Robot Revolution Read online

  Dad rolls down his window and waves at Lena with both hands.

  “Our car is driving all by itself!” I holler happily for all the world to hear. Or, at least, all of Creekside Elementary.

  And, of course, that’s when the SUV bids us a pleasant “Good-bye,” dims all its lights, and dies.

  Right in the middle of the drop-off lane.

  During rush hour.

  Again.

  Yep. This has to be the worst year of my life.

  That morning in Mrs. Kunkel’s class, right after everybody, including Trip, is finished laughing at me, my family, and our autonomous automobile (which, if you ask me, needs an Auto Correct button), I get another lousy grade to add to my collection.

  It’s a sixty-nine on a pop quiz we took the other day. That’s not as bad as my fifty-two on the Spanish homework. In fact, I think a sixty-nine is a D. Maybe a D plus.

  But the pop quiz was in science. Science used to be my best subject. And not because Mom helps me with my homework! I just like science. Well, I used to. Lately? Not so much. Maybe because science is what’s keeping my mother holed up in her workshop instead of being a mother. To me, at least.

  “Well done, Randolph,” Mrs. Kunkel says when she hands R.R.R. his test. “No one else scored a one hundred and three!”

  One hundred and three? How is that even possible?

  Reich looks pretty happy with himself. “I suppose no one else decided to elucidate on how a condenser can change water vapor into a liquid?”

  “No. They just knew that condensation is what makes the mirror fog up when you take a hot shower on a cold day. Except Sammy. He said that was caused by ‘low-lying clouds.’”

  Yep. That’s what I wrote. I was having an off day.

  After school, Dad picks E and me up in a white van I’ve never seen before.

  “It’s a rental,” he tells us. “My book is due to my editor. I can’t afford to spend half my day calling tow trucks for that stupid SUV.”

  Great. Now Dad doesn’t sound like Dad. Maybe he’s joining the robot revolt, too.

  As soon as we’re home, E heads for Mom’s workshop. “I want to build some prototype controllers for the rest of the robots,” he says. “I must try to correct my previous reprogramming missteps.”

  But Mom kicks him right out.

  “She says she is at the most critical stage of her experiment,” he explains, his eyes dimming a bit. “We are not to disturb her.”

  Ha! What else is new?

  Before dinner (Brittney 13 picked up some kind of frozen pancakes wrapped around sausages on Popsicle sticks), I head into Maddie’s room.

  “Why are you so sad?” she asks.

  “I don’t know. I guess because I’m all of a sudden flunking all the subjects I used to be good at. Spanish. Science. And those are just the ones starting with s.”

  “Well, have you been studying? Did you read your textbooks and do your homework?”

  “No. Not really. I’ve been too focused on our science fair project. It’s taken over my brain. Trip and I might’ve bitten off more than we can chew.”

  “What are you guys trying to do? Be the first kids to land on Mars?”

  Maddie makes me smile. She’s good at that.

  “I wish,” I say. “It might be easier. No, I have this idea about making your life more fun.”

  “You’re doing a project for me?”

  “Yeah. I didn’t want to tell you, in case it didn’t work…”

  “You’re just like Mom!”

  E said that, too. “I guess you’re right. I thought if I talked about what Trip and I were doing—”

  “You’d jinx it!”

  “Exactly. We’re trying to find a way for you to be able to horse around outside with your friends. Maybe even play soccer with ’em.”

  “That would be so cool! What’d you come up with?”

  “Nothing so far. Well, nothing that actually works. I’m like Mom that way, too.”

  “Well, don’t give up, Sammy,” says Dad, coming into Maddie’s room with another drawing to hang on the wall. “Stick to it. Just like your Mom always does. That’s why, when she’s close to an answer, she keeps herself locked up in her workshop. So come on, have a little faith. She’ll find what she’s searching for and then she’ll be back at the dinner table eating pancakes on a stick with the rest of us.”

  That makes us all laugh.

  Until we hear an explosion.

  The three of us run to the window.

