The Fly Bike rises easily off the ground. Frank guns it forward with a lean and a twist of the acceleration handgrip.
“Oh yeah!” cheers Watson.
Frank jets a quick circle down the alley and back. He banks a faster figure eight in the empty lot. He jumps the broken couch, flips over the stack of empty milk crates, goes horizontal along the back wall of the shop building, and does a nosedive 360, spinning to a stop exactly seven centimeters from Watson’s left toe.
Klink nods his webcam eye. “Energy from matter.”
Klank gives Frank a one-arm hug. “Sweet moves.”
Watson slides his toe back, just a bit. “An Antimatter Motor Fly Bike and Watson’s Universal-Strength Peanut Butter Bubble Gum? Tomorrow that Science Prize is ours for sure.”
Frank guns the Antimatter Motor with another deep HMMMMMMM.
Which might be why no one hears, or sees, a tiny metal bug fly up and out of Frank Einstein’s lab.
GOOD MORNING, EINSTEIN,” SAYS GRAMPA AL, POURING FRANK some cornflakes.
Frank plops down in the kitchen chair and yawns but still cracks a smile and answers, “Good morning, Einstein.”
“Cornflakes!” says Watson, already there and ready to go, as loud and awake as Frank is not. He holds a single cornflake up to the light. “This is what I am going to invent next.”
Frank chews his mouthful of cereal. Sleepily. Slowly. “I think they’ve already been invented.”
“No, I mean something like cornflakes. Something that is such a good idea that it seems like it’s always been around. Did you know they were invented by accident?”
“No,” says Frank. “But why do I have a feeling you’re going to tell me anyway?”
“It’s 1894,” says Watson, ignoring Frank. “The Kellogg brothers are making some dough to squeeze through rollers and flatten out. But then they both have to leave the room for some reason. I’m not sure why. Maybe their mom is calling them. No . . . wait. They were grown-up guys by then. I guess it’s not part of the story—”
“Which is why you should probably leave it out,” says Frank.
“Right,” says Watson. “Forget that part. So they have to leave the room. They come back. And guess what? The dough is all dried out. They don’t want to waste it, though, so they run it through the rollers anyway.”
“OK, now this is getting really exciting,” teases Frank.
“But when they run the dry dough through the rollers, it breaks into flakes! They are delicious. Everyone loves them. And now they’ve been around for more than a hundred years.”
“Which just might happen with Watson’s Universal-Strength Peanut Butter Bubble Gum,” says Grampa Al. He checks his full-scale model of the first atomic clock on the kitchen wall.
“Speaking of which—we’d better get you boys over to City Hall so you can get set up. Big day today.”
The thought of today’s Science Prize, and the Antimatter Motor Fly Bike—what it could mean for Grampa Al, what it could mean for science—wakes Frank up in an instant. But—
Rrrrarrrrrr rings the Dimetrodon.
Frank answers. “Hey, Mom. Hey, Dad.”
Bob and Mary Einstein, still in their orange parkas, appear on the Dimetrodon screen.
“Hi, darling. We can’t talk long. There is something happening down here with that orange zone you mentioned.”
“It’s the ozone, honey,” says Bob.
“Right. The O zone. Seems like it’s got a hole in it.”
“Yeah, there’s a bad thing going on with CFCs . . .” Frank begins to explain patiently.
“Yes, but anyway. We just wanted to call and wish you luck at your science fair today.”
“Aw, thanks, Mom. I’m hoping to win the big prize. Remember the trophy Grampa won when he was a kid?”
“Did you do that model of a volcano with flour and seltzer like I did when I was your age?” asks Bob. “That’s a classic.”
“Not exactly,” says Frank. “It’s baking soda and vinegar. And they do react in a pretty neat multistep reaction to form carbonic acid . . .
NaHCO3 + HC2H3O2 → NaC2H3O2 + H2CO3
“. . . which decomposes into water and bubbles of carbon dioxide . . .
H2CO3 → H2O + CO2
“. . . but actually, I finally figured out how to power my old flying-bike invention. With a real Antimatter Motor I made with Watson and my robot pals.”
The picture link fuzzes for a split second.
“What?” says Mary. “We didn’t hear all of that. But it’s wonderful that you are riding bikes with your friends.”
“We are heading home tomorrow,” says Bob. “See you in a couple days!”
“Love you, sweetie.”
“Love you guys. Bye.”
Frank turns to Grampa Al. “You let your own kid make a volcano model?”
