Out of a rainbow

By Michael Morpurgo

The original story of the London 2012 mascots

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A message from Seb CoeI am very pleased to introduce you to Wenlock and Mandeville – the London 2012 mascots. The mascots will become important faces of our Games, helping us to welcome the world in 2012.

What excites me most is that our mascots are more than just cuddly toys. They have a great story grounded in British, Olympic and Paralympic history. Made from the last two drops of steel used for the Olympic Stadium, Wenlock and Mandeville are named after locations at the heart of our Games heritage. They are also inspired by sport, not only in their design but also in the adventures they will have between now and 2012.

A great story needs a great storywriter, and former children’s laureate Michael Morpurgo is just that. The story he wrote, inspired by Wenlock and Mandeville, has been adapted into a stunning animated film introducing them to the world.

This book includes an exclusive edition of Michael’s story, and sketches by the film’s story board artist Pete Western. Wenlock and Mandeville also introduce themselves and tell you about their plans. You can follow their adventures at london2012.com/mascots

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Hello, I’m Wenlock, the official mascot for the London 2012 Olympic Games!

My name comes from the town of Much Wenlock, where the ‘Olympian Games’ that inspired Baron Pierre de Coubertin, founder of the modern Olympic Games, still take place.

You’ll probably have noticed that I have only got one eye. In fact it’s a camera lens so I can record everything I see. I’m really focused on my final destination – the Olympic Games in 2012! The bracelets on my wrists are friendship bands in the colours of the five Olympic rings.

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I love the light on my head – it’s inspired by the lights on London’s iconic black taxis. The three points represent the places on the podium where successful athletes stand to receive their medals.

I always try to do my personal best and I will do everything I can to help you do your best as well!

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Hi, I’m Mandeville, the official mascot for the London 2012 Paralympic Games!

My name comes from the birthplace of the Paralympic Games, Stoke Mandeville. On the day of the Opening Ceremony of the London 1948 Olympic Games, Sir Ludwig Guttmann organised a sport competition for injured World War II soldiers at the hospital there. That competition became the Paralympic Games.

From the prongs on my head representing the Paralympic emblem to my small, thin tail, I’m built for speed. I always want to be faster, and the timer on my wrist helps me push to beat my

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personal best. That’s because I want to be the best I can be… don’t you?

I’m spending from now until summer 2012 finding out all about Paralympic sport, and about all the different types of people in the UK. Everyone’s so different and I think those differences are great!

Out of a rainbowBy Michael Morpurgo

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A great rainbow arcs over the town down onto a giant steelworks. Inside the mill hundreds of steelworkers are busy working on the construction of a huge arc-shaped girder, the furnace roaring and blazing, sparks flying. Amongst this shower of sparks is one significantly larger molten fragment, which falls away from the girder, hits the ground, and breaks in two. The two pieces lie there glowing in amongst the ashes. One of the workers notices them. He’s an older man than the others. He chucks a bucket of water on them, sees them fizz and go black. A hooter goes to signal the end of the working day. They all stand back and look up in awe and wonder at what they have done. The old man lifts his visor. His eyes are full of tears.

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Now the steel workers are coming towards him from all sides, clapping, cheering him. Some unroll a huge banner: ‘Happy retirement Grandpa George’. The foreman presents him with a shield. ‘To Grandpa George, champion steelworker, champion friend.’ George takes off his helmet and hands it to the foreman. He smiles his thanks, unable to speak. As he turns to walk away he sees the two fragments lying there in amongst the ashes. He picks them up, turns to face everyone, smiling now as he holds them up. ‘Souvenir,’ he says, and walks away. They clap him out. He waves a hand in farewell without turning around.

George is cycling home, slowly, his head full of all the years he’s worked. He pats his jacket pocket

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as he remembers the steel fragments. As he arrives home, his twin grandchildren, Lily and Jack, come running out to meet him, blindfold him, and lead him inside, the dog bounding alongside. They sit Grandpa down at the kitchen table, and undo the blindfold. A huge cake is there in front of him on the table, made in the shape of the Olympic Stadium, with a marzipan girder all the colours of the rainbow. ‘Lily and Jack,’ Grandma says. ‘They made the rainbow together, all by themselves.’

‘And this!’ Lily cries, and they hold up a picture they’ve done, of Grandpa cycling to work in the mill. There’s a rainbow arcing over the mill. ‘We like rainbows,’ Jack says.

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Grandpa is very touched. ‘I’ll keep the picture for ever,’ he says. ‘But I won’t keep that cake!’ He holds out his plate. As they have their tea – the dog gets his piece of cake too – Grandpa pats his jacket pocket. The dog keeps smelling his pocket. Grandpa has had an idea, and he likes the idea of his idea. He smiles.

It’s night-time, and Grandpa and Grandma are in bed, Grandma fast asleep, Grandpa wide awake and thinking. He checks her, slips out of bed, feels in his jacket pocket, takes out the two steel fragments that glint in the moonlight. Putting on his dressing gown, he tiptoes out of the room. He looks in on Lily and Jack who are sleeping, and goes down the stairs.

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It is a moonlit night. Grandpa comes out of the house, with the dog, and goes into the garage. Moments later a strange light is flaring in the garage. Grandpa, helmet on, is busy at his workbench. All around are dozens of artefacts he has made before out of steel, little sculptures of animals, some finished, some not. He is a master craftsman, and now he is transforming the first of the souvenir fragments into the already recognisable shape of a small moving figure, abstract and strange, but definitely running, racing, black becoming silver all the time. Each of the little figures is now morphing, as he works through the night, into an embodiment of speed and stamina and determination. The dog looks on, amazed.

