolphin, and the answer is no. But if a dolphin starts speaking to you in plain English, then that’s a pretty big clue. Stay vigilant. Also, watch out for the sunglasses and smart black suits – they can be a dead giveaway.

‘There must be something else you can do,’ said Finn.

‘I can juggle,’ replied Doctor Quack, ‘but it seems like the wrong time for that now.’

‘I mean for the Mother Dolphin.’

‘There is, perhaps, one chance,’ said Doctor Quack. ‘Rumour has it that planet Fettle contains the cure for almost any ailment. It’s like the medicine cabinet for the universe. Unless she has dandruff or warts. They’re incurable.’

‘Then we must go there now,’ said Finn.

‘And hair loss. But just about any virus or disease. Is she suffering from hair loss?’

‘Dolphins don’t have any hair.’

‘That’s okay then.’ Doctor Quack made a note in his book: Cancel hair appointment for the Mother Dolphin.

‘Where is planet Fettle?’ asked Bubbles.

‘You should know this, Bubbles,’ said Finn. ‘It’s in the delta quadrant.’

‘Do we have agents there?’

‘We have agents everywhere,’ said Finn.

‘Okay, so let’s get going,’ said Doctor Quack. ‘But we need to be back by dinnertime because I have a casserole in the slow cooker.’

‘The delta quadrant is over four hundred million light years away,’ said Finn in a sombre tone.

‘Then we need the Defenders of the Universe,’ said Bubbles. ‘Scarlet and Jasper can shploink through time and space in the blink of an eye. What do you think, Finn?’

Officially, during a period of high alert like this

when a high-profile criminal such as Timmy the Timeworm has just been arrested, there shouldn’t be visitors of any kind – even the Defenders. Finn had already broken protocol by allowing the doctor into the headquarters. But there was no priority higher than the well-being of the Mother Dolphin.

‘We have no other choice,’ said Finn. He ran to the control room and pushed the distress call button. The orange light started blinking. Finn whispered a small prayer, and hoped the Defenders would see it soon.

Blink. Blink. Blink.

Still the Startilogue

Amazing. DOUBLE startilogue! For the first time ever in history. I know that because I invented the word startilogue and I only had one in the last book. Take that, conventional rules of writing!

I can never remember which is which out of prologue and epilogue, like which one goes at the beginning and which one at the end. Startilogue and endilogue are much easier to remember and the person who invented English should have thought long and hard about that.

Wanna see a magic trick?

OF COURSE YOU DO!!

I can guess what time it is.

I don’t know who you are or where you’re from, so I won’t know what time it is there, right?

WRONG.

I’m going to tell you what time it is at the count of three.

Ready?

One. Two. Three . . .

It’s READING TIME!

Fine. I owe you a magic trick.

Okay, let’s do a quick recap . . . Scarlet became Defender of the Universe after answering the ad in the Beano. She saved the world from an attack by the Gunks, then accidentally tore a hole in space–time by travelling back in time, thereby duplicating herself. A disturbing glitch in the multiverse. Which means that there are now two Scarlets. And I can tell you straight away that it’s not been easy for Scarlet trying to hide another her about the house!

Great, we’re all caught up again.

If you haven’t read the first book, Scarlet: Defender of the Universe, then I’ve just told you what happens, so there’s probably no need to. Unless you like laughing and having the best time of your life, then maybe go and read it.

Also, who buys the second book first?

I mean, who does that?