by Mark Young
“To be more accurate, you’ll know it as the Ultimate, Inescapable Obstacle Course of Death, Doom, and Destruction, and it’s a beauty,” Professor Juvinall said. “Designed to test your mental as well as your physical strength. Let me give you all a quick tour.”
She pointed to a wall built with various contours. “First, you scale the Geometric Shapes Wall—where the triangles, squares, pentagons, and polygons will continuously change shape as you climb. Second, you grab any of those hanging tentacles and swing over the Electric Leech Lagoon.” She paused and smiled. “They haven’t eaten anything today.”
Whimpers and gasps rose up from the students.
“Next, you run across the Sodium Bromide Bridge before it dissolves, jumping between the Matrix of Death Laser Beams as you go,” Juvinall continued.
“Death lasers?” Newton whispered.
“Then you crawl your way through the Giant Web of Sticky Spider Silk.” she said. “And if you don’t get stuck, you’ll come out on top of the Vortex Tank where there is an escape hatch with a panel of buttons. To open the hatch, you’ll see a sequence of flashing colored lights on the panel. You’ll have twelve seconds to punch in the correct sequence. If you run out of time, a trapdoor will open and you’ll drop into the center of the vortex, which will send you who-knows-where?”
The gasps got louder.
“If you successfully cross the tank, your last challenge will be to jump down and hop through a line of inflatable pool toys,” she said, pointing to lines of plastic pool toys of ducks, swans, unicorns, and dolphins at the end of the course.
“That last one seems kind of easy, doesn’t it?” Theremin whispered.
“Shhh! Don’t let her hear you,” Shelly warned. “We don’t need her to make this any harder!”
“So, is everyone ready to tackle the Ultimate, Inescapable Obstacle Course of Death, Doom, and Destruction?” Juvinall asked.
“Um . . . ready,” the students mumbled cautiously, barely audible.
“Well, ready or not, we’re starting!” she said. “The course can handle three victims—I mean, participants—at a time.”
She looked down at her clipboard. “Up first: Rotwang on behalf of Odifin Pinkwad, Mimi Crowninshield, and Newton Warp!”
Newton looked at Shelly and Theremin, worried.
“You’ll do great, Newton,” Shelly said, but she sounded worried too. “I’m sure Professor Juvinall wouldn’t let anything bad happen to any of us.”
“I hope not,” Newton muttered.
“Warp! Get over here!” the teacher barked.
Newton jogged over to the start of the course and stood between Mimi and Rotwang. Mimi cracked her knuckles and stared up at the imposing wall with a fierce look of determination in her blue eyes.
“Let’s do this,” she said.
“On my whistle,” Juvinall said. “On your marks, get set . . .” Tweet!
Newton took off running and started to scramble up the Geometric Shapes Wall. From the corner of his eye he could see Mimi quickly moving up next to him. Rotwang was so tall that he easily scrambled to the top of the wall and pulled himself up.
By the time Newton reached the top of the wall, Rotwang was already holding on to a tentacle and swinging across the water tank. His long legs splashed against the water, and the electric leeches snapped at his ankles with their tiny toothy mouths.
Good thing I’ve got extra-grippy fingers! Newton thought. He took a deep breath, grabbed on to a tentacle, and swung himself across the pool. He could hear cheering in the background. “Go, Newton! You can do it!”
He landed on the other side of the tank with a thud. In front of him, Rotwang had already begun to race across the Sodium Bromide Bridge, which was starting to bubble and dissolve. His feet were so big that he kept hitting the Death Laser Beams.
“Ow! Ow! Ow!” Rotwang yelped, and slowly made his way across.
Danger! Danger! Danger! Newton’s brain screamed at him, and he couldn’t move. Luckily, his camouflage instinct didn’t kick in, either, which would have meant everyone in class would know his special skill.
That’s when Mimi caught up to him. “What are you just standing there for, Newton? Scared?”
Newton blinked. He hadn’t realized he was frozen in place until he heard Mimi’s voice. The very thought of Death Laser Beams had paralyzed him with fear.
