THE ZILLIONAIRES V

An excited shout echoed through Keith’s lab.

"There! It’s finally finished!" Keith exclaimed. He had just added the finishing touch to his shrink machine. It had taken him 4½ months of hard work and inventing to create his greatest invention ever! With it, he and his brother Ryan could go anywhere without being noticed at all. The machine could be set to make them as small as a nanometer!

"Ryan! Get down here now! I’ve finally finished it!" Keith shouted into his Radio Watch.

A few minutes later Ryan emerged from the secret entrance into Keith’s large lab. Only he and his brother knew how to get inside of the secret lab.

"What do you want this time? Do you think that this machine will actually work?" Ryan asked.

"Of course it will work! Do you think that I would spend all this time making some that wouldn’t work?"

"Yes. By the way, what do you think you are going to accomplish with this shrink ray of yours?"

"Are you an idiot or something? I can go anywhere without being seen. I can shrink our planes and we could fly around the house and land anywhere. We could go out in public and amaze people while we fly around their heads. I’m going to take my shrinking machine outside and try it out on something. What do you think I should test it on?"

"Maybe you could try it out on some of the badguys! I’d love to see you shrink someone like General Douglas Rancor! That would be so cool!"

"I think that maybe that’s the first bright idea that you have come up with today! Let’s go and test it right away!"

Keith and Ryan went to the State Prison and got Rancor. As soon as they got back home, Ryan tied Rancor up to a big tree out in the open field in their yard while Keith set up his shrink machine.

"Hold on a second here!" Rancor shouted. "What do you think you are going to me? You can’t get away with murder you ugly baboon. The police will arrest you, even if I am a criminal!"

"Will you please just shut up a second? Nobody is going to die. Me and Ryan are going to shrink you. It’s no big deal. Now shut-up." Keith said.

Rancor shut-up.

"Hey Keith," Ryan asked, "Are you sure that this won’t kill him?"

"Relax Ryan. I don’t think that it will kill him. We’ll just have to take a chance. Who cares anyway? He tried to kill us didn’t he?"

"Yeah, but still, could we even get away with it?"

"Maybe. I guess."

"I hate you."

"I hate you too."

"Will you just shrink this fool and get this whole mess over with for crying out loud?"

"Oh please! Don’t cry Ryan! Your too big to start that again."

"SHUT-UP!"

"No thank’s."

"Arrrrrggggg!!!!!"

Keith laughed, which made Ryan only madder. Pretty soon, Ryan and Keith were sharing punches and kicks. Keith got kicked in the shin which made him howl in pain. Ryan gave him a bloody nose and Keith frogged Ryan in the arm with the force of an train. Ryan frogged Keith in the side of the upper leg. Keith got so mad that he punched Ryan out cold. When Ryan woke up, he was lying on the grass out in the field near Keith and his shrink machine.

"It’s about time! Your been out for 45 minutes!" Keith said.

"Can we just shrink Rancor and stop this?" Ryan asked.

"I thought you never ask."

Keith turned on the power button and aimed the devise toward Rancor. He flicked a couple of switches and watched his monitor and the power went up.

10%...

20%...

30%...

40%...

It went up some more and Keith pressed another button.

70%...

80%...

90%...

100%.

The screen flashed. -PROCEED-

Ryan watched as his brother pushed a button marked FIRE.

A blue and red laser beam shot out of the machine and hit Rancor in the stomach. He shrank and fell through the ropes and into the soft grass. The laser beam was still going and it hit and shrunk the tree that Rancor was tied to.

"No!" Rancor screamed, "Noooooooo!"

"Yes! It worked!" Keith shouted. Ryan and his brother ran over to the tree and searched for Rancor. A minute later they found him hiding under a large mushroom. He was an inch tall!

"You’ll never get away with this! I’ll get you back and your gonna wish that you had never heard of General Douglas Rancor!" he shouted.

"Not likely." Keith said. They took him to their house and put him in a container that Ryan had made just for something like this. It was about the size of an aquarium with a hut and a stream of water coming out of the wall onto a large terrace. The hole that it came out of was to small for Rancor to fit through. It fell over the edge to make a miniature waterfall which ran out through a drain. The hut had a toilet, sink, shower, bed, T.V., table, refrigerator, and a cabinet full of food.

"Well," Keith said, "Let’s go test out my shrink machine on ourselves and X-36's. We’ll have a great time."

