Nait the shinx and Zappy the pichu explore an old junkyard looking for parts to build a plane. But they run into a small bit of trouble after diging up an old satellite.
Zappy Zaps, Zappy Zapped
By CalexTheNeko
“Find anything useful?” Zappy asked as he stood next to a mountain of junk, moving pieces of random scrap side with a long sturdy stick. The pichu looked less then enthused as he went about his work.
“Not yet… But give it time.” Nait responded. The shinx flashed a grin. “According to legend, this junkyard is said to have been here well before our town was ever built; and contains just about anything you could ever need.”
“Legend or playground rumor mill?” Zappy asked.
“Is there a difference?” Nait stuck out his tongue. “Still, you gotta admit, this is a really weird place for a junkyard. I’d honestly believe I could find anything here.”
“Maybe…” Zappy looked around. The odd thing about the junkyard was its location. It was basically completely surrounded by forest. There were no signs of civilization for miles. It had taken them hours to hike out here. It was really weird for this to just be in the middle of nowhere. Best guess Zappy could come up with is there must have been some part of the town or something that stretched out this far. But if there was, other than the junkyard no traces of it were left. It was entirely wilderness around the large fenced in area filled with piles of random junk. Zappy was a little worried. They had to climb the fence to get in, meaning there was a good chance they weren’t supposed to be here. And even if they found something they could use, how were they going to get it back over the fence? They had already checked the gate, and found it rusted shut so over the fence was the only way.
“Hey!” Nait called out to Zappy. “I think I found something!” He tugged at a large metal chunk that was buried beneath several other things. “It’s stuck!”
“Coming!” Zappy ran over to help his shinx friend. There was something big that looked like it was some kind of piece of advanced technology, but he couldn’t figure out what with most of it buried. The two pulled as hard as they could, and finally it slid out. Both of them stared at it for a moment. It had a dish style antenna, a long cylinder body and pair of solar panels that almost looked like wings.
“A satellite. This might work.” Nait grinned. The two were working on a very special project. They were trying to build a plane. Not a big one, just something that could fit the two of them. Of course, most adults would probably say building and flying a plane was way too dangerous for kids. That was why neither Nait nor Zappy had informed their parents of their current project. As far as any of the adults were concerned, they were working on an extracurricular activity after school each day for science class.
“Will it?” Zappy seemed unsure.
“I mean, if it has a propulsion system that solves a lot of problem on how to get the thing off the ground… And the solar panels could easily give our plane power.” Nait was poking and prodding at the satellite, trying to get an idea of its condition. Despite having been near the bottom of the junk pile, the thing seemed to be in good repair.
“I don’t think satellites have propulsion systems.” Zappy crossed his arms as he thought. “Pretty sure you launch them up with a rocket, that falls down and then the satellite just orbits the planet relying on gravity.”
“Maybe but it’s worth a check.” Nait insisted. “I mean, at the very least, the thing’s gotta have some complex circuitry we can probably make use of. I wonder if it still works at all.”
“Maybe?” Zappy was unsure. “I mean it’s pretty intact but the fact it’s here pretty much means it fell out of orbit and crashed. Even if the outside is in perfect shape the inside could be broken.”
“Maybe we should try giving it a bit of power and see what still works?” Nait asked.
“Well… We could try to get it in a good spot where the sun catches the solar panels…” Zappy suggested.
“Or we could just take advantage of the fact we’re both electric types!” Nait grinned. “We don’t need to get the thing fully running. Just powered up enough to see if it’s still functional or not.” As he spoke sparks began to jump off of the yellow band fur markings on his wrist.
“Hey! Hang on! If you overdue it you risk frying the circuits. Then we won’t be able to use it for anything!” Zappy protested.
“You have a point.” Naut’s wrists ceased sparking. “So… I guess just one of us should do it. So… You or me?”
“I’ll handle it. I think I can manage a lower voltage easier.” Zappy replied. “Then we can add more power if nothing happens.”
