Speaker 1: Hello, friends from across the nation and around the world.
I'm Martin, and you are listening to Dad's Bedtime Stories,
the podcast that takes a listener ideas and turns them
into bedtime stories. Let's see what we have today here
in the old voicemail by.
Speaker 2: My name is Kiara, and I would like this story
where Spaceship makes this new invention where you could turn
small things into fess and big things into small things,
and you use it and you accidentally shrink yourself and
you have to find a way to make yourself bigger
than thanks. I love your podcast.
Speaker 1: By thank you, Kiara, And I mean honestly, I imagine
that not everybody has listened to every single episode of Spaceship,
But I think the ability to shrink things and make
them big again is already an established device that Spaceship has.
So I've adapted things just a little bit because that's
the case, But otherwise I believe I can make that story.
If you like the podcast, don't forget to rate us
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All of those things help other people find it. And
as usual, if you want the ad free experience, I
keep it as cheap as possible, for as little as
one dollar a month, you can enjoy the episodes on Patreon,
where no ads will be added. But if you're okay
with ads, here's one more, the last one I'll play
right before the story begins. Now it's time to get
as comfy as you can in that bed, close your eyes,
and imagine yourself doing what the kid in the story does.
Imagine yourself waking up on spaceship. You get out of
your little spaceship bed, You stretch your arms and legs,
and you head out to the main part of the ship.
Speaker 3: Good morning, Spaceship.
Speaker 1: You say, good morning, I am detecting an interesting planet,
one with very unusual life signatures. Spaceship says, there are
many animals, very cool animals actually, however, they are largely
very small. How small you ask, small small, Spaceship says,
possibly even tiny, inconveniently tiny. On the screen, a planet appears.
It's green and blue, with huge forests, and you know,
sparkling rivers, clouds, that sort of thing. Then Spaceship zooms
in on the forest to a tree, and then even
more to a branch, and then even more to a leaf.
Something flies past the camera. It looks like a dragon fly,
but brighter and more colorful, with shiny wings that are
kind of like blue and silver. Another creature crawls across
the bar. It looks like an ant, except it has
tiny pieces of armor along its back, like real man
made or possibly ant made armor. Then something glides through
the leaves. It looks like a miniature dragon, a very
very small dragon. All right, that looks awesome, you say,
I thought you might enjoy it, says spaceship. There appear
to be entire civilizations of bug like creatures, possibly sentient,
possibly friendly, possibly not friendly, possibly the sort of creatures
who build tiny bridges across large gaps in the ground.
All right, well, that sounds worth checking out, I agree,
space ship says, Setting course instantly, you jump to super
hyper drive. The stars stretch around you as spaceship speeds
forward at incredible speed. Soon you stop in front of
the planet. You grab a hold of the controls and
sit down in the command's chair. You point the spaceship
straight down towards the planet and push forward on the throttle.
You blast through the atmosphere, drop below the clouds. When crack,
there's a sudden, large banging noise as lightning strikes the ship.
You honestly didn't even notice a storm. The lights flicker,
and Changer, still in his little earth dog form, pops
his head up to look around. Nothing to worry about,
Spaceship says, I believe my systems have absorbed the shock.
No problems. Another small spark jumps across the ceiling. Hmm,
maybe small problems, Spaceship says. Either way, you continue to
fly the ship down. It seems to handle about the
same and well. You glide over a forest so thick
it looks like a green ocean. The trees are enormous,
their leaves overlap vines hanging between branches. Flowers bloom and
very bright colors, and Spaceship lands in a clearing with
a soft little thump outside the window. The world looks
well wild, but a lot tiny little shapes buzz and
flutter everywhere. Shapes so tiny you can barely see them now,
says Spaceship. Because the local animals are extremely small, Proper
exploration may require an adjustment. What kind of adjustment you ask,
I will use my re seismatizer, says Spaceship proudly. You're
what my resismatizer one of my built in functions. It
can make big things small and small things big. It
is easy and very basic. It hardly ever goes wrong. Well,
that doesn't sound particularly reassuring. You have been resized inside
spaceship many times, and well, I'm pretty sure you remember
him using something like a resize ties are before. Ah,
all right, you say. The back hatch opens and warm
air drifts in. It smells like, well, like a forest,
like leaves, dirt, and flowers. You step down the ramp.
The world outside is incredible. Trees tower above you, their
trunks twist upward, and little spirals huge roots curl out
of the ground like kind of like snakes, while the
rest of the forest floor is covered in grass and everywhere.
Bugs fly and crawl and leap. But they're not normal bugs.
