Flip the Silver Switch

by Jackie Yeager

  “Besides,” says Jillian, “our story was pretty good.”

  “It was pretty good, actually,” says Mare. “If we picked New York, I was just going to talk about the Statue of Liberty or something.”

  “I’m so mad at him,” I say. “Why can’t he just let us compete and leave us alone? Why can’t he bug Martina’s team?”

  “Just forget about him, okay?” says Ander. “We solved it without his help anyway. Hopefully we didn’t lose too many points from when we switched our answer. Let’s go find Seraphina and Gregor and tell them how it went. They’re probably wondering what’s taking us so long.”

  FLIPPING THE SILVER SWITCH

  Seraphina and Gregor are waiting when we get to the preceptor’s lounge. About twenty other preceptors are sitting there too, waiting for their teams. Gregor notices us first. “Ah, there you are.”

  Seraphina jumps up from her chair. “How was it?”

  We pull them into a corner. “We did okay,” says Ander.

  Seraphina folds her hands. “But . . .?”

  “But we could have done a little better if we didn’t have to change our answer at the last minute.”

  “Why did you have to do that? What was your task?”

  “It had two parts,” I say. “First, we had to name a place where we’d all like to go, but we couldn’t talk, and we had to use cards, and then we had to tell a story about it.”

  “That sounds hard,” Seraphina replies.

  “It was,” says Jillian.

  “But I think we did okay,” says Jax.

  “I think we pulled it off, even if we did almost choke.”

  “What happened?”

  “Okay, so can I tell them?” asks Ander. But he doesn’t wait for us to respond. “Right before we went into the task room, we each got a watch message from Principal Bermuda.”

  Gregor shakes his head. “Him again.”

  “Yeah, he said that New York is the best team, and today we had to be sure to put it on top.”

  “That does sound like something he would say.”

  “Anyway, we thought he was wishing us luck and that’s it, but when we got the task, we all put the New York card on top, and at the last second, Kia picked Bermuda, and since we all had to agree in as little time as we could, we all picked Bermuda then too.”

  “Because I think he was trying to give us the answer ahead of time, and I didn’t want to get us disqualified if he was, so it was the only way I could think of to tell everyone else not to pick New York.”

  “I don’t know if he was trying to signal you, but if he was, you surely could have been disqualified. The Piedmont Organization does monitor those things.”

  “But our story was good,” says Jillian. “It was about Principal Bermuda.”

  We laugh. “Well, sort of!” I say.

  “That’s great because it’s one third of your score. It will be added to your Showcase Festival score and then that will be added to the last task score,” says Gregor.

  “Yes, the Global Task—and it’s just a little while away,” says Seraphina. “We better head over to the Imagination Centre so you can get ready.”

  And just like that, we forget about Swirl and Spark Recall and shift our focus to our skit and the Satellite Specs. We step outside into the warm breeze together and make our way through the campus. Ander and I walk side by side. He’s practically bouncing on his toes. “So, KK, one more task to go. One more task to present to the judges—ever.”

  My stomach butterflies wake up. “I didn’t think about it like that.”

  “It kind of stinks. I like being Freddie Dinkleweed.”

  “I like being Little Girl too.”

  “You know . . . if we place in the top three, we get to keep performing our play. Crimson Catropolis will live on and on.”

  “I know.”

  “Wouldn’t that be awesome?”

  “Yeah, it would.”

  “Even better than being at PIPS.”

  “I know what you’re trying to do.”

  “What am I trying to do?”

  “You want to know if I’ve changed my mind.”

  “I am good, huh?”

  I smirk at him. “Yeah, you’re the best.”

  “Well?”

  “I don’t know, Ander. I’m going to try my hardest—as hard as I possibly can—to win, really I am. Because I really might want to go on the tour. Besides, I wouldn’t even know how to mess up on purpose anyway. That would be even harder than trying my best.”

  “When are you going to decide then?”

  “Soon, I hope.”

  “I hope so too.”

  I try to put what happens after the competition out of my head, to focus on competing today, but when we walk into our final task room, I’m sure I’ll be looking for Grandma Kitty and I know she won’t be there. I just wish she could send me a sign, something that tells me I can do this without her. I mean I know I can perform just fine, but I’m not sure I can perform like I did at Camp Piedmont. Not when she’s lying in a hospital bed unable to talk to me.

  We drag our props out from a small corner of the prep room and set them up for when we compete. We have an hour until we start, enough time to practice a few more times and get changed into our costumes. I inspect the syncing box, its bright colors and shiny button. The C5 symbol is slightly off center, but I don’t think the judges will notice. I pick up the Satellite Spectacles and hope that they work when it’s show time.

  I look at the C5 button again, closer this time. I like having a symbol for us, just us. I think about what the other teams said, about none of them having a symbol, and I wonder why that is. I wish we had thought to ask more teams if they had one too. I mean, why would Andora give us one and no one else? I mean, she wouldn’t. There’s no favoritism in this camp.

  Oh my god! She wouldn’t.

  But Principal Bermuda would.

