Many Worlds of Albie Bright (6 page)

I can feel my eyes starting to leak. Dad was wrong. Quantum physics is a load of rubbish. Parallel universes don’t exist. You only get one world. You only get one mum. And I’m never going to get to see mine again.

Angrily, I rub my eyes and that’s when I notice
that something’s not quite right.

On the poster of the solar system above my bed there should be eight planets lined up from left to right: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. But this poster seems to show nine instead.

I shake my head, thinking I must have rubbed my eyes too hard, but when I look again there’s still a brand-new planet between Jupiter and Mars.

I stare at the poster in disbelief, trying to make sense of it. Instead of the asteroid belt there’s a bright-purple planet hanging in space where no planet should be. The caption on the poster gives me its name. Ceres.

When I realise what this means, I can’t stop myself from smiling. Dad’s book said that in a parallel universe there might just be one tiny change. Well, I reckon a brand-new planet in the solar system must count as a pretty big one. The Quantum Banana Theory really works. I must be in a parallel universe.

“What the—”

The sound of my own voice makes me spin round. Standing in front of me I see – well, me. The same face, the same hair, the same school
uniform. It’s like looking into a mirror except this Albie isn’t wearing BMX body armour, gardening gloves and a Scary Clown Halloween mask worn back to front.

I open my mouth to start to explain exactly who I am, how I’ve travelled from a parallel universe and how everything’s going to be OK now.

And that’s when this other Albie punches me in the face.

Sir Isaac Newton invented gravity. Well, he didn’t invent it but he definitely discovered it. One minute he was sitting under a tree minding his own business and the next minute an apple falls down out of the tree and clonks him on the head. Most normal people would just think “Ouch!” or “Why did I decide to sit under this flipping tree?” But Sir Isaac Newton was a scientist and instead he wondered why apples always fall down and not up.

Newton worked out that gravity was the reason why, and came up with his three Laws of Motion to describe how
things move scientifically. Newton’s Third Law of Motion says that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. So when this alternative-universe Albie hits me in the face, I end up hitting the floor.

Now, it’s not like he knocks me out with a single punch, but when I step back in surprise at being hit in the face I trip over a pile of comic books, bang my head on the edge of the desk and knock myself spark out.

When I open my eyes again I discover I’ve been gaffer-taped to a swivel chair by my evil twin from a parallel universe who’s now leaning over me holding a compass set. And from the expression on his face it doesn’t look as though he is planning to use it in a very mathematical way.

“What are you doing in my bedroom?” he says, menacingly jabbing the compass in my direction.

I try to explain how I’ve used a quantum computer, a Geiger counter and a banana to travel from another universe inside a cardboard box. How I’m searching for my mum and to make everything right again. I even want to ask if he’s seen my next-door neighbour’s cat, but with the gaffer tape
over my mouth this all comes out more like “mff-SMURGLE-FLURGLE-GURGLE-mff!”

As well as my mouth, my arms and legs are wrapped in gaffer tape too, pinning me to the chair. I try and pull myself free, but this just spins the chair around and I end up tipping myself sideways.

This other Albie leans forward, the point of his compass now dangerously close to several of my vital organs as well as a few others that probably aren’t so vital but that I’m still kind of attached to. In my chest my heart is beating faster than an atom whizzing round the Large Hadron Collider. OK, maybe not quite that fast, as that would result in a serious heart attack, but fast enough to show that I’m pretty freaked out by the whole situation.

It’s not because I’m scared, although the compass is definitely keeping me on my toes. It’s the total weirdness of seeing my own face staring back at me. You might think that you see your own face in the mirror every day, but you never see your face in the same way as everybody else does. The face you see in the mirror is reversed. If you’ve got a spot on your right cheek, in the mirror it looks like it’s on the left. Try it yourself – hold this book up to a
mirror and you’ll see the words on the page are the wrong way round. So this was the first time I’d ever had the chance to see what I
really
look like. And to tell you the truth it’s kind of creepy.

This parallel-universe Albie – I’ll just call him Bad Albie for short – has the same green eyes, the same dark-brown hair, the same mouth and nose, and even the same mole on his cheek as me. I can even see parts of my face that you can never see properly in a mirror – like inside my ear and that bit under my chin. All these features are put together in exactly the same way, but this Albie looks different to me. He looks mean.

“I know what you are,” Bad Albie hisses, reaching up to pull the tape from my mouth. “You’re a clone.”

“Ow!”

Now, I should put him right straight away, but I’m too busy checking that he hasn’t ripped off half my face along with the gaffer tape.

“So this is the secret science project that my dad’s been working on for the past year?” he says. “All the time he said he was working on perfecting cold fusion when really he was creating a clone of me.”

As Bad Albie babbles in my ear, my stomach takes
a nosedive – a delayed reaction to travelling into a parallel universe, I suppose – and I throw up all over the floor.

“Aw, no! Not on my X-Men comics.”

Luckily, spewing my guts up over his comic-book collection convinces Bad Albie to take off the rest of the gaffer tape that’s keeping me prisoner. After using a towel to cover up the sick, he sits on the edge of my bed – I mean, his bed – staring at me.

“You’re not going to puke again, are you?” he asks. “That must be the side effect of all the cloning drugs my dad’s given you.”

I’m still feeling pretty sick, but I manage to shake my head in reply.

