The Time Traveller

• Josh Cotton, Grade 2, Manly West Public School
• Short Story
• 2008

Finalist in the 'Empowered 2008' competition

One day I was playing soccer with my friends Louis, Jasper and Conor. We were playing on a brown patch of grass next to an old, deserted factory. The windows were smashed and the doors were very battered. There was graffiti all over the walls. Suddenly, there was a loud bang! We looked up; the roof of the factory had blown up. We decided to investigate.
We went in. We'd never been inside. It smelt musty and mouldy. As we went higher we heard a low-pitch buzzing sound. We followed the sound until we reached a door. We heard a man coughing. Slowly, we opened the door. Behind the door was a mad professor. He had frizzy hair and there was ash all over his face. Next to him there were four tubes. One had green liquid in it, one had blue and one had brown liquid in it. The other tube had blown up. Finally, the mad professor looked down, slowly he said, “Will you get in my time machine?” We were too stunned to answer because we had just seen a huge machine. It was as big as a house and as red as a lobster. There was a ladder. It was made of pure silver. We could just make out the driver's seat. There were funny instruments inside it. The professor thought we said 'yes' so he put us in the machine.
He asked me what my favourite topic was. I said, “dinosaurs.” Suddenly, he pressed a button and picked up the tubes. He put them in three different holes, then he pressed a button and shut the lid. Everything went black. There was a loud, high-pitched buzzing sound and a sudden bump. The lid opened and we looked out. Everything looked different. Next to us there was a screen; it read 'You have gone back in time to the Jurassic Period'. Just then we heard a huge roar! We turned around and saw a giant tyrannosaurus rex. It had three inch long teeth and a four metre, scaly back. Its fingers were short and stubby and its arms were rough and bumpy. Its tail was as sharp as a knife and its claws were as sharp as icicles. Altogether the t-rex was eight metres high.
We ran for our lives. The t-rex was close behind. We turned down a corner and saw a huge river, it was rushing very fast. We couldn't cross it because we would have been tumbled over and over in the water. Suddenly, the t-rex came around the corner. We ran and hid behind some bushes but it smelt us. Just then we all tripped over a rock and fell into the river. We got tumbled over again and again and every time we came up to the top we gasped for breath and got pushed back under. The river became deeper and the rapids slowed. We swam up for air but two seconds later we were sent shooting down a waterfall. We landed in the water at the bottom and managed to swim to the river bank. We climbed a huge tree which was quite easy to climb. Once we were at the top we looked over the landscape to find our time machine.
We climbed down the tree and got into the time machine. The screen said 'Home'. There was a massive rumbling sound and the next minute we found ourselves back in the old factory. We were safe. We had had such an adventure but now we were just happy to be home.