“No, I’m not scared!” he said, trying to sound convincing. Mimi just laughed and began to hop and skip across the bridge, expertly avoiding the Death Lasers Beams. When she was in the middle, she looked back at Newton triumphantly.
“I was elementary school hopscotch champion for three years in a row!” she said. Then she turned and kept hopping across, getting closer to Rotwang and the tangled Giant Web of Sticky Spider Silk.
Newton snapped out of his stupor when he heard Theremin cheering from the gym floor below.
“Stronger than steel, brighter than the sun,
Newton won’t stop, ’cause he’s number one!
GOOOOOOOO, NEWTON!”
Newton smiled and stepped onto the bridge. He scanned the pattern of lasers and cautiously took his first hop.
He expected to feel the pain of a laser, but instead his foot landed safely. More confident now, he quickly hopped across the bridge and then jumped onto the Giant Web of Sticky Spider Silk, relieved to have made it across.
Newton had expected Mimi and Rotwang to be far ahead of him but was surprised to see Rotwang’s gangly legs and arms completely tangled up in the sticky mesh. And Mimi was climbing hand-over-hand along the bottom of the web, in a shouting match with Odifin.
“Just give up now, Mimi!” Odifin taunted her through the speaker on his jar. “You’ll never make it all the way across!”
Mimi held on to the sticky webbing with one hand as she looked down and shook her fist at Odifin.
“Stuff it, pickled brain!” Mimi yelled. “At least I’m not tangled up like your dopey assistant!”
Newton knew Odifin was just trying to shake Mimi’s confidence. He tried to ignore them and began to crawl through the web. The spider silk swayed as he grabbed each strand, but once again his grippy hands kept him steady. Mimi didn’t even notice as Newton easily made his way past her.
“Rotwang might be dopey, but at least he’s not some silly girl!” Odifin yelled at Mimi.
Mimi’s eyes flashed with anger. “What did you say?”
“I said there’s no way a girl is going to beat me, I mean, Rotwang!” Odifin shot back.
Mimi let go of the web and dropped to the floor. She charged toward Odifin, fuming.
“How dare you!” she yelled. “Girls can do anything boys can do!”
Professor Juvinall blew her whistle. “On the bench, Mimi! You’re disqualified!”
“You can’t do that!” Mimi protested. “I’ll tell my parents!”
Newton tried to ignore the drama going on below him and finish the course. By now Rotwang had miraculously untangled himself and was standing on top of the Vortex Tank. As Newton climbed closer to the tank, he focused on keeping his balance while keeping an eye on Rotwang.
A control panel in front of Rotwang had rows of buttons that lit up in six different colors: red, blue, yellow, green, orange, and purple. The lights blinked quickly in a random sequence.
Red, red, blue, purple, orange, green, red, green, yellow, blue.
“It’s easy, Rotwang, repeat the sequence!” Odifin called up to him.
“Twelve seconds!” Professor Juvinall yelled.
The control panel began to beep out the seconds.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
Rotwang stared at the buttons, scratching his head.
“Rotwang, you oaf!” Odifin yelled.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
Rotwang began randomly pressing buttons.
Blue, purple, orange, orange, yellow, red, red, green.
“No, no, you brainless flatworm!” Odifin yelled.
Frustrated, Rotwang started pounding the bu
ttons with his fist.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
“It’s as simple as quantum addition!” Odifin screamed. “Red, red, blue, purple, orange, green, red, green, yellow, blue!”
Beep!
Rotwang smiled, wiggled his index finger, and slowly lowered it to the panel.
Beep!
BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!
At the sound of the last beep, a trapdoor opened beneath Rotwang and he fell into the swirling vortex. “Master!” he yelled.
“Rotwang!” Odifin cried as his dutiful assistant disappeared.
The trapdoor slammed closed and Newton stepped up to the flashing light display.
“Concentrate, Newton!” Shelly yelled up at him.
He took a deep breath and watched carefully as the lights flashed.
Green, yellow, yellow, blue, purple, orange, red, yellow, green, orange.
The timer began its countdown.
Beep! Beep!
