The Time Gobbler
Once there were two siblings – Matěj and Klárka.
Matěj was older and loved building all sorts of things. From blankets he could make a fort, from a box a rocket, and from a stick a sword, a telescope, or a magic wand.
Klárka was always inventing something. One day she was a vet, the next a queen, and the next the owner of a restaurant that served only pebble soup.
But one day they got a tablet at home.
“Just for a little while,” said Matěj.
Klárka sat down beside him.
On the tablet was a game where you collected coins. When they collected enough coins, they got a chest. When they opened the chest, they got a new character. When they got a character, they could complete another quest.
And when they completed another quest…
another one appeared.
“Just one more!” Matěj begged.
“And then we’ll go outside,” added Klárka.
But they didn’t go outside.
Outside the window the sun was shining.
Then the neighbours’ dog appeared in the garden.
Then it started to rain.
Then it stopped.
And Matěj and Klárka barely noticed any of it.
The next morning Matěj asked:
“Can I have the tablet?”
“Breakfast first,” said Mum.
Matěj frowned.
At breakfast he thought about the tablet.
While getting dressed he thought about the tablet.
When Klárka showed him a picture of a dragon she had drawn, he only said:
“Hmm.”
“You didn’t even look!” Klárka said, offended.
“I did.”
“You didn’t!”
Matěj really hadn’t looked.
In his head he could still only see his game.
In the afternoon he finally got the tablet.
And suddenly he was happy again.
At least for a while.
Then Mum told him:
“Matěj, time’s up.”
“What?! I’ve only just started!”
“You’ve been playing for almost an hour.”
“NO!”
Matěj gripped the tablet with both hands.
“I need it!”
Mum looked at him in surprise.
“You need it?”
Matěj wanted to say no.
But the strange thing was that right then he really felt as if he couldn’t be without the tablet.
That night Matěj couldn’t sleep.
And then he heard:
Ting.
He opened his eyes.
The tablet was glowing on the table.
Even though nobody had turned it on.
On the screen it said:
ONE MORE ROUND?
Matěj stood up.
Then Klárka appeared beside him.
“Did you turn it on?”
“No.”
The tablet jingled again.
ONE MORE VIDEO?
Then:
ONE MORE REWARD?
And finally:
JUST A LITTLE LONGER?
A thin little voice came from the tablet:
“Come closer.”
Matěj and Klárka stepped back.
“Who are you?” Klárka asked.
“I’m the Time Gobbler,” the tablet answered.
Two little glowing eyes peeked out of the screen.
“I love minutes best. Yum. And hours! Those are even better.”
“You’re eating our time?” Matěj cried.
“Oh no,” the Time Gobbler giggled. “You’re giving it to me yourselves.”
And suddenly pictures appeared around them.
Matěj at the tablet while the sun shone outside.
Klárka watching videos while her dolls lay beside her.
Dad calling Matěj to come kick a ball.
“In a minute!”
Klárka had a half-built dollhouse.
“When I finish watching this!”
And every time the Time Gobbler appeared beside them and swallowed another glowing little minute.
Chomp.
Chomp.
Chomp.
Matěj stopped finding it funny.
“Give them back!”
The Time Gobbler shook his head.
“Time doesn’t come back.”
“Then we’ll turn you off!” said Klárka.
“Go ahead,” the Time Gobbler grinned. “But tomorrow you’ll want it again. And if you keep wanting more and more, I’ll grow.”
Now he was almost as big as a pillow.
“So what should we do?” Matěj asked.
The Time Gobbler shrank.
“That’s your business.”
And he vanished.
The next day Matěj told his parents everything.
He expected them to laugh.
They didn’t.
Dad said:
“The tablet isn’t bad. But some games and videos are made on purpose so you want to keep going.”
“So the Time Gobbler really exists?” Klárka asked.
Dad smiled.
“Maybe he doesn’t look exactly the way you saw him. But that feeling of one more, one more, one more — that definitely exists.”
And so they made a rule at home.
The tablet had its time.
And when the time was up, it was really up.
The first day it annoyed Matěj.
The second day too.
The third day a little less.
And on the fourth day, when the tablet chimed that it was over, Matěj put it on the shelf.
“Klárka!”
“What?”
“Shall we build a rocket?”
“Yes!”
They took a huge box.
They stuck wings on it.
They drew buttons.
Klárka put a colander on her head as a space helmet.
And Matěj counted down:
“Three! Two! One! BLAST OFF!”
Their rocket flew past the Moon, landed on Mars, and rescued seven aliens from a giant space slug.
It took the whole afternoon.
In the evening Matěj walked past the tablet.
The screen flickered faintly for a moment.
ONE MORE ROUND?
Matěj stopped.
Then he looked at Klárka.
Klárka was holding two wooden swords.
“Shall we go fight a dragon?”
Matěj smiled.
“Let’s go.”
And the tablet went dark.
Somewhere deep inside it a tiny voice said:
“Oh well.”
The Time Gobbler went hungry today.
And Matěj and Klárka discovered something important:
A tablet can be great fun. But the best thing is when we decide when to use it — and not when it starts deciding for us.
The end.