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Willard grabbed it. “Mouse cleaner!” He grinned eagerly.

“No! No!” Granger cut in. “That's acetic acid! It's highly caustic!”

Willard splashed a little bit of the acid out of the bottle, and it dripped onto his boot. Within seconds, the acid had worn a hole through the boot, showing Willard's big toe. Again, Fisher had to clamp his hand over his mouth, this time to keep from gagging. Even from fifteen feet away, the smell of Willard's feet was worse than a trash barge running aground on a skunk-infested island.

“Caustic? I don't think I know that word,” Leroy was saying.

“Caustic?” Brody stroked his whiskerless chin and squinted his eyes in mock thought. “Pretty sure that means—good for mouse-cleaning! Let's give it a try!”

Leroy started counting down from ten as Granger moved out of Fisher's vision, babbling and stammering protestations.

“Ten Missouri …”

“Not Missouri, Leroy.
Mississippi
.”

“What's the difference?”

“Just count, okay?”

Fisher imagined what his favorite comic book character would do. Vic Daring, Space Scoundrel had been in spots like this before. Two issues ago, he'd smuggled himself inside an asteroid pirate's ship by hiding in an ore crate. Then, just as the pirate captain and his gang were about to execute the captured crown prince of Mars, Vic had burst out, subdued the pirates, and returned the captured prince. For a hefty cash reward, of course.

Fisher imagined himself springing from his hiding spot, asteroid-forged sword in hand. Brody, Willard, and Leroy would back away from him, trembling
. We can't all be brave enough to pick on tiny rodents,
he'd say.
Why don't you go find a species closer to your mental level. Like sea slugs.

But instead, he did nothing. And Leroy kept counting.

“Five, four …”

“Please, boys, I'm telling you—he's
not here
.”

“Three, two …”

“Please!”

Just then, Brody put his hand up.

“Put 'em back,” he said to Willard and Leroy. “He's not here.”

Leroy tossed the mouse carelessly back into the cage. Einy was lucky enough to land on the slingshot, bouncing up and down a few times before going on his way. Willard put Berg back after giving him a few pats on the head that had the poor mouse walking in loops for a minute.

Fisher heard the classroom door open and shut. Then, after a minute, Mr. Granger's defeated voice. “It's okay, Fisher. You can come out now. They're gone.”

Fisher crawled out, a little woozy from chemical fumes, and collapsed into the nearest chair. Mr. Granger sat down next to him, mopping his forehead with his necktie, which was decorated with carbon molecules.

“I should've stood up to them,” Mr. Granger said as much to himself as to Fisher. He unpacked a small lunch and used a plastic cafeteria knife to divide a tuna sandwich evenly in two. Fisher took his half and sighed.

“It's all right, Mr. Granger. The Vikings are determined to make my life miserable. Nothing either of us says or does is going to change that.”

Mr. Granger wilted in his chair like a piece of old lettuce. For a moment he and Fisher sat in silence, munching despondently on their tuna fish. Fisher polished off his sandwich without having tasted a single bite. He usually relishedthefactthatonceaweekorsothathegottoescape from the biohazard of a cafeteria, but the Vikings had so spoiled his mood, he couldn't even enjoy Mr. Granger's company.

“How are your parents?” Mr. Granger asked, trying to break the silence. “Did your father's experiment with the harmonizing crickets ever turn out?”

“Not really,” Fisher said. “They couldn't stay in tune.”

“And your mom? How's her work?”

“She's fine. They're both fine,” Fisher said. “Neck deep in their own projects and not helpful about the Vikings at all.” Fisher sighed and took a handful of the Doritos Mr. Granger offered him.

“Hey!” Mr. Granger said, suddenly brightening up. “I know something that will cheer you up! Those slides finally arrived from New York—the cross sections of the polygamous tube worm I was telling you about. You want to come by my house after school and see them?”

“I can't. Too much homework. Besides, I'm in the middle of a very important experiment. I'll tell you all about it once I've got the final kinks ironed out.” Fisher sighed again. “Well, I'd better get ready for my next class. Thanks, Mr. Granger.” Fisher got up and walked out, shoulders slumped, his stride small even by his subnormal standards.

Mr. Granger watched him leave and a dark look suddenly spread across his face. He stood over Einy and Berg's tank, petting the mice as he pondered. He had big plans for Fisher. It was all just a matter of timing.

“Holy polygamy!” he exclaimed. “That hurt!” He looked down to see that Heisenberg had bitten his hand.

CHAPTER 2

Objects in motion remain in motion until stopped by friction—or by the metal toe of Willard's army boots.