“Sure…” Nait took a step back.
“Alright, here comes nothing…” Zappy took a deep breath. “CHUUUUUUUUUUUU!” As he spoke, his cheeks sparked and a chain of electricity began to pour into the satellite.
“Something’s happening!” Nait shouted excitedly as he moved around the satellite near where the dish is. “The antennae thingy is lighting up. Keep it up!” Nait got down on his hands and knees to get a better look at the antennae inside the dish. It was glowing with a blue light. Then suddenly, said blue light shot straight out of the satellite engulfing Nait’s body.
And everything grew giant.
Nait was suddenly shrinking in size. It happened so fast it took the shinx a moment to even register what had happened to him. One moment he had been studying the satellite. The next, random blades of grass were now towering over his head. He had to crane his neck up to see the dish part of the satellite.
“Wait… What?” Nait asked.
“Nait?” Zappy looked around in confusion. He stopped powering the satellite. “Where’d you go! What happened!?” He scrambled over to where Nait had vanished looking around for him.
“WHOA!” Nait jumped to the side, avoiding Zappy as he came through. “Hey careful!” Nait shouted up at the now giant pichu. Judging by their size difference Nait was only an inch tall. Apparently, his voice didn’t carry far enough from where he was to reach Zappy’s ears. So, when the pichu was standing close by, Nait jumped onto his ankle, grabbed clumps of fur and began to climb.
“Come on Nait! This isn’t funny! Stop hiding!” Zappy was concerned about the sudden disappearance. He looked everywhere and could find no sign of Nait. At least not until the point Nait suddenly rolled down his head and landed on his snout.
“I’m not hiding! And you almost stepped on me! Be careful!” Nait chided.
“Nait?” Zappy went cross eyed staring at the very tiny shinx. “Um… What happened to you?”
“Well…” Nait sat down with his legs crossed on Zappy’s snout. “Either the entire world including you just got bigger… Or I just got smaller.” He paused. “There was a blue flash of energy from the satellite. Then suddenly, I was looking up at grass as tall as trees.”
“We are so grounded when our parents see you like this.” Zappy muttered.
“If they see us like this.” Nait countered. And he looked around the junkyard. “It’s not all bad! At this size I could really get a better look at things! I could probably try to squirm my way inside this thing and look at the circuitry.”
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Zappy asked. “Considering what just happened…”
“Relax.” Nait grinned mischievously. “This is only a problem if we get caught like this right? Whatever this machine is, it has to have some way to reverse it. We just need to like, reverse the polarity on it or something.”
“What would that even mean in terms of messing with this machine?” Zappy asked.
“I dunno, making it go backwards or something probably.” Nait replied. “Though… It would probably be better to find a test subject other than myself before zapping me.” Nait had a mixture of shock and anticipation. Being small was a bit intimidating. But the world had never been so big and full of possibilities before. And, while he was stuck like this he might as well make use of his small size and see what he could get done. “Set me down on top of the satellite thingy, I’ll see what I can figure out.”
“Alright…” Zappy gently plucked up Nait by his scruff with two fingers and set him on top of the satellite.
“Alright let’s see… Looks like this is an access panel…” Nait walked to where he saw a groove and pulled on it. He wasn’t strong enough to open it. “Um… A little help?”
“Just a little huh?” Zappy snickered a little as he pulled opened the trait.
“What? Oh… Cause I’m little. Ha ha.” Nait stuck his tongue out at Zappy, and then crawled into the access panel.
There was a circuit board, Nait recognized that. He had seen plenty of before. And there were different colored wires running in every possible direction. Nothing was labeled, at least not in anyway that Nait could understand it. There were some weird symbols that kind of reminded him of Unknown next to where some wires connected. But other than that…
“I have no idea what any of this does.” Nait considered his options. Randomly pulling wires out was probably not the best solution. But without knowing what anything did, the best hope he had was to try disconnecting or rearranging some of the wires and see what happened. It was definitely a good idea to get something other than himself to test things on. They were going to have to rely on the classic scientific method of guess, test and revise till they found a way to put this thing in reverse mode.
