Science Fair (22 page)

Accompanied by their large escorts, the four cel mates trooped down the corridor. They stopped at another cel . The door opened and Tamara came out, accompanied by an agent whose ID badge said IMMIGRATION AND NATURALIZATION, and under that, LEFKON. Tamara looked exhausted, and her eyes were red from crying, but she managed a wan smile when she saw Toby and Micah.

“You know,” she said, “I used to think the worst thing that could happen would be if I got detention.” Toby managed to smile back and was about to say something when Turow nudged him forward. The group continued down the corridor into a large room, which Toby realized was the reception area. As they passed the counter, Toby noticed that there was a smal room behind the receptionist. On the door, which stood ajar, there was a red cross; apparently it was a first-aid station. Inside the room, Toby could see a supply cabinet, a sink, a cot, a chair, and a smal desk. On the desk was a plastic box containing a stack of manila envelopes.

Toby’s heart leaped; they looked like the envelopes the feds had used to hold the prisoners’ possessions.

They were past the reception desk now, but Toby’s thoughts were stil focused on the first-aid room. If he could get in there, get his hat and phone…

“In here,” said Turow, opening a door. The five prisoners trooped into what looked like a conference room. In the center was a long table surrounded by eight chairs. On a sideboard was a pitcher of orange juice, some plastic cups, and a plate of muffins.

“You’l wait here,” said Turow. “We’l be back for you in a bit.” He closed the door, and the room echoed with the click of a dead bolt sliding home.

Drmtsi and Vrsk headed straight for the food. Each man took a muffin and, while chewing it, stuffed several more into his pockets. Tamara, Micah, and Toby stood looking at each other.

“We gotta get out of here,” said Micah.

Toby shook his head and pointed at the ceiling. Micah looked up.

“What?” he said.

Toby pantomimed a video camera.

“What are you doing?” said Micah.

Toby sighed.

“He’s pantomiming a video camera,” said Tamara.

“Why would he do that?” said Micah.

“Because they’re
watching
us, you moron,” said Tamara.

“Ah,” said Micah. He winked at Tamara and Toby, then, aiming his voice at the ceiling, said, too loudly, “Wel , we certainly aren’t planning to get out of here!” Toby and Tamara rol ed their eyes.

“What?” said Micah. “I don’t real y
mean
it. I’m just saying it for the…”

“Just shut up, okay?” said Toby.

“Okay,” said Micah, looking hurt.

Toby sat down and drummed his fingers on the table, trying to force his tired brain to think. If he could get to the first-aid station behind the reception desk…

Toby sat up straight.

The first-aid station.

He looked toward Tamara and Micah, who had gone over to the side table with Vrsk and Drmtsi and were helping themselves to juice and muffins. Trying to keep his voice calm, Toby said, “Hey, Micah, Tamara—either of you guys have any gum?”

“Nope,” said Micah.

“I don’t chew gum,” said Tamara.

Toby slumped in his chair. So much for his bril iant plan.

“Excuse me?”

Toby looked up: Vrsk was speaking to him.

“Did you say gom?” said Vrsk, through a mouthful of muffin.

“Gum, yes,” said Toby.

“I have gom,” said Vrsk.

Vrsk reached into his pocket and pul ed out a smal package. On it, in several languages, were the words “Air Zerkistan.”

T
HE GYMNASIUM OF HUBBLE MIDDLE SCHOOL
was humming. Literaly. Motors were whirring, keyboards were clicking, lights were flickering, and the air itself seemed to buzz with tension as students worked frantical y to get their science-fair projects ready before the deadline.

At four p.m. sharp, Mr. P would blow a whistle, then throw the master switch that cut off the power to the outlets. The gym would be cleared, closed, and locked. At six p.m., the students, along with parents, teachers, and school administrators, would gather outside on the bal field for what had become a major Hubble tradition and the much-anticipated highlight of the school year.

Al eyes and ears would turn skyward, awaiting the dramatic arrival of the TranScent Corp. helicopter, which would land near second base. Bil ionaire scientist/businessman/celebrity Lance Swingle would emerge from the chopper, waving to acknowledge the cheers of the crowd. After greeting the dignitaries, Swingle would lead the throng into the gym and take his place at the podium set up next to the master switch. There he would make what the official program described hopeful y as “brief remarks,” although they usual y lasted quite a while, as Swingle loved to tel the story of how he overcame many obstacles and was able to succeed because of hard work and because of being, with al due modesty, a genius.

When Swingle was final y done, he would turn to the master switch, and, with a dramatic flourish, flip it up to the “on” position. Instantly, the science fair would come spectacularly to life. Then Swingle, accompanied by a clot of science teachers, would personal y inspect the projects. With the inspection completed, they would confer, although this was real y for show, as only one opinion counted. And then Swingle would, with great drama—he loved drama—announce the winner. The lucky student would come forward and, as cameras flashed, receive a check from Swingle.

This year the check would be worth $5,000, a fact that was on the mind of every student in the gym. Many of them were stil fiddling with their projects when the big clock on the wal clicked off the last minute to four. A shril blast echoed through the gym as Mr. P blew his whistle. A second later, he grabbed the master switch on the wal and flipped it down. The project lights went off; the motors stopped whirring. Within ten minutes, al the students and teachers were gone. The doors were locked. The gym was empty.

Except for Prmkt.

Using his key, he entered through the side door of the gym. He carried a cheap vinyl athletic bag. It contained a coil of thick black cable, a flashlight, tape, rubber gloves, and tools.

He walked down a long row of exhibit tables passing a variety of projects, including three, which were standing side-by-side, titled: DEATH BY PACKAGING, THE FLOATING FROG, and NUCLEAR MENTOS.

