Shrunk!

by F. R. Hitchcock

  ‘Promise.’

  ‘Promise, double promise, with bells on?’

  ‘Promise, double promise, with bells on,’ growls Jacob.

  Woah.

  ‘Well,’ says Tilly, ‘if you really mean it.’ She turns and stuffs the corner of the quilt up through the hole in the roof. It weighs a ton. It’s so heavy that when I finally get it over the planet, the planet starts to sink. It slides slowly down the front of the house, like a huge blob of ice cream.

  CRACK. The planet doubles in size.

  ‘Yeay!’ shouts Jacob. ‘Now we can all be crushed to death.’

  Chapter 30

  I scramble down through the hole into Tilly’s room. She’s picking up her scattered Woodland Friends.

  ‘Thanks,’ I say.

  ‘I’m never helping you again,’ she says, without looking. But she follows me downstairs and when I grab the fourth corner of the quilt, she joins me.

  ‘Are we just going to let it go and let the astro-whatsits sort it out?’ pants Jacob.

  Eric starts pulling hard, lugging the planet and the rest of us over the rooftops of the model village. ‘No – we’re going to fire it. We need to get it against the south-western sky, get it between the church tower and the castle bailey and fire it.’

  CRACK.

  ‘Fire it?’ I ask.

  ‘Yes – like a catapult,’ says Eric, panting, his laptop bag swinging round his neck.

  ‘Are you serious?’

  A giant catapult? That would need a giant elastic band.

  CRACK.

  And then the lights come on.

  ‘It’s Dad!’ cries Eric. ‘He’s fixed the wiring.’

  A line of yellow bulbs spring into life, one by one. They ping on, stretching straight across the model village, and race out towards the sea. Another line starts out at the real castle and pings back towards the centre of town, and Eric’s house.

  The town’s cut into sections with the lines of lights.

  The gate clangs behind us. ‘Guys, I was looking for you – woah! What’s this? What goes down?’ It’s Eric’s dad; he seems to be wearing pyjamas. Actually I don’t care what he’s wearing – he’s tall and heavy and I’m really glad to see him.

  ‘It’s Jupiter, Dad,’ says Eric.

  ‘Oh – yeah – sure, fantastic. A giant planet in the model village, that so proves the thinness of the Veil.’

  The great thing about Eric’s dad is that he’ll believe anything.

  CRACK.

  How brilliant is that?

  ‘Hold on here, Dad,’ shouts Eric. ‘Take over from Tom.’ His dad grabs the quilt, I let go, and they stumble on towards the model village castle. They’re all flapping from the sides, Jacob swinging like a blue tit from a giant peanut feeder.

  By the shed there’s a hosepipe; I pull on it. It’s long enough, but not really stretchy.

  I run on, thinking about stretchy things.

  YUK!

  It’s one of the pumpkin lanterns, almost back to full size.

  Pulling my shoe out of the goo, I rush towards the house. Something’s blocking the hallway. The donkey. It’s donkey sized and it’s got Grandma’s apron in its mouth.

  I squeeze past it and run up the stairs. From the landing you almost wouldn’t know there’s a massive hole in the roof. Diving into Mum and Dad’s room I throw open their wardrobe and gaze at the shelves.

  There’s Mum’s glittery swimming costume, and her diamond-studded hats. But on the top shelf are braces. Hundreds of pairs of braces.

  Dad wants to use them for performing, but I think they’ve got a higher purpose.

  I count thirty pairs, and fill my arms with them. The donkey’s still standing in the hall, eating the coat stand, but I wriggle out of the front door, trails of elastic flapping all around me.

  The others are still fighting their way through the model village. Jupiter’s even bigger. Surely everyone in the village can see this. Everyone in Devon. Everyone in England. Everyone in Europe. Maybe everyone in the world?

  I run to overtake them and smash into something heavy and plastic. It’s the giant hot dog from the seafront. Very big and very hard.

  ‘Ow!’

  I reach the castle just before the others and discover that there is no clever way of attaching one pair of braces to another. I just have to tie them all up, like a load of spaghetti. They hang like a long, badly made hammock, slack between the castle and the church, illuminated by the shooting stars bursting overhead.

