A/N- This story is almost finished! Only two more chapters after this one and then it's on to the sequel! After I take a breath of course. Because of that, the structure of this chapter may feel a little odd...it definitely feels that way to me. Basically, I had two very important things to get across in this chapter...and so you might find one particular character a little bit missing...but don't worry, there's a point for that too!

The Frozen Ones

The kids rushed back into the house after spending two hours at the zoo. Carl trudged in behind them. Had he had them, his hair would be tussled and his clothes ripped. Instead, he sported a few scuff marks and one of his arms definitely felt like it needed a tune up. "Aren't you out of energy yet?" He asked with a sigh as he shut the door behind him.

"Come on!" one of the boys shouted. "You're a robot! You should have enough energy to keep up."

"And you should have enough manners to be nice to him," one of the girls shouted back.

"Okay, okay," Carl had a bad feeling about where the conversation was leading. And sure enough, a bunch of the kids began yelling among them. "Please, it's not a big deal. Please!"

"Poor, Carl," Talia heard the robot's pleas and moved over to comfort him. "Where's Tallulah? She could help."

"That would be nice," Carl shook his head. "She's on a date."

"Everybody shut up!" Buzz yelled above the noise causing all of the other kids to become silent. "What did you say?"

Carl looked around in amazement, realizing that Buzz's outburst had worked. He now felt obligated in repeating himself, even though he knew it would create a whole new dilemma. "I said that Tallulah isn't here because she's on a lunch date…uh…meeting is more like it though."

"She can't date someone who isn't me!" Buzz exclaimed. "I was willing to wait for her!"

"Buzz, she would be the one that would have to wait for you. You do realize that, right?" Carl looked at him curiously. "I'm telling you, it's not really a date. It's just someone who wants to help her with her fashion designs."

"She's a fashion designer!?" the girl who Tallulah had comforted the night before asked excitedly. "That's why she dresses so nice!"

"Well, she's not a fashion designer yet. But she wants to be," Carl tried to explain, feeling a little uncomfortable as all of the girls crowded around him wanting as many details as they could get.

"Hey, give him some room," Buzz commanded. "So, you're telling me that it's not a date?"

"No, at least I hope not," Carl answered, and then realized what he had said. It shocked him, but apparently the kids didn't think anything of it.

"It better not be," was the only response and that was of course from Buzz.

"So, do you think she'll show us some of her designs if we ask her?" one of the girls asked.

"Absolutely. Those designs are her pride and joy and believe me, she loves showing them off," Carl answered. "In fact, how would you like to see them now?"

--Inside The Time Machine--

"Finally, the future where I can breathe easy again!" Camila exclaimed as the time machine blasted out of the time stream and into the sky just above the outer limits of TodayLand.

"Maybe not," Wilbur decided to be a killjoy. "We can't breathe easy again until that machine is fixed and Lewis is back in the past. I'm already going to be in so much trouble as it is," the thought of the inevitable punishment that was on the horizon, and growing nearer, was all Wilbur could think about now that they had a greater chance at fixing the machine.

"You know," Lewis didn't miss the opportunity to reprimand his future son. "Maybe you should think about the consequences before you mess with any of my inventions."

"But come on!" Wilbur argued. "You're an inventor and I'm an inventor's son. It's my job to mess with your inventions. It's like an unwritten rule or something."

"Emphasis on the unwritten," Lewis spat back, causing Wilbur to let go of the wheel and turn to face his dad's younger self.

Camila, who was also sitting in the back of the green time machine, realized immediately what could happen. She jumped to the front seat, using Wilbur's head as a lobby and took hold of the wheel. "If you're not going to drive then I will!"

"What!? Not happening. Girls do not pilot time machines unless they're my mom and even then that's almost never," Wilbur fought for control over the wheel, causing it to jerk this way and that.

Immediately, Lewis remembered his first trip to the future and what had happened when he and Wilbur had fought over the steering wheel. "Both of you stop now!" he yelled in a voice that echoed the not to be messed with voice that Wilbur was used to hearing from Cornelius. Both Wilbur and Camila let go of the steering wheel as Lewis also jumped into the front in order to take over as pilot. "Now I want the both of you in the backseat. And if I hear so much as a word, whimper or whine from either of you, I will see to it that you are both grounded until I you die or I die, is that understood?" Wilbur and Camila both nodded and moved to the backseat as quickly as possible. "Okay now, good. I need the fastest route to the house, because re-entering this dimension from the time stream drained quite a bit of Carl's battery," Lewis said as he looked at the reader he had attached to Carl for the trip. He was grateful that he had also thought to put Carl in sleep mode while his circuits did all the work. He could just imagine how Carl would have started panicking as the time machine jerked left and right at the hands of two stubborn kids.