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As dawn breaks Grandma comes in with a cup of tea for him – she is clearly used to these nights he spends in his workshop. She helps him polish the little running creatures. Then they step out of the garage in their dressing gowns, and hold the creatures up to the sunlight, delighted with what they have done. They look up at the grandchildren’s window, anticipating how much they will love them when they see them.

Lily and Jack come down to breakfast to find a wrapped present for each of them. They open them in a hurry, and are stunned. ‘They came off that girder we were making for the Olympic Stadium,’ Grandpa says. ‘You’ve got to keep them polished up, mind. They like to be shiny,

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like to look their best. Keeps them warm, makes them feel alive.’

Lily and Jack touch them, almost nervously, tentatively at first, then when they pick them up, they are clearly a lot heavier than they expect. Each senses at once a life force in them, and knows instinctively that the other feels it too.

Grandma says, ‘You can call them what you like. You could name them after yourselves – they’re twins, of course, like you. Eat your cornflakes now.’ The children can’t take their eyes off them as they eat. They are speechless.

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In their bedroom after breakfast, they put them side by side on the windowsill, and kneel there on the bed, simply gazing at them in awe and wonder. Jack says ‘Hello’ to his. Lily says ‘Hello’ to hers. Suddenly, out of the sunshine it is raining heavily. There’s a dark grey cloud looming over the town, and the beginnings of a rainbow. They see the little creatures shiver to life, take on all the colours of the rainbow, lift their heads, and then, of their own volition, turn to face the window, and hold out their arms. As they do so, the rainbow brightens, then dazzles coming out of the cloud, and straight down towards them, so that the whole room and everything in it, including the goldfish, including the dog, glows with its colours.

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Grandma calls from downstairs, then comes rushing in with the dog. ‘A rainbow, children! Look, a rainbow!’ She hurries to the window. Alarmed, the children are sure she will notice how the creatures have changed. But when the children look, they are just as they were before. Everything in the room is as it was. Each knows for sure they haven’t imagined it, because the other’s seen it too. The telepathy between them is obvious.

Once Grandma has gone out, Jack puts a chair against the door. They know there is life in their new steel friends. They try to talk to them. The little creatures are trying to talk back. ‘We have to do what Grandpa says,’ says Lily. ‘Let’s rub them, warm them up, bring them to life! Maybe

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they’ll talk to us then.’ Watched by the dog, they both rub them furiously. The dog sees the change first, then the children do. Each of the creatures suddenly has an eye, and a light shining from the forehead. The dog yelps and crawls under the bed. Alarmed, the children stop their rubbing. ‘Mine’s warm,’ says Jack.

‘Mine too,’ says Lily. ‘ They’re alive!’

‘Alive!’ say the creatures in unison.

‘Wow!’ say the twins.

‘Wow!’ the little creatures whisper back, in a still small echoing voice that sounds far away,

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and yet close at the same time. They stretch themselves, feeling their power to move, marvelling at it, as the children are, and all the time they are taking on colours, becoming who they are. They see themselves in the mirror and gasp in astonishment.

‘Hi,’ says Jack, touching his on the head. ‘Hi,’ echoes the little creature.

‘Hello,’ says Lily, touching hers on the head.

‘Hello,’ comes the reply.

The children discover that they learn fast, imitating everything they say and do. The children test this.

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They wave, they dance, they turn somersaults. Soon they are not just imitating, but interacting. They play each other on the computer, they play chess, they dress up. They draw pictures together, write texts on their phones to one another.

The attic room is like an Aladdin’s cave of sport. The walls are covered in photographs, the shelves full of books about the Games.

Everywhere we see pictures of athletes running, jumping, diving, boxing. The little creatures begin to imitate the photographs – they seem capable of anything.

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Suddenly they catch sight of the rainbow in the mirror. They leap up onto the windowsill, pointing at the rainbow, longing to go.

‘We must go now,’ they say.

‘Please don’t go,’ Jack cries.

‘We want you to stay,’ Lily begs them. ‘Please.’

‘It is time for us to go on our adventures. It is what we were made for,’ they say.

‘But wherever I go on my journey, Jack,’ says one, reaching out and touching Jack’s hand, ‘you will see me. You only have to look and I’ll be there.’

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‘And wherever I go too, Lily,’ says the other, ‘you can find out what I am doing.’

‘You’re not going together then?’ Jack asks.

‘Look!’ they reply. The children look out of the window, and see two rainbows arcing down towards them from opposite directions. The children are astounded.

‘I go one way,’ says one.

‘I go another,’ says the other.

‘Because we have so many people to tell, so many adventures to have.’ They speak in unison now.

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‘But in two years from now, we’ll meet again. You too. You’ll be there. The whole world will be there!’

‘So we will see you again then?’ says Lily.

‘Of course,’ they tell her, smiling.

Jack looks at Lily for reassurance, then opens the window. Their two friends shake each other by the hand, wish each other luck, and then fly out onto their rainbow. They pause to wave at the children. Then they’re gone, running, then leaping, up the rainbow and away. The rainbows vanish, leaving an empty sky.

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Grandpa comes in, and joins them at the window. ‘They flew away,’ says Jack sadly.

‘On a rainbow,’ says Lily. ‘But we’ll see them again.’

‘Hope so,’ says Grandpa. ‘They’re the best little creatures I ever made, those two. Something magical about them.’

– The End –

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Wenlock and Mandeville: the start of their journey

Between now and 2012, Wenlock and Mandeville will be travelling around the UK, meeting people and learning from them. Follow their journey and join in at london2012.com/mascots

© The London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games Limited (LOCOG) 2010.The London 2012 emblems ® © LOCOG 2007.The London 2012 mascots TM © LOCOG 2009-10. All rights reserved.Not for resale

london2012.com/mascots

19 May 2010