The Wonderful Baron Doppelgänger Device

by Eric Bower

  The Bizarre Baron Inventions

  The Wonderful Baron Doppelgänger Device

  Eric Bower

  Amberjack Publishing

  New York | Idaho

  For Brigitte & Curt, the real M & P.

  My Pants Proved How Wrong I Was By

  Falling To the Floor

  November 13th, 1891

  “I’m the real me! He’s the fake W.B.!” I shouted, pointing at the fake me.

  “No, I’m the real me! He’s the fake W.B.!” the fake W.B. shouted, pointing at me.

  Well, now I’m out of ideas.

  P frowned as he looked at me, then he looked at the fake me, then at me again, then at the fake me again, and then he looked at his horse Geoffrey and smiled.

  “I really love our new horse,” he told my mother.

  “McLaron, please focus!” M ordered.

  “Right,” P said as he turned back to me and the fake W.B. “W.B. and . . . other W.B., there is only one way to be certain which one of you is telling the truth.”

  He held up a funny looking device that resembled a combination between an alarm clock and a wedge of cheese.

  “This,” he announced, “is my newest invention. It is called the Gänger-Doppel Device. And what does the Gänger-Doppel Device do, you ask? Well, I’ll tell you. It reverses the effects of my Doppelgänger Device, which is the invention that turned one of you into a perfect copy of my son. All I need to do is point the Gänger-Doppel Device at you and press this button, and then the fake W.B. will be transformed back into whoever he or she really is.”

  I looked over at the fake W.B. He was beginning to sweat. But then again, he looked exactly like me, and I tend to sweat a lot.

  In fact, I felt my forehead and realized that I was sweating too.

  “Why are you touching my forehead?” the fake W.B. asked me.

  Oops. We look so much alike that even I’m confused about which one is the real me.

  “Sorry.”

  “Go ahead and use the Gänger-Doppel Device on them, McLaron,” M told P as she nervously clutched his arm. “I want my son back.”

  P frowned. Then he looked at Geoffrey and smiled again.

  In P’s defense, Geoffrey really was a clever horse. We were all quite fond of him.

  M tweaked P’s nose, and he once again focused on me and the fake me.

  “There is a slight problem with this invention, Sharon,” P told M. “You see, if you use the Gänger-Doppel Device on someone who hasn’t had the Doppelgänger Device used on them first, it will try to reverse and undo who they are, which can’t be done, since they already are who they are. Understand?”

  “Huh?” I said.

  “Huh?” the fake me said.

  I’m glad that the fake me was just as confused as the real me. Otherwise, I would have been rather embarrassed. I may be slow, but at least I’m as slow as myself. I nervously ran my fingers through my hair.

  “Why are you running your fingers through my hair?” the fake me asked.

  “Sorry. I thought it was my hair.”

  “What are you saying, McLaron?” M asked P. “What happens if you use this Gänger-Doppel Device on the real W.B. instead of the fake W.B.?”

  “Basically, what I’m trying to say,” P said as he nervously licked his lips, “is that if I use it on the real W.B., it will turn his skin inside out.”

  ???

  . . .

  !!!

  For a moment, no one spoke.

  I wasn’t certain of many things, but I was pretty darn certain that I didn’t want to have my skin turned inside out. I was actually quite used to having it outside in, or right side out, or whatever it’s called when your skin is the way that it’s supposed to be. I didn’t know what would happen to a person who had their skin turned inside out, but I imagined that it wouldn’t be too pleasant. At the very least, it would be terribly messy.

  Are you confused?

  You look confused. You’re scratching your head more than usual, which means you’re either confused, or you forgot to wash the soap out of your hair during your bath. Don’t feel bad. I do that all the time.

  Maybe I should start at the beginning. I’m currently at the end, where things aren’t going too well for me, and if I start at the beginning, maybe you’ll understand why.

