— George's Secret Key to the Univers —
by Lucy and Stephen Hawking
Dr. Reeper’s laboratory was clearly divided into two parts. On one side, a strange-looking chemistry experiment was in progress. Lots of glass balls were linked to others via glass tubes. One of the balls was connected to what looked like a miniature volcano. Most of the volcano fumes funneled upward into the glass ball, but from time to time little wisps of them leaked out. Gases poured from one glass ball to the next, eventually ending up in one large ball in the center. There was a cloud inside this last ball, and now and then they saw sparks flying around.
“So, who wants to go first with the questions?” asked Dr. Reeper, excited to have an audience.
Ringo sighed. “Sir, what’s that?” he said, pointing to the large chemistry experiment.
“Aha!” said Dr. Reeper, grinning and rubbing his hands. “I’m sure you remember the wonderful rotten-egg stink you smelled when you entered the house. Well, do you know what it is?”
“Rotten eggs?” piped up Tank, feeling happy he knew the answer.
“Stupid child,” grumbled Dr. Reeper. “You’ll have to try harder than that if you want to become a scientist. Think! What could it be? Such an easy answer.”
The boys looked at each other and shrugged. “Don’t know,” they all murmured.
“Dear, oh dear,” sighed Dr. Reeper. “Children today, they really do know nothing. It is the smell of the Earth—billions of years ago, when there was no life on it.”
“Well, how were we supposed to know that?” moaned Whippet.
But Dr. Reeper ignored him. “This isn’t a real volcano, obviously,” he continued, pointing at the small homemade volcano, which had smoke erupting from the crater at its top.
“Yeah, like, obviously,” murmured Ringo. “I mean, like we hadn’t noticed that.”
“It’s just a little chemical reaction that emits the same kind of fumes,” Dr. Reeper enthused, seemingly unaware of Ringo’s rudeness. “So, I made it look like a little volcano with mud from the garden. I very much like it.”
The fumes from the volcano puffed upward into a glass ball, where they mixed with water vapor. This came from another glass ball, in which water was being heated over a gas burner. When they mixed together, the fumes and vapor formed a little cloud inside the large ball. Dr. Reeper had built a device inside that cloud that produced electrical sparks.
As the mini-volcano puffed dark smoke upward, a little crackle of lightning shot across the cloud inside the ball. Dr. Reeper tapped the glass gently.
“You see, when lightning strikes clouds of gas, strange reactions occur, and scientists have discovered that these reactions can sometimes lead to the formation of the most basic chemicals that life on Earth needs. These chemicals are called amino acids.”
“But why?” said Whippet. “What do you want them for?”
“Because,” said Dr. Reeper, a sinister look crossing his face, “I am trying to create life itself.”
“What a load of garbage,” said Ringo under his breath.
But Zit sounded more intrigued than his leader did. “Sir,” he said thoughtfully, “there’s lots of life around us. Why would you need to make some more?”
“There is on this planet,” replied Dr. Reeper, giving him an approving look. “But what about on another planet? What about another planet where life has not yet emerged? What would happen if we went there and took life with us?”
“Sounds a bit stupid to me,” said Ringo. “If we go to a new planet, there won’t be anything there, so there’ll be nothing to do.”
“Oh, unimaginative boy!” cried Dr. Reeper. “We would be masters of the planet! It would be all ours.”
“But hang on a minute,” said Whippet, somewhat suspiciously. “Where is this planet? And how are we gonna get there?”
“All good questions,” said Dr. Reeper. “Come and have a look over here.”
He walked over to the other side of the room, which was covered with a huge picture of space and stars. In one corner there was a red circle around a couple of little white dots with lots of arrows pointing at it. Near the red circle was another circle drawn in green—except that the green circle seemed to be empty. Next to the map were white boards covered with diagrams and crazy-looking scribbles. There seemed to be some kind of link between the scribbles and the star poster.
Dr. Reeper cleared his throat as the boys gathered around him. “This, children, is the future!” he said, waving his hands toward the crazy scribbles. “Our future! I expect,” he continued, “you have never given a moment’s thought to what I do when I’m not teaching you at school.”
