Free Floors #3: The Field of Wacky Inventions by Patrick Carman

hide, and the two of them took a good look. There was an image carved into the stone that did look a little bit like a strand of DNA — two lines twisted together so they resembled a barbershop pole. Above the marking were two buttons — one red, one blue.
    “I found that first,” a voice said from a ways off. Leo turned and saw Miss Sheezley standing on top of a boulder about twenty feet away, peering down through thick fauna. She wasn’t about to come anywhere near Phil.
    “Hey, Remi! Hey, Alfred!” Leo yelled as loud as he could. “Can you guys hear me?”
    “Yeah!” Remi yelled back from about fifty feet in the opposite direction of Miss Sheezley. “But not very well. Yell louder.”
    “There’s a puzzle here!” Lucy screamed — and, wow, she could really belt it out. Leo was pretty sure even Merganzer could hear her yelling from outside.
    “You sound like a girl!” Remi said as he laughed. “Hilarious!”
    Lucy looked at Leo curiously.
    “Your friend sounds goofy,” she said.
    “He’s my brother — well, stepbrother, but really my brother. He’s a hoot. You’ll like him.”
    “And Alfred has wandered off somewhere, looking for clues,” Remi called out. “He’s in here somewhere.”
    Lucy smiled and her button nose flattened out against her face. She turned her attention to the puzzle.
    “I know how to solve this. It’s not what you think.”
    Leo looked again at the symbol and the two colored strands. It did look like DNA, and he, like Bosco and Sheezley, assumed he’d find a dino enclosure with a creature that matched the DNA, along with some buttons to push. It wasn’t much, but it was a start.
    “Which dinosaur does this DNA match?” Leo said. “I bet that’s where we should start. There must be some markings on the enclosures somewhere.”
    Lucy wasn’t buying it. She had very different ideas about the puzzle.
    “Would you mind terribly if I solved it for you? I’ve been wanting to do it for a while, but it takes two people and there’s only one of me.”
    Leo felt suddenly sad for Lucy and wondered how long she’d been living on the floor and how she’d come to be there. And it was a complicated puzzle. He didn’t think Lucy stood a chance of solving it, but he nodded anyway, just to encourage her.
    Lucy stepped up to the puzzle and then turned in Remi’s direction.
    “Hey, kid!” Lucy screamed.
    “His name is Remi,” Leo offered.
    “Who you calling kid?” Remi shot back. “And what’s with the weird impersonations?”
    “Are you all right over there?” Alfred Whitney yelled. He had returned to Remi’s side only a moment before, hobbling in from the deep of the jungle.
    “I’m fine! Just follow the instructions!” Leo yelled back.
    “Whatever you say, Leo-patra,” Remi cackled. He was getting a real kick out of Leo’s voice talents, even if he had no idea why Leo was practicing them.
    Lucy took charge, barking out instructions in rapid succession.
    “If you push the vines away from the left side of the ladder, you’ll see two buttons. Push only the red one.”
    There was a pause, then Alfred yelled back, “Done!”
    Lucy turned to the puzzle and pushed the red button. A whirling sound emanated from behind the stone wall.
    “Now the blue button! Push that one!” Lucy screamed.
    “I tell you, that’s my puzzle!” Miss Sheezley yelled. She had come down off the rock and was marching toward them with a new sense of purpose.
    “Should we sic Phil on her?” Leo asked.
    Lucy pushed the blue button. “Come on, run!”
    “Wait, where are you going?” Leo asked, but he followed anyway, running in line behind her toward Remi and Alfred. He looked over his shoulder and saw Sheezley burst through the leaves onto the path, taking chase.
    “Now grab the ladder by both sides!” Lucy cried. “And twist it as hard as you can. Don’t stop twisting until it stops!”
    Leo understood now — the puzzle image wasn’t a DNA strand at all. It was the ladder that