Peter watched as his father put the finishing touches to his latest and most ambitious invention yet — a time machine.

Peter’s father, Mr Brainy, was a scientist, working in one of the world’s most advance and best laboratories. For years he had been working hard inventing things but all of them either didn’t work in the end or were not considered to be of much use by Mr Brainy’s boss, the director of the lab. Mr Brainy had been given one last chance to prove himself otherwise his contact would not be renewed.

So Mr Brainy gave his best to come up with the world’s first time machine which was to be presented in the most prestigious science competition in the world. The competition was to take place the next day and Mr Brainy happily admired his work with his son beside him.

The machine was in Peter’s room as it had enough space and his father was using Peter’s computer to programme the machine. Mr Brainy said goodnight to Peter and told him to go to sleep as they needed to get up early the next day.

Once Mr Brainy left, Peter lay down on his bed but he couldn’t sleep. He was too excited. Peter kept glancing towards the time machine wondering if it would work the next day or not, hoping that his father would not be disappointed again.

Unable to contain himself, Peter decided to start the time machine and turn it off quickly just to be satisfied that it was working. Mind made up, Peter jumped out of the bed and stood by the machine. He was both excited and nervous. He was unsure about touching his father’s beloved project without his permission. But then his curiosity took over his sensible side and Peter climbed into the small operator’s cabin of the machine.

Before he realised it, the door closed. Did he close it himself or it closed by itself? Peter wasn’t sure but he now started feeling very nervous… or was it excitement that was making his hands shake?

Peter sat down on the seat and looked at all the buttons and control panels around it. It was silent and almost dark inside, except for some light from his bedroom that was coming in from the glass screen of the machine. Peter now felt as if he was in a new world, forgetting both his nervousness and excitement. He pressed the start button and moved a lever by its side that had ‘Turbo’ written on it. He knew this was how the machine started because he had been told so by Mr Brainy. Suddenly there was light, thunder and then everything started to shake….

The next morning Mr Brainy was busy dreaming of being awarded for his invention and he had to be woken up by his wife, who told him to get ready while she made the breakfast. The first thing that Mr Brainy did on getting up was go to Peter’s bedroom and the first thing he did on getting inside Peter’s bedroom was scream, “What?”

His wife quickly rushed to see what had happened and when she reached Peter’s bedroom, she too screamed — Peter was missing and so was the time machine! The two looked at each other in disbelief, realising that Peter had gotten into the time machine and goodness knew where he was.

Peter’s mum started to cry and Mr Brainy quickly switched on Peter’s computer and once the screen came alive, he tried to connect to the time machine’s computer and controls. A few minutes passed and he could not access the time machine’s controls. He tried again. There was a bit of buzzing sound and then silence again. Now he too started to panic.

“Have I lost my son and my invention together?’ he thought to himself.

Once again, after taking a deep breath, he started punching the keyboard, trying to connect with the programme he had so carefully created but which seemed not to work now.

Finally the screen showed the image of a scared Peter sitting in the time machine, looking wide-eyed out of the glass screen. Happy that he could now make contact with the machine, Mr Brainy quickly punched a couple of commands and the small monitor in the machine came alive and Peter was startled to see his father and hear his voice.

“Dad! Dad! Help me please!”

“Calm down Peter, I am here! You’ll be fine, just listen to what I say carefully and do what I tell you to do,” Mr Brainy then started giving instructions to Peter. “Okay now push the lever on your right downwards,” he said finally.

Peter did as he was told but the time machine stood still where it was, stuck in some other era.

“Dad, nothing is happening. Please get me out of here, I can see weird creatures around me!” Peter spoke in a shaky voice, trying his best to control his tears.

Mr Brainy suddenly had an idea, he punched a few more commands and then both Peter and the time machine disappeared from the screen… and there was a loud noise that almost made Peter’s parents jump. Both Peter and the time machine were back in the room. Once the machine turned off, Peter opened the door and came out and rushed straight into his parents’ arms.

After sometime when Peter became normal, he narrated how he had been literally lost in time inside the machine, seeing strange worlds as he travelled through time, sometime into the future and sometimes back in the past, the eras changing as he pressed different buttons trying to get back home to the present.

It clearly wasn’t a pleasant experience and he didn’t want to have anything to do with it anymore. And after hearing his tale, Mr Brainy realised that a time machine isn’t really such a great invention as anything can go wrong and people can get ‘lost in time’.

Mr Brainy then decided that this invention of his would remain a secret which he would destroy as soon as he got the time because now he had just a few hours to fix up any of his other experimental inventions so that he could present it in the science competition.

Well readers, the robot that could do any homework a student asked it to do, exactly in the same writing as that of the student (so that the teachers never get to know who actually did the homework) didn’t win any prizes at the competition, but it did get Mr Brainy’s contact renewed and soon became a very popular and bestselling robot.