Prmkt paid no attention to these. His objective was a group of four projects, al submitted by idiotic, spoiled ME students who had no idea what the projects real y were. These projects real y looked as though they’d been made by middle-schoolers—they had loose wires, paint smears, scratches, excess glue blobs, and misspel ed words in the explanations.

But this was camouflage to fool the judges, part of the service provided by the Science Nook.

In the quiet of the gym, Prmkt quickly examined the four projects. When he was done, he al owed himself a smal smile. The Science Nook, as in previous years, had fol owed his plans exactly. Of course, in previous years, the projects were harmless. They were clever and technical y sophisticated; that’s why they won awards. But they posed no threat to anyone.

These four projects were different. These were the result of years of patient research and careful planning by Prmkt. He had designed the projects on two levels. On the surface, they were scientific demonstrations that were educational, if a bit sil y. But each project had far greater hidden capabilities, made possible by the technology supplied by the foolish ME

parents, thinking they were helping their idiotic, spoiled children.

When the projects were linked together, as they would be shortly, their hidden capabilities would be networked and amplified, and they would become something altogether different: a hugely powerful, highly sophisticated weapon. It would be a weapon unlike any ever built—a weapon against which there was no defense; a weapon that would bring the mighty United States to its knees, groveling for mercy before Krpshtskan.

Prmkt smiled again, thinking about it, savoring the cleverness of his plan. He was confident now that it would work. He had been concerned when the student Toby Harbinger and his two friends had somehow become suspicious and tried to warn Principal Plotz-Gornett. He had been even more concerned when Grdankl the Strong had sent his idiot brother Drmtsi and Vrsk to the United States to “help.”

But Prmkt had dealt with both of these threats, decisively and cleverly. He had, by planting the plasma in the boy’s locker, managed to make the boy himself the object of the investigation, at the same time taking advantage of the fire-dril distraction to retrieve the project list from the principal’s office and return it to the Science Nook. He had, even more cleverly, managed to send both the boy and his countrymen to Jungle Norman’s, where they were caught with the classified chip that had been planted by Prmkt, who had also cal ed the FBI.

He had overcome al the obstacles. Nobody would stop him now; nobody was intel igent enough to even suspect what he was up to. He was sure that the Science Nook proprietor, Sternabite—clever as he was—had no concept of the true capabilities of the devices he had built. Al Sternabite cared about was getting his money. As for the foolish ME parents and their idiotic, spoiled children, al that mattered for them was winning the stupid science fair and getting a check they didn’t need.

But there would be no winner this year and no check. When the blowhard bil ionaire Lance Swingle threw the master switch to start the science fair, he would instead be starting Prmkt’s machine. After that would come chaos.

Prmkt opened the athletic bag and began removing the tools and the rol of cable. He knew exactly what he needed to do; he had rehearsed this a thousand times in his mind. He uncoiled the cable, went to the four projects one by one, and careful y connected them together.

He began with the project submitted by Jason Niles. It was titled TERMITE FLATULENCE: POWER SOURCE OF TOMORROW. It looked a like a high-tech ant farm: a large metal box fil ed with dirt and rotting lumber, the front side of which was made of glass to show the termites inside busily eating tunnels through the wood. Atop the farm was a smal , clear-plastic box containing a series of tubes and some crude-looking wiring—al egedly soldered by Jason—that connected various basic electrical components. Sitting atop this was a single glowing five-watt lightbulb. According to the project explanation, the termites, as they digested the wood, produced methane gas, which was col ected by the apparatus on top and converted, by a process cal ed “oxidative coupling,” into electricity, which powered the bulb.

This explanation was a lie. In fact, hidden behind the wood and dirt was the world’s smal est neutron generator, a top-secret experimental prototype being developed by the military for use by troops in remote areas that lacked electricity. This generator was powering the lightbulb. But it could produce a
lot
more than five watts; it could power a smal city.

Prmkt careful y connected the cable to Jason’s project, then, routing it under the table, moved to the project submitted by Farrel “The Ferret” Plinkett, titled A PRACTICAL

SOLUTION TO CELL-PHONE NOISE POLLUTION. It consisted of a lifelike female department-store dummy inside a crude box made of Plexiglas. The dummy’s mouth had been replaced by a smal speaker; wires ran from this speaker to a volume knob on the outside of the box. Next to the speaker was a decibel meter, and next to that was an older model cel phone, with some extra batteries taped to the back.

When the project was turned on, the speaker played a recording of a woman talking, with the volume control ed by the knob. If the volume was turned up past fifty decibels, the cel phone emitted a loud crack and a shower of sparks, charring the dummy’s right ear, as a reminder that the dummy should keep its voice down.

The project explanation said that Farrel had built this “noise-suppression technology” using inexpensive capacitors that could easily be incorporated into new cel phones. But what was actual y inside the cel phone in The Ferret’s project was no ordinary capacitor. It was a bank of state-of-the-art supercapacitors made from an experimental process that used barium titanate nanoparticles in a polymer matrix. Each supercapacitor could hold extremely high voltage levels and discharge this energy extremely fast. Right now, the bank was getting its energy from the weak batteries strapped to the phone. Prmkt was connecting it to a far more powerful source.

He moved next to Harmonee Prescott’s project, which was cal ed THE HOTNESS BOX. It consisted of a black box with a dial labeled HOTNESS. The input to the black box was a video camera; the output was a computer screen. According to the project explanation, the box contained a programmable chip running a program written by Harmonee, which she had adapted from a program used to enhance digital photographs. Except that instead of just fixing the contrast and removing red-eye, Harmonee’s program, according to the explanation, could make pictures of people’s faces more attractive.

To demonstrate how it worked, the video camera was aimed at a picture of Ursula, the sea witch from
The Little Mermaid
.