Nick and Tesla's High-Voltage Danger Lab

by Bob Pflugfelder

  Tesla had been the last of the kids to be interviewed. By the time she stepped out of the meeting room, Silas and DeMarco were already gone, and Lily was being led away by an attractive teary-eyed couple.

  Lily turned back when she heard the door open, and Tesla saw that she was cradling a little yellow-brown bundle in her arms.

  The little yellow-brown bundle growled at her.

  “Hello, Mr. Snugg,” Tesla said.

  “You’re done! Good! I was worried I wouldn’t get to talk to you again!” Lily said. She took a step toward Tesla, but Mr. Snugg started barking, so she stopped. “I wanted to thank you for everything. You were amazing! So brave, so smart. You’re, like, my hero!”

  Tesla’s face grew strangely warm and tingly.

  She didn’t blush much, so she didn’t even know what it felt like.

  “Oh, well … you’re welcome,” she said with an awkward shrug.

  “I can’t tell you how grateful we are,” said the man standing behind Lily—her father, obviously. “If there’s anything we can ever do for you, just let us know.”

  “All right. Sure.”

  Lily lifted one of Mr. Snugg’s paws and made him wave, even though he was still growling and baring his little teeth at Tesla.

  “Good-bye!” she said.

  Nick stepped up beside Tesla.

  “Bye,” they said together.

  Lily and her mom and dad left, leaving Nick and Tesla alone with Yvonne the administrative assistant.

  Yvonne was hunched over her keyboard, either hunting for a letter she couldn’t find or dozing.

  “So,” Nick said, “how’d it go?”

  “Okay, but weird.”

  “That’s how it was for me. There’s a lot that people haven’t been telling us.”

  “I know. And unfortunately the only person we can turn to for answers is—”

  The door that Lily and her parents had just walked through burst open again, and a grinning Uncle Newt came striding in.

  “Hey, kids!” he said. “Who wants to grab a nice plate of oysters?”

  Nick and Tesla had to explain that, although going out for seafood wasn’t necessarily something they hated, it wasn’t the sort of treat most traumatized eleven-year-olds could get excited about.

  “I see,” said Uncle Newt. “How about sushi?”

  They ended up getting ice cream.

  “So,” Uncle Newt said once they were all hunkered down around a little round table in the local ice cream shop, “Bill tells me you two foiled a kidnapping or some such.”

  “Bill?” said Nick.

  “Sergeant Feiffer. He’s out to the house pretty regularly—checking on explosions and ‘strange glows’ and ‘threats to public safety,’ whatever that means—so we’ve gotten kind of chummy.”

  “Well, he’s right,” Nick said. “Although technically I guess we didn’t foil the kidnapping. That happened before we got here. But we did help save the kidnapped girl and catch the kidnappers.”

  “Hey, better late than never,” said Uncle Newt. “Tell me about it.”

  Nick looked at his sister. She was working methodically on her scoop of mint chocolate chip with a distant, slightly sullen look on her face.

  Obviously, it was up to Nick to tell the story.

  Uncle Newt listened politely enough, though he got excited and asked questions only when Nick was describing the gadgets and doohickeys he and Tesla had whipped up. It was as if he heard stories about kids facing down killer dogs and hardened criminals every day, but when they made their own squirrel out of diet cola and Mentos … now that was something!

  “Well done, you two! I’m proud of you!” Uncle Newt said when the story was over. “An electromagnet built from a radio and rusty nails? I love it!”

  “Thanks,” said Nick. “Still … there are some unanswered questions.”

  “Oh?”

  Nick gave Uncle Newt a significant look.

  Uncle Newt stared back blankly. If there’d been a word balloon over his head, it would have looked like this:

  Tesla finally broke her silence.

  “Why are we really here?” she said.

  Uncle Newt looked at her in surprise. “I thought we’d settled that. We’re here to get ice cream.”

  “No,” Tesla said. “Why are Nick and I in Half Moon Bay?”

  “Well, you know that as well as I do, Tesla. Your mother and father are in Uzbekistan studying … studying … Brussels sprouts?”

