On a massive dockside platform just outside of the Marine Air Station, several large trucks were being unloaded. Cranes lifted heavily wrapped pallets out over the water. Here the great base portion of the undersea dome floated with the aid of giant inflatable pods. Dozens of workmen on the floating base, unpacked triangular panes of transparent Astridium, fitting them together like a huge jigsaw puzzle. Others constructed an internal frame that would hold the three floors in place. Paige Liebowitz carefully oversaw the operation.

“Is everything going okay?” asked Astrid, running up to her.

“Everything is on schedule,” the wavy-haired woman replied. “We should have the floors constructed this morning and the dome assembled by this afternoon. Then tomorrow we can float it out to the site. The foundation has already been laid using hydraulic cement just north of the reef at a depth of 175 feet. So we just sink it down and bolt it in place. While that’s going on, the workmen here can assemble the Astridium elevator.”

“It’s going to have an elevator?” asked Mr. Diaz, from behind Astrid.

“Sure,” she said, turning around. “That way people can go back and forth from the surface without having to scuba dive. It also serves as an airlock, since the dome will be kept at a pressure of one atmosphere inside.”

“I thought it was going to be down deeper,” said Mr. Brown.

“The Astridium can withstand the pressure up to a depth of 300 feet,” explained Astrid. “I chose 175 feet for two reasons, one being safely. This is a test after all. Plus, I want the people in the dome to be able to see without a lot of external lighting. At 300 feet, it gets pretty dark.”

“We have a construction ship coming on site tomorrow. It has cables to guide the dome down, and a crane to lower the elevator shaft,” explained Paige. “We’ll attach it to the dome and then pump out the water.”

“What’s in all those crates?” Mr. Diaz asked, pointing to a truck just pulling up.

“Equipment for inside and furniture,” replied Astrid.

“And that is my cue,” said Mr. Brown. “I’ve got to make sure that my chairs and lounges are set up properly.”

“Martin and I are going to roll up our sleeves and do some manual labor,” said Mr. Harris, as he and Toby’s father joined the workmen assembling the dome.

“Sound like fun,” said Dr. Maxxim.

Over the next several hours, Astrid watched as her dome slowly took shape, rising first to form a ring and then growing up until it became a geodesic dome—a half sphere fifty feet tall and one hundred feet in diameter. She moved from spot to spot around the dome, checking the Astridium panes and double-checking the fastenings. The three scientist/engineers who had taken on jobs as workmen had a great time, but Astrid was sure that they had actually increased the construction time by at least an hour. Mr. Brown however had successfully loaded all the furniture and equipment on board, and had overseen the installation of all the vital mechanisms.

“I’m starving,” said Dr. Maxxim, exiting out of the open emergency airlock along with Mr. Harris and Mr. Bundersmith, all three of them looking exhausted and happy.

Mr. Diaz, who had been working with a liaison from the Marine Corps all morning, guided them toward the van.

“I’m told there’s a pizza shop right around the corner,” he said.

“Pizza doesn’t sound very Hawaiian,” said Mr. Harris.

“Hawaiian Pizza,” replied Mr. Diaz.

The music thumped so loudly as they walked into Epicenter, that Astrid thought she could feel her internal organs bouncing around. The vast nightclub was filled with hundreds of teen-aged boys and girls, bouncing up and down to the throbbing beat. Strobe lights inside mimicked the spotlights outside. A few small tables and chairs sat around the perimeter of the dancers and a vast bar stretched across the back of the room, right below a metal catwalk which was just as full of twisting teens as was the dance floor.

“Come on!” shouted Penelope over the din. “Let’s dance.”

She grabbed Astrid’s hand and pulled her along through the gyrating crowd to the center of the club. Turning to face her niece, she threw her arms over her head and tossed her black hair, dancing in perfect time with the now louder-than-ever music. Astrid copied her as best she could.

“I don’t usually dance with girls!” Astrid shouted to make herself heard.

“What?” shouted back Penelope.

“You’re a great dancer!”

“What?”

Astrid gave up trying to communicate and waited until the space between songs to talk. There was no space between songs though. The throbbing beat continued on right into a different track—this one the girl inventor recognized from her own MX-360 favorites list. She kept dancing and by the end of the second song, began to feel well-exercised. Though the thumping baseline continued, the next song was slightly less loud.

“I don’t usually dance with girls!” Astrid repeated.

She was loud enough this time that several other dancers around her laughed.

“I’m just chumming the waters,” said Penelope. “Look around. You have plenty of boys waiting to dance with you.”

The young inventor glanced around and sure enough, there were half a dozen boys forming a circle around her.

“How do I pick one to dance with?” she asked, but Penelope was already moving away through the crowd. A tall, dark-haired boy took her place as another song thrummed into existence. Without a word, he started dancing. Astrid followed along.

She couldn’t have said how long she had been dancing, but after seven or eight dance partners, Astrid was exhausted and dripping with perspiration. She waved off a disappointed-looking and rather short boy with blond hair and started through the crowd toward the bar. The counter was two or three patrons thick all along its extent. Apparently a lot of others had the same idea that she did. Reaching forward, she waved for one of the servers.

“Here, have a drink,” said a voice right beside her.

Astrid turned and found herself nose to nose with one of the boys she had danced with. He was handsome and about sixteen years old, with brown hair and green eyes. He pushed a tall glass with a red straw toward her.

