Buster Slydale opened his eyes and saw the bright sun pouring through his window and could feel the soft breeze on his face. He immediately got out of bed and looked out his window. He blinked as he looked out into the sunlight.
It was one of those lazy spring days in Sylvania. After months of winter, the trees were finally green and the sun was shining bright. The sky sparkled blue, boasting its cloudless perfection. The air was warm and a light breeze blew from the west. It was the perfect day to have a picnic, take a slow raft ride down the river, or maybe just snooze in the meadow on a bed of soft new grass with the sun as your blanket. But no matter what sounded like the perfect activity, the day was too perfect to spend indoors.
“What a perfect day,” he thought to himself, “and it’s even Saturday!” He immediately dressed, brushed his teeth and went downstairs. He slowly peeked around the corner and looked into the kitchen. His younger sister Scarlett sat at the table trying to convince their baby brother Skitter to eat his cereal instead of throwing it on the floor. But neither his mother or father were in the kitchen. So Buster walked in and grabbed a corn muffin.
“Buster,” called Scarlett, “would you help me feed Skitter? He’s being awfully fussy this morning, but he always eats when you feed him.”
“Sorry,” answered Buster, “it’s the perfect day out and I’m off to enjoy every second of it.” With that, he headed out the door munching on his muffin as he went.
“Hold it right there, young man.” Buster’s father Slick had just entered the kitchen to hunt down his own corn muffin. Buster stopped on the doorstep and slowly turned around. His father looked at him sternly.
“Buster, you promised the clean out the garage this morning.”
“Oh, but Dad,” Buster whined, “The weather is perfect out. I can’t spend all day inside cleaning out the garage.”
“No buts,” countered his father. “You promised me last night when you wanted to watch that movie on TV instead of cleaning out the garage.” His father looked at him thoughtfully for a moment. “Besides, if you get right to work, it shouldn’t take you too long to clean it. You will still have the whole afternoon to play.” Buster sighed. There was no arguing with his dad. He very slowly walked towards the garage.
What a mess. His father was always collecting odd bits and pieces of things and trying to make new inventions out of old junk. Sometimes he came up with some really neat ideas, but most of the time they ended up in piles in the garage. He was certainly not an inventor like Ernest Evergreen. Buster picked up a few items and placed them on shelves, and threw a couple of old rags away. He found some pieces of scrap wood and carried them outside to the woodpile. Again he felt the sun and the cool breeze. He also saw Scarlett, with Skitter squirming in her arms, leave the house to meet her friends and enjoy the beautiful day. Buster sighed as he returned to the dark garage.
“I’m never going to get this done,” he said to himself as he looked at the mess. “I wish there were two of me, so I could go out and enjoy the day while my clone cleaned out the garage.” Then an idea hit him. Maybe it was possible that there could be two of him. Ernest Evergreen was always inventing new machines; maybe he could invent a cloning machine, and make him a clone to do his work. Buster grew excited as he thought about having a clone. He would never have to do chores like cleaning the garage again!
Buster abandoned the messy garage and ran all the way to Ernest’s workshop. But when he got there, Ernest was nowhere to be found. So Buster walked up to the Evergreen’s house to see if Ernest was at home. Instead he found Ernest’s grandson, Logan.