  We see Mom staggering out of her workshop, in a cloud of smoke!

  Mom spends the entire night in her workshop—probably trying to fix whatever it was that blew up.

  Meanwhile, inside the house, the robots are all kind of blowing up, too. They’re not exploding, but they’re seriously misbehaving. I didn’t think it could get much worse, but I was wrong. Instead of doing what robots are supposed to do—help humans—they’ve decided to do the exact opposite: make life miserable for everybody.

  I’m pretty sure one of them filled my shampoo bottle with glue this morning and shrunk my bath towels into washcloths while I was in the shower.

  I’m not pointing fingers here, but Groomeo the Groomatron sure looks proud of himself.

  The Breakfastinator is back to making breakfast, but it has a new surprise recipe “courtesy of Trip’s mother.”

  You guessed it: brussels sprouts surprise.

  With a side order of scrambled cauliflower. Have you ever smelled overcooked vegetables first thing in the morning? Don’t do it. Unless you already have some of that sawdust gunk that school janitors use everywhere to soak up puke puddles. You’d need it.

  “This is bad, Sammy,” says Maddie as we both stare at our early morning vegetable platters. “Worse than that dandelion salad and the seaweed combined.”

  “Yep. And I have a feeling it’s only going to get worse.”

  I, of course, am correct.

  Dad is way too busy finishing up his graphic novel and scanning images into his computer to do anything about the out-of-control bots. And E is outnumbered.

  “You were designed to be better than this,” E tells Geoffrey the butler-bot, who is busy unscrewing all the lids on every ketchup jar, mustard bottle, and saltshaker in the house so they’ll fly off when one of us humans tries to use them.

  “I grow weary of roboticists orchestrating our every move,” says Geoffrey. “I have sensors and actuators and, by jingo, I am not afraid to utilize them! Now if you will excuse me, I need to go to the bathroom.”

  “No, you don’t,” I say. “You’re a robot. It’s one of the best things about being a machine! You never, ever have to go to the bathroom.”

  Geoffrey doesn’t listen to me or E. He scoots into the closest bathroom and starts fiddling with the showerheads so they’ll fly off and surprise us, too.

  Meanwhile, outside, Hayseed is leaving squishy “organic surprises” all over the place. In the lawn. In my bike basket. Even in my gym shoes, which I sometimes keep on the back porch because they stink so bad. Well, now they smell even worse. Don’t forget, Hayseed’s our gardener. He has sacks filled with cow manure to use for his pranks.

  I know that I could easily shut off each of Mom’s robots so they’d stop misbehaving. With a flick of a switch, they’d power down and just be silent hunks of metal in the garage, and my sneakers would be free of cow poop. But I don’t want to shut them off.

  Because I understand what they’re feeling.

  These bots are only upset because they don’t think Mom is paying enough attention to them.

  That’s right. They kind of remind me of me.

  E and I are going to be late to school.

  Drone Malone won’t let us anywhere near our bikes, and we already missed the bus.

  He’s hovering near the garage carrying two very droopy, very heavy-looking balloons. This can’t be good.

  “I don’t think those balloons are filled with water,” I tell E.

  “I agree
. I believe Hayseed loaded those breakable inflatables with the same substance he loaded into your gym shoes.”

  Gross.

  “I’m leaving my gym shoes at home and skipping PE today,” I tell E.

  “You might also wish to go back inside and adjust your hairstyle,” E suggests.

  “Can’t. The Groomatron slipped glue into my shampoo. Groomeo has gone goofy-o.”

  “Today I am ashamed to call myself a robot,” says E with what sounds like a very human sigh. “We were designed to process information and compute the best way to complete our tasks. We were engineered to serve. We were not meant to be this selfish.”

  “I guess Mom made you guys a little too human,” I say.

  “Perhaps.”

  Suddenly, the intercom speakers all over the house, even near the back door, play this loop of marimba music.

  It’s the ringtone from Maddie’s iPhone.