“I’m not a clone,” I tell him.

Bad Albie laughs sourly.

“Of course you’re a clone. Just look at you.”

In my bedroom there’s a mirror on the wall facing me, and as I glance up I see that this universe has got the same. My reflection stares back with this alternative Albie sitting next to me – the two of us creating our own mirror image.

“So what was my dad’s plan?” Bad Albie asks. “Create a new happy family with the real me out
of the picture? Get you to kidnap me and take my place so you can play the part of the perfect son? Am I too much trouble for him now he’s the superstar scientist on every TV screen? Isn’t it enough that he leaves me stuck here in this stupid village while he jets off to the White House? I know Dad said I was on my final warning after that last detention at school, but I didn’t think that meant he’d replace me with a programmed clone.”

My head spins as Bad Albie spits out his crazy theory. I might be in a parallel universe, but it doesn’t sound like much has changed for my superstar scientist dad. But what’s all this nonsense about kidnapping and clones…

Wait a minute. “What do you mean, the White House?”

“Durr!” Bad Albie pulls a face like he’s talking to the most stupid person in the universe. “Have the cloning drugs fried your brain too? It’s where the President of the United States lives.” He pulls out his mobile and swipes the screen.

“Take a look. My dad tweeted this a couple of hours ago.”

I look down to see a picture of Dad’s face staring out from his Twitter profile.

My evil twin taps on Dad’s latest tweet, which zooms out to fill the screen of his smartphone.

Beneath this tweet was a photo of my dad in the Oval Office of the White House. He’s shaking hands with someone who looks like a Hollywood film star, his broad smile dazzling the camera while my dad just pulls a geeky grin like he can’t quite believe who he’s shaking hands with. Neither can I.

On his TV show Dad usually rubs shoulders
with pop stars and celebrities – you know, pushing stand-up comedians wearing suits made out of Mentos mints into dunk tanks filled with Diet Coke. But this picture shows him shaking hands with the President of the United States in this parallel world.

I look up at Bad Albie as he swipes the photo away. I’m beginning to realise that a brand-new planet between Jupiter and Mars isn’t the only difference between his universe and mine. In this universe, Dad’s Twitter profile says he is the inventor of cold fusion, but I don’t have a clue what this means.

“What
is
cold fusion?”

The expression on Bad Albie’s face hardens into a frown.

“Don’t you know anything, Clone Boy?” he sneers. “You’re not going to be able to fool anyone that you’re me if you don’t even know a simple fact like that. Cold fusion is my dad’s brilliant invention that should have made him a billionaire. Nuclear energy from a fusion generator the size of a microwave oven. The power of the stars in every home and business across the world – safe, cold and clean. No more global warming, no more food shortages, no more poverty. Unlimited energy
helping to solve every problem the world has ever known. All given away for free by my dad’s stupid charity – the C.E.B. Foundation.”

This alternative-universe Albie is really starting to annoy me. My dad might be a scientific genius in this parallel world, but why am I such an idiot? I try to stay calm. I didn’t come here to get into an argument with myself. I came here to find my mum.

“So what does Mum think about all this?” I ask him, trying to keep the sarcasm out of my voice. “Surely she’s going to have something to say if she finds out Dad’s planning to swap you for a clone?”

Bad Albie stares at me like I’ve just asked him to jump into a black hole.

“My mum’s dead.” He spits out the words one by one, his face flushed with anger. “She died of cancer when I was just a baby.”

My heart seems to freeze in my chest. No. She can’t be dead. Not here. Dad said that quantum physics proved that Mum was still alive in a parallel universe. But according to Bad Albie this just isn’t true.

“You’ve probably got her name stamped on the sole of your foot,” he says, still staring at me with
hate in his eyes. “The Charlotte Elizabeth Bright Foundation makes all of my dad’s inventions now – from cold fusion to clones. He said he named the charity after my mum to keep her memory alive, but he can’t wait to forget about me. You’re the proof of that.”

I glance up at the poster of the solar system above Bad Albie’s head, staring blankly into space. The bright-purple planet between Jupiter and Mars starts to blur as the tears leak from my eyes. A parallel universe might have one tiny change, Dad said, and in this universe I’ve got the wrong one.

The black hole in my heart aches even harder. If I had a Death Star I’d blow this brand-new planet to smithereens. But deep down I know this wouldn’t bring Mum back.

I wipe my eyes angrily. I feel like I’m losing her all over again, but this other Albie doesn’t even seem to care.

Behind him I can see the cardboard box, still on its side. In the shadows at the back, endless lines of zeroes and ones scroll across the screen of Mum’s laptop. It’s still hooked up to the Geiger counter with the banana resting alongside, all ready to go radioactive again. All I need to do is wait for
Bad Albie to turn his back and then I can crawl inside that box and escape from this stupid parallel universe.

But he’s still staring at me, an evil grin slowly spreading across his face.

Suddenly I feel like I’m in one of those cartoons where Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck are both starving hungry and Bugs starts to imagine that Daffy has turned into a giant hot dog. At least that’s the way Bad Albie seems to be looking at me now.

“What?” I ask him, still trying to work out how quickly I can get inside the box.

“If my dad’s made a clone to keep me in line then you better start earning your keep,” he says. “If he wants me to behave myself at school, then
you
can go to school for me instead.”