Science Fair (39 page)

Eventual y, after everyone calmed down, the president proceeded with the ceremony, noting that the Hubble Heroes deserved the nation’s thanks for thwarting the terrorist plot

“against overwhelming odds.” (He did not mention that one of the biggest obstacles confronting the Hubble Heroes had been federal agents trying to arrest them.) The president also noted that the “misguided threat from the Republic of Krpshtskan had been swiftly and permanently eradicated.” This was definitely true. The Republic of Krpshtskan had formal y surrendered to the United States before the Diet Coke had finished fizzing in the gym. Grdankl the Strong had agreed to turn over to the Americans al of the Krpsht army’s weaponry, which consisted of a few dozen nonfunctioning rifles and a cannon from World War I that had rabbits living in it.

Grdankl had also agreed to resign. For the first time in Kprshtskan’s history, free elections were held, under American supervision, with more than a dozen candidates vying for the job.

The winner, by a landslide, was: Grdankl the Strong. He immediately requested, and received, a multibil ion-dol ar aid package from Kprshtskan’s new al y, the United States; within weeks, construction had begun on more than a dozen Starbucks.

As for Prmkt, he had been taken into federal custody and interrogated extensively by the FBI, the CIA, the NSA, and other agencies. He was total y cooperative, and, after much analysis, the experts concluded that he was a bril iant if unbalanced man who, out of love for his shamed brother, had managed to concoct and execute his intricate plot with no American help, other than from some clueless spoiled rich kids and their hyperambitious parents.

Clearly, Prmkt had to pay for his crimes: the question was, how? After much discussion at the highest levels, it was decided to punish Prmkt by making him a ful -time employee of the federal government. Specifical y, he would work for Homeland Security, where he would head the Anti-Hacking Task Force. The feds wanted him to wear an electronic monitoring bracelet on his ankle, but within fifteen minutes after they attached it to him, he had reprogrammed it so that it appeared, to the tracking computer, to be sending signals from Mount Everest. In the end, the feds decided that they either had to put Prmkt in jail or trust him, and by that point it was clear that he was way too valuable to put in jail.

Vrsk and Drmtsi were also a bit of a headache for the American government. On the one hand, they had entered the country with the intent of aiding and abetting Prmkt. On the other hand, they had not actual y done anything useful for him; in fact, they had, in their own way, helped the Hubble Heroes as wel as the American retail economy. They had also both declared their desire to remain in America and become citizens.

The government decided to let them stay as long as they could support themselves. This they did by forming what turned out to be a very successful business venture with Toby’s parents—a new health-food-product television channel. From here they sold a “dietary additive,” based on a secret Krpsht recipe that al egedly offered near-miraculous health benefits to anybody who was able to actual y choke it down. This product was cal ed “smerk.”

As for Gmygmy—whose humiliation was the cause of Prmkt’s elaborate scheme—his career received a huge boost when the video of his hideous rendition of “MacArthur Park” on
America’s Next Superstar
, broadcast incessantly as part of the news coverage, became a camp hit.

Cable-TV host Greta Van Susteren tracked Gmygmy down. He had spent the past five years traveling around the country, pursuing his hopeless dream of stardom, but mostly working as a waiter. When Van Susteren found him, he had worked his way up to a smal part in a dinner-theater production of
Cats
in Sandusky, Ohio. Her interview with him got such strong ratings that he was offered a good-paying gig in Las Vegas, opening for Barry Manilow.

On the other hand, Lance Swingle’s fortunes declined rapidly after the science fair. Word quickly got around that he had acted like a coward during the blackouts, and that he’d ordered his thugs to stop the Hubble Heroes. Even worse, his company, TranScent, whose core business was transmitting fragrances over the Internet, started to have major technical problems. No matter what fragrance a sender scanned into the fragrance digitizer—lilac, rose, watermelon, strawberry, cinnamon, etc.—the decoder at the other end emitted a smel like a musk ox passing gas. Swingle was sure that Sternabite was responsible, and he ordered TranScent’s lawyers to sue him. Al of them quit when their BlackBerrys mysteriously exploded.

D. Arthur Vaderian, disheartened by his defeat at the hands of Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia, abandoned his Star Wars hobby altogether and became a successful political consultant.

As for Toby, life was good. Mostly, anyway. There were a few not-so-good parts: for example, his parents were very,
very
unhappy when he confessed to them about sel ing their Han Solo blaster pistol to buy a computer. They made him sel it and give them the money, and they grounded him for two months, a record. Toby accepted this punishment without complaint, because (a) he knew he deserved it, and (b) Sternabite let him keep the invisibility iPhone so he could get out of the house if he real y needed to.

Life at school was definitely better for Toby. The Hornet cal ed him into her office and apologized to him—The Hornet! Apologized! To
him
!—for not believing him.

The Hornet also ordered Mr. Neckstrom to apologize to Toby. She would have forced Mr. Pzyrbovich to do the same, but he was no longer at Hubble Middle. It turned out that on the night of the blackouts, he had panicked and gone home without tel ing anybody. The Hornet, who did not tolerate this kind of disciplinary breach, had insisted that he be transferred.

Speaking of discipline: the ME kids, of course, got into big trouble with the school, and their parents got into even bigger trouble with their companies and the federal government.

Al of the ME projects were disqualified from the science fair. There was no way to judge the rest of the projects, since most of them were destroyed by the nuclear Mentos, so the judges

—consisting of The Hornet and the science teachers—decided to give four special achievement awards. Three of them went to Tamara, Micah, and Brad Pitt Wemplemeyer, since theirs were the three projects that, combined, had helped to save the country. The fourth special achievement award went to Toby. He protested that he didn’t deserve it, because in al the craziness, he never got around to actual y doing a science-fair project. The judges disagreed; in their citation, they said that Toby had done “important scientific research concerning the effects, on combustible materials, of sparking Rol erblade wheels.”

Winning the award was cool; al the other attention was pretty cool, too. But for Toby, the best part was going to the White House and being honored by the president. Toby could hardly believe it was happening as he stood in the Rose Garden with Tamara, Micah, and, in hologram form, Sternabite, listening to the president of the United States thank them for saving the country.

“Without your efforts,” the president was saying, “this nation could have suffered an attack from which it quite likely would not have recovered. You, the Hubble Heroes, saved America from a vicious act of terrorism—the greatest threat that we, as a nation, face today.” Next to Toby, hologram Sternabite snorted.

“What’s so funny?” whispered Toby.

“The line about terrorism being the greatest threat we face,” Sternabite whispered back.

“You mean it isn’t?” whispered Toby.

“Not even close,” whispered Sternabite.

Toby turned to stare at Sternabite. “What do you mean?” he whispered.

Sternabite was about to answer, but then he and Toby saw that the president, annoyed by their conversation, was glaring at them.

“Don’t worry,” whispered Sternabite. “We have a couple of months to deal with it.”

“Deal with what?” said Toby.

“If you don’t mind?” said the president.

“Deal with what?” repeated Toby.

But Sternabite, in a flicker of light, was gone.