  I pull on them. Together they’re strong and stretchy and I feel 7%, maybe 10% better.

  ‘Mind out – here we come!’ yells Jacob.

  I turn and grab the bottom of his rope. He’s dangling above me, like a small piece of ballast in a shredded babygro. He’s growing. Shame – small was beautiful.

  CRACK.

  Jupiter swells again; in a few minutes we’ll have lost it. I feel the slope of the castle under my feet, and hook my toes into one of the windows of the great tower.

  CRACK.

  ‘Eric! The catapult’s ready,’ I yell.

  ‘I just need to check something.’ Eric drops to the ground and paces back towards the house. He balances his laptop on the miniature amusement arcade and punches in some more numbers.

  The planet pulls again, and I wrap the rope around my hand. If it goes it’s going to take me with it.

  ‘Oh, Amalthea, this is truly wondersome,’ says Eric’s dad. He’s clambering up the side, like some sort of mad mountain climber, but it’s keeping the planet down.

  ‘Hurry up, Snot Face!’ yells Jacob.

  ‘Who was that?’ Tilly drops on to the path. ‘Oh no! Where’s my doll gone?’ She sees Jacob. ‘Ugh – yuk, you’re horrible, Jacob Devlin, and you’ve ruuuuuined that babygro. You were lying – all boys are liars. I should never have trusted you.’

  CRACK.

  ‘Tilly, dear, now’s not the moment. Grab my feet, hang on,’ says Grandma.

  But Tilly won’t, she just sticks her nose in the air and stomps back towards the house.

  ‘I’m going to let go,’ I yell. ‘Hook your feet into the castle windows.’

  ‘Righty ho!’ shouts Grandma, jamming her substantial feet into the main entrance of the miniature castle and steadying the planet.

  I let go, and without my weight the whole thing bounces up, but then settles back down.

  I run towards Eric, glancing back to see Jupiter hanging over the castle, Grandma and Jacob flapping against the sides. Eric’s dad’s balancing on top. Jacob’s got one hand wrapped round the flagpole, the other gripping the quilt.

  Something suddenly occurs to me.

  ‘Eric – does Jupiter have a top and bottom, a north and south pole?’

  He stares at me, the shooting stars reflecting in his glasses.

  ‘Well, yes.’

  ‘So which way up is it now?’

  He peers at it. ‘I think it might be sideways. The red spot, the storm, is supposed to be at the bottom.’

  I gaze at the planet, I can’t see the red spot – it might even be upside down.

  ‘Jacob – red spot at the bottom!’ I shout.

  Jacob peers under the quilt and shouts something to Grandma; Grandma leans forward to listen and lets go.

  Jupiter springs up.

  ‘Ahhhrgh!’ screams Jacob and falls off.

  Jupiter bounces up, but Eric’s dad stands there, silhouetted against the shooting stars, his arms out on either side. He’s surfing the planet.

  He looks like he’s enjoying it.

  ‘It’s the wrong way up, Dad,’ shouts Eric.

  ‘What? Oh yeah – wow, this is CRAZY.’ He walks on the ball, like a performing dog. Eric’s mad dad walks the planet round so that the red spot is at the bottom. While he does it, the whole thing’s floating up.

  Eric and I run to the tangle of elastic and pull it downwards and backwards until it’s at full stretch.

  ‘We need to get Jupiter back in here, like it’s a mis
sile,’ I shout.

  CRACK.

  Grandma and Jacob push at the planet, which bobs over until it nestles inside the curve of the elastic. It only just fits between the towers on either side.

  Without Eric’s dad on top, it would float away. He’s keeping it down and keeping it steady.

  ‘Wow,’ he cries.

  ‘Jump!’ I shout.

  ‘It’s fine, it’s cool. This is massive, this is better than aliens,’ says Eric’s dad.

  ‘But we’re going to send it back into space.’

  ‘Leave him be, love – he’s enjoying himself,’ says Grandma.

  ‘I don’t know where we’re sending it,’ whispers Eric.

  ‘What?’ I say.

  ‘Hurry up,’ says Grandma.

  ‘I can’t see the right stars – I don’t know where to put it.’

  CRACK.