  “Guys, come here!” I yell and quickly gather everyone around me. “This is bad. This is really bad!” I feel myself freaking out. I can’t get the words out fast enough.

  “Kia, what’s wrong?” asks Seraphina.

  “The symbol, the C5 symbol! We can’t use it!”

  “Why not?” asks Mare.

  “The same reason we couldn’t use New York!”

  My teammates look at me with blank stares, but then they get it.

  Mare puts her hands over her face. “You think Principal Bermuda sent us the symbol, don’t you?”

  Jax shakes his head. “This is great. Just great.”

  “What are you all talking about?” asks Gregor.

  “We got these packages from Andora with invitations for the bonfire.”

  “Yes, I know.”

  “We also got that symbol. It was inside the box, with instructions to add it to our team solution somehow.”

  “We didn’t hear about any symbol,” says Gregor. “We thought it was just a nice symbol one of you had from back home.”

  “No,” I say, “and none of the other teams got symbols, and we couldn’t figure out why. But it makes sense now. Principal Bermuda has been trying to create buzz about our team, any way he can.”

  “I know he has,” says Seraphina. “He knows there will be photos taken of your inventions after the Global Championships are over. He probably wants to advertise that your team wasn’t just from the USA, not just from New York, but from Crimson Elementary.”

  “He’s such a rat!” says Mare. “I hate that guy so much!”

  “So we have to take the button off!” I say. “We can’t have any outside help with our task. He’s the one who told us to use it.”

  Mare walks around the room. “What are we going to do? We have to compete in like an hour.”

  “Less than an hour,” says Gregor.

 
“But we can’t just rip it off,” says Jax. “Our syncing box will look awful and won’t power up or activate without the metal symbol. We need it to trigger the action.”

  We pace the room. “I knew this was too good to be true. We have another really important invention to show the judges, and maybe even the whole world, and now it won’t work at all. What good is our idea if we can’t show it to the judges? This is our only chance. We have to make it work. We have to think of something.”

  Ander grabs a pen from the table and starts tapping it. “Okay, so we need to break the C5 symbol off, find another metal object, and solder it in place.”

  “That’s all?” asks Mare. “Oh good. I thought this was going to be a problem. We have no cutting tools for metal, we have no other metal object, and we have no soldering tool. Not a problem at all.”

  “We packed our craft kit, remember?” says Jillian. “It has all our extra fabric and stuff. I’m sure the tools are in there too. Maybe there’s even a small metal piece we could use.”

  “Great idea, Jillian,” says Seraphina.

  We scramble to the craft kit and rummage through the glue, duct tape, fabric, thread, and glitter. “Here’s a cutter thing!” says Jillian. We keep looking, but there’s no solder tool and no metal object.

  I bite my thumb nail. “How much time do we have?”

  “Forty-five minutes,” says Gregor.

  I think as hard as I can, but I feel myself starting to panic. There has to be something we can use. “Come on, guys, we have to think of something!”

  Seraphina frowns. “We can’t help you. I’m sorry. You’re on your own with this.”

  “It’s hopeless!” says Jillian.

  “No, it’s not,” says Seraphina. “You’re here for a reason. You’re smart and creative—the best in New York State. That means something. You can’t give up. You can do this. I know you can.”

  She’s right. We are the best in New York. The best in New York State. Ohmygodohmygodohmygod!

  “I have it!” I say. “I have something we can use!” I pull the silver switch out of my pocket.

  “What is that?” asks Ander.

  “It’s a silver switch.”

  “Where did you get that?” asks Mare.

  I look at Seraphina and smile. “A friend gave it to me.”

  Jax looks it over. “That would work if we had the solder tool.”

  “Ugh!” yells Ander. “But we don’t.”

  “We don’t need it,” says Mare. “We can use this.” She holds up a roll of red duct tape.

  “Will that work?” I ask.

  “Sure,” says Jax. We just need the wire to touch the metal. We can attach the post from the switch to the wire with the duct tape.”

  “We can slip it over the hole we made for the C5 symbol,” says Ander.

  “The switch actually flips up and down too,” I say. “So can we make it flip to activate?”

  “Let’s try,” says Jax.

  We gather close around the table, cutting the C5 symbol off the box, and then ripping duct tape and securing the silver switch in place. While we do, Gregor examines the C5 symbol. “Just as I thought,” he says.

  “What?” asks Seraphina.

  “It looks like a tracking device. He was planning on tracking these kids.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “Then he probably already has,” says Jax. “He’s probably been watching us.”

  Gregor looks closer. “On second thought, I don’t think he has. This is a very primitive picture taking device. It appears as though it has been taking pictures of your team. But in order for him to get the pictures, he needs the symbol to be in his possession so he can develop them. I’m fairly certain he was planning to use the pictures upon your return to generate even more buzz.”

  “Yeah,” says Ander. “He was probably going to sell secret pictures of the Crimson Five to whoever wanted them.”

  Mare secures the last piece of duct tape. “It should work now, just like the symbol did. But this time, we have to flip the silver switch instead of pushing the C5 button.”

  “Do we have time to try it?” asks Jillian.

