William's story through to second round of BBC's 500 word competition

Year 5 pupil William was delighted when he heard recently that his short story ‘Mysterious Mine’ had been selected for the next round of the BBC 500 word story competition.

With over 130,000 stories submitted into the competition and only 5,000 being selected for the second round, William’s story was in the top 4% of entries!

Taking inspiration from his Cornish surroundings, William’s story is a descriptive and dramatic tale of scary goings on in an old Cornish mine and depicts a young hero called Nigel, who defeats an evil presence with the help of a football, and a ginger biscuit!

Read William’s story below:

‘Mysterious Mine’ by William Orwin

It was a beautiful summer’s day on the beaches of Cornwall with sand as golden as the glistening sun and waves as blue as the sky were gently eating away at the rugged coastline. Surfers rode the waves like cowboys riding mustangs. Thousands of tourists were crowding the beach and enjoying the good weather.

However all good things have to come to an end and huge black clouds rolled in over the deep blue skies and the crowded beach hid under huge tarpaulins and small tents. People trudged up to an old mine house to get to some shelter.  Little did they know they were to have the scare of their life. Cracking sounds were made as they crunched the gravel under their feet, mud splattered under their feet and the rain hammered out a beat on the thick stone roof. Shadows were cast over the engine house; big black shadows of mysterious shapes of ghosts, tigers and bears. Torches were shone over the shadows but as soon the shadows had appeared they disappeared.  Something was going on and the town’s folk didn’t like it.

A sudden high pitched scream broke the eerie silence.  All of the people whipped their heads around to see what had happened but whatever it was had vanished and it had taken the screaming person with it. They were terrified.  A boy called Nigel was bemused by all of this and he took it in to his own hands to sort this creature out. He silently slipped down the old mine shaft with a packet of ginger biscuits, some rope and his football, crunching on a ginger biscuit as he went. He saw the beast.  It was small with light blue fluffy fur but it had the sharpest claws and teeth. In fact, dare I say, the teeth were of a tiger and the claws of a bear. He shuffled towards Nigel and immediately sunk his claws into him, cutting through his red flesh. Nigel fell to his knees in pain as the beast scratched him again.  Nigel knew he had to stop him before it kidnapped anyone else but the beast was strong and he was weak. Nigel thought. He had one ginger biscuit left and as the beast raised his claws Nigel lobbed the biscuit as far as he could.  The beast was distracted and while it had its back turned Nigel flicked his football towards the beast. Even though he narrowly missed the beast was drawn to this new object that bounced around in the shaft. With its back turned Nigel whipped out the rope and lassoed it around the beast pulling at the ends to tie a huge knot. The beast struggled and strained but the rope held firm.

Nigel was a hero and the town folk gave him a lifetime’s supply of ginger biscuits. However this doesn’t mean you should stray in to mineshafts because you never know what could be waiting for you.