"Excellent idea."

Ryan put up a two-way mirror 30 feet in front of the shrink machine. It had a video camera attached to the back of it so that they could record what it looks like coming right at it. Ryan and Keith explained to their wives how to operate the machine and how to un-shrink them. They shrunk their X-36's and after that they walked out to the 3 inch high platform that Keith had made especially for this purpose.

"Do you think that this is a good idea?" Ryan asked his brother, sounding a bit worried.

"Don’t worry so much. I wish you stop being such a scaredy-cat. It didn’t hurt Rancor so why should it hurt us?"

"I guess your right. Let’s do it."

They got on the platform and looked at the shrink machine. Now they knew what Rancor had felt right before they had shrunk him earlier that day.

"Hey Keith," Ryan asked, "how is it going to hit us both at the same time?"

"That’s simple. I made where it could shoot out up to 10 different laser beams at one time."

"You think of everything."

"Thanks."

"Ready?" Allison asked.

"We’re ready. On the count of three, do it." Keith said.

"Three... Two... One... Fire."

The machine shot out the laser beams. Ryan and Keith didn’t feel anything as they shrank. All that they remembered was the platform rushing up at them. Keith and Ryan looked around. It had worked! They were and inch tall!

"This is so cool!" Ryan said.

"This is the most amazing thing that has ever happened to me in my entire life!" Keith exclaimed.

They expected their wives to come over to them but they didn’t. Ryan and Keith looked over to the shrink machine but didn’t see their wives.

"Where are they?" Ryan asked.

"I don’t know." Keith answered.

"Let’s go find them."

"O.K."

They got in their airplanes and took off. At the shrink machine, they didn’t see their wives. They were hovering 10 inches above the ground. Keith looked around and spotted their wives on the ground. They were an inch tall too!

"Ryan! Ryan! Our wives got shrunk some how. Land near me and we’ll pick them up. Over." Keith said into his radio.

"What?! Never-mind. I see them too. Over and out."

They landed and hopped out. Their wives raced over to them. They were all shaky and frightened.

"Allison, Andrea, what in the world happened? How did you get shrunk too?" Keith asked.

Finally Allison and Andrea calmed down enough to talk.

"When we shrunk you and Ryan, the laser beams lasted five seconds and by that time you and Ryan were shrunk. The beams hit the mirror and reflected back on us." Allison said.

"Great. Now what are we supposed to do?" Ryan asked.

Keith answered. "The first thing that we need to do is try to un-shrink ourselves. That shouldn’t be to much of a problem unless it’s to hard to press the buttons. Then we’ll really be in a bad situation. We may never get un-shrunk. I doubt that we could get our kids attention."

"This is not good." Ryan said, "Definitely not good at all."

They got in the planes and flew to their house. The small planes flew through an open window and tried to find their kids.

After searching for a few minutes they still couldn’t find them.

"So where do you think they are?" Allison asked.

"I don’t know. The only place that I can think of is their rooms but their doors are shut. If we could fit under their doors, we might be able to get them to un-shrink us." Keith answered.

They flew to their son’s room and tried to stop at the door. Something was wrong with the plane! They couldn’t stop!

"Oh no!!!!!" Keith screamed.

"What’s the matter?" Allison managed to choke out.

"Something’s wrong with the brakes! I can’t get this aircraft to stop! We’re going to have to eject!"

"What?!!!"

"We have to eject! Buckle your seat belt now! This plane’s gonna crash!"

Allison frantically buckled her seat belt and Keith pushed the eject button. The roof of the plane popped off and the passengers were shot out. The plane went forward and ran into the wall. It blew up and billows of black smoke went with it. The wall got a chunk knocked out of it. Allison and Keith floated down to the carpet in parachutes. The first thing that Keith did was make sure that his wife was O.K. She was.

"Do you think that we could fit under Eric’s door?" asked Allison.

"We can try." answered Keith.

"Where do you think that Ryan and Andrea are?"

"They probably went to get their son. We’ll find them later."

Meanwhile, on the other side of the house, Ryan and Andrea were flying to their son’s room. They went up the stairs ans down the hall. Finally they reached their destination, Ryan Jr.’s room. The door was shut. Ryan landed beside the door in case someone came in or out. Now no-one would step on it. They crawled under the door and looked around. His room was a mess. Action figures were all over the floor, and half of them were burned. Remote controlled vehicles were scattered everywhere. The only thing that wasn’t there was Ryan Jr..