  “Soybeans,” Nick said.

  “And we don’t believe that anymore,” said Tesla.

  Uncle Newt had his tongue out for a big lick of double fudge praline swirl.

  He sucked his tongue back in.

  “Don’t believe it?” he said.

  Tesla shook her head. “We’ve always been told that Mom and Dad were government scientists who specialize in agriculture. But the way they suddenly had to go running off to another country halfway around the world? It doesn’t make sense.”

  “Oh, you might be surprised,” Uncle Newt said. “The world of high-yield farming can be a rollercoaster ride of thrills and chills.”

  Tesla gave him an “Oh, puh-leeeeze” roll of the eyes.

  He didn’t seem to notice.

  “A woman helped us today,” said Nick. “Some kind of government agent. And she said she was a friend of Mom and Dad’s.”

  “A friend they’d asked to check on us,” Tesla added.

  “Really?” Uncle Newt went ahead and took his bite of ice cream, then kept speaking as he moved it around in his mouth. “I wonder if I should be insulted. As if I’m not responsible enough to look after a couple kids!”

  A little dab of double fudge praline swirl was stuck to his nose.

  Tesla pulled out her pendant and showed it to her uncle. “Somehow, she found this even though we couldn’t.”

  “That’s the locket your Mom and Dad gave you?”

  “We think it might be a tracking device,” Nick said. “The woman—Agent McIntyre—she was the person following us around in the black SUV. She probably wanted to keep an eye on us because Tesla had lost her pendant.”

  “And last night, someone did try to get into the house,” Tesla said. “I think it might have been Agent McIntyre again. We’d sneaked inside after the chase on the road, so she had no way of knowing I’d made it home safely. I think she wanted to check.”

  Uncle Newt put down what was left of his ice cream cone—laying it on its side on the table—and folded his arms across his chest.

  “Let me see if I understand your hypothesis here,” he said. “Your mother and father aren’t in Uzbekistan studying lima beans—”

  “Soybeans,” said Nick.

  “—but are really mixed up with some kind of secret agents? And they sent you here and had you put under surveillance because …?”

  “There’s some kind of danger,” Tesla said. “To them or Nick and me or all of us … we don’t know.”

  “Which is why we’re asking you,” said Nick.

  Uncle Newt shook his head, looking disappointed. “Kids, kids, kids. Don’t you remember Occam’s—”

  Tesla cut him off.

  “Occam’s razor assumes that life tends to be simple,” she said. “And sometimes it’s not.”

  Uncle Newt stopped shaking his head and seemed to mull over her statement.

  “You’re right,” he said eventually. “About Occam’s razor, anyway. The rest of it …?” He shrugged his bony shoulders. “It’s hard to picture my brother hanging out with spies. And I’ve never been big on conspiracy theories. Well, except for the one about Elvis faking his death and living out the rest of his life in a trailer park. The National Enquirer ran some pretty convincing stuff on that, back in the day.”

  Uncle Newt picked up his cone again. About half the remaining double fudge praline swirl stayed behind, puddled on top of the table.

  “Of course, that was ages ago,” Uncle Newt said. He took a lick of ice cream and got anoth
er, even bigger splotch on his nose. “You kids have probably never heard of Elvis. He was a singer … and a great mind. Invented the fried peanut butter and banana sandwich, which is nothing to sneeze at. That’s the only way I can eat bananas, in fact. If it weren’t for Elvis sandwiches and candy apples, I’d probably never eat fruit at all.”

  Nick and Tesla looked at each other as Uncle Newt went on about his dislike of fresh fruit and the debt he owed Elvis.

  On their first day in Half Moon Bay, Nick had joked that they’d been sent to stay with Uncle Newt because he was so clueless that he wouldn’t ask awkward questions about where their parents were going or why.

  It didn’t seem like a joke anymore.

  Uncle Newt did eventually remember Nick and Tesla’s questions—and the fact that he hadn’t provided any answers.