After studying wires for a bit, Nait noticed two wires were bigger than others. A red one and a blue one. Red wires were always important! As were blue usually. He got an idea. He walked to where they were on the circuit board, tugged on them one at a time and disconnected them. Then, he plugged the two wires back into their opposite connections. If they represented positive and negative charges, then that probably reverse the polarity. He climbed out of the console and back up onto the machine.
“I got an idea! I think it’s ready for testing!” Nait replied. “But um… Let’s find like… A leaf or something to test it on…”
“Right…” Zappy scooped up Nait from the satellite and placed the tiny shinx on his shoulder. Then he quickly retrieved a fallen leaf from the tree and placed it in front of the satellite’s antennae. “So we’re sure this is a good idea.”
“Not really, but it’s better than being grounded for a month.” Nait insisted.
“Alright…” Zappy took a deep breath, and then once more his cheeks sparked as he powered the satellite. The blue light in the cone began to light up again. It looked like it might fire. Then suddenly, there was a burning smell, the tip of the antennae erupted into flames, and the entire machine suddenly died despite Zappy still powering it.
“That’s… Not good.” Nait observed from Zappy’s shoulder.
“I think we fried it…” Zappy muttered. He stared at the antennae, at least the fire wasn’t very big and would die out any second. But they definitely short circuited something.
“Well… At least it didn’t explode this time, right?” Nait asked encouragingly. “I mean remember the-“
And then the satellite exploded.
It unleashed a wave of blue energy enveloping the entire junkyard. When the blue light vanished, the satellite was nothing more than a smoking pile of debris and Zappy was gone.
Or at least, very small.
Now Zappy was an inch tall, staring up at the giant grass around him and the smoldering remains of the giant satellite.
“Um… It exploded.” Zappy muttered. “I’m pretty sure that’s bad.”
“Yeah…” Nait nodded from where he was still on Zappy’s shoulder. “This might be harder to-“ He froze. “Wait…” He looked around noticing the world was even bigger. “Zappy… Did you shrink?”
“I… Think that’s a safe assumption yes.” Zappy looked at all the grass towering over him.
“But you’re still a giant compared to me… Meaning…” Nait froze up.
“Meaning you a very, very tiny shinx.” Despite their situation, Zappy couldn’t help but giggle a little big. He grabbed his friend’s tail between two fingers, lifting him off his shoulder and dangling him upside down. “You know, I could get used to being able to carry you around like this.”
“Yeah, but you’re tiny too!” Nait shouted back before blowing Zappy as raspberry. “And stop dangling me by my tail.”
“Fiiiine.” Zappy held out a palm and sat Nait in it. “But… This is kind of a major situation.”
“Yeah…” Nait considered. “That thing is busted, there’s pretty much no way for us to avoid getting grounded now.”
“That’s your main concern?” Zappy asked. “Actually… Yeah, you’re right. I think being small will be a lot easier to deal with than my dad when he finds out not only where we went but what we did to ourselves.”
“Silver lining!” Nait stood on the tip of his toes to see over Zappy’s hand. “We’ve got a giant forest between us and home.”
“How is that a silver lining?” Zappy asked.
“I mean when are we ever going to get a chance to experience anything like this again?” Nait asked. “Giant mushrooms! Able to glide on the wind using flower petals! Maybe sailing down the river on a boat made out of a leaf! We’ve got a big adventure ahead of us! This is a rare chance. An opportunity like this might never arise again.”
“Or it might arise every single day if we’re stuck like this.” Zappy tried to look serious as he said it, but he couldn’t help but sound like he was teasing Nait a little. “Still, I feel like I’ll be doing the adventuring and you’ll mostly be watching.”