They're kind of beautiful, honestly. Dragonfly like creatures float past
with their glassy and colorful wings. Tiny fly like creatures
with round, shiny bodies buzz and circles watching you. A
little creature that looks like a dragon the size of
your thumb flaps past, trailing a little puff of smoke.
None of them even try to bite you or attack you.
They just fly around, all curious and careful, as if
a giant has stepped into their garden. Which to them
you you are. You are absolutely a giant. Are you
ready to become closer to their size?
Speaker 3: You take a breath? Ready, you say?
Speaker 1: A panel opens on spaceship side, and a little ray
gun folds out, turns and points at you.
Speaker 3: Ah, that does look.
Speaker 1: A little ray gunny, You say, it is a ray gun,
Spaceship says, but a helpful one, the re seismatizer. Please
stand still. A beam of blue white light shoots out
and hits you. It tingles, and the grass around your
boots begins to grow taller. Or well, I guess it
doesn't grow taller. You grow smaller. The ramp rises above you,
Spaceship's landing legs stretch upward like huge metal towers, and
a flower near by becomes the size of a, well,
a skyscraper. Then you see a spark of lightning pass
through spaceship systems. The beam flickers, the lights stutter. Oh no,
says Spaceship's much larger, much louder voice. That is not
your favorite thing to hear. The shrinking finishes all at once,
the beam shuts off and spaceship goes completely dark. The
hatch stays open above you, but now it's super high,
like the entrance to a giant metal cave. Uh, spaceship,
you say, You tap your watch and try again, Spaceship,
are you there? Nothing answers. You press the button on
your watch, causing your armor to fold out around your body.
The armor is extremely high tech and provides protection in
both the offense and defense for you. You simply think
about flying, and you float up into the air. Only unfortunately,
the wind hits you at that point, a powerful gust
of wind, or well at least powerful for your current size.
You're not sure what it would feel like if you
were your normal size. You try to push against the
wind using your thrusters, but it's simply too powerful. You
tumble through the air, spinning past grass blades as tall
as trees. You try to grab one, but miss. You
bounce off a leaf and sail straight into the branches
of a tree, a tree that would probably look small
at your normal size, except now it's huge. You're caught
in a fork between two branches. You look off in
the distance and see that you are very very far
away from the ship, at least for your current size.
You attempt to fly up in the air again. You
push forward with the blasters on your feet, pushing against
the wind as hard as you can, but still the
wind pushes back. You can barely make any progress at all.
You slowly lower yourself down towards the ground beneath the grass,
and the wind stops. Here you're able to actually float
around and fly. Oh well, I guess flying's not going
to work, you say, so you begin to walk at
this size. Each blade of grass that surrounds you looks
like a gigantic green wall. Drops of dew hanging from
the stems look like crystal balls, tiny roots to whist
across the dirt like ropes, and every bebble is well
a boulder. You push through the grass, keeping Spaceship's gigantic
silver shape in sight wherever you go, which actually isn't
that hard because it looks huge from here. Soon you
see something move ahead of you. A creature steps from
behind a root. It looks like an ant only it's
very very large compared to you. It's about the size
of a horse. It has dark red armor plates, shiny
black eyes, and two antenna The twitch in your direction.
You raise your arm, and a small blaster folds out
from your suit. Stay back, you say. The ant freezes,
and then it speaks, oh, sorry, hello, I did not
mean to surprise you.
Speaker 3: You lower your blaster a little.
Speaker 1: You can talk, of course, I can talk, says the ant.
Speaker 3: The names Antoine.
Speaker 1: You're telling me that you're an ant named Antwine, Yes,
says Antoine proudly. It's a strong name. My mother liked
the sound of it. Uh, okay, I guess that's fair.
Antoine looks you up and down. You are a very
strange creature, he says, uh, yeah, well I'm normally bigger.
Speaker 3: Well that's a very strange thing to say.
Speaker 1: Antoine replies, well, to be fair, it's been a very
strange day, you say. Antoine looks towards spaceship in the distance.
Did you come from the giant Silver Mountain?
Speaker 3: Yes? I did.
Speaker 1: That's actually my ship. I kind of got shut down
and I need to get back to it. Antoine's antennae
twitch with interest. The Silver Mountain is your ship, yes,
you say, Then you must be the giant, although you
don't look particularly giant right now. Now I was the giant.
Now I'm more kind of like a tiny lost person,
I guess, Antoine considers this. I see, well, my village
is halfway to the Silver Mountain. I can take you there.
Our tunnels are faster than walking through the grass. You
look at Spaceship, then back at Antoine. Uh, all right,
Antoine crouches slightly, as if offering for you to ride
on his back. You want me to ride on your back?