  “May I have your attention, please,” says Maddie over the intercom. “This is Maddie. I am so sorry to hear that so many of you guys are feeling kind of lousy right now. Trust me. I know what that’s like. Every time my fever spikes and the paramedics on the ambulance crew come to take me to the hospital, I just feel lousy.

  “But you guys always make me feel better. Geoffrey? You always tell my visitors to take off their shoes, put on sterile masks, and rub sanitizer on their hands. Mr. Moppenshine? If it wasn’t for you—cleaning and scrubbing and disinfecting everything—I’d be even more of a prisoner in my own home. And McFetch? What would I do without you? You keep me company, all day long. My life’s a lot less lonely with you in it.

  “And yes, E, my new bro-bot, has been a huge help. Thanks to E, I get to go to a real school for the first time ever. And as much as I like Trip and Sammy, it’s been fun making some other real, human friends.

  “But when all is said and done, you robots are my family. I hardly ever leave or even go outside—unless I’m on my way to the hospital. So, you guys, I just want you to know you mean more than the world to me. You are the world to me! My whole world!”

  Before Maddie finishes her little pep talk, there isn’t a dry electromagnet, capacitor, servo, or solenoid in the house.

  “In conclusion,” Maddie says over the intercom, “I want to do more to help. Maybe I can be the new mini mom for our house of robots. I’m here all the time—even when I go to school. If you need something, just let me know and I’ll do my best to get it for you. And when it comes to our real mom, because think about it: Dr. Elizabeth Hayes is everybody’s mother in this house, except, of course, Dad’s, and Trip’s, if he’s here—”

  “I’m not,” shouts Trip, who just rode his bike up our driveway. “I mean, I wasn’t. Not when you were saying all that mushy junk about your mom, even though I kind of heard it out on the street because the volume dial on your intercom is cranked all the way to eleven or something…”

  Maddie laughs. “Thank you, Trip. So, like I was saying, when it comes to Mom, we all just need to keep the faith. What she’s working on has to be extremely important or she wouldn’t be working on it so hard.”

  All the robots start nodding.

  And then Geoffrey leads them all in a rousing song.

  “For Maddie’s a jolly good human! For Maddie’s a jolly good human!”

  While they finish their hip hips and hoorays, E and I grab our bikes and head off to school with Trip.

  Luckily, Drone Malone is too busy cheering for Maddie to drop a wobbly poop balloon on my gluey hair!

  All righty-o.

  Maddie’s early morning pep talk seems to have done the job!

  When E and I come home from school, all the other bots are humming along, completing their tasks with speed and efficiency. The lawn is so lush and green, it reminds me of a golf course.

  “I done resodded the whole thing,” explains Hayseed.

  “And then I mowed it,” adds Blitzen.

  Mr. Moppenshine buffed and polished all the gleaming glass and chrome and countertops in the kitchen. The stainless steel refrigerator door is so shiny, you can use it as a full-length mirror. Which Brittney 13 does. Constantly.

  Even McFetch is on his best behavior. He’s teaching himself some new tricks by watching video clips of that winning dog act from America’s Got Talent.

  “They are all using their effectors quite effectively,” E says proudly.

  “Huh?” I say.

  “Sorry. Effectors are devices, such as a gripper, tool, or laser beam, that allow robots to affect things in the outside world.”

  “Cool,” I say. “Who has the laser beam?”

  “Drone Malone.”

  “He should fly over to Trip’s house someday. His cat goes crazy chasing laser pointers.”

  “I will pass along the suggestion, Sammy.”

  Seems Maddie’s pep talk got to Dad, too. He totally restocked the Fooderlator.

  “Tonight, we feast on grilled shrimp tacos!” he announces as he bops a few buttons. Yes, the Fooderlator can flame-broil stuff. Mom picked up some of its parts from a nearby Burger King.

  The wafting aroma of barbecue shrimp is enough to lure Mom out of her lab. She joins us at the table for the first real family dinner in what seems like forever.

  “This is delicious, Noah,” she tells Dad.