Grampa Al smiles and shrugs. “He loved it. And it made a very nice imitation-lava flow. Now come on. Pack up your Fly Bike and Peanut Butter Bubble Gum, and let’s blow this pop stand.”
“Blow this pop stand” is another one of those mysterious Grampa Al sayings, where you know what he means but you really have no idea what he just said.
Frank jumps up and hustles to his laboratory.
“I’ve got my Peanut Butter Bubble Gum right here and all ready to go,” says Watson. “Want another piece?”
“Maybe later. I’m still trying to unstick my right molars,” says Grampa Al. “But hey, on second thought, it might be just what I need.” He pulls his bongo drum out from under the table and smooths a piece of Watson’s Universal-Strength Gum into a crack in the wood. Grampa Al plays a quick couple of beats and gives Watson a thumbs-up for his invention.
Frank flings open the door to the lab. “Time to fly!” He pulls the blue tarp off the Antimatter Motor Fly Bike.
“OK, Klink and Klank, we are antimatter-flying out of here. We’ll be back in a couple hours . . . with the Midville Science Prize trophy and the cash.”
Frank waits for a second to hear a sarcastic crack from Klink and a bad joke from Klank.
But there is nothing.
“Klink? Klank?” Frank looks around the lab. It suddenly seems very empty.
Frank leans the Antimatter Motor Fly Bike against the wall and looks out into the yard and junk pile.
“Klink! Klank!”
Nothing.
No one.
No robots.
Frank instantly knows that something is seriously wrong. Klink and Klank did not just step out for what Grampa Al would call a “constitutional.”
Frank hurries back inside and examines the whole lab for a clue.
Nothing.
No, wait. There on the paper plans. Small black specks. Dirt? Pepper? Frank wets a finger, picks a piece up, and looks more closely. “It’s some kind of insect leg.”
Who would leave an insect leg behind? And why?
Frank crushes the disembodied leg between his fingers and smells it. A sharp, acid, chemical scent, like really intense Magic Marker, fills his nose.
“Frank! Come on, let’s go!” Watson calls from the kitchen door.
Frank drops the insect leg. He carries his Antimatter Motor Fly Bike into the kitchen and gives Grampa Al and Watson the bad news.
“Klink and Klank have been robot-napped!”
THE FIX IT! TRUCK SPEEDS THROUGH THE SLOW-MORNING-TRAFFIC streets of Midville, taking corners tight, drifting wide on the turns, and roaring full-throttle down straightaways.
Watson wraps his arms around his Universal-Strength Peanut Butter Bubble Gum boxes. He wonders out loud, “Should that light on the dashboard be blinking red?”
Grampa Al gives his gauges a quick glance as he leans into the next turn. “Oh yeah,” he says. “This engine likes to run hot. It’s a regulation NASCAR 850 horsepower V-8. We are talking—”
Squeeeeeeeeaaallll! whine the truck tires on the turn.
“—around two thousand degrees Fahrenheit. Just like I used to run in my stock-car-raci
ng days.”
“You never told me you used to race stock cars,” says Frank, surprised once again by something he doesn’t know about his Grampa Al.
Grampa Al smiles. “You never asked.” He passes two cars on the Oak Street straightaway, downshifts into an S-turn, and passes two more cars coming out high. “But hey, are you sure you don’t want to look for Klink and Klank now? You don’t have to do this Science Prize for me.”
“I’m sure,” says Frank, grabbing the door handle as Grampa Al brakes hard and fishtails ninety degrees right on Main Street. “I am going to win this prize. Then we can look for Klink and Klank. If you can get us there on time.”
Grampa Al checks his navy dive watch and gives Frank a nod. “Roger that. And while you guys are in there kicking butt, I will get started looking for Klink and Klank.”
Grampa Al floors it past the Midville Cemetery, blows by the courthouse plaza, and weaves around a gold minivan, a blue station wagon, and a poky red pickup truck. Still going full speed, he yanks up the emergency brake and pulls the steering wheel hard left. The truck locks all four wheels and skids sideways to a full stop, perfectly curbside, right in front of City Hall. Tires smoking just a little bit.
“Hit the beach, guys!”
Frank and Watson pile out of the truck. Watson lugs his boxes of gum and poster-board display. Frank grabs his ultralight Antimatter Motor Fly Bike. Together they race up the wide stadium steps of the white-marbled and many-columned City Hall building into a swarm of kids carrying working-eye models, prime-number charts, fruitfly genetics displays, blown-up earthworm dissections, a poster of photon and positron emissions from a black hole, solar panels, optical illusions, and, yes, baking-soda volcanoes.
