The Rise and Fall of The Lidev

“The Rise and Fall of The Lidev” is one of the outstanding stories of the first biannual International Short Story Contest 2018 written by Marco Pricopi, British International School Budapest, Hungary.

The Rise and Fall of The Lidev

Night was falling fast as the forest was getting swallowed up by darkness. A person creeped through the forest stricken with fear as shadows haunted the floor. Shadows of objects were unseen by the human eye. It was the midnight hour. For a second, he thought he heard a low growl echo through the murky darkness, the next he thought he heard a roar. Then he knew he had to reach the headquarters before the owner of the roar hurt him, or worse...

“This may not be a good idea, your lordship,” stated the officer breathlessly. Finally, he reached the headquarters of the E.E.L. (Evil Enterprise Link) foundation to the AI Master Machine.

“It is not about good ideas young man, it’s about the fact if we have enough men and monsters brave enough in the U.A.E. (Undercover Agency of Evil) to demolish the enemy’s defense system when they are least expecting it,” replied the machine, every inch of its voice filled with a dark desire.

“When do we attack?”

“While they’re sending off the final rocket that contains the last of the royal soldiers, generals, commanders and the royal family. You know how people don’t realize what a big problem it is to litter. After you people make my new physical form I will be able to eat rubbish and grow by exactly the same amount as the size the rubbish I’ve eaten. If you don’t understand me, I’ll tell you in an easier way; If there was a plastic bag on the floor that was only 100 square centimeters, then I shall grow no less than 10cm taller and 10cm wider.”

Meanwhile on planet Earth, the remaining humans were gathering at the Z-port.

“The last few ships are ready for take-off Sir,” reported one of the commanders to the general, “should we board this spaceship too?”

“Not yet, we want to be sure there’s nobody sneaking dangerous items into the ship, don’t we?” replied the general. “And after you check all the ships, send in for our spaceship (the royal one) and get it ready for departure.

“Yes sir,” replied the commander hastily.

“Your suit is ready sir,” established the chief inventor of the E.E.L cooperation to the AI Master Machine. “This is a memorable moment. Your physical form is now complete. AI Master Machine, now you may lead the whole organization!”

“Thank you, young man, you have served me well so I shall allow you to build a custom designed mothership for us to trace our rivals with when they take off and find out where they’re headed.”

“Master, I also have a new name for you because of course, I name every single one of my creations. I have decided to call you lightening-devourer, Lidev for short.”

Take off in 5...4...3...2.- BOOM!!!

“Stop the take-off instantly and tell me where you puny little humans are going!” roared the Lidev, his voice grasped by a terrorizing darkness.

“No, we don’t tell our secrets to strangers, so if you would- “the king’s speech was interrupted as the Lidev brutally knocked him out using his shield as a weapon.

“H-h-here is the m-m-map s-s-sir,” stuttered the chief navigator of the royal ship.

“Thank you,” said the Lidev, already flying back to the E.E.L HQ, leaving the startled humans to set up their spaceship and leave planet Earth.

“The earth has finally finished evacuating sir,” said one of the royal soldiers.

“You have done well, but we have to try and reach the better world as quick as we can so we can set up a military base to defend ourselves against that monster robot that stole the map from us.”

“Maybe we should just find another pla- “

“Nonsense!” snapped the military commander,” we can fight for this AI robot without even opening our eyes.”

Meanwhile the infamous Lidev arrived to the E.E.L Headquarters and headed to the floor of the newly built mothership that simulates the outside world.

“Sir, we have accumulated around 5 trillion tons of rubbish so you can start expanding,” reported an E.E.L commander to the Lidev.

“Where is it?”

“The entrance of the storage unit where the rubbish is kept is to your left Sir.”

“NOW THAT I HAVE EATEN ALL THIS JUNK, LET’S TAKE OVER THIS MEASLY PLANET AND ALL OF THE REMAINING INHABITANTS!” thundered the colossal Lidev.

‘Where the heck am I’, thought Patrick. The last thing he could remember was one of the bullies pushing him into a sand pit at school. He had to escape from this sandpit. He thought that the civilians evacuated but he could not remember for sure.

The only thing that he was definite about was that the reason that everybody evacuated was because of the rubbish.

Oh why did everybody have to litter the whole world? It had all started in Midway at the North Pacific Ocean when the humans killed all of the animals living there by throwing tons of plastic into the sea.

Suddenly, a huge shadow fell upon the playground, “if there is anybody left on this planet I shall assure you that you are under my command and if you deny me you will wish you were never born,” ordered the Lidev into the worldwide microphone, “my robots are currently patrolling this ground so you can’t escape, after my robots get you they will bring you to one of my headquarters so you can start working for me, and believe me, it won’t be easy.”

“I have heard of a prophecy that a young knight will come and fight me, I don’t know this young knight’s identity, but I will find him and I will exterminate him.

Patrick started scrambling around huge masses of rubbish, he wanted to find pieces that he would use to build some sort of shelter that he could use keep himself safe from the robots, when he found something that almost made him faint, right in front of him, casually sitting there, was a bow.

Let me assure you that this was no ordinary bow, this was phenomenal.

Patrick went to archery club and he was pretty much a champion, so he could recognize by the lightness of this bow, it was beyond professional.

Well, he had business to do. He would find and beat this mindless freak that was trying to take over Earth.

“Help me, please,” pleaded an old man, coming out of nowhere, “help me defeat the Lidev and I’ll give you arrows and armour to complete your truly amazing bow that you have just found, I promise.”

Patrick looked at the old man pitifully before asking him: “how do you know so much about the art of the blacksmith and what makes you hate the Lidev so much,” inquired Patrick.

“The reason is because I used to work for the Lidev as his top class engineer before he tried to kill me because I designed one of his weapons wrong and I just fled for my life. I need help.”

“In that case I’ll do it “

“Thank you so much!” “I already built some armour that I think will be pretty cool for you to use in war against the Lidev.

Patrick took one look at the new armour and fainted with astonishment.

When Patrick woke up, he realized that he was in a strange place and he heard the former blacksmith telling the Lidev’s workers that he knocked ‘the boy’ out and the blacksmith asked them to go and fetch the Lidev so he can exterminate the boy who has been seen in the prophecy.

As soon as the workers left, the blacksmith whispered to Patrick “I have hidden your bow (already loaded) behind your back, when the Lidev comes in, strike him on his knee which is his only vulnerable part.

As soon as the monstrous Lidev came in, Patrick took one look at him, then took out his bow, and shot his arrow through the air, slicing the wires on the Lidev’s left knee straight apart.

“I shall return!” cried the Lidev, before exploding, the ground quaking around him, causing the whole building to collapse.

Patrick and the blacksmith somersaulted out in the nick of time.

You may think that now it is over, but you are wrong, in front of the colossal wreckage of the Lidev, there was a memory chip unharmed.

As well as there being a huge number of trees catching fire and other environmental damage, the more important outcome was positive.

The Lidev ate all the rubbish on the planet so when he blew up, all the rubbish burned down with him.

The Lidev’s old workers were so happy that all the rubbish in the world had been cleared that they called all of the humans to come back to Earth. Nobody ever littered again. Of course, there was still some plastic left in the ocean, so the humans had to spend a lot of time clearing it up.

Even the children helped to tidy up, because every little hand was needed. All of them were given buckets and they were trained to scuba-dive.

Now, if you go from the very top of the ocean to the very bottom, you won’t find a speck of dust.

Meanwhile at the old E.E.L HQ a former builder picked up the Lidev memory chip and brought it home… to start working on the Lidev 2.0.