  There’s a horrible silence, while I can practically hear Eric thinking.

  ‘Follow the lights,’ I say.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Follow your dad’s lights – they point towards Jupiter. He’s lined them up.’

  Eric’s silent for a moment.

  ‘You’re absolutely right, that’s it.’

  ‘Sure?’

  ‘100%,’ says Eric.

  ‘100%?’ I look up. The sky’s busting with stars, and shooting stars.

  ‘Yes – I’m 100% sure. Let’s just do it.’

  ‘He’s sure!’ shouts Jacob. ‘Just get on with it!’

  ‘And believe,’ shouts Grandma. ‘It’s most important that we all believe.’

  ‘I believe,’ says Eric.

  ‘And me,’ yells Jacob from the flagpole.

  I close my eyes. Open them again, and believe as hard as I can. ‘One. Two. Three . . .’

  Kerrrrrtwannnnnng.

  Chapter 31

  It’s wild, really. It’s crazy. One minute Jupiter was there, rolling over the model village, all of us shouting and screaming and falling over the houses – the next it was gone. We looked up there, forty-three minutes later, and there it was – twinkling in the sky, framed by the shooting stars, and perfectly in line with Eric’s dad’s landing lights.

  And we’d done it.

  Just like that, we’d saved the Earth.

  We stood in the garden for a long time waiting for Eric’s dad. Then we set out to look for him. I didn’t think we’d sent him off with Jupiter, but I wasn’t sure because things were a bit panicky with the braces.

  I kept imagining him up there, floating about on the edge of the giant planet, and it worried me. If I was Eric, I wouldn’t like to think of my dad loose in the cosmos, especially my dad, a thousand times bigger, or a million times bigger.

  We started walking towards the sea; we found the bedspread on the crazy golf course, and the quilt on the seafront.

  But no sign of Eric’s dad.

  We searched for hours until Grandma came over and put her hand on Eric’s shoulder. ‘Time to go to bed now, love.’

  Eric looked gutted, and Grandma tried to comfort him. Even Jacob held his hand, like a mad waddling baby in the high street.

  ‘He’ll be fine,’ said Grandma. ‘Honestly, just you wait.’

  But I don’t think she was sure, and I think she was the most surprised of all of us when he suddenly appeared, wet and giggling from the sea. He couldn’t speak properly, just kept saying:

  ‘Wow.’

  ‘Wow,’ and,

  ‘Yeah.’

  Then he said:

  ‘Cosmic.’

  And ‘Wow!’ again.

  Eric held his hand really tight. And Grandma started to sing ‘Rock-a-bye-baby’.

  She put her arm around him, and called him her little one.

  So we all walked back together. The geek, his mad dad, the half-size devil, the old lady and me. We giggled all the way back to the house, and when we got there, Grandma made hot chocolate with lumpy cocoa powder and off milk.

  Nothing ever tasted so good.

  Epilogue

  Today’s my birthday and only one of my scary dreams has come true. Mum and Dad did do a ‘Mr and Mrs Magic’ show at school. Grandma tried to stop them, but Mr Devlin was so pleased to have Jacob back, even though he was only four foot tall, he said we should have a big celebration, so we did. It wasn’t too awful. Mum shut Dad in the cabinet this time, and he managed to get out after a while, although the audience thought it was hilarious. The girls loved the rabbits, and the pigeons pooed all over the dining hall.

  Mum and Dad bought me a telescope for my birthday, and I’ve promised Eric that I’ll never be tempted to click anything through it. Grandma gave me a real camera; she said it might stop any accidents.

  She’s making a cake for tea, and we’re all going to have a twilight picnic on the beach, cos even though Jupiter’s back, it’s still pretty warm. I’m mixing the butter and the sugar; Jacob’s outside with Eric and his dad, stringing the landing-strip lights all over the model village. It’s going to look crazy when they all get switched on at sunset. That’s in about ten minutes. I wonder if tiny aliens’ll land on the tiny version of Eric’s house?

  I jam the spoon into the buttery lumps and try to squash them against the side of the bowl and we work in silence, listening to the sounds from the garden.

  Grandma lays down the flour sieve. ‘Tell me something, Tom. What did you wish for?’

  ‘That’s a secret,’ I say.