The group nodded, agreeing that no, they hadn’t.
“So let me save you the trouble. I”—Dr. Reeper drew himself up to his full height so he towered over the boys—“am an expert on planets. I have worked all my life on planets, trying to find new ones.”
“Did you find any?” asked Whippet.
“I found many,” replied Dr. Reeper proudly.
“But don’t we know them all, like Mars or Saturn or Jupiter?” asked Whippet again.
The other boys nudged each other. “Oooh,” whispered Tank. “Who’d have thought it? Whippet’s trying to be teacher’s pet.”
“No, I’m not,” huffed Whippet. “It’s just interesting, that’s all.”
“Aha!” said Dr. Reeper. “You are right! We know all the planets that are around the star closest to the Earth, the star that we call the Sun. But I am looking for other ones! I am looking for planets that are around other stars, planets that are very far away. You see,” he continued, enjoying having his class—or a few of them, anyway—actually listen to what he said for a change, “a planet is not an easy thing to find. I have spent years collecting data from telescopes, and I have looked at hundreds of planets in space. Unfortunately, most of the planets we have found so far are too close to their sun, making them too hot to support life and be habitable.”
“That’s not gonna help then, is it?” said Whippet, sounding disappointed.
Dr. Reeper pointed at his star map. “But wait,” he said, “I haven’t told you everything yet. Out there in space are extraordinary, fantastic things, things that until now we have only been able to dream about. But the time is coming when all that will change, when man will go out across the cosmos and inhabit the whole Universe. Just imagine, boys, if we were the first to discover a whole new planet.”
“That’s like that TV show,” said Zit cheerfully, “where everyone gets on a spaceship and goes to a new planet, where they get eaten by green aliens.”
“No, it’s not like that at all!” snapped Dr. Reeper. “You must learn to distinguish between science fiction and science fact. This planet here that I have found”—his finger traced the red circle drawn in the corner of the map around the white dots—“could be the new Planet Earth.”
“But it looks like this new planet is pretty far away,” said Whippet doubtfully.
“Yes, it is,” agreed the teacher. “It is very, very, very far. So far away that if I had a phone conversation with someone there, I would need to wait several years between the time I ask a question and the time they reply, just because of the time it would take my question to travel there and their reply to travel back again.”
“Did you talk with them on the phone?” the four kids said in unison.
“No, no, no!” said Dr. Reeper in an annoyed voice. “I said if I had. Don’t you understand anything?”
“But is there anyone out there?” Zit persisted, hopping from foot to foot in excitement.
“That’s hard to tell,” said Dr. Reeper. “So I need to get out there and have a look.”
“How are you going do that?” asked Ringo, who was feeling interested now in spite of himself.
Dr. Reeper gazed into the distance over their heads. “I have been trying all my life to get into outer space,” he said. “Once, I nearly made it. But someone stopped me, and I have never been able to forgive him. It was the greatest disappointment of my life. Ever since then, I’ve been looking for a way. And now I’ve got another chance. That’s where you boys come in.” Dr. Reeper reached for the letter in his pocket. “Here is the letter that we spoke about in the driveway. Take it to George’s friend. His name is Eric. Drop it in his mailbox and make sure no one sees you,” said the teacher as he handed the letter over to Ringo.
“What’s in it?” asked Ringo.
“Some information,” replied Dr. Reeper. “Information is power, boys. Always remember that.” Facing his star map and pointing with his burned hands toward the red circle drawn around the bright dots, he said, “And the information contained in this letter is the space location of this amazing new planet Earth number two.”
Whippet opened his mouth to speak, but Dr. Reeper interrupted him.
“Drop off the letter tonight,” he said, cutting short any questions. “And now it’s time for you to go,” he added, hurrying them back out into the hallway.
“What about the cash?” asked Ringo sharply. “When do we get our money?”
“Come and see me on Monday at school,” said Dr. Reeper. “If you’ve delivered the letter, I will pay you handsomely. Now go.”