The herd of one hundred kid scientists pours into the high-ceilinged cavern of the main hall under the enormous banner of the sponsor, GrabCo. Each scientist checks in with GrabCo officials, receives a GRABCO SCIENCE PRIZE CONTESTANT badge, and is directed to a numbered spot in the maze of tables filling the patterned marble floor.
The packed main hall hums like some kind of gargantuan beehive filled with a swarm of kid-size buzzing bees setting up, comparing projects, talking science.
In spot 338B, Watson arranges the finishing touch, the final piece of his Universal-Strength Peanut Butter Bubble Gum, on a very attractive pyramid display.
In spot 403A, Frank Einstein adjusts his Antimatter Motor Fly Bike diagram.
And that’s when the lights suddenly go out.
A surprised hush quiets the roaring buzz.
A squeal of feedback echoes around the hall.
A single spotlight pops on a raised stage, illuminating two men in bow-tied tuxedoes.
A voice booms, “LADY AND GENTLEMAN SCIENTISTS. WELCOME TO THE FIFTIETH ANNUAL GRABCO SCIENCE PRIZE. I AM ADAMS JOHNSON, PRESIDENT OF GRABCO, AND WE HAVE A SURPRISE ANNOUNCEMENT. PROBABLY THE BIGGEST SURPRISE WE HAVE EVER HAD IN OUR FIFTY YEARS OF AWARDING THE GRABCO SCIENCE PRIZE. MR. MAYOR?”
The one tuxedoed man gives the microphone to the other.
“AHHHEM!” The mayor coughs nervously into the mic. “WE, UH . . . WELL, AH . . . HAVE THIS ANNOUNCEMENT . . .” Someone says something to the mayor. “OH, YES. I AM MR. MAYOR. ALSO THE MAYOR OF MIDVILLE. SO YOU CAN CALL ME MAYOR MAYOR. HA-HA.”
No one, except GrabCo president Adams Johnson, laughs. Everyone has heard this from Mayor Mayor before. And it is never funny.
“WELL, OK, THEN . . . THIS MORNING WE GOT TO SEE AN INVENTION SO AMAZING . . . WE ARE SO SURE IT IS GOING TO CHANGE THE WORLD . . . THAT WE, UH . . . JUST HAD TO, AH . . . AWARD THE SCIENCE PRIZE THIS YEAR, WITHOUT EVEN SEEING ANY OF THE OTHER ENTRIES, TO THIS YOUNG MAN . . . T. EDISON!”
The assembled crowd gasps in surprise.
A kid in an old-fashioned coat and tie steps into the spotlight and grabs the microphone. He speaks quickly to drown out the rising protests and boos.
“THANK YOU SO MUCH, MAYOR MAYOR AND GRABCO PRESIDENT MR. JOHNSON. I WANT TO CONGRATULATE ALL YOU BUDDING SCIENTISTS FOR BEING HERE. BUT I REALLY HAVE CREATED THE BEST INVENTION EVER—”
“That stinks!” someone yells.
Edison speeds quickly to his point.
“A MOTOR THAT COMBINES MATTER AND ANTIMATTER AND PRODUCES ALMOST UNLIMITED ENERGY FROM A SINGLE DROP OF WATER!”
Across the rows of science projects, Frank Einstein and Watson lock eyes.
“No,” says Frank to no one in particular, but to the whole world at large.
“Boooo!” yells a voice in the crowd.
“That’s not fair!” yells another voice.
“Prove it!” yells another.
A small, powerful, hairy figure in pin-striped pants and bare feet walks to the edge of the stage, stares out into the crowd, and appears to smile. It is Mr. Chimp. Mr. Chimp walks to one side of the stage and pulls on a gold tasseled rope. The red curtains behind him swoosh open and display a small, brightly lit silver motor on a pedestal. Next to it lies what looks like the prong end of the biggest extension cord in the world.
“WITH THIS ONE DROP OF WATER,” Edison booms over the noise of the restless crowd, “I WILL SUPPLY POWER TO ALL OF MIDVILLE FOR THE ENTIRE YEAR. FOR FREE!”
The murmurings of the crowd turn a bit brighter.
“AND . . . AND . . . SINCE I AM SUCH A NICE GUY, I WILL SHARE MY ONE-HUNDRED-THOUSAND-DOLLAR GRABCO SCIENCE PRIZE . . . WITH EVERYONE HERE. GIVING EVERY ONE OF YOU—MY FELLOW SCIENTISTS—ONE THOUSAND DOLLARS EACH!”
