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Welcome back to Bedtime Stories, BBC Radio 2's 500 words podcast.
The one and only place where you can listen to some awesome 500 word stories written by you.
He's Dick.
And I'm Dom.
And...
What are you doing now?
Ah, hello, Dom.
I'm just having a little relax with a lovely book.
Yeah, we've had some very busy podcasts lately, so I thought it would be a good idea to have a nice, relaxed one.
Oh, yes, a nice relaxed one.
We all like having a nice relaxed one, don't we?
That's a very good idea.
So what's your book about?
Well, it's all about heroines and heroes. which is also today's podcast theme.
Well, that's good.
Like Batman.
Oh, is it a bird?
Is it a plane?
No, it's Superman.
Oh, what about Iron Man?
He's great, but my favourite hero is Spider-Man.
Spider-Man, he's so cool.
You know, he climbs walls, he fights crime and... No, not that kind of hero, you fool.
I'm talking about real people from history.
Oh, historical heroes.
Like Thor or Captain America.
No, no, not characters from comics and films.
Actual real-life people from the past.
You know, like the lady with the lamp.
Oh, right.
Yes.
Yes, the lady...
The Lady with the Lamp.
You know, Florence Nightingale.
Oh, yes, yes.
Didn't she help to make hospitals cleaner places and wrote books about how to be a good nurse?
Exactly.
And during the Crimean War she was nicknamed the Lady with the Lamp because she would work all night to make sure the soldiers had what they needed like water and warm blankets.
Move over.
Right, who else is in here?
Well, let's see.
We have Sir Isaac Newton.
Oh, yes.
Sir Francis Drake.
Yeah, he was famous for... The 500 Words Bedtime Stories podcast with Dick and Dom.
Today they forced us all to sing the Japanese national anthem.
I was angry.
It isn't my national anthem.
Of course I didn't know the words, so I tried to copy the teachers and I mouthed the rest.
They even made us face towards Japan, which was confusing because I don't even know where Japan is.
I'm so worried I might have to start speaking Japanese all day at school, like the older kids have to.
Mother called me and told me to take some food to my father.
So I took the bowl full of steaming noodles to him.
He was sitting on the hard floor, worry all over his face.
Father reached out his hands and I put the bowl gently into them.
Father, are you okay?
I asked.
I'm getting used to it now.
The darkness, the boredom.
Don't you worry about me, he replied in a trembling voice, and he ruffled my hair.
He'd been so lucky not to be captured when the others were.
Many of them didn't make it and the rest were suffering in Changi prison.
When the Japanese had invaded Singapore, my father with many of the other Malayan soldiers had fled.
He came home and hid in the maid's room, a narrow, gloomy cupboard at the back of the apartment.
I'm not sure how to feel about what he did.
I am disappointed in him for failing his men, but I am so relieved that he's alive and at home.
The next day I had just got home from school and was telling Mother how I had seen a weary old man forget to bow down to the Japanese soldiers as they marched down the street.
Without warning.
A powerful-looking soldier had slapped the old man hard on the back and the man stumbled to his knees.
Bang!
Bang!
Bang!
Five hostile-looking soldiers burst into the room without waiting for our reply.
They immediately started stamping around, searching in the bedrooms, knocking over furniture, throwing open cupboard doors and shouting at us threateningly Where's your husband?
They demanded of my mother.
I was so terrified I couldn't stop myself shaking.
What was going to happen to my father if they found him?
I watched as two of the soldiers swung open the door to the maid's room.
I gasped and wanted to shout at them to stop.
After a couple of minutes, they came out of the room with faces that were red and raging.
They hadn't found him.
Where had he gone?
This won't be the last time we come, one of them growled as they all stomped out of the front door.
That evening we sat on the sofa waiting for our friend to knock and tell us that the coast was clear.
Father had been hiding on the veranda when the soldiers came, but we knew that we wouldn't be safe here any more.
The knock came.
The time had come to leave Singapore.
Maybe forever.
Hollywood's End Cut.
Baron von Misburg, Hollywood's most experienced director, threw away his pen in disgust.
His new film was not going well.
His aim was to make a horror film so scary that they would have to create a new rating.
B-Y-O-C-T-H-B plus S-P.
Bring your own cushion to hide behind, plus spare pants.
The problem was the actors just weren't scary enough.
The Baron stroked his pointed beard and stared into space.
Who could he get to replace the poor actors?
That Voldemort guy?
Too human-looking.
Daleks?
Too much like Doctor Who.
But wait a minute.
A robot wasn't a bad idea.
The next day, the Baron visited the office of Syceps.
Can I get you anything? said the receptionist.
Just as the Baron was listing all the things he wanted, he was interrupted by a buzzer and the receptionist said Mr Riretbell will see you now.
William Riritbell, CEO of Syceps, was sat behind his large desk, his grim expression unchanging as the Baron entered.
So...
You want a robot, a scary robot, said Riritbell.
Wow, I can make you the scariest robots of all time.
Excellent, said the Baron, and he eagerly signed the contract.
As he left the building, he had a nagging feeling that something was not quite right.
It's a wrap, exclaimed the Baron, rubbing his hands with glee.
