The Shrinkinator – By Joshua Lathbridge

As Bob got out from his mums car, he dribbled his football over to the shed, where his Grandpa normally worked. Going into the shed he was about to step on a snail but it looked as if it had transformed and – and wheels grew out of its shell. Entering the shed, his eyes met with some sort of machine, like a karaoke player for cavemen. Turning the handle with his hand, he noticed that it kept going faster and faster until Grandpa burst into shouting, hoping to get bobs attention. But it was too late, Bob and Grandpa had shrunk!

Waking up from the explosion, Grandpa was chatting about how it was a breakthrough because they had shrunk down to the size of bugs. Bob was not at all happy that he was the smallest in his family, even before he was shrunk down in the size of a ant! “good job, Grandpa how did you get that small?” asked a curious little wasp. Bob wasn’t sure of what was happening or why a wasp could talk. “Yeah, why are you the size of an ant?” Bob remembered this snail, because he almost stepped on it when he was half way to the shed! Scratching his head, he noticed his hand was cold. Later on, he realised that he didn’t have a hand. It was made of metal.

“What happened to my hand?!” Bob exclaimed in his outside voice. He didn’t know at all what was happening, “first I had to come to my grandpa’s place because my mum is travelling and I don’t know where my dad is, secondly, I get shrunk down to the size of an insect and lastly, I don’t have an arm! So, I don’t care what it takes to get big again, but I will find those shrinkinator parts and I’m going to be big again!” Bob thought he could inspire them with such a speech, but willow and Syd (short for Sydney) didn’t agree.

“You don’t know what you’re getting into and you definitely don’t want to run into Lydia and her henchmen.” Bob was very confused now, he didn’t know who a “Lydia” even was. “What’s a Lydia anyway?” Bob was really curious of what was so dangerous about a yard anyway…

Meanwhile…

“High, Low, get here now!” Lydia was in a rage yet happy at the same time. “So, the shrinkinator has had a hiccup and exploded. This means that I can grab my chance and take over the world!” As Lydia celebrated her chance, bob and the rest of the gang went out to find shrinkinator parts, while grandpa put them together. “See, what could possibly go wrong?” asking willow and Syd, almost wanting a reaction from them. “Guys!, r-roach-roaches coming our way!” Chowder burst like a packet of sweets mixed with soda. bob slowly turned around, body locked in place until his neck had reached half way round. Head fully turned, he stared in horror at what he was looking towards.

“Look who showed up, a puny human, smaller than us, walking around the back-yard.” The others, except for bob, all backed away. “Run away!” They screamed simultaneously, bob locked his feet steady n the ground, but he was lifted up by chowder and brought back to the shed. “What did you just do, we have all the power because we have all the gear. We should be the ones to get them to run away!” Syd, Willow and Chowder all knew this was true, but they were aware of the ranking system and they definitely knew that a roach out ranked a snail, a wasp and a caterpillar, but they went back anyway. The roaches were almost at the giant sprinkler, but bob and his friends were well on their way to catching up.

Finally, they were gaining on them, all of them, especially bob were ecstatic. The roaches started to run as the team charged at them. Willow, who was in a rage, transformed and sent her drill straight at them, but, splitting up, she drilled into the floor. Bob and chowder were having more luck. Bob, being able to shoot things out his robotic hand, got a piece of his string around low’s legs. High, however, was almost at the giant sprinkler! Bob, with the help of chowders blades, when high fell down, caught their first part with his grappling hook. Going back victoriously, they all talked about how they were able to perform all that without getting hurt by them.

“Hi mum, I’m OK. I met a few bullies but nothing I can’t handle, love from bob”.

They kept doing this until the shrinkinator was ready, and when it was ready, bob was going to get big until Lydia shrank down smaller than she even was. So, bob couldn’t get big because his dad was the only one who could make more…