Now the crowd outright cheers.
“No, no, no,” says Frank Einstein.
Edison makes a big show of walking over to the silver machine and placing a single drop of water into its fuel tank.
“MR. CHIMP, PLUG IN ALL OF MIDVILLE POWER AND LIGHT. LET THE FREE ENERGY FLOW. AND, FELLOW SCIENTISTS, TELL EVERYONE YOU KNOW THAT YOU HAVE SEEN THE WONDER OF . . . THE EDISON ANTIMATTER MOTOR!”
Mr. Chimp inserts the massive plug into the socket connected to the Edison Antimatter Motor. The lights in the great hall blaze back on.
The national anthem blares from every speaker.
Parachute-size red, white, and blue banners unfurl from the ceiling.
A forty-foot bank of LED lights covering one wall blinks alternately:
Now the crowd (all but two) goes completely crazy. Someone on stage, actually Edison himself, starts a chant in a poorly disguised voice. “Ed-i-son, Ed-i–son, Ed-i-son.
“ONE THOUSAND DOLLARS FOR EVERY KID HERE,” Edison reminds the crowd. “AND DON’T FORGET TO PICK UP YOUR GRABCO SCIENCE PRIZE CERTIFICATE OF PARTICIPATION. Ed-i-son, Ed-i-son, Ed-i-son . . .”
The Midville Science Prize contestants surge happily toward the stage to get their payoff, and join the chant. “Ed-i-son, Ed-i-son, Ed-i-son . . .”
They are curling back their lips and showing a lot of teeth.
This worries Mr. Chimp.
Frank lifts his Antimatter Motor Fly Bike onto his display table to avoid getting swept forward by the waves of kids flooding toward the stage. He looks for Watson. But even Watson is gone. Heading for the stage? And his thousand dollars?
Frank Einstein straddles his bike and fires up its Anti-Matter Motor with the touch of a single button. He looks over his shoulder in disgust at the cheering crowd still chanting Edison’s name. He leans forward and zooms off above the tables, over the risers, and right through the MIDVILLE, A LOVELY PLACE stained-glass window with a sharp crash and a shattering of glass that almost no one even hears or sees.
ON THE SANDY GROUND AT THE TOP OF THE HIGHEST HILL UNDER the oldest oak tree in the Midville Forest Preserve, the last wave of the red-ant army attacks the entrance to the black ants’ hill. A line of giantheaded black soldier ants meet and mow down the charge, easily chopping the red ants to pieces with their jagged, oversized mandibles.
The invading red-ant army is reduced to a scattering of heads, abdomens, and thorax parts, bent feelers, and ripped-off legs.
The black-ant army is victorious.
A speck appears in the blue sky n
ear the horizon.
The speck grows larger. The speck takes the shape of a bike flying above the ground, carrying a hunched-over figure. The flying bike zooms into full-size close-up, banks around the oak tree, and drops suddenly and quickly to the ground right next to the black ants’ hill.
One large sneaker-covered foot swings over the bike and down, right on top of the band of black soldier ants, smashing two flat and scattering the rest.
The kid wearing the sneaker sits down on the slate rock under the oak tree, folds his arms across his chest, and stares out over the whole town of Midville spread below, thinking a thousand thoughts, electrical impulses in his brain jumping from neuron to neuron, oblivious to the ant chaos he has just caused under his rubber-tipped toe.
Frank Einstein—because, really, who else drives a flying bike?—thinks.
The Earth revolves. Time passes. Frank feels flattened. Like he has been stomped by a giant shoe. The ants next to Frank’s sneaker begin digging a new tunnel, begin mounding a new anthill.
Frank mutters darkly to himself, “‘Best invention ever . . . Single drop of water . . . The Edison Antimatter Motor . . .’”
Frank forms thoughts of smashing, breaking, throwing everything away.
The Earth revolves.
Frank mutters more. “Even Watson . . . Robots lost . . . Oh no, Grampa Al—”
“At your service.”
Frank looks up to see Grampa Al, who has just stepped out from around the oak.
“Huh? How . . .? What are you doing here?”
Grampa Al slings off a small rucksack and sits down on the rock next to Frank.
“I heard about the Science Prize. And I didn’t have any luck tracking down Klink and Klank. So I thought I might just hike up here and take in this great view.”