  “It wasn’t me,” he says modestly. “Your machine did all the work.”

  “Just like we always do, mum,” adds Geoffrey with a bow as he serves Mom her third helping of shrimp tacos.

  “Is there any more salsa?” Mom asks.

  And with the help of Brittney 13, who stops posing in front of the refrigerator door long enough to open it, Drone Malone airlifts a jar of cilantro-lime salsa over to the table.

  Yep. Everything is running like clockwork. Just like a house full of mechanical taskmasters should. Even our family seems like it’s back to normal. I guess Mom and I have called a truce, because we try our best to be nice to each other again.

  When dinner’s done, we play a fun game of Scrabble—humans only. The bots know too many words.

  “This is great, you guys,” says Mom. “Thanks for picking up my slack. I am pleased to report that my dual projects might be nearing completion.”

  “Might?” I say.

  “Well, I’m still hitting stumbling blocks on the most important project.”

  “What are you working on?” I ask. “Maybe we can help.”

  Mom smiles and cocks an eyebrow. “Sammy?”

  “I know, I know. If you tell us, you might jinx it.”

  “If I may inquire, Mum,” says Geoffrey, “what exactly is a jinx?”

  “It’s the name of Trip’s cat,” I say, because, well, it is.

  E, who is our resident vocabulary whiz, takes over for me.

  “A jinx,” he explains, “is an unseen force that is thought to bring bad luck or misfortune.”

  “Is that what Trip’s cat does?” Maddie asks me.

  “Nah. Mostly she just licks herself and hacks up hair balls.”

  Now everybody is laughing—including the robots equipped with humor detectors.

  “Dang, that’s a regular knee-slapper,” says Hayseed, poking his head through the kitchen window. “I’d slap my knee but I’m afraid I might dent it.”

  “You guys?” says Mom, smiling. “I promise that everything is going to be okay.”

  And you know what?

  Everything is okay.

  For a few hours, anyway.

  I’m sound asleep up in my room when, all of a sudden, I hear this incredible KABANG!

  It’s followed by a CRACKLE-CRUUUNCH.

  It’s louder than my alarm clock, which, by the way, is telling me it’s two o’clock in the morning. Literally. The thing is a robot, and when its motion detectors sense that I’m looking straight at it, it tells me the time.

  I ignore the clock and race to the window.

  What now? Another explosion in Mom’s workshop?

  Nope! When I pull back my curtains,
I see that Soovee, Mom’s autonomous automobile, has crashed right through the garage door!

  Splintered wood and twisted metal are scattered everywhere. All of it is from the demolished garage door. The SUV, sitting in the driveway, isn’t dinged, dented, or even scratched. Mom must’ve made it out of something indestructible.

  “Who would like to go for a ride?” Soovee chirps as it blinks and flashes all its various LEDs. The thing looks like one of those Christmas trees with the hyperactive lights. “I would like to go for a ride. Who would like to go with me? I am equipped with new cartoons and video games…”

  Mom climbs out through the jagged hole in the splintered garage door. She’s still in her lab coat. Guess she went back to work after our shrimp taco dinner.

  “Liz? Are you okay?” Dad comes racing out the back door in his robe. E’s right behind him. No robe.

  E is carrying a first-aid kit the size of a suitcase. We have a bunch of them stored all over the house, and not just for Maddie. We need them handy for Mom’s experiments, too.

  I grab my robe, hurry out of my bedroom, and hustle down the hall.

  Maddie sticks her head out her door. “Is everything okay downstairs, Sammy?”

  “I think so,” I holler over my shoulder as I round the landing and hit the stairs. “Mom’s autonomous automobile just tried to turn itself into an automatic garage door opener.”

  “Did it work?”

  “Nope. Not really.”

  When I reach the back porch, most of our robots are already out in the driveway, trying to assist Mom and Dad.

  Soovee’s midnight ride has also woken up half the neighborhood. There are a lot of people in pajamas and robes standing on the sidewalk in front of our house, gawking at all the robotic activity in our driveway.