The Prodigy

Young Alfred sat slouched in his chair, arms folded across his chest. He had an expression on his face that was obviously intended to send a message to his teacher. He did not want to give a show-and-tell presentation. He was not in the mood to stand in front of the class of six-year-olds, explaining to them the small object in his desk that he had brought from home.

Alfred waited for a classmate to conclude his theoretical analysis on the tooth he had lost recently, and groaned as the teacher called him to the front. "Miss Clabwach, I'd rather not." The teacher merely looked at the boy and said, "You know the rules, Your Eminence. Just because you happen to be a prodigy who has an IQ rivaling Einstein's, you still must participate in show-and-tell."

"Fine," uttered the boy, more to himself than anyone else. He opened his desk and pulled out the brown paper bag with the small object in it. He fastened his radiation mask firmly in place and donned a pair of gloves before pulling the glowing object from the bag. "This," he said, "is the first fully functional proton accelerator confinable in a cylinder the size of this Duracell battery."

"Oh, how nice!" said the teacher. "And what does it do?"

The boy rolled his eyes and reached into his pocket for his portable headphone stereo microamplifier and inserted the battery. "I recommend the application of auditory reduction equipment," said the boy.

"Earplugs, children!" shouted the teacher as she dived beneath her desk. Then the boy tapped the power button.

Needless to say, the soundwave created by this leviathan power source shattered the foundations of the buildings in most of the surrounding states and caused earthquakes and tidal waves in California and Japan. The Earth was hurled out of orbit, so Alfred felt obliged to solve the problem. He designed a plan to restructure the entire planet and aerodynamically send the Earth back into orbit. Soon after, he was nominated to win the Nobel Prize for Science and Humanity. Unfortunately, he decided that it was more important for him to receive a full education, so he went back to second grade.

Just like any other normal kid.


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