Harry was a vibrant red dragon with a bright orange stomach which rumbled all the time. He was incredibly fat because he constantly, hour after hour, ate sweets and junk food which made his teeth fall out. He had dark green wings with light green on the inside which were too small for him to fly with because he was so fat that he couldn’t support himself in the air. Hungry Harry, which he was also known as, had 16 bright yellow spikes lined up along his back but most of them were covered in fat.
The villagers in the nearby village were so scared of him that they gave him food in order that he wouldn’t eat them whole. He also got a measly, poor old man to bring him meals seven times a day.
One day, Harry was feeling particularly peckish and, to make matters worse, the man who usually brought him food was late! Harry was outraged – to make things worse his stomach groaned over and over again. Never in his life had he felt so hungry. Out of the very corner of his eye he spotted a bright blue shine. Quickly, Harry turned his head to find his mother’s precious clock sitting on the table which was wasting away day by day hour by hour.
He sat and stared at the dusty clock with his mother’s face in the very middle. After a few minutes Harry jumped to his feet and picked up the clock. At that very moment, he swallowed the clock whole. Tick, tock, tick, tock the clock went in his fiery belly.
As soon as he had realised what he had done, he started to think of what his mum had told him when he was little, “Don’t ever let the clock stop ticking, if it does it will blow up the whole planet, it needs to be wound up again in the year 2000.” Harry stopped thinking and remembered what year it was – it was the year 2000!
He could feel the clock with his mother’s face on ticking in his massive fiery stomach. He sat down. Suddenly, he started to try and shove his hand down his throat to get the clock out. When it didn’t work he breathed some fire to see if it would fly out with the fire.
At last the food person arrived and Harry jumped up straight away and ran to him. “ARRRGGGHHH!!!” The food man screamed in horror, ”Please, please don’t eat me.”
“I need help!” Harry called.
The food man stopped running and eventually asked, “With what?”
Harry explained everything that had happened and to his surprise, the food man knew exactly what to do!
“Go to the south part of the village and there you will find a dragon named Glordia. She has the key,” the man told Harry.
“Thank you,” Harry called.
Harry ran quickly to the entrance of his cave, opened his wings and began to flap. He jumped off the edge of the small drop and fell straight to the ground. He hadn’t tried to fly in at least five years. Suddenly, it hit him, he was too FAT!!
He got up and ran all the way to the other side of the village, his belly bouncing up and down all the time. He panted and gasped for air, he wanted to give up but this dragon had determination unlike any other dragon. When he finally arrived at the house, he was proud of himself.
Nervously, Harry walked up to the beautiful dragon house door. He could feel his heart pounding as he stared at what could only be described as astonishing. His claws shaking, Harry knocked on the large door.
After a while Glordia pulled open the door.
“Hello have you got the key to a ticking clock?” asked Harry.
“Maybe,” replied Glordia.
“Well I need it, otherwise me and you are going to die as I accidentally swallowed the clock.”
“Here is the key then, but how are you going to wind it up?”
Harry took a while to think. “I’ve got it! I’ll swallow you so you can wind it up, then I’ll spit you out.”
“How can I trust you to spit me out?” Glordia questioned.
“How can I trust you to wind the clock up?” he replied.
So he swallowed her and she wound the clock back up and out she came. She was covered in saliva top to bottom and they agreed to meet up every ten years to wind up the clock.
“Thank you for saving everyone,” said Harry gratefully. At that very moment, their eyes met from across the room. Harry and Glordia stared at each other for what seemed like an eternity. Slowly, they moved towards each other and just when they were about to kiss the phone screamed, RING RING.
“Oh, I should probably answer that,” said Glordia hesitantly.
“Yes, I should probably get going then,” Harry replied, reluctantly.
In 2010 he returned to Glordia to wind the clock up again, as he needed to wind the clock up every ten years. When he knocked on the door he suddenly remembered how beautiful Glordia was – the dragon of his dreams. Without warning, the door opened. Harry jumped but got calmer when he saw her face.
“Hello again,”said Glordia in an excited manner. They remembered how they nearly kissed each other last time. After five minutes of having tea Harry proposed to Glordia with an enormous diamond ring. Then they wound up the clock hurriedly. After they had done that, they decided to live with each other. After a year of being together, Glordia and Harry had a baby dragon named Darcie Dragon.
Darcie was a very beautiful dragon who looked just like her mum. She was green with red spots and had a purple tummy and purple lumps all over her back. She also had bright yellow wings with a blue outline.
Harry, with the help of Glordia, got fitter and looked like a proper dragon. The villagers were no longer scared of Harry and they stopped feeding him food. Even when they offered him food Harry simply said no.
Hungry Harry and the Ticking Clock, written and illustrated by The Cheese, was created during a Dynamic Studio project exploring values. Year 6 pupils from Didsbury CE Primary School worked with class teacher Simon Ball, designer John Conibear, author David Hanson and illustrator/author Lizzie Finlay.