"The fastest route is left at the next junction, straight for about two miles, right and then straight for another mile until you see the house," Wilbur answered.

"Thank you," Lewis was glad to at last have some cooperation and silence as he drove forward.

--A Fancy Restaurant--

"Do you need this seat?"

"Yes, I'm waiting for…" Tallulah looked up from where she had been staring at her empty salad plate nervously and realized that it was Johnny Vantino. "Or I suppose I could let you have it," she answered playfully.

"I thought you'd see it my way," Johnny smiled and took a seat across from Tallulah. "I'm glad that we were able to get together. I mean, I would have made time for you again, but I'm seeing a lot of different people over the next few weeks for my uncle's sake and I wanted you to be the first."

Tallulah blushed slightly, "I'm, wow, I'm flattered."

"Flattery has nothing to do with it when someone is genuinely talented," Johnny answered, not wasting any time whatsoever. "And you are definitely talented. I could barely take my eyes off of the sample design you submitted to my uncle's company. And then my cousin Trish said the designer wasn't half bad either," he said with a smile, proving that he was pretty confident with himself and his choice of words.

Tallulah, on the other hand, wasn't feeling as confident. In fact, she felt slightly uncomfortable by the amount of praise she was getting from someone she had only just met, even if she knew it was praise that she had been hoping for over the past few days. "I'm sure you say that to all of the girls you meet," she used the most cliché line she could think of, hoping to hide her lack of ease with the conversation. "So, how is Trish? I haven't talked to her since her trip to Paris."

"Well, you know Paris. It takes a person who was a nobody, makes them think they're a somebody, and makes them impossible to get along with anybody," Johnny laughed. "That's the fashion industry for you though. Once you hit fashion week in Paris, you've arrived."

"And now Trish has arrived and I'm not exactly standing at the same destination?" Tallulah asked knowingly.

"She's done the same to all of her friends, unfortunately. I've scolded her for it, but she won't hear a word. She's had one hit line and suddenly she's forgotten where she was before she was lucky to have people think that her design had potential," Johnny sighed. "It's one of the things I hate about this business. It turns people into versions of themselves that they never realized could exist. That's why I make sure I'm not the one designing. Sure, I could, but I don't want that life. I want to be me."

"So, instead of designing for your uncle, you find designers for your uncle. You have a lot of willpower to settle like that. I wish I could settle so easily," Tallulah sighed, not really sure where the source of it came from.

"No, no you don't, trust me. Once you settle once, it comes naturally over and over until again, you've created this completely different version of yourself," Johnny responded quickly.

"I'm impressed," Tallulah said with a smile. She couldn't deny that she had expected someone slightly more lacking in depth.

"Hey, even fashion pros can be deep," Johnny defended with a laugh. "Actually, I minored in psychology."

"Well, then I stand corrected for judging a book by its cover."

"No worries," Johnny smiled again. "I'm a little guilty of pre-judging you too. I mean, no offense, I kept wondering if you were partly made of wood when my cousin first told me about your mom. But she assured me that you weren't when I finally asked her."

"I'm used to that one," Tallulah felt the ever familiar insecurities that surfaced every now and then from her childhood. After all, it hadn't been easy growing up with other kids who thought it was strange that her mother was a puppet. Some would even accuse that it was all a lie and that she wasn't really a Robinson at all but was adopted or something of that sort and that Fritz should be institutionalized. And these memories came flooding back every time someone new learned about her mom.

"Are you okay?" Johnny noticed that Tallulah had suddenly become distant. "I've offended you haven't I?"

"No, of course not," Tallulah answered graciously. "Just sort of hit a raw nerve that's all. I guess you could say I'm still always waiting for people to label me when they learn that my mother's a puppet. It's not you, really. I do it with everyone, well, except my brother and my family and…now I'm rambling."

"You're fine. I understand. Besides, this is the year 2038. It's not that weird anymore. I mean, it's not like she some robot or something," Johnny laughed but then kicked himself when he realized that Tallulah had become non-responsive again. The truth was, the mention of a robot suddenly made Tallulah remember that Carl was fending off the children by himself while she indulged in a lavish meal. A hint of guilt began to rise inside but wasn't given much of a chance to take form when she realized that Johnny was fumbling to apologize. "I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to, I mean, I forgot that you had a friend who's a robot. And really, marrying a robot isn't too strange anymore either. In fact, this is supposed to be hush hush but a lot of the models today are androids."