You say, why not, I'll be much faster than your
tiny little legs can take us. Okay, you climb onto
his back and grip onto two smooth armor ridges. Hold on,
says Antoine, and then he moves very, very quickly. He
races across the dirt, under roots, between stones, and into
a small tunnel hidden beneath a little curled leaf. The
tunnel slope downward into the ground. The walls glow softly
with little dots of golden fungus. You speed through the
underground passage. Other ants about the same size hurry past,
carrying seeds, leaves, crumbs, bits of bark, and well other
things you can't identify. They move like they're all part
of one giant creature, one giant idea that's communicated between
them telepathically or something. The tunnel soon opens into well,
into a village. Tiny homes are carved into packed earth.
Bridges made of roots cross little streams. There are carts, ramps,
storage rooms, and glowing little mushrooms look like lanterns. Ants
move everywhere, working together, talking, building, carrying things, repairing things,
even selling things. A little ant stands, this is incredible.
Speaker 3: You say, welcome to Antonia.
Speaker 1: Oh wait, the village is named after you, No, says Antoine.
Many of us named Antoine. It could get confusing, but
we manage. Several ants nearby wave hello, Antwin, They call
hey Antoine. Another calls back. You're starting to understand the confusion.
Antoine brings you to a little open square where ants
gather around. They start staring at you as well friendly curiosity.
You explain as simply as you can that you're from
the giant ship, that you were shrunk down by accident,
and that you need to get back to it to
well restart it. The Antoines whisper excitedly. Then you hear
the buzzing of wings overhead. It sounds kind of like
a helicopter. You look up to see what looks like
a giant dragon fly swoop down into the village and
land on one of the raised roots.
Speaker 3: He's long and sleek, with bright green and blue.
Speaker 1: Armor, huge shining eyes, and wings that shimmer.
Speaker 3: He folds them in behind him.
Speaker 1: Antwine, he says, you will not believe what has landed
in the clearing. A giant silver mountain and a giant creature,
A true living giant stepped out before disappearing. Where Draco,
you may not believe this, but this here is the giant.
The dragonfly looks at you, then at Antoine, and then
back at you. That is not a giant. I shrank,
you say. Draco leans closer and stares at you. That
is unfortunate, I agree, you say, but also interesting. I
also agree. Antoine quickly explains everything that happened, and Draco
listens carefully. So you need to reach the silver ship,
Draco says. And you cannot fly like I can. I
can fly. That the wind threw me into a tree.
I didn't really expect the wind to be so strong
around here. Ah, you don't understand the currents. You tried
flying against the currents. It sounds like you cannot fight
the air when you are this size. You must ride
with it like a river. So the air is like
a river exactly. Different currents move in different directions. Some
are low, some are high, Some twist between the trees.
Just because you cannot see them does not mean they
are not there. You must go with the flow, he explains, Ah,
got it, Well, maybe I can try that out. I
think it is better if I show you. Perhaps you
would like a ride. Draco flies down onto the ground
in front of you and ducks as low as he can.
You climb carefully onto Draco's back. Antoine walks beside you
to the tunnel exit. Well, uh, good luck, Antoine says,
try not to be eaten by anything. Thanks, you say.
Draco spreads his wings and then he leaps. The two
of you shoot upwards through a gap in the grass.
Wind grabs you immediately, but Draco doesn't fight against it.
He turns his wings slightly, and instead of being thrown away,
you slide into the current. The ride is incredible. The
grass becomes a green canyon beneath you. Drops of dew
flash like stars, and Draco rises into another current, then
dips through a spinning pocket of air and catches a
faster stream moving towards your ship. See, he says. The
air knows where it wants to go. You must simply
ride the wave. You look ahead. Spaceship is now closer,
still huge and dark, but closer. Then you hear a
strange screeching noise behind you. Small shapes burst from the leaves,
small shapes that look like tiny dragons, or well, from
this current perspective, very large dragons, long bodies, sharp wings,
little horns, and glowing eyes. At first you think that
they might just be curious, like the others. Then one
of them breathes fire. Fire breathing bug dragons. A tiny
blast of flames streaks past your helmet.
Speaker 3: Uh, Draco, you.
Speaker 1: Shout, I see them bothersome creatures. The dragon creatures fly
into formation around you. Their leader is dark purple and
has little sparks glowing in its throat. Give us the giant,
it snarls, the sky back, claims the strange thing. Draco
twists away from another blast of flame. The giant is
under my protection. That was the wrong answer, growls the leader,
and I'll at once the dragon's attack. Draco dives as
fire flashes overhead. You grab on tight with one hand
while you raise the other. A panel slides open in
your suit arm your ice blaster folds out. Hey, I
think I'm gonna cool things down here, you say, and
then you fire. A blast of ice shoots from your
arm and hits one of the dragons square in the chest.