Newton started pressing buttons. Somehow, he remembered the sequence. He didn’t know how he was doing it, but he didn’t have time to think about it.
Green. Yellow. Yellow. Blue. Purple. Orange. Red.
Then he stopped and stared. What had come after the red? Was it yellow, green, orange? Or green, yellow, orange?
Beep! Beep! Beep!
Newton started to sweat. His mind was suddenly blank. Panic was setting in but he had to try. He pressed three more buttons.
Green. Yellow. Orange.
Nothing happened. He must have gotten something wrong. At least he had time to start over.
Beep! Beep! Beep!
He quickly started pressing again. Green. Yellow. Yellow. Blue. Purple. Orange.
Newton hesitated. What came next?
That’s when he heard it—a strange voice calling up from below. “Newton Warp! Use your noodle noggin!” Newton didn’t recognize the voice, but when he heard those words, something clicked in his brain.
Beep! Beep!
He remembered. It was so simple! Red. Yellow. Green. Orange.
Beep!
The panel of buttons flipped open to reveal the escape hatch.
BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!
Newton jumped into the escape hatch and slid to safety just as the trapdoor dropped open. He could hear cheers from the students below.
He jumped to the floor and began to hop through the line of inflatable pool toys. He hopped faster as he reached the swan toys and then the unicorns. He was steps away from the dolphin toys when he heard the cheering grow louder and louder. Newton turned to look at the crowd, not because of the cheering but because of that familiar tingling on his neck. That’s when he saw it. A head of green hair! Startled, Newton tripped over the horn of a unicorn pool toy and fell flat on his face.
The crowd gasped.
“On your feet, Warp!” Professor Juvinall growled. “Move it, MOVE IT!”
Newton jumped up and looked behind him. There was no sign of the green-haired man anywhere. Newton finished hopping through the dolphin toys and was heading for the finish line when a deafening sound roared into the gym.
Newton—and everyone else—looked up. A second whirling vortex opened up in the gym ceiling and Rotwang came tumbling out, his lanky limbs flailing, and landed on the gym floor next to Odifin with a thud.
“Rotwang,” Odifin shouted. “You came back!”
Rotwang didn’t have time to answer, because the roaring vortex began to suck up the obstacle course. Strands of the web streamed up through the air, wriggling like snakes. Students began to scream and run.
“Class dismissed!” Juvinall yelled as the vortex pulled her whistle off her neck.
Newton ran to the nearest exit and slammed the door behind him, puffing and panting. Shelly and Theremin pushed their way through the crowd in the hallway and found him.
“You did great back there!” Theremin yelled over the noise.
“Thanks!” Newton replied. “But I didn’t get to finish.”
“Well, I’m glad I never had to start!” Shelly said. “That vortex was no joke.”
Newton nodded. The three friends ran down a staircase and stopped at the bottom to catch their breath. Newton nervously looked from side to side.
“Do you think you’re being followed again?” Shelly asked.
“Yes,” Newton replied. “I saw the man with the green hair in the gym!”
CHAPTER 6
WHO IS DR. FLUBITUS?
“Why are we going to Yuptuka’s class?” Theremin asked, as he, Newton, and Shelly made their way there. “I thought she was still stuck on the moon.”
“They got a substitute teacher,” Shelly replied.
“Well, whoever it is, I hope they’re not as spacey as Yuptuka,” Theremin said.
When they entered the classroom and sat down, Newton’s seat was behind Mimi. She turned around to talk to him.
“Nice work on the obstacle course back there, Newton,” Mimi said. “Of course, I would have beaten you if Odifin hadn’t opened his big mouth.”
“Well, technically, he doesn’t have a mouth,” Newton pointed out. “He’s a brain in a jar.”
Mimi frowned. “You know what I mean!” she snapped. Then she turned around.
The bell rang to announce the start of class, but there was no teacher in sight. The kids stayed quiet for a minute. Then everybody started talking.
“This is ridiculous!” Mimi said. “There’s no substitute. We should just get up and leave.”
A murmur of agreement rose up from the students. Newton looked to Shelly and Theremin and made a “what now?” gesture. Then a voice made him turn around.
“Salutations, students!”
