Professer Plum

• Delilah Harris, Grade 6
• Short Story
• 2020

Professor Plum forced himself into his laboratory.
Working days on end, he was famished.

Leaning on his messy desk, gently tweaking the beaker, he observed the dangerous orange liquid bubble and splash as it danced to the bunsen burner heat.

Head in arms, eyes shut and a floppy body. Asleep.

A spark flickered across Professor Plum’s face.
A warning. A signal. Still he rested on.
The potion angrily grew and grew.

The entire basement (well, ‘lab’) was filled with the now revealed behaviour-extraction-cloud-potion.
“Zaoshang hao yangguang!”
Plum was woken by ‘Atmosphere’ the Ragdoll cat… mysteriously speaking Mandarin!

The cloud was escaping.
“Oi liai!” Plum exclaimed, exasperatedly. Unlocking the door, this mad scientist realised he’d made a BIG mistake.

“Ratiko khana mero pyari tyara cha!” (Dinner’s ready, cutie!) Plum’s mum called out in Nepali. Prof. Plum didn’t understand so he proceeded to search his dishevelled bookshelf of recipe books he had been stealing from Nonna Aldina’s cooking cupboard. You would be surprised how they come in handy in an evil lair!

When he finally came across ‘Fagiola all’insalata’ Professor Plum hastily grabbed the ingredients, adding in snail brains and a handful of Atmosphere’s messy, static fur. A few hours later the concoction was ready but he had a problem: how to convince every villager to let him rub oily beans and snails on their feet.

Plum thought it would be better if it appeared an accident.
“Knock on the door, start talking, go in, trip over and spill the potion over their feet. Apologise and wipe the Fagioli all'insalata ‘off’ (but sneakily rub it in.) A masterplan!”

Professor Plum quickly realised this was harder than it looked. The nice people were mean and the mean people were nice and what’s more they were talking in random unidentifiable languages. Who knows what they were saying!

Despite this he worked through each of the villagers, answering all the various questions in ranging languages, the giant orange cloud growing bigger and thicker by the second.

There, it was done. But why wasn’t the cloud disappearing? The new antidote had been ‘spilt’ on everyone's feet. Oh well, back to the drawing board. Stumbling through the endless toxic cloud Prof.Plum made it home, staring downwards. Wait! His own feet! That’s why it wasn't working. Immediately he rubbed the Fagioli all’insalata into his tired, well used toes.

Done! Now everything would return to normal and professor Plum wouldn’t work on his potions again! Wait, no! It hadn’t happened, it didn’t disappear. He had gotten the recipe wrong. He trudged down the stairs.
“Ratako khana!” (dinner!). “Not now, mum,” a dejected Professor Plum replied.
Hang on!!
“Mama, do you want a foot massage?”
“Bilkula!” (absolutely!) she replied enthusiastically. The missing piece! He rubbed the ‘massage oil’ in. A split-second after, the cloud (and the new language) disappeared.

I wish I could end the story here but the next day the silly professor crept down to his lab, I think you know what happened next!...