Frost spreads over its wings and it tumbles backward, lapping
wildly until it catches on to a leaf. Another dives
from above, and you fire again. A blast of icy
energy streaks through the air. The dragon dodges, but Draco
rolls sideways, giving you a better angle. You fire again,
an ice explodes into the dragon's face. It veers away,
sneezing smoke as it slowly floats down towards the ground.
The others continue to chase. Draco shoots upward into a
rising current, then suddenly drops out of it. Your stomach
feels like it's floating in your throat For a minute.
Fire blasts cross where you were a second ago. They're
still behind us. You shout. Not for long, says Draco.
He aims straight for a tree, A jag gigantic tree,
bigger than a skyscraper. A huge trunk fills your view.
Speaker 3: Draco.
Speaker 1: The bark has holes in it, Tiny tunnels twist through
the wood. He folds his wings slightly and dives into
one of the openings. You shoot into darkness. Draco twists
through the tunnel at impossible speeds, left, right, down, up,
around a little noot, through a little crack, and h
out another hole. The little dragons try to follow, but well,
Draco is just too nimple, and he seems to know
his way through this particular tree. He bursts out of
the tree into open air again, and only two dragons remain.
Two that well didn't try to follow him through the
tree in the first place, but instead it flew around it.
You turn and fire two icy blasts. One goes wide,
the other hits a hanging leaf above them. The leaf
snaps down, covered in frost, and the dragons crash straight
into it. Draco catches a final current towards Spaceship.
Speaker 3: There he calls the.
Speaker 1: Open hatch looms above the ground like a gigantic cave mouth.
Draco angles up, catches a lifting current beside one of
Spaceship's landing legs, and glides up through the hatch. Inside
the wind disappears, and everything is enormous. The floor stretches
like a huge metal field. The walls rise like towers,
The seats look like mountains, the control console looks like
a city of little buttons. You point over towards the
control console and Draco lands on the edge of it.
His giant eyes widen as you climb off.
Speaker 3: Of his back.
Speaker 1: So this is your ship, yes, you say, it seems
unnecessarily large. To be fair, I'm normally much larger myself.
You hop off of his back and run across the console.
Buttons tower around you. Some glow softly, but most are dark.
You know that spaceship has a reset button somewhere. You
continue to climb over the ridges through the control panel
until you finally find a large red button that says
system reset. Perfect, you say, and then you jump onto
the button, but nothing happens. Apparently you're far too light.
You jump again, and still nothing. I'm gonna need a
little more haf to this, you say. You place your
hands down on the ground and lift your feet up
in the air as if you're doing a handstand.
Speaker 3: All at once.
Speaker 1: You activate your thrusters and push down on the button
as hard as you can. Eventually, the button finally clicks
into place. You hear a strange well series of jingling
noises as Spaceship boots back up systems re initialized. Interesting,
it seems I had some sort of electrical overload. Where
did you if you go, Spaceship says, you lift up
your watch, press the button and speak into it. I'm
down here, Spaceship on the control panel. You kind of
made me tiny and then disappeared there for a second. Interesting. Well,
I believe we should probably correct that quickly. Please fly
over to the marked spot on the floor. A little
glowing circle appears on the floor. You fly up into
the air and drop down towards it. Draco follows beside you. Well, buddy,
I think I'm about to be a giant again. Thanks
for your help, but you might want to get out
of here, understood, Draco says. He buzzes up into the
air and out the back of the ship. A panel
opens and spaceship ceiling a very similar looking ray gun
folds out and blasts you with a blue light. Your
body feels kind of tingly again, and slowly everything starts
to get smaller, or well, you start to get bigger.
Speaker 3: Anyways.
Speaker 1: Before long you're back to your normal size, and the
ship doesn't seem like a giant cavern anymore. Thanks spaceship.
Next time we shrink me down, Let's make sure your
systems are actually okay, okay, understood. Initializing takeoff, the back
hatch closes behind you. The ship starts to hummed to
life and lifts up into the air once again. You
head over to the couch down, place your head on
the pillow, and begin to focus on your breath, noticing
your stomach rise and fall, and with each breath, your
muscles let go of a little bit more tension. With
each breath, you sink down deeper and deeper into the couch,
and slowly your mind begins to wander off to thoughts
of new dreams and new adventures to come.
Speaker 4: Good night, everyone name.
Speaker 5: Them in New York Union, No no thing, no.
Speaker 6: Mo M one one mo
Speaker 2: M