Welcome to Disney's Magic of Storytelling podcast, brought to you by Wake Med Children's.
Because inside every child is a story waiting to be told.
Our storyteller is ABC 11's DeJuan Hogard.
This is the short story of A Bug's Life.
In the tiny world of ants amongst the grass, the clover and dandelions, Princess Atta was feeling very happy.
This season, she was in charge of the annual harvest for her kingdom.
Everything was going very smoothly.
Every year, the ants had to gather food for the grasshopper gang.
The gang was very mean.
They hardly ever left any food for the poor ants.
All of a sudden, the alarm started ringing.
It could have only meant one thing.
The grasshopper gang had arrived.
They had come early this time.
The ants were very scared and they scattered hurriedly.
Their queen helped them hide in the anthill.
Flick, their community's crazy inventor, was the last one to enter the hill.
He was as clumsy as he was creative.
As Flick struggled out of his grain-picking machine, he knocked over the offering stone.
The offering stone had all the grains that were to be given to the grasshoppers.
All the hard work of the ants slipped down a cliff and into the river.
The ants were very angry with Flick as he had destroyed all of their hard work.
The scared and angry ants were standing together in a group.
They heard a buzzing sound.
The earth began to shake and the angry gang of grasshoppers burst into the ants' hill.
Where is our food?
They asked angrily.
Princess Atta trembled with fear.
She was not prepared to deal with this problem.
Flick slowly went up to the princess and told her in a quiet whisper that he had not intended for the grains to fall down into the river.
It was an accident, he tried to make sense to the princess.
The angry grasshoppers gave the ants one more chance to gather food for them and stormed out.
They told the ants they'd be back soon.
Princess Atta and her mother, the queen, were very unhappy with Flick.
This meant the ants would have to start collecting grain again.
But Flick had an idea.
He announced that he would look for some bugs.
The bugs would help the ants to fight the evil grasshoppers.
While the rest of the ants collected grain, Flick set out.
He made a journey to the city.
There, he would look for warrior bugs.
When Flick arrived at his destination he saw some bugs were very annoyed with some horseflies and very soon the bugs and the horseflies started fighting.
The fight was over as quickly as it began.
Bugs defeated the horseflies.
Flick, who had been watching the fight, was very impressed.
He asked the bugs to come fight for the ants.
Come to Ant Island and help us, he told the bugs.
Upon thinking about the ants' invitation, The bugs agreed and went back to the anthill with Flick.
At that time, Flick did not know the bugs were really circus bugs and not warrior bugs.
When Flick and his companions reached Ant Island, the ants came to greet them.
Three cheers for Flick and the warrior bugs, they cheered.
On hearing this, the circus bugs got offended and said they were leaving.
They told the ants that they were circus bugs and not warrior bugs.
The queen and Princess Atta looked very unhappy.
Flick was very confused.
Then Flick somehow thought of a new plan and asked the bugs to stay.
Soon the ants became busy building Flick's newest invention, a bird.
Flick was making a fake bird out of dried leaves, twigs, and some grains.
This bird would be used to scare the grasshopper gang away so they would never return.
The circus bugs were helping too.
They were making a special machine that would launch the bird into the air.
Soon, the grasshoppers returned.
They were furious when they saw no food was at the offering stone.
Hopper, the leader of the grasshopper gang, was very mad.
To take revenge, Hopper and his gang broke into the ants' storeroom.
Once inside, they started eating the ants' food stored for the coming winters.
When the ant clone saw this, she was very scared.
She told the ants that if the grasshoppers ate all of their food, the ants would starve in the winters.
Flick had already known that the grasshoppers would do something like this.
He already had a plan.
While the grasshoppers ate the ants' supplies, they heard a drum roll.
Roll up, roll up everyone, shouted the circus bugs.
Rub your legs for the greatest circus show, they shouted at the top of their voices.
One by one, the circus bugs began to perform.
They performed their best tricks for the grasshoppers.
Meanwhile, Flick gathered up some ants and climbed into the fake bird.
Just as the circus bugs were finishing up with their circus, Flick launched the bird.
Off they flew into the air, gliding swiftly down toward the grasshoppers.
All the grasshoppers ran away, terrified.
Only Hopper stayed back.
Hopper had realized that the bird flying towards them was a fake one.
Soon, the bird crashed and the ants came out of the bird.
Hopper had been waiting for them and he was furious.
He then chased the princess and fled.
But the ants were clever, and they ran to the other side of the river.
A hungry sparrow lived there.
They took Hopper straight towards the sparrow's nest.
When the sparrow saw Hopper, it came down.
It waited for her chance to catch Hopper.
The ants had carefully chosen a spot where the bird could not see them.
Is this another one of your tricks?
Laughed Hopper.
Before the grasshopper could even realize what happened, the sparrow ate it up.
And that was the end of Evil Hopper.
The ants lived peacefully after that.
Flick was thanked by all his companions.
The evil grasshopper gang never bothered the ants again.
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