—Fisher Bas, Scientific Principles and Observations of the Natural World (unpublished)

Fisher ran his hand through his springy hair as he walked through Wompalog's main entrance. Thick dust billowed out from his head, clogging his eyes, and making him sneeze. Between seventh and eighth period he had had to hide in a dusty maintenance closet in order to avoid the Vikings. The soup splash across his shirt had turned into a crust.

But now, finally, he was free.

The bus sat ahead, its open door gleaming in Fisher's vision like a stairway to the stars. But his attention was quickly taken by something even more beautiful.

Veronica Greenwich.

Fisher glanced around carefully to make sure nobody saw how he was looking at her. He had never told a soul about his feelings for her, and he didn't plan to admit it, ever. Her bright eyes radiated sweetness and intelligence. She was tall, towering over Fisher, with long, blond hair that she usually wore down and wrapped around her left shoulder. Although she didn't share Fisher's scientific mind, she was a gifted student of language and history.

Once, at the end of their fifth-grade year, she had touched his hand. At the annual academic awards, as she walked from the stage with her French prize and he was approaching to receive his science honors, her right hand had brushed his left. She probably hadn't done it intentionally, but she hadn't pulled away from him, either, which was a lot more than he had come to expect.

Just then, Veronica glanced up and made eye contact.

Fisher's insides turned to grape jelly. He wanted to look away, but he couldn't. He was frozen, paralyzed.

Veronica's mouth spread into a small smile. She lifted a hand … and
waved
.

Fisher's mind began to stutter like Willard.
Veronica waved. Veronica waved at
you
. What is the normal social response when a person waves? Think, Fisher, think… .

Just when he remembered how to lift his hand in response, he saw the Vikings step out of the school's front doors. His ability to move instantly came back as the fight-or-flight instinct kicked in—although Fisher's instincts didn't really include the “fight-or-” part.

A decorative shrub arrangement stood a few feet from Fisher and without thinking, he dove in. Spindly branches raked his clothes and left long red lines down his arms. He pushed his way as far in as he could, wedging himself among its thick leaves. He didn't know if Veronica had seen him. But right now his survival was at stake.

He could see the Vikings through a gap in the leaves. They were looking for him. Willard was plodding his way along the sidewalk, his heavy-lidded eyes moving back and forth. Leroy paced along one side of the bus, then the other, looking up into the windows, like a shark circling a boat, hoping for it to capsize. And Brody stood on the steps of the school, overseeing the expedition.

Fisher knew there was nothing to do but stay put. The leaves were itchy, but they kept him well hidden. He almost wished he had a shrub he could lug around wherever he went.
Mental note: research portable shrub con
cept.

After a few minutes, Brody walked to the bus, shouting something Fisher couldn't hear, and Willard and Leroy followed him aboard.

Fisher pushed, twisted, and hopped his way out of the shrub just in time to watch the taillights of the school bus vanish around the far corner. Veronica was nowhere to be seen.

He took a deep breath, resigning himself to the long walk home.

It was a typical late September day in Palo Alto. The sun was beaming brightly, and palm trees swayed lazily on either side of the road. After about five minutes, a familiar hum and crackle filled the air. Fisher looked off to his right at the enormous concrete-and-steel complex that housed TechX Enterprises.

Somewhere inside those laboratories was the well known Dr. Xander, more commonly known in popular media by the nickname Dr. X™.

Dr. Xander had been a mysterious figure ever since he arrived on the scene back when Fisher was just learning to walk. He had brought all sorts of inventions to public light, some more successful than others. Fisher himself had used Dr. X's Shakespearean-to-Modern English Instant Translator Earpiece. The Voice-Responsive Moving Propane Grill, by contrast, had rolled blazing into a few too many living rooms to catch on.

But these were only his little gizmos, the everyday products to keep his operation funded. Years earlier, he had successfully teleported a small car from one end of the city to the other. He claimed the technology was still a long way from being practical and widely useful, but no one had forgotten the moment that a green convertible had popped into being right before their eyes. Nor the day that a drill-headed machine the size of an office building had plunged beneath the ground at Dr. X's command and literally stopped an earthquake. And his bid to enclose all of Palo Alto in an immense dome to “optimize the imperfect weather in the region,” had received sharply divided opinions.

What few announcements Dr. X had ever made to the public had all been made by video, with his face in complete darkness and his voice disguised. No one seemed to know what he looked like, or anything of his personal life.

People didn't know what to think of Dr. X. They adored his inventions and hailed his genius, but the fact that he never showed his face made them wonder. Was he trying to hide something? Or was he just … shy?

