In their 100th episode, the Story Pirates attend a show by famous octopus magician Octavious the Great (Raúl Esparza). Featuring two new stories: “Popsicle Sweater,” a blissed out tune about popsicle outerwear, written by Izzy, a 6 year old from Nevada, and “The New Species,” about a detective with a bad attitude on the hunt for a local monster, written by 9 year old from Texas named Shaan.
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Illustration by Camila Franklin
Listen to the episode, and scroll down for the original stories!
Original Stories
Popsicle Sweater
by Izzy, age 6, Nevada
There were two popsicles that had one sweater (imagine a double popsicle with the 2 sticks). Then I ate the sweater, then they were naked but they had underwear on. I threw them away in a volcano that then erupted!
The New Species
by Gabriella, age 10, Virginia
As he sprinted across the forest, Jerry periodically looked behind his shoulder, after running for about a mile, Jerry was out of breath and urged himself to stop running and take a break. He immediately called the person he knew would help him the most, Tec Jones, the best detective in the world. After thanking the sky for cell service, he pressed on the call icon for the contact, Tec Jones. The phone rang a few times. “Come on, pick up, pick up!” Jerry pleaded to the phone. After ringing several more times, it switched to voice mail. Even though Tec didn’t pick up, Jerry had faith that Tec would take his case. “Hello?” Jerry said. “My name is Jerry Hodge and I need our help. You see, there is this- this creature that has been in the papers for a long time now. Just a few hours ago, I went into the place where the creature sightings were to see if it was real. Turns out it is.” Jerry said, trembling at the thought of seeing the abnormality again. “If you get this please help, please.” He said pleading to his mobile phone. He ended the call and started heading out of the forest.
As Tec Jones, a private detective, and his partner, Dr. Jim Bennet were walking to their apartment, Tec got a voicemail from a person named Jerry Hodge. “Do you know anyone by the name of Jerry Hodge?” Tec asked his partner, Jim. “No,” Jim said curiously. “Why do you ask?” Well, I just got a voicemail from a person by that name.” Tec explained. “Probably just another client,” Jim said. “You should listen to it,” Jim suggested. “Ok,” Tec said. “Let’s see what my next case is.” “Hello?” Said the voice from the phone. Tec presumed he was the man named Jerry was in his early twenties. “My name is Jerry Hodge and I need our help. You see, there is this- this creature that has been in the papers for a long time now. Just a few hours ago, I went into the place where the creature sightings were to see if it was real. Turns out it is.” Jerry’s pre-recorded voice said. Even though his voice was a little muffled, Jim could hear the concern in the man’s voice and started to feel bad for him. “The location is Poonawala town, east forest.” Said Jerry’s voice. And with that, the recording ended.
“It sounds like a pretty good case,” Jim said to Tec, feeling bad for the man and trying to convince him. “Ok,” said Tec. “I would have never taken this case but since I’m so bored…” Said Tec purposely leaving Jim in suspense. “I’ll take it” “Alright!” Said Jim. Tec had never seen Jim this happy. Tec turned on the phone, put in his passcode, and accepted the case by saying: I’ll be right over. After Tec responded to the voicemail, the two men switched routes and started walking to their destination.
When Tec and his partner got to the area, which was a big forest, Jerry was waiting there for them, trembling in fear. Tec had asked what the creature looked like but he didn’t get a very accurate answer. Even though Jerry, was terrified to go into the forest again, Tec convinced him to come because he would be a big help in finding out the exact location of the animal within the massive, tree-filled forest.
The two men started following Jerry. They walked around for a very long time, Tec was starting to lose trust in Jerry, Jim kept confirming every so often that Jerry knew what he was going.“I know what I’m doing,” He said, trembling, “I know what I’m doing!” After about an hour of walking, the men started to get tired but the Jerry kept assuring them that they were coming close. Tec knew he shouldn’t have taken the case, the man probably had hallucinations. “Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea,” Tec said, “You keep saying we are close but I don’t think there’s any-” Tec stopped dead in his tracks there, he saw a massive creature breathing down on him, saliva dripping from its mouth.
Tec and the others were paralyzed in fear. Even though he was scared, his master detective skills kicked in; He started looking at the creature with a magnifying glass that could look at a microscopic scale. He scanned the creature as it lurked towards them. Then, he saw it, the creature’s feet, not only where they pixelized, the massive, red-eyed thing that they were looking at, didn’t even make a sound when it stepped into the dry leaves in the forest.
So, after safely escaping, Jerry invited the two men to say for dinner. While and after they ate the delicious meal that Jerry and prepared for them, Jim and Tec thought long and hard until Tec shouted “I’ve got it!”
“Amazing!” Jim said, “What is it?”
“The creature that we saw, wasn’t a creature. It was a hologram!” Tec said.
“How did figure that out?” Said Jerry, shocked that Tec had solved the problem in such a short amount of time.
“Well, you see, when we walked, our shoes crushed the dry leaves making a crunching sound, right?” Tec asked.
“Yes, so what’s your point?” Jerry asked, eagerly waiting for an answer.
“The creature, who had enormous weight, didn’t make any sound at all!” Said Tec. “And to prove that it was a hologram, not anything else, I confirmed it was not just the feet that were pixelated, it’s whole body, was made of pixels!”
“Wow!” Jim said, amazed.
“But, I still need to go back by myself to the area to confirm my hypothesis,” Tec said.
Jerry usually would have made an excuse for Tec not to go, but now that Jerry knew that it was a hologram, he felt safe enough to let Tec go.
When Tec arrived at the area, this time in stealth mode, he immediately confirmed his hypothesis, the creature yet again made no sound as it patrolled the area where it lived.
After Tec had contacted the police and they had taken down the hologram, they found out who had been behind all of this, Killian Smith, a criminal mastermind. Killian was taken to court and was sent into lifelong jail.
After Tec attended the court session as a witness of Killian’s thefts, he went back to the area of the hologram, the police were still there, awing over massive amounts of gold that Killian had stolen and hidden underground. Killian made the hologram to make sure nobody could steal the gold from him. For helping solve the case, the police decided to give him 50% of the gold. Tec insisted that they take it but he made sure not to push too much because deep down, he wanted the gold.
When Tec arrived at Jerry’s house he told Jim they needed to go, so after saying their goodbyes, they went back to their apartment, and Jim was shocked to see Tec hauling in gold. When Tec was finished getting all the gold in, Jim asked what had happened and how he got gold. So Tec sat himself and Jim down and told him all about it. Jim’s mouth was hanging the whole time. After Tec finished telling Jim his tale, Jim was amazed.“Wow!” Jim said, “This might be the craziest case we have ever had!”
“Oh, don’t worry my dear Bennet,” Said Tec grinning. “I’m going to have a lot of crazier cases.”
