Free Toad Heaven by Morris Gleitzman

work.
    “Charm,” he croaked. “You're not ugly. You're …”
    Before Limpy could tell her she was beautiful, plus the best sister in the whole universe and the nicest individual he'd ever met, he was interrupted by a scream from Goliath.
    “Look!” Goliath yelled. “Food! Heaps of it!”
    Limpy scrambled out from under the frond.
    Goliath was on his feet, jumping up and down excitedly, pointing at the water.
    “Look!” he shouted. “Peeled slime grubs stuffed with mashed ants. Fresh locust breast accompanied by mosquito-and-centipede salad. Snail guts on the half shell.”
    Limpy hung on to the edge of the wildly rocking cooler lid and stared at where Goliath was pointing.
    All he could see was water.
    “I'll get it!” yelled Goliath.
    Limpy realized his cousin was going to dive in.
    “Grab him!” said Charm.
    They grabbed Goliath's skin folds and dragged him down onto the lid.
    “Locust breast,” sobbed Goliath. “I saw it.”
    “He's delirious,” said Charm. “Seeing things.Dehydration can do that. I saw a drought-affected galah once who thought Goliath was a tree stump.”
    “Snail guts,” moaned Goliath.
    Limpy glanced at the patch of water Goliath had been pointing at, just in case. And saw, below the surface, a dark shape.
    He looked more closely. The shape was too big to be any of the food items Goliath had mentioned. Even a jumbo slime grub wasn't anything like that big. What it looked like, Limpy realized, warts tingling, was the smooth top of a small hill.
    A small hill in a national park.
    “Yes!” screamed Limpy, suddenly bursting with more energy than he'd had all day.“We've found it. It's not much, but it's a start.”
    The small hilltop broke through the surface of the water.
    Limpy's excitement evaporated.
    Two eyes were looking at him from under what Limpy now realized wasn't a hilltop. Two eyes in a creased and warty face.
    “Stack me,” croaked Goliath. “It's a giant cane toad.”
    Limpy stared. Was it possible? Had a cane toad made the journey before them to find the national park?
    “Cripes,” said Goliath. “It's bigger than Malcolm.”
    Limpy looked more closely. The curved brownthing he'd mistaken for a hilltop was attached to the toad's back. Was it a cooler lid that had melted in the sun?
    “Excuse me,” said Limpy. “Are you a cane toad?”
    The face looked offended.
    “Certainly not,” it said. “I'm a giant turtle.”
    “Sorry,” said Limpy. “Um, you don't happen to know if there are any higher-up bits of the national park around here, do you? Bits that haven't been flooded?”
    The turtle frowned. “Flooded?” it said. “None of the national park's been flooded. It's always like this. This is the ocean.”
    Limpy didn't understand. But he could feel something gnawing at his guts that wasn't hunger.
    “What do you mean?” he asked.
    “The Great Barrier Reef national park,” said the turtle. “It's down there, under the water. You're floating on it.”

L impy leaned over the side of the cooler lid, stuck his head in the water, and looked around.
    The salt burned his eyes and made everything faint and blurry.
    But he could still see enough.
    Hills and valleys and long wavy grass, and creatures that Limpy was pretty sure were going about their business safely and securely.
    He felt himself slipping off the cooler lid. He pulled his head out of the water and regained his balance.
    “We've found it,” he said excitedly. “The national park.”
    “Limpy,” said Charm. “It's underwater. We can't live underwater. We need air.”
    “And flying insects,” said Goliath, peering hopefully at a speck of dirt on the cooler lid. “Poop, I thought that was a gnat.”
    Limpy sighed. He loved his sister and cousin heaps, but sometimes they could be a bit thick.
    “I know we need air,” said Limpy. “But don't forget we can breathe through our skin. We just need to make sure a bit of our skin's above the water.”
    Charm and Goliath looked