A tall man confidentially strode into the room—and promptly tripped and fell! He wasn’t hurt, but he had dropped the load of folders he was carrying, spilling papers all over the floor.
Some of the kids giggled at the man’s clothes as he got to his feet. He wore shiny black pants, yellow rubber boots, a yellow shirt with barely visible purple polka dots, a black vest striped with LED lights, and a red bowtie. A tight-fitting bowler hat was pulled down to the top of his ears.
The strange man took a few steps and walked straight into his desk. Then he turned, faced the wall-size digital screen, and cleared his throat.
“As I was saying . . . salutations, class!” he bowed to the screen.
Laughter rose up from the students.
“Um, sir, we’re behind you,” Shelly said helpfully.
The man spun on his heels. “Of course you are!” he announced. He put his index fingers to his eyes. “I’ve got my night-vision contacts in, but as you probably know, it’s daytime, so I can’t see very well at all. Goodness, I swore last time would be the, well, last time.”
He took out the contact lenses, pulled a case from of his vest pocket, and popped them inside. Then he turned the case over, opened it, and popped two new lenses into his eyes.
“Ah yes, I lost my regular contacts, so these wavelength visualizers will have to do,” he mumbled, apparently to himself. “Not ideal for a classroom situation, but I mustn’t hold up your education!”
He cleared his throat again. “Young seekers of knowledge and know-how, it is I, Dr. Hercule Flubitus, here to instruct you in Dimensional and Interdimensional Teleportation from now on, hopefully, if all goes well.”
The strange man then dramatically whipped off his hat—revealing a head of wild, bright green hair!
Newton gasped loudly. He whipped his head around to look at Shelly and Theremin. Both were wide-eyed.
The professor was the man in Theremin’s footage! The man who had been following Newton around campus! But why would a new professor be following me around? Newton wondered.
“Now, I’ve got an exciting lesson planned for you today,” Flubitus said as he held up his hand. He looked to see that the hand was empty. “Oh dear. Where did it go?”
“Do you mean those papers on the floor?” someone called out.
“Yes, yes, positiv
ely—the papers!” Flubitus said. He walked over to the fallen papers—and then slipped on them and toppled backward, his arms flailing.
Shelly jumped up to help him, and Newton followed her—partly out of curiosity, and partly because he knew Shelly was a good person and he wanted to follow her lead.
The two of them helped Dr. Flubitus to his feet. Newton searched the professor’s face for some kind of reaction to seeing him, but Dr. Flubitus acted like he didn’t know Newton at all. Then they helped pick up the papers and stuff them back into the folders. Most of the papers were covered with scribbled writing, symbols and numbers that Newton could barely decipher as being in English. And one was covered with lines of computer-generated bar codes.
“Many thanks,” Dr. Flubitus said as he took the folders from Shelly and Newton and carefully made his way to his desk—safely, this time.
“Today we’re going to discuss . . . ,” he began as he randomly pulled a page from a folder, “the physics involved with dimensional teleportation!” He squinted at the paper. “One cup of chocolate chips. One half-cup of jellybeans. Two and a half eggs. Two cups of flour.”
“Professor?” Mimi said as her hand flew into the air.
“Sorry,” Flubitus said, “have I lost you already?”
“That sounds like a cookie recipe!” Shelly answered.
Dr. Flubitus froze in place. He blinked. “Cookie?” He looked at the paper and then sniffed it. “Why yes, you’re correct. My aunt Venitis makes the best jellybean chocolate cookies.”
The professor shuffled through his papers, muttering, “Just give me a second,” then he smiled and raised an index finger, “which happens to be 1/86,400th of a mean solar day.”
The students stared at him blankly, so he returned to his search. “I’m sure I’ll find what I’m looking for. It’s a bit hard to see much with the wavelengths oscillating as they do.”
Restless, the students in the class started to whisper to one another.
“I’ve heard of this guy,” Gustav Goddard said. “He’s from a family of mutants; that’s why he has green hair.”
“You’re wrong,” said Tabitha Talos. “I heard that he is descended from a tribe of sentient broccoli warriors.”