“No thanks.”

“They don’t serve alcohol here,” he said. “All the drinks are just soda.”

“I don’t know you though,” said Astrid. “I don’t take drinks from anyone I don’t know.”

“Sorry,” she called to him, as he turned with a frown and melted into the crowd.

“Astrid,” said Valerie, shyly. “Have you thought about what you can do to take care of Valerie’s problem?”

“I thought you were Valerie,” said Penelope. “I’ve been calling you Valerie for years now.”

“I am Valerie. I meant Robot Valerie.”

“Oh yes,” said Penelope. “I still can’t believe your robot, Astrid. It looks so realistic.”

“She’s not exactly my robot,” said Astrid.

“And I’m not an ‘it’,” said Robot Valerie.

“Sorry,” said Penelope. “What is the problem that Valerie… I mean the other Valerie was talking about?”

“Let’s go back to my room, and I’ll show you,” said Astrid.

Penelope and the two Valeries followed the girl inventor inside and down the hallway to her bedroom. Denise trailed them, carrying her plate of crepes. Once in her room, Astrid pulled out a dome-shaped shiny steel object.

“Here is your scalp,” she told Robot Valerie. “We’ll attach it after we remove your hair unit.”

“I’ll be bald!” gasped Valerie.

“That’s not what Valerie wanted at all, Astrid,” said Regular Valerie.

“No, don’t worry,” said Astrid. “We’ll put hair on it once we have it installed. I just haven’t decided what to make the hair out of yet. We could use wire or fiber-optic cable, I suppose.”

“Why don’t you just wear a wig?” Penelope asked the robot girl.

“We tried a few wigs,” replied Valerie’s flesh and blood twin. “They just didn’t look right with her metallic skin.”

“Wait right here,” said the young woman, stepping out of the room.

Astrid, the two Valeries, and Denise looked back and forth at one another. A moment later Astrid’s aunt was back, carrying a metallic blue wig.

“Here you go.”

“How come you have a blue wig?” wondered Astrid, cocking an eyebrow.

“I like to wear it when I go out dancing. It’s a good one—real synthetic hair.”

“Can you fix it for me now, Astrid?” asked Valerie.

The young inventor retrieved her pocket toolkit from her suitcase and removed a dozen tiny screws that held the solid hair-shaped molded scalp to Valerie’s head, replacing them once she had fitted on the new scalp piece. Then she used Maxxim Wonder Glue to fasten the wig to the metal. Penelope and Valerie carefully styled the new wig once it was in place, and minutes later, Robot Valerie was smiling at her image in the mirror.

“I look like Katy Perry!” she exclaimed happily.

“At least you look like you stole Katy Perry’s hair,” said Denise.

Denise was lying face down on a chaise lounge, her long blonde hair draped from her head all the way through the slats in the chair down onto the ground. As Astrid approached, she saw that a bottle of sun block was lying on the pavement beside her.

“Did you use that sun block?” asked Astrid.

“I couldn’t reach my own back, could I?” asked Denise, without looking up.

The girl inventor sat down beside her friend and began applying the lotion to Denise’s back. Looking around, she saw that the tiny cloud had moved on and the sun was shining warmly. A gentle breeze was just enough to ruffle the many flowers without moving the trees. When Astrid was done, Denise sat up and returned the favor by applying sun block to Astrid’s fair skin.

“Where are they going?” asked Denise, nodding her head toward the path that led down to the beach.

Astrid turned to see Toby, Christopher, and Austin heading toward the ocean, carrying snorkels and fins. Austin already had his facemask on.

“They’re taking Austin snorkeling.”

“You don’t suppose he’ll drown, do you?”

“Not as long as Toby and Christopher are there,” replied Astrid. She didn’t need to ask Denise who she thought might be the drowning victim. Disaster had a way of seeking out Austin. “Speaking of Christopher, what’s going on with you two?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, the two of you went to the Spring Fling together. Has he asked you to the Junior Prom?”

“Not yet,” replied Denise. “I don’t know if he’s going to ask and I don’t know if I want him to.”

“I thought you liked him.”

“Well of course I like him. But we’re such good friends that when we think about being anything more than friends, it just gets weird.”

“Come on,” said Astrid. “Let’s try out this pool.”

The pool was roughly oval in shape, with a table and umbrella built into one end. A person could swim right up to the table and have a seat without even getting out of the water. Astrid entered the water, doing a perfect jack knife off the diving board at the other end. Denise followed with a one and a half forward flip. They swam laps for a while and then pretended they were synchronized swimmers, before getting back out and drying off in the sun.

“Astrid! Denise!”

Neither girl needed to look to recognize the owner of the voice, but they did look up just in time to see Valerie and her robot twin bouncing toward them. Following behind them were Valerie’s parents and Astrid’s mom and dad, and behind them—Astrid’s aunt Penelope.

“Look who we picked up in Denver,” said Mrs. Maxxim.

Penelope Maxxim could have been Astrid’s sister rather than her aunt, since only eight years and two inches separated the two of them. They shared a great family resemblance, with similar large, expressive eyes and cute button noses, but Penelope’s jet-black hair was a contrast to Astrid’s strawberry blond.

“Surprise!” said Penelope, as Astrid hopped up to give her a wet hug.