"So what do we do now?" asked Andrea.

"I guess we go to Eric’s room now. Lauren is at mall with Sarah and her friends again. She told me that she would be home by eight tonight, and it’s only five o’clock now. Besides, Allison and Keith are probably there and we need to stick together. Let’s get in the plane and go there."

"Whatever you say."

Back on the other side of the house Allison and Keith were crawling under Eric’s door. Inside was a giant race track that was literally 15 miles long! It had taken Eric 2 years and $20,000 to build it. The track went through every room in the house and all of the rooms had pit stops for the cars, which connected to ramps which went down to the floor. Real cars ran on it. Keith had made them for his son. They were exactly like real cars, only smaller. They even had keys in them! Eric wasn’t there.

"So what now?" said Allison.

"We might as well get in a car and ride on the tracks. They stretch through every room in the house so we’ll find Eric if he is in the house."

"Do you really want to do that?"

"Of course. This is the easiest way to find him."

They climbed into one of the best-looking cars and took off up the track. It looped around and went under his desk and bed. There was even an under water part of the track that went through a tunnel. It came out of the water and up near the ceiling. When it got to the corner it went through the wall and into another room. After they reached the kitchen they saw Ryan Jr. and Eric at the table, cutting up pieces of cheese.

Keith drove the car off of the track and down the ramp.

"What are they doing?" asked Allison.

"There making a snack or something." her husband answered.

"What kind of snack?"

"I don’t know."

"So how are we going to get the kids attention?"

"Maybe we should just bite their legs or something. I’m sure that them will get there attention."

"You do it."

"Fine."

Keith drove over to Eric’s shoe and parked the car. He got out and climbed up his son’s shoe.

"Be careful!" Allison called after him. He managed to get up the sock.

"Well, here goes." Keith said. He bit down as hard as he could.

"Ouch!" Eric said. He reached down and scratched the spot where his dad had bit him.

"What happened?" asked Ryan Jr. to Eric.

"Something bit me. Must of been a mosquito. I’ve got to tell dad to call the exterminator." Eric answered.

"Where are we going?" Andrea asked Ryan.

They had just checked Eric’s room and were flying down the hall.

"To find our son." Ryan answered.

As they flew , Ryan began to notice the spot on the wall where Keith’s plane had crashed.

"What is that thing?" Ryan said to no-one in particular.

"What is what thing?" asked Andrea.

"That spot on the wall at the end of the hall."

"I don’t know. Let’s find out."

Ryan skillfully landed the plane right under the plane crash area. He and his wife got out examined the wreckage.

Finally Ryan knew what had happened. "Keith and Allison crashed!"

"Do you think that they, you know, d-died?" said Andrea.

"I’m sure that they ejected in time." Then he saw their parachutes and knew they were alive.

Ryan’s stomach let out a long, deep growl, which reminded him that he hadn’t had anything to eat in hours.

"Come on." He said, "Let’s go get something to eat in the kitchen. They got in the plane and flew back down the hall. When they got to the kitchen, they saw the same thing that Allison and Keith had seen when they went into the kitchen. Ryan and his wife flew to the table, landed, and got out.

Eric and Ryan Jr. looked at them, shocked.

"Mom?! Dad?!" Ryan Jr. said, as shocked as he could possible be. "What in the world happened? Did you get stuck in the dryer or something?"

"Yes, Ryan, it’s your parents." Ryan senior said even though the boy couldn’t hear them.

"Hey, Allison, come on up here. We need to climb to the top of the table." Keith said.

"What?!"

Allison climbed up to Keith and they went up their son’s pants on the out side of them. When they got on the top of the table, they saw Ryan and Andrea and ran over to them. There was a joyful reunion while their boy’s got magnifying glasses. They looked at their parents in astonishment as their parents told the amazing story through a voice magnifier.

Twenty minutes later the adults were standing on the platform waiting for the boys to un-shrink them.

"Are you guys ready?" Eric asked.

"We’re as ready as we’ll ever be." Ryan said.

Eric and Ryan Jr. pushed some buttons and the machine started

up. It reached the un-shrinking point. -PROCEED-

Four lasers hit four adults and they became un-shrunk once again.

"Well," Keith said to Ryan, "This is on day that I’ll never forget!"