The movie was complete and everyone on set agreed that it was the scariest film ever.
Back in William Riritbell's office, the SISEP's CEO was also rubbing his hands in glee, but he was letting out a maniacal muah that echoed throughout the building.
He pressed the big red button that was conveniently in front of him on his large desk.
"'It is time,' he said evilly, and he rubbed his tiny chin-strap beard and walked towards his office window.
"'Five, four, three, two, one,' he muttered softly under his breath."
Suddenly, the large H from Hollywood exploded, followed by the O-L-L-Y.
As if pushed from the ground by magic, D-I-E emerged.
I love it when a plan comes together.
Back of the Baron's movie set, things were going crazy.
The robots were destroying everything in sight.
Lasers fired from their hands, fire breath came from their mouths and knives shot from their soulless eyes.
They were coming straight for the Baron.
With no time to think, he picked up his director's chair as a shield and his megaphone to use as a club.
"'Destroy!
Destroy!
Destroy!' came the robotic voices as they inched closer to their prey.
Suddenly the Baron saw a marking on the robots he had missed before.
"'Property of Sysep's W.
Riratbell.'
The Baron had always been a fan of crosswords and loved a good anagram.
He knew those letters spelt something.
Belt-ryer, he shouted.
Terrible.
That's it.
Terrible.
William, terrible.
I should never have trusted a guy with a chin-strapped beard.
To be continued.
Clot and the Antibody Army Will I feel better in the morning, Mum?
Yes, of course, Ben.
This medicine will do the trick.
Ben's mum raised the spoon to his mouth and poured in the medicine.
It tasted of strawberries and felt silky and cool on his throat.
Now snuggle down.
Nighttime is when your body fights the germs.
Sweet dreams.
Wake up, man.
Huh?
I said wake up.
We have incoming.
Corpuscle Clot rubbed his eyes and accidentally head-butted General Red, who glared down at him.
Clot had been caught in a nightmare.
Now he was alert to the real thing.
He pulled on his uniform, picked up his bacteria blaster and, at the last minute, pushed some germinators into his pockets.
Clot was a proud, if clumsy, member of the General's antibody army.
It was their job to fight off terrible tummy bugs and diseases.
Clot tasted rotten eggs in the air as he rushed from the safety of his blood cell.
Across the battlefront, he saw a gigantic bug.
Gelatinous pods were falling from it.
Suddenly, one of the pods hatched, spewing smaller bugs.
They had sharp pincers and were firing poisonous liquid from long, jagged tails.
The Hema goblins are spreading into the trenches, men, shouted the general.
Following the order, clot, dive between two ribs, the bones providing good cover.
Corpuscule Rhesus, line up your men on the left side ready for artery fire.
My group will take the mother Hema goblin from inside, said General Red.
Claude Splatoon rushed towards the huge bug.
A soldier fired his bacteria blaster.
Inside, the men faced several passageways that smelled putrid and were sticky on the foot.
Clot felt a pulsing.
This way, he directed the team.
They moved forward through a writhing mass of jelly-like substance that made a squishing noise with each step.
Suddenly, the whole chamber shook.
The Mother Hema Goblin was fighting back.
Their standard weapons would be no match.
This calls for the Mega Medicine Blaster, the General called.
Luckily, I loaded it with the new ammunition supply that dropped in earlier.
The officer fired.
An explosion of lethal pink juice slammed into the mother haemogoblin's brain.
Once more should do it, cried General Red.
But popping sounds signified more haemogoblins were being generated.
Hurry, they're coming, warned Clot.
Suddenly, a wave of bugs crawled over the general, stifling movement and muffling his mouth.
The weapon fell and the vital medicine began to drip out.
Clot feared they would fail their mission when he suddenly remembered the germinators.
He pulled two from his pocket, ripped off the pins and hurled them towards the haemogoblins.
They shriveled and turned to dust.
Clot grabbed the mega-medicine blaster with its failing supply, stood back and pulled the trigger, splattering the mother haemogoblin.
It convulsed, then lay lifeless.
The rest of the antibody army cheered.
Clot had saved the day.
In the morning...
Ben woke up and shouted downstairs, I feel better, Mum.
In fact, I feel ready to take on an army.
Oh, yeah, this is very inspiring, isn't it?
I'm really enjoying learning about all these people.
There are so many heroes and heroines.
Let's read some more.
Right, let's see what we've got next.
Ah, look, there's Shakespeare.
He is considered to be the finest writer of English and probably the greatest wordsmith in history.
Oh, yeah, he's written a bit more than 500 words in his time.
Yeah, that's true, that's true.
There's Grace Darling, Alan Turing, Rosa Parks.
BBC Radio 2's 500 Words.
Bedtime Stories.
The Rainbow Alien.
Gualo was a moonling, a cute little alien from the faraway planet Muno.
All the moonlings and everything else on planet Muno was grey.
Even the rainbows and all the aliens were unhappy.
One day Gualo was in his grey house and he was bored, so he went on an adventure.
He put his grey clothes on, went outside to water his grey flowers, got in his grey rocket, which was grey, and set off.