  “Look,” he said as they walked out of the ice cream shop, “I meant what I said about being proud of you. And it’s not just because you know how to wire up your own intruder alert or use markers to follow cars. You’re a couple of amazing kids who can handle more than most adults. Including me. So I wouldn’t keep secrets from you. I mean … do I seem like the overprotective type?”

  “No,” said Nick.

  “Quite the opposite,” said Tesla.

  Uncle Newt beamed at them. “See? So you can believe me when I say that your parents are not spies and that this kidnapping business and the agent lady and the other excitement you’ve had is just one big fluke. Really, guys—it’s going to be a nice, quiet, boring summer from here on out. Okay?”

  “Okay,” said Nick.

  “Okay,” said Tesla.

  “Good,” said Uncle Newt. “Now, let’s hurry up and get home. I’ve got a batch of barium nitrate cooking that’ll go up like dynamite if I’m not back in my lab by …” He checked his watch. “Uh-oh.”

  Uncle Newt started walking a lot faster.

  “Don’t you mean our lab?” Tesla said as she and Nick scurried along beside him.

  “Yes, yes! Of course! Our lab!” Uncle Newt said. He sped up into a sprint. “And we wouldn’t want it to blow up, now would we?”

  “No, Uncle Newt!” Nick and Tesla said together. Before they broke into a run, they looked at each other, obviously thinking the same thing.

  A nice, quiet, boring summer? Yeah, right.

  Tesla was smiling. Nick wasn’t.

  After that, they were so intent on catching up with their uncle that they didn’t even notice the black sedan following them down the street or the drone airplane circling around and around and around high overhead.…

  About the Authors

  “SCIENCE BOB” PFLUGFELDER is an award-winning elementary school science teacher. His fun and informative approach to science has led to television appearances on the History Channel and Access Hollywood. He is also a regular guest on Jimmy Kimmel Live, The Dr. Oz Show, and Live with Kelly & Michael. Articles on Bob’s experiments have appeared in People, Nickelodeon magazine, Popular Science, Disney’s Family Fun, and Wired. He lives in Watertown, Massachusetts.

  STEVE HOCKENSMITH is the author of the Edgar-nominated Holmes on the Range mystery series. His other books include the New York Times best seller Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: Dawn of the Dreadfuls and the short-story collection Naughty: Nine Tales of Christmas Crime. He lives with his wife and two children about forty minutes from Half Moon Bay, California.

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  Nick was in the lab in the basement making a volcano with vinegar and dish-washing liquid.

  Tesla was in the lab in the basement making a rocket with vinegar and baking soda.

  Uncle Newt was in the lab in the basement making a compost-fueled vacuum cleaner out of a leaf blower and a bag of putrid bananas.

  It was the vacuum cleaner that exploded.

  Fortunately, the Banana Vac 8000 began sizzling and melting before exploding, giving Uncle Newt time to groan, “Aww, man. Not again.”

  Nick and Tesla knew what that meant. They put down their beakers, test tubes, and tongs and hurried toward the rickety stairs. They had to do a lot of zigzagging, as the dimly lit basement was packed with old computers and grimy tools and abandoned inventions (a rocket-powered skateboard here, a gumball machine stocked with goldfish there) and, along the walls, mysterious contraptions that hummed and throbbed and occasionally went ping. Some of the machines were scorched. All were covered with soot.

  “Come on, Uncle Newt!” Nick said as he and his sister began bounding up the steps.

  Uncle Newt was the kind of man who needed to be reminded that it’s a good idea to leave when a vacuum cleaner is about to explode.

  “I just don’t understand,” he said as he reluctantly rose from his cluttered worktable and followed his niece and nephew. “I had the oxygen/methane mix perfect this time.”

  “That’s what you said last time,” Tesla pointed out.

  “I know! It was perfect then, too.”

  Nick and Tesla scrambled up to the landing at the top of the stairs and turned to find their uncle plodding along behind them.

  “Uhh, Uncle Newt?” said Nick. “Maybe you want to move a little faster?”

  Uncle Newt swiped a hand at him dismissively. “Oh, I’ve still got at least five more seconds to get away. Maybe even six. Well, four now.”

  The kids retreated into the kitchen, and slowly, serenely, he followed them.