Many people were scared of Dr. X, but Fisher wanted to be just like him. As he passed the impenetrable walls of the TechX compound, he imagined a possible future Fisher: a dark, shadowy figure silently stalking the halls of an immense laboratory complex. The people would react to his name with awe. No—with
reverence
! They would whisper and wonder about him, about his amazing machines and miraculous discoveries. And he'd gaze at the masses from a tall tower, above and apart from it all.

Fisher's thoughts of future power and prestige distracted him so much that he almost walked right past his house without noticing. And not noticing Fisher's house is like failing to notice a two-hundred-man bagpipe parade.

The Bas's neighborhood was pleasant and well-groomed. The streets were lined with short trees, many with oranges or lemons hanging off them. Flowers of every color dotted the trim green lawns. No, the Bas house didn't stand out because it was more beautiful than the other houses.

It stood out because Mr. and Mrs. Bas were geniuses who had no reservations about using their genius anywhere and everywhere they could.

Fisher's parents had lent all of their scientific ingenuity to the construction of their home. Broad banks of solar panels extended out from all sides of the roof like an upside-down umbrella. Huge antennae bristled on the roof. One was for high-speed encoded transmissions between the house and the field labs where his parents worked. One was set up to communicate with the family's personal satellite. Another was a fully featured radio telescope that Fisher's father used for studying distant galaxies and celestial phenomena.

Above the roof hovered a cloud. Not a cloud hanging majestically in the stratosphere like good, polite clouds generally do, but a little cloud floating about twenty feet above the house, moving only very slightly in the wind. In the house there was a keypad with a series of controls and dials, like a thermostat. Fisher's parents could adjust the cloud's density with a slider, depending on how much shade was needed. A light drizzle was a button-press away, and a moderate downpour a quick knob-twist later.

Fisher walked through his front gate. This would not be so unusual except that he didn't walk through his front gate by opening it, walking in, and then closing it behind him, but by actually walking
through
it. To the casual observer, the iron gate appeared perfectly normal, but it was in fact composed of Mr. Bas's patented Liquid Door. When the gate detected a family member, it was programmed to drastically lower its density, allowing Fisher to walk right through it as if it were fog.

He passed his mother's garden. At its center was a cantaloupe the size of a small car. There had been a cantaloupe the size of a large one, but its rind was so thick that a cutting torch had been needed to slice it. For the smaller ones they just used a buzz saw.

As he began to cross the front yard, stepping-stones skimmed across the grass to place themselves beneath his feet.

Situated in the midst of everything else, the front door seemed a bit out of place. It was about six and a half feet tall and three feet wide, made of wood, and set into hinges that allowed it to swing open and closed when unlatched by a brass knob.

In other words, it was just a door—which, for the Bas home, was the strangest thing of all.

Fisher sighed to himself as he shoved open the door. As useful as all of the gadgets and thingamajigs both inside and outside the house could be, he often wished that he lived in a house that didn't have its own weather or throw newspapers back at the paperboy if they landed in the wrong spot. He was getting tired of other kids pointing and laughing at it when they passed by.

He wished, in fact, that his family could just be
normal
.

“Hey, I'm home,” he said as he walked into the front hall. After a few seconds, a tall figure wearing a fullface respirator, enormous goggles, and a pair of thick lab gloves walked over to meet him.

“Wrrcm hmmm, Fshuhh!” came the muffled reply. Then the gloved hands reached up to remove the mask, and Fisher's mother smiled down at him. The mask had left red welts on her forehead and cheeks. “Good day?”

Fisher was about to launch into a multi-point lecture detailing all the ways in which it had
not
been a good day at
all
, but before he could say anything, a crash sounded from another part of the house, followed by a man's voice saying “Ow, ow, ow, ow …”

“Oh dear.” Fisher's mother sighed. “The hermit crabs must have staged another breakout.” She ran up the stairs.

Fisher set down his backpack, took off his coat, and flung it into the air. Just then, the hall closet spat out a coat hanger on an extendable boom, caught the coat, and retracted, storing his coat neatly inside.

His mother came downstairs a few minutes later followed by his father, who was holding an ice pack to his nose.

“I told you their aggression impulse was overengineered, but you didn't believe me,” Fisher's dad said.

“Well, if your little cage was up to par they wouldn't be able to get out, now would they?” his mom replied, adjusting the ice pack.

“All right, next time
you're
on maintenance duty. I'll work on the enclosure if you try to make some crabs who don't act like they're James Bond.”

“Of course, sweetie,” said Mrs. Bas. They reached the bottom of the stairs. Mr. Bas glanced over his ice pack by tipping his head down, and noticed his son standing in the hallway for the first time.