Gualo zoomed through the Milky Way when suddenly a massive meteor hit his rocket and made him crash land on a planet.
The planet was full of colours and Gualo said, this looks strange.
Though he is normally grey, he had changed colour to green, like the grass he was stood on.
But Gualo doesn't know that yet.
All the people on the strange planet were wearing colourful clothes, so he walked with somebody who was helpful and showed him where the clothes shop was.
In the clothes shop, Gualo saw his reflection in a mirror and he noticed that he was the same colour as the blue rough carpet he was standing on.
Gualo shouted, I do not know what is happening here.
The person who owned the shop said, Go outside, you are too shouty to be in here.
Gualo went outside and it was raining, so he ran into a library to get dry.
At the library he found a book which told him that the planet he was on was planet Earth.
He saw his hands and they were yellow, the same colour as the book he was holding.
Oh my goodness, I must be a colour-changing alien, Gualo shouted happily.
Gualo ran outside to see what other colours he could change into.
He felt warm when he went outside because the sun was beaming and the rain had vanished.
Suddenly he looked up and saw the most beautiful, colourful thing he had ever seen.
Gualo thought it was amazing because on planet Muno the rainbows were grey.
I would love to be the same colour as that rainbow, squealed Gualo as he set off running to it.
As he was running over grass and the pavements, he kept changing colour from green to grey, green to grey, green to grey.
He ran for so long, but the rainbow was not getting any closer.
Gualo had an idea and ran back to his rocket, blasted into the sky and went straight through the rainbow.
Suddenly, Gualo and his rocket became an amazing mix of all the colours of the rainbow, and he was no longer grey.
Gualo landed back on planet Muno and all the other moonlings were shocked at the colourful rocket.
When Gualo stepped out, the grass turned green, the sky turned blue and all planet, Muno and the moonlings, were filled with bright colours.
The moonlings danced and celebrated their new amazing planet, and Gualo was now called the Rainbow Alien.
And they finally lived happily ever after.
BBC Radio 2's 500 Words.
Bedtime Stories with Dick and Dom.
The wind ripped at Charlie's clothes like icy daggers.
As he walked home from school in the rain, his mother's words replayed through his head.
Be careful in the park tonight.
You know people have gone missing in there before.
With a stealth of a burglar, Charlie slid open the jagged gate and entered the park.
He gazed around at the familiar scenery the ancient willow tree with its threatening branches overshadowing the steep ditch beneath it, the age-old swings, the jagged edged slide and the splintered bench next to the always busy road.
He listened to a car whiz by with its radio blaring.
He could only catch a few words, but what he did hear chilled him to the bone.
Pale.
Girl.
Murderer.
Charlie decided to continue home, but just as he was turning towards the exit, he heard a faint Help.
It was no more than a whisper on the stinging wind.
Charlie scanned the park to see if there was anyone there, but he saw no one.
Help.
There it was again, coming from the steep ditch.
He crept over as quietly as a black cat crouched down and peered in.
There, lying curled up in the mud, at the bottom was a girl as pale as the new moon on a misty night.
Her white hair lay over her ghost-like face.
Mud was splattered across the paper-thin skin on her legs.
Her blue and grey school uniform was tatty and ripped.
The hand that charlie could see was stretched upwards in a desperate plea.
Because of the rain, Charlie couldn't climb down to help her, so he stood up and hurried away, searching for something, anything that he could use to reach her.
Instead, he saw keen lights on the footpath, like glaring search beams.
They were car headlights.
What is a car doing in the park?
Charlie thought aloud as a grimy white van lurched unsteadily into view.
The man inside was muscly and had a gruesome scar running down his cheek.
The cobweb tattooed on his neck, bulged with veins.
The man's grim, menacing eyes pierced Charlie.
Rusty red stains covered the T-shirt he was wearing.
He was shouting and brandishing a baseball bat.
Charlie was frozen with fear.
The man bellowed a terrible cry and the van rattled forwards.
But not towards him.
Towards the ditch.
Charlie had to save the girl from the monstrous man.
In desperation, Charlie sprinted back to the ditch.
He threw himself on the ground and thrust his hand down towards the girl as far as he could reach.
He prayed that his arm would stretch far enough into the dark to rescue her.
With relief, he felt her fingertips touch his.
Suddenly, the girl grasped his hand with a grip like icy steel.
The man leapt out of the car and roared, Don't!
She's got a knife!
A flash of silver.
And it all went black.
I really enjoyed reading about all those heroines and heroes.
Me too.
It's hard work, all this reading, isn't it?
I know what you mean.
If 500 words have encouraged you to keep writing, here's a tip that might help from our friends at Oxford University Press.
Give yourself time to daydream.
Sometimes ideas for stories pop into your head when you're staring out of the window.
If your teacher asks what you're doing, tell them you are hard at work thinking up a great story.
We hope you enjoyed this episode of Bedtime Stories.
Make sure to like, subscribe and give us a good review.
And listen in next week...
From everyone here at Radio 2 at 500 Words, good luck and good night!
I might just curl up on this sofa.
Oh, yeah, just a five-minute nap.
Take your foot out of my armpit.
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