  My name is Waldo Baron, but since I consider Waldo to be the second worst name in the world, I prefer to be called W.B. instead. My parents, who I call P and M, are two of the cleverest inventors who have ever lived. They used to have an assistant named Rose Blackwood (who happens to be the little sister of Benedict Blackwood, the worst criminal in the history of history) who lived with us, but because of an incident involving the Doppelgänger Device, Rose decided to quit working for my parents and moved out.

  Actually, she was arrested and put in jail, but I’ll get to that later.

  We live in a large home just outside of Pitchfork, Arizona Territory, and we call our home the Baron Estate. We live there with my Aunt Dorcas, who has what I consider to be the first worst name in the world. She is a weepy and frumpy woman, who is bothered and annoyed by everything. But once you get past all her whining and crying and complaining and off-key singing, she’s really . . . alright, she’s still pretty awful. But there isn’t anything that I can do about it.

  You know what? I just realized that if I start from the very beginning, I’ll need to tell you about a whole lot of unimportant stuff. Let me skip to a few weeks before the Doppelgänger Device ruined our lives. That lousy invention is the reason why I’m currently standing at the edge of a cliff with a fake W.B. who is claiming to be the real me. It’s also the reason why there’s now a fifty-fifty chance that my father will press a button on his new invention that will cause my skin to turn inside out.

  You see, it all began six weeks ago . . .

  The entire class pointed at me and laughed.

  Most of my stories start with a large group of people pointing at me and laughing. I suppose I should be upset by that, but, to tell you the truth, it’s kind of nice that I’ve given so many people joy. At least they don’t all point at me and cry. That would be depressing.

  “Class, please don’t laugh at Waldo,” my teacher Miss Danielle said as she sighed and gently rubbed her eyes.

  I winced. I’d rather be covered in honey and dropped on an anthill than be called Waldo, and I’m not exaggerating one bit by saying that. You might be telling yourself that I’m underestimating how horrible it would be to actually be dropped on an anthill while covered in honey. But just last week I really was covered in honey and dropped onto an anthill, so I know exactly what I’m talking about.

  In case you’re wondering who did that to me, it was me. I accidentally did it to myself. I was making myself a bacon and honey sandwich, accidentally fell out of the kitchen window, rolled down a hill, and ended up covered in honey and ants.

  I’m what you might call a little bit clumsy.

  Alright, that’s a lie. I’m what you might call insanely, ridiculously, unbelievably, comically, bafflingly, astonishingly, horribly, wonderfully, incomparably, undeniably, bewilderingly, extremely, astoundingly, unforgivably clumsy . . . and even that is letting me off a bit easy. I’m the sort of kid who, while he’s asleep in bed, will accidentally roll out of a second story window, and then land on a horse that bucks him into a swamp, where he’ll drop into an alligator’s open mouth, and then be coughed up into a raging river, which ends in a fifty-foot waterfall drop.

  That actually happened to me last month
, when my family visited the state of Louisiana. It was not a highlight of the trip. In fact, after I dropped off the edge of that waterfall, I experienced very few highlights. I spent the rest of my time in Louisiana with so many bandages wrapped around me that I looked like a mummy. All I could do was lie there and moan, wishing that the accident had happened closer to Halloween.

  Anyway, the children were all laughing at me because our teacher had asked us each to give an oral report on what we did over the weekend. My teacher really likes assigning us reports to present to the class but, for some reason, she never seemed to enjoy hearing mine. I guess it’s because I often give reports about the adventures that I have with my inventor parents and their assistant, Rose Blackwood. And I suppose that our adventures must sound a bit ridiculous to most people. They sound pretty ridiculous to me as well. If I wasn’t there to experience them, there’s no way I’d believe they were real. In fact, even though I had been there to experience them, I’m still not 100 percent certain that they were real.

  Suddenly, there was knocking at the schoolhouse door.

  As Miss Danielle went to answer the door, I slipped for no reason and bumped my head on the edge of her desk, before scurrying back to my seat in the corner of the room. Why did I slip and bump my head? I don’t know. You might as well ask me why the grass is green, why the sky is blue, and why you get that gross, crusty stuff in the corners of your eyes after a good night’s sleep.

