S itting in the middle of Grampa Al’s backyard junk pile, 
Frank Einstein consults his Energy notebook.
“Here are the basics we need to know,” says
Frank. He continues:
“Energy is what makes everything happen.
“Energy is a property of matter.
“Energy comes in many forms . . . like light, heat, sound,
electrical, chemical, mechanical, and nuclear.
“Energy cannot be created or destroyed. But it can be
transferred from one object to another. And it can be
converted into different forms.
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energy is applied. The pushes and the pulls that get things
moving.”
“I have added jets to my legs to get things
moving,” says Klank. “Watch!” 
Klank pushes a new green button on his side panel. Small
rocket motors on the bottoms of his metal feet fire up
with a low, roaring blowtorch sound.
Klank rises slowly up off the ground.
Watson checks the engines. “Saturn V F-1 booster
rockets! Nice!”
Klank rises higher. He turns his feet right and flies
left. He turns his feet left and flies right.
“A perfect demonstration of all three of Newton’s
Laws of Motion!” says Frank.
“Huh?” says Klank.
Klank rises higher.
“One: An object at rest will stay at rest unless a force
acts on it.”
The tiny rockets roar a bit louder. Klank zigs and zags
around the backyard a bit more wildly.
“Two: When a force acts on an object, that object
will move, speed up, slow down, change direction. The
greater the force, the greater the change of movement.
What are you using to control the thrust?” asks Frank.
“What is that?” yells Klank.
“Thrust!” repeats Frank, now shouting above the
building roar of the rockets. “The amount of energy
the engines are pushing out!”
“OHHHhhhh,” says Klank, bouncing off the brick wall
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of the back of Grampa Al’s Fix It! shop. “I have not
figured that ooooouuuuuuttttt . . .”
Klank flies around the yard, bouncing off walls, fences,
telephone poles, and wires. His legs flop. His legs twist.
His legs wrap around each other. And he roars straight
up into the sky.
“Three: For every action, there is an equal and opposite
reaction,” says Frank.
“Point your feet up!” yells Frank.
Klank points his feet up. He stops rising, turns in a big,
 jet-propelled curve, and rockets back down to earth, into
Grampa Al’s backyard, with a SMASH BOOM BLAAAANG,
crushing three old metal file cabinets, a shopping cart,
and a baby grand piano.
Klank’s foot rockets sputter out and go quiet.
Klink rolls over to Klank and helps untwist his legs.
“Nice demonstration of Newton’s Three Laws,” says
Watson.
 Phooomph!  goes one last blast of a rocket in Klank’s
left foot.
“I am going back to a safer form of energy ,”
says Klank. “Badang badang. Badang a-lang a-ding
dong. Boogie bing bong.”
And Klank goes out.
tricity since birth, shocking the doctor who deliv-
ered him with a jolt of baby-JS static electricity. He
is the author of The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs!,
The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales,
 Battle Bunny, the Time Warp Trio series, and 4,832
other stories. He is the founder of Guys Read (a web-
based literacy initiative for boys), and served as the first
National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature.
He lives in Brooklyn, New York, and is still scientifically
shocking.
Cynthia Rylant, and Katherine Applegate,
and is the writer and illustrator of
the Everything Goes series.
He lives in Philadelphia.