"Uh oh," Sarah said as she took in the pile of rubble that was all that remained of Dr. Octavius's lab. "It looks like Vance beat us over here."

"Oh well," Pauline shrugged. "I guess we can't switch back bodies now. Such a shame."

"Hang on," Sarah said. "My uncle mentioned it was a possibility the lab might be destroyed by the time we got here. I'm sure he had some sort of contingency plan in place. He said if this were to happen we should stand at the end of the street and moo like a cow."

"Oh, I'm good at mooing," Danielle said. "I won a contest at the state fair when I was eleven."

"Now that's a random skill to have," Sarah said. "But also highly useful in our current predicament."

"I practiced every day for two months because I really wanted to win the prize that came with first place."

"What was that?" Pauline asked.

"A yo-yo," Danielle said. "What? I was eleven. And it was a really cool yo-yo. I got really good at that, too, and then I won first place in the yo-yo competition at the next year's state fair when I was twelve."

"Yeah?" Pauline asked. "And what was the prize for that one?"

"Oddly enough, it was a cow. My parents made me give it away though because we didn't have anywhere to keep it."

"Man, I never did anything fun like that when I was a kid," Sarah said.

"I did!" Maurice piped up. "I built intricate models of famous spaceships from science fiction movies. The best I ever won was third place though."

"Did you win any prizes for that?" Pauline asked.

"Just a little certificate with my name on it," Maurice said. "I got it framed and it's still hanging up in my bedroom."

"Eh," Pauline said. "That sounds pretty lame. I'd rather win a cow any day. They're very interesting conversationalists, you know."

"Sci-fi nerds are really interesting conversationalists, too," Maurice sniffed.

"Whatever, dork," Pauline said. "Let's hear this famous moo of yours, Danielle."

"I'm probably a little out of practice," Danielle said. "I mean that competition was a while ago, although I do still moo in the shower sometimes just for fun. Anyway, here goes nothing." She cupped her hands around her mouth and let out a long and surprisingly low-pitched moo sound.

"Sarah?" a small high-pitched voice said. "Is that you?"

"It's me," Sarah said. "Is that you, Uncle Oscar? Where are you? I can't see you."

"Hang on a second," the voice said. "The effects should be wearing off momentarily. Ah, here we go."

Dr. Octavius and Lothar suddenly materialized directly in front of Sarah and her companions.

"What the heck?" Sarah said with a start. "Where did you guys come from?"

"Well, it's a bit of a complicated story," Dr. Octavius said. "As you may have noticed my lab has been blown up."

"Yeah, we can see that," Pauline said.

"Oh, my goodness, you found Pauline!" Dr. Octavius said. "That's wonderful news."

"Yes, yes, I'm here," Pauline said. "We can have a celebration later. Now make with the explanations."

"Well, I'm afraid your friend Vance dropped by and delivered on his threat to destroy my lab."

"He's not my friend," Sarah said. "I hate that jerk. I figured he was probably the culprit since he also just blew up the diner we were eating in."

"Oh no, it wasn't Sal's Famous Diner was it?" Lothar asked.

"No, I think it was called Smelly John's or something like that," Danielle said.

"Shwoo," Lothar said. "That's a relief. Sal's makes the best anchovy and cherry casserole in town. Plus, Sal owes me some money."

"So how did you guys escape?" Sarah asked.

"Well, this is where things get a smidge complicated. You see, there was a time travel door in the room with us. Or there used to be. I'm sure it got destroyed in the blast. Ironically, considering said time travel door, we didn't have a lot of time to work with. Lothar here was able to set the dial to take us about one minute into the past before Vance snapped his fingers and we leaped through, likely just in the nick of time. Luckily Vance himself provided a suitable distraction when he blew the front door off its hinges on his way in. Nobody even noticed us popping out of the time travel door."

"I saw us come out," Lothar said. "But I had the presence of mind not to say anything. That's also how I knew to set the dial back."

"Yes, well at any rate, Vance was unaware that there were two versions of us in the room, as was everybody else except apparently for Lothar here. So while our past selves engaged Vance in conversation, the versions of us that went through the time travel door remained hidden by crawling underneath the work table. We knew we couldn't change the past, therefore we couldn't do anything that hadn't already happened, including attacking Vance or anything along those lines. Fortunately, I remembered I still had my shrinking ray. You remember the shrinking ray, don't you, Sarah?"

"Yes, all too well," she said with a roll of her eyes.

"It was too heavy to shove into Lothar's door where we stashed most of my equipment and I figured I didn't have much use for it these days so I wasn't too concerned with it getting destroyed, which I'm sure it is now considering it was still in the building when the detonation occurred. It proved its worth one last time, however, as I utilized it to shrink us down to a small enough size that we were able to survive the explosion."

"So that was the high-pitched buzzing sound Vance heard," Lothar said.

"Indeed it was. Luckily for us, he did not figure out what was going on and the two of us were able to drift through the air harmlessly. We just blew out into the street like dust particles when the lab went boom. I set it to only last a few minutes, so I knew we would resume our normal sizes shortly after I heard your moo. Nice job on that, by the way. If I didn't know better I'd have thought someone of the genuine bovine persuasion had been here."

"That was all Danielle and her prize winning cow impression," Sarah said.

"It was nothing," Danielle blushed. "Just a stupid little trick."

"There is nothing stupid about a job well done, young lady," Dr. Octavius said. "Be proud of your achievements."

"Speaking of achievements," Maurice piped up. "It was really impressive how you were able to switch Pauline's and my mind into each other's bodies, but don't you think it's about time we switched back?"

"You mean you don't wish to remain a chicken forever?" Dr. Octavius asked. "I should think you would be getting accustomed to it by now. Perhaps growing to like it."

"That's how I feel about this human body," Pauline said. "It's pretty cool. Opposable thumbs really do live up to the hype, if I do say so myself."

"Being a chicken's all right, I guess," Maurice said. "Having a neck wattle is neater than you'd think. But there's definitely nothing like inhabiting your own body when it comes right down to it."

"I'm definitely not okay with him staying a chicken," Sarah said. "We have a wedding planned in a few days, in case you forgot. No offense, Pauline, but I don't want to be betrothed to a chicken."

"Inter-species marriages are all the rage these days," Pauline said with a sniff. "Get with the times, honey. But I suppose I'll agree to being a chicken again. It'll certainly make it easier to roost. I tried sitting on some eggs the other day in this body and that was nothing but a disaster, I'll tell you what. I think I might still have some dried yolk and pieces of egg shell on my tush."

"Yes, well, we're definitely getting you into the shower once you're all switched back, babe," Sarah said.

"Couldn't agree more," Maurice nodded.

"Well, there's not much I can do about your predicament here, what with my lab being blown up," Dr. Octavius said. "Luckily the doorway back to Earth should still exist, especially since those two young men just placed it there. Although I suppose technically they placed it there a while ago since they were back in time when they did so. If we travel back to my Earth lab, I can get your bodies sorted out in a jiffy. And it would likely provide a nice quiet space to work on our Vance problem. Lothar, you want to come with us so we can put our heads together?"

"Yes, I've already been thinking quite a bit on the matter of energy containment. If we could stop by the invisible door we hid so I could grab a few items, I believe I have a few preliminary ideas already."

"Then off to Earth we go!" Dr. Octavius shouted.

"What do you think, Danielle?" Sarah asked. "Are you ready to go home?"

"No, I don't think I am yet," she said. "But if you want to show me where this doorway back to Earth is, it would be good to know. Just in case."