  ‘But has it come true?’

  I look out of the kitchen window at Jacob, holding a string of lights up to Eric’s dad. Eric, feeding carrots to the donkey, and even Tilly chasing rabbits around the model village. They’re all my friends.

  And I think about my wish.

  ‘Yes, Grandma – it really has.’

  From an original idea by Rufus Mckay

  Acknowledgements

  I would like to thank the very many people who helped bring this book to life.

  Ian, for listening, suggesting, reading, cooking a great many meals and generally egging me on.

  Rufus, for a moment of brilliance on Swanage Pier.

  Rosa, for loving Sylvanians.

  My friends and my family, for giving endless support.

  My compatriots and tutors on the Bath Spa Writing for Young People MA, for teaching me to be a better writer.

  Gill and Sarah for thinking that SHRUNK! ‘had legs’.

  G.G. for encouragement.

  Sara O’Connor, whose tenacity and love of this story has brought us to this point.

  Georgia Murray for ironing out the bumps.

  The new team at Hot Key Books, who have given it the energy and spark that I hope it deserves.

  But finally,

  I’d like to thank Kate Shaw and Pippa le Quesne, my fantastic agents, for showing extraordinary faith.

  A few things you might like to know about Jupiter

  Jupiter is a pretty special place. Just as Eric says in the story, it has a lot of moons, so if you could stand on the surface of the planet – which you couldn’t because it’s too cold and made of gas – you’d be surrounded by moons rising and falling like a merry-go-round. He’s also right about the red spot. The Great Red Spot is a storm and it has been observed for more than 300 years, but there’s another one forming – yes, you got it right – it’s called the Little Red Spot.

  Jupiter is so big that the diameter (the line right through the middle of a sphere) of the planet is approximately 142,984 kilometres. So if you set out in a cosmic camper van (with some sandwiches), driving at a top speed of 80 kilometres an hour, it would take you 74 days to drive through all the helium, liquid hydrogen and maybe some lumps of rock, and then out the other side. In comparison, the same camper van, after a service, would take only a week to drive through the Earth’s core, and you’d be in Australia in time for lunch on the last day, having covered roughly 12,756 kilometres. And if you wanted to cross from the dark to the light side of our Moon, it would take a mere 44 hours, so you might e
ven be home by bedtime on the second day.

  Although we can see Jupiter from the Earth, even without a telescope, but probably with the help of someone who knows which of the bright starlike things it is, it’s a reeeeeeeeally long way away. At its closest the distance is 628,743,036 kilometres, which in the cosmic camper van travelling at 80 kilometres an hour would take 327,470 days or 897 years. So if you bothered to set out, you’d need to take a shedload of sandwiches to keep you going, and probably, by the time you got there, it would have moved on. And you’d be really old.

  For more information about Jupiter and the rest of the solar system, use the internet to find planetariums, local astronomical societies, stargazing events, and look up NASA and National Space Centres to find exciting information about space exploration, and on a clear night, get away from the street lights, and look up.

  It’s amazing.

  A little bit about F.R. Hitchcock

  I grew up loving model villages.

  The first one I fell in love with was Godshill in the Isle of Wight. I explored it and invented people to live in it, animals to run in the tiny patchwork fields, stories to fill the streets. I took those ideas home and went on playing with the imaginary people in my own imaginary model village. I never forgot about them.

  Years later, I was supposed to have grown up. I went away to university and studied English, but spent my whole time in the drama studio building sets and messing about with scale. Working life came my way, but I still managed to bring the model village with me. I sold Applied Art, which means 3D things, and we had a shop underneath the gallery, where we sold beautiful wooden toys. A lot of them were miniatures, and I lost myself arranging them into scenes, re-creating snapshots from my imaginary model village. When my children came along, they wanted railway tracks laid out. I obliged, but the best bit was arranging the people, the houses, the cows, and then, when they were older, I introduced them to their first model village and – much to my delight – they too were captivated.

  Then one summer we had a damp family holiday in Swanage. Driven by wind and rain to Corfe Castle, the magical world of SHRUNK! revealed itself and the characters, just as they had when I was little, jumped out from the miniature houses and the rainbeaten castle.