  Seraphina looks at her watch. “Oh no! You need to report in ten minutes, and you’re not even in your costumes. There isn’t time to try it again.”

  Ander laughs. “We got this Seraphina. Don’t worry. We just recreated our syncing box. Heading back to Crimson Catropolis, even if we do have an untested silver switch, will be a breeze.”

  What, is he kidding?

  We grab our costume bags, race to the bathroom, and change as quickly as we can. I put my hair in pigtails and add the yellow ribbons. I look at myself in the mirror and hope that I won’t forget my lines. I hope and hope and hope that the silver switch works. But most of all, I hope Grandma Kitty is okay so I can tell her all about this when I get home. I make a silent wish that I’ll hear from her when all of this is over.

  We roll the table full of props down the hallway. My team has serious looks on their faces, and I know we need a pep talk. But my heart is thumping too fast to give one. My watch rattles. My teammates glare at me. “Sorry! I’ll turn it off.”

  I look down to see who it is, and my mom’s face is smiling back at me.

  Why is she messaging me? She should be inside the presentation room. Maybe something worse has happened to Grandma Kitty!

  Hi Baby Girl. You were probably hoping for a message from Grandma Kitty before you compete, and I’m sorry she couldn’t give you one. But I’m going to tell you what she would be telling you if she could: She’s going to be fine and if you go out in front of those judges and do what you do best, with that wonderful team of yours, you’ll win—in all the ways that count. Mark my words.

  The screen goes blank. I blink back my tears. And now I know what I have to do. I have to win for Grandma Kitty. She would want me to.

  We walk into the task room, and I see Mom, Dad, Malin, and Ryne in the row behind the judges. I smile at my mom and she smiles back. I see the judges smiling too. This is weird. They don’t look as stern as they usually do. Is this a trick? But then I realize that maybe it’s because we’ve all come this far already, and that’s a really far way to come.

  We take our places and I skip out from behind the prop table. My nerves fade away in an instant and I belt out my lines so the back of the room can hear me. I skip and I sing and I become Little Girl again, this time a little girl who is able to use her imagination and see things in the world more clearly than anyone else. A little girl who has found a way for people to see things and people they never saw before with a little help from a re-imagined invention.

  Soon, as Jax waves his cape near the table, I step toward the syncing box and flip the silver switch. The lights inside the box glow, the lights on the table glow, and the screen behind me swirls. I open the box, and there they are . . . the Satellite Specs! The audience and the judges watch and see what I see, our invention that might just change the world.

  The audience’s applause fills the room as we wrap up our finale song and stand there like statues, waiting to be judged, analyzed, and graded. I wish it didn’t matter what the judges thought. I wish this wasn’t our last Piedmont task. I wish we could do all of this for fun. I wish I could show other kids who don’t get to go to Camp Piedmont or to the Global Championships how much fun it is to make stuff . . . especially the kids who think my ideas are weird, like most of the kids at Crimson.

  THE BREAKNECK STAIRS

  Seraphina barges into our tree chamber, waking us up earlier than usual. “Come on my Crimson Girls! Wake up! We’re going on an adventure!”

  I peek out from under my blanket. “What are we doing?”

  “The Global Stars Award Ceremony isn’t until tonight. You didn’t think we were going to sleep all day waiting for the results, did you?”


  Mare groans. “I did.”

  “Drink these breakfast shakes and get dressed. Gregor and I will be waiting out front.”

  We get ready as fast as we can and pile into the aero-cart. The boys sit in the back seat, and the girls and I squish into the middle one. “Can you at least tell us where we’re going?” asks Ander.

  “Young Ander, you are all about to experience the culture of Old Québec!”

  Jillian squeals. “Yay!”

  I rub my ear.

  “Sorry, Kia. I’m just so excited! We’re going to speak French, aren’t we, Seraphina?”

  “We’ll see,” she says. “We’ll see.”

  We fly over the tree tops and away from le Universite de Creativite. Never in all my dreams did I imagine I would be flying around a country like this, with all my friends. Ander leans up to my seat. Hey KK, look. There’s a road down there. I bet if I raced you, I’d win!”

  I turn around. “Only if you were on a turbo scooter.”

  We soon land on the streets of Old Québec, a historic area clustered around the city’s harbor on the banks of the St. Lawrence River. The old stone buildings and the narrow winding streets look like they’ve been here for a million years. Gregor drives the aero-cart up to the Notre-Dame de Québec Basilica, and as we stand there in front of it, I feel like I’ve been transported to another world.

  “Come on,” says Seraphina. “Let’s go in.” We step inside the church, and I can’t believe my eyes. It’s made of gold and must be at least a thousand stories high!

  “I wish we had more time,” says Gregor. “We could tour the crypt. It’s the resting place of more than nine hundred archbishops, cardinals, and governors.”

  “You mean there’s nine hundred dead bodies in here?” asks Ander.

  “That’s so creepy,” says Mare.

  I laugh. “I bet we could look them all up on the Ancestor App and talk to them.”

  “That would be so cool!” says Ander.