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By Root 1187 0

He’d taken the old dehumidifier from the basement and plugged it and a desk lamp and fan in with extension cords. Along the wall were two sets of metal shelves lined with jars and vials of ingredients he’d collected or created to make his breeder reactor. Books his grandfather had given him were propped on one shelf: Atoms to Electricity and Nuclear Power, Friend or Foe? alongside a framed black-and-white photograph of his much younger grandfather, in a white lab coat, at the University of Iowa. Another shelf held Otis’s logbook and a notebook and drawings he’d made, plans. He loved that word. Plans. It made him want to rub his hands together and cackle.

And he loved all his tools and equipment, no matter how humble others might find them to be. From a nail in the corner hung a paper mask and rubber gloves and a cracked lead-lined suit, one he’d pilfered a while back from the chemistry lab at school—he wouldn’t really call that stealing, since they’d been about to throw it away. On the table, beside the stolen clock, sat a blowtorch and a frying pan and a Bunsen burner. Also on the table lay his most prized possession—his neutron gun. He’d fashioned it from a block of lead with a hollowed-out center in which he would place a chunk of fuel.

Stored in the corner were boxes of defective smoke detectors he’d bought at a discount from First Alert, so that he could remove the americium chips and weld them, with a blowtorch, into a big ball. Originally he’d planned to use americium as fuel, because it was easier to find. Granddad had been the one to suggest smoke detectors as a source for americium. He always answered Otis’s questions and gave him practical suggestions to what he thought were hypothetical questions about how to obtain ingredients for a breeder reactor, without having any idea that Otis was actually following his advice. Of course, the fact that the old man had dementia helped along these lines, but it seemed that dementia was also making his grandfather act flakey.

What was the deal with his grandfather getting locked in his shed? Had the old woman really pushed him in, or had something else happened? Had Granddad and the old woman been snooping around together? How had they found the key where he’d hidden it in the crook of a tulip tree? Otis never allowed anyone into his shed. Had his grandfather forgotten that the shed was off limits? This was another reason that he needed to hurry and finish his reactor. Before too long his grandfather would be completely gone, either mentally or physically or both. Otis wanted to surprise him with the completed reactor—surprise and impress him and make him proud. He wanted to be just like his grandfather when he grew up, only smarter and richer and more famous.

Atomic energy was Otis’s passion, had been ever since Granddad had sent him some old nuclear energy textbooks that spoke in glowing terms about the future of nuclear science, about massive power and thrilling discoveries. His grandfather was the only other person Otis knew who shared this passion. Everyone else was afraid of it and refused to recognize its possibilities. So the two of them had exchanged letters about the textbooks—the old man refused to try e-mail—and spoke on the phone at least once a week.

But after Grandma died, when he was still living in Iowa, Granddad started losing his memory. He’d be driving to the grocery store and get lost. He forgot to take his medications and missed doctor appointments, wore dirty clothes to church, and didn’t pay his bills. People from Iowa City called his mother all the time to report on his worrisome behavior. Mom cried about it, and Dad tried to comfort her, and eventually the two of them drove up to Iowa and moved him down to Florida. They gave him the guest bedroom down in the walk-out basement, where Otis had his room. Now that he lived right in the same house, his grandfather was even more available to discuss nuclear energy and answer Otis’s questions about how to get materials for his reactor.

And he was making great progress. He’d already spent an afternoon