  I know that there are perfectly reasonable scientific answers to all those questions. But I don’t know them, just as I don’t know why it is that I happen to be the clumsiest two-legged creature on planet Earth.

  The whole class watched with interest as Miss Danielle opened the schoolhouse door. We never had visitors in the middle of the day.

  Standing in the open doorway, with a stack of books in his hands, was a short kid with curly black hair. Even though he was dressed the same way that most of us were dressed, the other kids in class all turned to each other to whisper about how funny looking the new kid was.

  I turned and pretended to whisper to my friends too, even though I don’t have any friends, and, even if I did, I would have nothing to whisper to them. I didn’t think the new kid was particularly funny looking. He just looked like any other kid. To be honest, he looked boringly average, like the sort of kid who would easily blend into the crowd while walking down the street. It wasn’t as though he had an eye patch or a mustache or a wooden nose or something.

  “Class,” Miss Danielle said, as she led the new kid to the front of the schoolhouse, “this is Belford Eustace Nigel Egbert Doolittle Ignatius Cattermole Threepwood Whitestone the Third. He will be joining our class. Please make him feel welcome.”

  That was our cue to give the new student a round of applause, but our hands were all frozen in shock, as we stared in disbelief at the poor kid who sounded as though he had been named after the entire British army.

  I suppose Waldo wasn’t that bad of a name after all.

  The new kid’s cheeks turned as red as a freshly picked apple.

  “Actually,” he said to Miss Danielle, as he cleared his throat, “if you don’t mind, I prefer to be called B.W.”

  I smiled.

  “Nonsense,” said Miss Danielle as she led B.W. to his new seat. “You have a perfectly wonderful name, Belford Eustace Nigel Egbert Doolittle Ignatius Cattermole Threepwood Whitestone the Third. In fact, I quite like saying it. It’s sort of like a tongue twister. I wonder if I can say it five times fast. Belford Eustace Nigel Egbert Doolittle Ignatius Cattermole Threepwood Whitestone the Third, Belford Eustace Nigel Egbert Doolittle Ignatius Cattermole Threepwood Whitestone the Third, Beltnerd Birdsnest Egnelforp . . . oh drat. Let me try again. Belford Eustace Nigel Egbert Doolittle—”

  While our teacher entertained herself by repeating the new kid’s name as quickly as she could, B.W. sat beside me and took a shy glance at the rest of the class. The other children continued to whisper about him, taking the time to point and chuckle so B.W. would know for certain that they were whispering about him.

  “Why are they doing that?” B.W. whispered to me.

  “I don’t know,” I whispered back.

  “Oh. Do you know what they’re saying?”

  “I’m not sure. I’ve never been a part of the whispers before. Maybe they’re discussing the best way to hide their webbed toes and hairy backs during the summertime?”

  B.W. giggled. “Maybe. Or maybe they’re discussing the most effective way of using their thumbs to remove their earwax?”

  I snickered. “Or maybe they’re discussing—”

  “Waldo Baron and Belford Eustace Nigel Egbert Doolittle Ignatius Cattermole Threepwood Whitestone the Third, stop whispering to one another,” Miss Danielle ordered. “Otherwise, I’ll have to separate you two.”

  I looked over at B.W. and smiled. He looked back at me and smiled as well.

  Nothing helps two kids become friends like getting into trouble together.

  When the teacher announced that class was over, the other children quickly poured out of the schoolhouse. B.W. and I were the last two students left. That’s because B.W. was being given a special homework assignment by Miss Danielle, and I had somehow managed to get my belt stuck in my desk.

  “I am assigning you an oral report to give to the class tomorrow,” Miss Danielle was telling B.W. “I expect your report to last at least thirty minutes.”

  “Does it matter how slowly I speak?” B.W. asked.