  “Two,” he said. “One.”

  Nick, Tesla, and Uncle Newt stood for a moment, staring at each other. Then there was a whomp that shook the whole house.

  “See?” Uncle Newt said. “There was plenty of time.”

  Smoke rose from the basement. It smelled like a hundred burned banana cream pies sitting in the sun at the county dump.

  “Eewww,” said Uncle Newt, grimacing and pinching his nose. “That’s even worse than usual. Come on.”

  He led the kids out to the backyard, leaving the door open so the smoke could swirl out instead of filling the house. Uncle Newt’s hairless cat, Eureka, trotted after them, curled up on the porch, and began licking ash off his wrinkled, bald butt.

  It was a bright, warm summer day, and one of Uncle Newt’s neighbors—a genial old man Uncle Newt always called Mr. Blackwell, even though his name was Jones—was mowing his lawn nearby.

  Mr. Jones stopped his mower and pointed his inch-thick glasses at Uncle Newt and Nick and Tesla.

  “Need me to call the fire department again?” he said.

  “No thanks, Mr. Blackwell,” Uncle Newt told him. “It’s just a methane-rich banana mash reacting to oxygen and putting out a lot of carbon dioxide and water vapor.”

  “Oh,” Mr. Jones said, nodding and smiling and clearly not understanding a word. “All right, then.”

  “Don’t worry about the smoke,” Uncle Newt went on. “That’ll probably stop in an hour or so.”

  “An hour or so?” someone said.

  Uncle Newt and the kids turned around to find another neighbor, Julie Casserly, glaring at them. She was crouched by the side of her house, planting a new bed of begonias to replace the one that Uncle Newt’s (supposedly) self-steering lawn mower had chewed through two weeks earlier.

  Julie coughed melodramatically, then jabbed a trowel in the direction of the foul-smelling smoke billowing out of Uncle Newt’s back door.

  “You expect me to put up with that for an hour?”

  “Of course not, Julie,” Uncle Newt said. “You could always go inside.”

  Julie shot to her feet and did just that. But there was something about the wa
y she snorted and scowled before she stomped off that made it clear she wasn’t retreating from just the smoke.

  “Who do you think she’s gonna call?” Tesla said. “The fire department or the police?”

  “Both,” said Nick. “And probably the Pentagon and the White House, too.”

  Mr. Jones started his mower again.

  “I could modify that so it’d mow the lawn for you, Mr. Blackwell!” Uncle Newt bellowed at him.

  Mr. Jones just waved and went back to cutting grass. He obviously knew better than to let Uncle Newt anywhere near his lawn-care equipment.

  “Oh well,” Uncle Newt said. “Time for Italian, I guess.”

  “What?” Nick and Tesla exclaimed.

  Uncle Newt sucked a lungful of smoky air in through his nostrils.

  “I don’t know about you,” he said, “but I’ve got a sudden craving for Ranalli’s chicken vesuvio.”

  Nick and Tesla blinked at him. Neither had any idea what chicken vesuvio was, but they did know this: Ranalli’s Italian Kitchen had great pizza.

  “Let’s go,” Tesla said.

  It was 10 o’clock on a Sunday morning—not the time most people chose to go out for Italian food. But if there was one thing Nick and Tesla had learned since coming to live with their uncle two weeks before, it was that he wasn’t most people.

  “Great!” Uncle Newt said. He pulled the lapel of his lab coat over his mouth like a mask. “You two pour a gallon of grease into the car. I’ll go get the electro bib. I’ve been meaning to try it out in a restaurant.”

  He walked toward the smoke still roiling out the back door.

  Tesla grabbed his right arm. Nick grabbed the left.

  “Maybe you shouldn’t go back in there till you can see what you’re doing,” said Tesla.

  “And, you know … breathe?” said Nick.

  Uncle Newt mulled it over while Nick and Tesla watched him anxiously. Not only were they worried about him asphyxiating in the house, they didn’t want him bringing his electro bib—which was supposed to teach kids to eat neatly by giving off a shock every time a crumb touched it—to the restaurant.