“H-hey! I’m useful like this still!” Nait retorted. “I can climb up to the top of one of your ears and be lookout! Plus… There are bound to be some small places only I can get into. There will be plenty of stuff for me to do!”
“If you say so.” Zappy rolled his eyes. He had his doubts on how useful Nait was going to be on an adventure at his current size. But, then again, Nait did just sort of have that adventurer’s spirit. It was entirely likely that no matter how impossible he seemed he would find a way to contribute and make himself essential.
Still, Zappy was going to have to do the majority of the walking. They had miles to go, and at Zappy’s size that was going to take forever. If Nait was walking on his own… They’d probably be gone for over a month.
“This is gonna be a long walk back.” Zappy ran to the edge of the junkyard. He found one advantage to being small immediately. He didn’t have to climb over the chain link fence. He could just go through one of the gaps in it.
“Yeah it is, but at least it’ll be exciting.” Nait insisted. “Besides, it’s a good thing that we have a long way to go.”
“And why is that?” Zappy asked. He personally felt that if they were going to get shrunk it would have been nice to do it somewhere closer to home to make the journey back less difficult.
“It’s gonna be really, really hard to explain this to either of our parents.” Nait explained. “Like we’re looking at possible years of being grounded. Only allowed to leave for school.”
“How will we go to school?” Zappy asked.
“Maybe find a joltik student to ride to school each day?” Nait suggested. “I mean I’m probably gonna stick to riding with you. You can still get around a lot faster than I can.”
“Uh huh.” Zappy replied. “Shouldn’t you be just a little more concerned about this?”
“Probably.” Nait shrugged. “But where’s the fun in that? What happened, happened, dwelling on it won’t change us back or make a difference. So, we might as well make the most of this and turn it into an adventure!”
“I suppose…” Zappy laughed a little.
“See there’s the spirit!” Nait grinned. “And maybe by the time we finally get back home we can come up with some kind of excuse that keeps us from getting in trouble.”
“Do you really think that’s possible at this point?” Zappy asked.
“I dunno…” Nait sat down in Zappy’s hand and crossed his arms. “But I feel like I got plenty of time to think on it. Mabe we could blame aliens?”
“I don’t think they’ll buy that.” Zappy shook his head. “Especially since we were supposed to be at school in the science classroom.”
“Maybe… Some kind of accident in the chemistry lab?” Nait tried. “No, that’s too easy to prove false. Oh! We encountered a legendary pokemon on the way home and they shrunk us as part of a game and flew off without changing us back!”
“Can any legendary pokemon actually do that?” Zappy tilted his head.
“I don’t know, but I’m willing to bet neither do my parents.” Nait grinned. “Best idea I got so far.”
“We’ll call that plan B.” Zappy started his way into the oversized forest, ducking to go underneath a tree root as the grass rose even higher on either side of him. “Let’s keep workshopping the idea and see if we can get a better excuse.”
“Maybe a scapegoat?” Nait suggested. “Someone we can blame who they won’t actually be able to punish. Maybe someone else who has been shrunk somehow? I mean if it happened to us I doubt we’re the only people in the universe it happened to.”
“So, what are the odds, you think we’re just going to run into another tiny pichu and tinier shinx?” Zappy asked.
“Maybe!” Nait replied. “I mean, you tend to meet a lot of people on adventures. They could be different people. I’m just trying to come up with ideas.”
“Right… You keep doing that.” Zappy rolled his eyes. “I’m gonna try to climb this tree to get a better view of the land… And then maybe make a leaf glider.”
“Right!” Nait saluted Zappy then climbed up onto the pichu’s head. “There’s gotta be a perfect excuse to get us out of trouble.”
Eventually, when they got home, it would turn out that if there was a possible excuse it had escaped both of them. But, at least while grounded, mercifully only for a week, their bedrooms would be a lot more interesting to explore while tiny.
But that was something to deal with later. For now, the two traveled into the giant forest, working their way home in a strange yet fantastic gigantic world.