  Miss Danielle thought for a moment.

  “No. I suppose it doesn’t. But I want your report to include a full description of where you used to live, the school you used to attend, what you like to do for fun, what your parents do for a living, and what you would like to accomplish while here at Pitchfork School.”

  “All of that?” B.W. asked with a frown. “But what if I can’t remember some of those things?”

  “You could just make them up?” I suggested while I tugged at my belt.

  “Absolutely not!” Miss Danielle loudly declared, turning up her nose in disgust as though I had just suggested B.W. go on a cross-country crime spree. “If you tell lies, as your friend W.B. often does when he gives his ridiculous reports about his family, you will become well acquainted with the corner of the classroom, as well as the inside of the dunce cap.”

  She went to the closet and pulled out the dunce cap so she could show it to B.W. It was a long, pointy cap that had “DUNCE” written on it, and the inside of the cap was shaped exactly like my head. It was shaped like my head because my head was quite familiar with that cap. I wore it almost every day.

  “It’s not so bad,” I told B.W. “It keeps your head warm in the winter.”

  B.W. laughed. He thought I was joking. But just wait until winter comes along, and we’ll see who the one with the cold head is. It’s not going to be me.

  “W.B., will you please unhook your belt from your desk and go home,” Miss Danielle said, then she sighed. “While I’m happy you finally made a friend, I hope you two won’t turn out to be bad influences on one another.”

  I looked at B.W.

  B.W. looked at me.

  My teacher was right. I had finally made a friend at school. After all those years of the other children treating me like something brown and slimy they’d found stuck to the bottom of their shoes, I finally had someone on my side, someone who wouldn’t point and laugh at me, someone I could whisper to while the other children were whispering as well, someone who could warn me if another kid was stuffing a rat into my book bag or slipping itching powder into my socks or locking me in the closet with a pack of angry dogs. I didn’t understand how B.W. and I could be bad influences on one another. I finally had a friend in town, and the new kid had his first friend in Pitchfork.

  What could be wrong with that? Nothing, I thought to myself. Nothing could be wrong with
that.

  Looking back, I realize that I’ve never been wronger about anything in my life. And I’ve had some impressive moments of being pretty darn wrong.

  “Absolutely not,” I told the teacher, as I undid my belt so I could unhook it from my desk. “We’ll be good, Miss Danielle, I promise. We won’t be any trouble at all. Everything will be alright.”

  And as Miss Danielle turned around to erase the blackboard, my pants proved how wrong I was by falling to the floor.

  Why Would A Horse Want Sequins On Its Hat?

  I asked B.W. if he wanted to come over to my house after school. He told me that he’d like that, and that his father wouldn’t mind if he got home a little bit later than expected. So we made the long walk together, over the sandy dunes of the Pitchfork Desert, back to the only home I’d ever known: the Baron Estate.

  As we walked, I told B.W. all about my family. I let him know that my parents were very brilliant and very odd inventors, which meant that he should prepare himself for a very strange afternoon. Last month, a kid had come over after school so we could work on a report together, and when he saw my father using one of his newest and weirdest inventions (the invention he called his “Mecha-Trunk”: a long, mechanical tube he attached to his nose and mouth, which he could use to suck up and shoot water, like an elephant’s trunk), the kid had run away screaming. It wasn’t the first time that someone had run away from the Baron Estate while screaming, and I’m pretty sure that it wouldn’t be the last. People are frightened of things they don’t understand, and even though I’ve lived with my parents all my life, I can’t say that I understand them particularly well either. But I’m used to them, so I don’t get frightened when I see them acting strangely. Frankly, I don’t have much of a choice.

  I liked B.W., so I gave him a fair warning. I told him that while he’s at the Baron Estate, he should expect the unexpected. And by that, I meant that he should expect to see some baffling and crazy things, like maybe my mother using our Bigging Machine to make herself as tall as a mountain, or my father testing a pair of mechanical legs that allowed him to run as fast as a cheetah.