"They are?" Tallulah asked in shock. "That explains why they all look so perfect. I'm the one who should be sorry. I'm already making for lousy company aren't I?"

"No, I think that would be me. In fact, I was actually thinking that it's my cousin's loss for breaking ties with you."

"And if I didn't know any better, I'd say you're determined to make me like you," Tallulah laughed, a little shocked at the hint of flirtation in her voice.

"Is it working?" Johnny asked slyly.

"Maybe…" Tallulah started but was caught off guard by the sound of a familiar song being played by the house band. As she listened more closely she realized it was the one that Frankie had performed the day before when she and Carl had danced thanks to the encouragement of the kids. "There I go again," she sighed.

"Are you sure I didn't say anything?" Johnny asked with concern.

"No, you've been a perfect gentleman. I'm the one who's been an insensitive jerk. It doesn't matter what he said to me, it doesn't give me the right to sit here while he's at the mercy of the kids," Tallulah thought out loud.

"I'm not exactly following," Johnny said. "All my psychology minor helps me to realize is that you're obviously guilty about something…what that guilt is from is beyond me."

"Yes, I am feeling guilty. You see, Carl was nice enough to call you back and arrange this because he knew how much it meant to me."

"It did…it does?" Johnny asked hopefully. He was finally glad for a hint of how Tallulah felt about their lunch date.

Tallulah nodded." But I can't help but feel bad for leaving him there all by himself with 44 kids," Tallulah explained.

"44! He didn't tell me there were that many kids! In fact, he assured me that you would be able to come because it was no big deal. 44...geez. What was he thinking?" Johnny asked in disbelief.

"No, what was I thinking, is the question," Tallulah sighed, relenting to her guilt. "I'm sorry, Johnny, but I've got to get back to the house. Who knows what kind of trouble Carl's in."

"You don't have to be sorry. I'd think less of you, actually, if you didn't rush off to your friend's aid," Johnny replied, getting up as she did. "In fact, do the two of you need any help? I mean, two against 44? How did you manage to survive yesterday?"

"With great difficulty," Tallulah answered honestly as he followed her to the exit. "Thank you for the offer. But I wouldn't want to inconvenience…"

"Nonsense. It wouldn't be an inconvenience. Besides, you promised me a look at your designs," Johnny reminded her.

"I guess you got me there. Thank you so much!" Tallulah exclaimed, truly grateful, as they left the restaurant.

--The Robinson Mansion--

"Where is everybody?" Lewis asked as he, Wilbur, Camila and Carl entered the Robinson mansion only to find complete emptiness and silence.

"Oh, I just knew it. They ate us! No, worse, they ate her and now they're dissecting my parts to offer me up to some heathen god. Oh it's horrible."

"I repeat, dad, you need to monitor what you let him watch," Wilbur was getting annoyed with the fact that Carl was acting like a foolish five or six year old.

"Relax, Carl," Lewis warned. "It's best that they not see us anyways. The kids that is. Who knows what kind of effect that could have on the time stream."

"That's a good point," Camila chimed. "Come on, let's go to the lab."

The group started towards the lab, but Carl stopped along the way without any of them noticing. He walked over to the living area and saw a family portrait. "Is that Laszlo?" he stared at the picture studiously. "Hey, look at me…I look good. Still no muscles though," he sighed. His eyes moved over slightly to the person standing in between himself and Laszlo. "Tallulah…"

"Carl!" Lewis' voice could be heard behind him. "With me at all times remember?"

"Oh, yeah…" Carl realized that Lewis was right and that it could mess up the time stream if he was caught. He turned and followed after the others until they reached the broken machine in the lab.

Lewis began inspecting it immediately. "So you pushed this button here?" Lewis asked and Wilbur nodded. "I'm almost tempted to push it again. After all the input hasn't been changed yet. And that's sometimes the best way to know where the error is."

"Let me!" Wilbur volunteered and rushed towards the machine.

"No!" Camila yelled, causing Wilbur stop in his tracks, his sneakers squeaking from the abruptness.

"What's wrong, Camila?" Lewis asked her, ready for any insight she might have on the matter. "It's just a simple procedure of trial and error. It's effective for inventors."

"Tallulah remember?" Camila responded. "We already know that the machine doesn't take into account the variable of a robot life form, but if Tallulah's somewhere in the house, she won't be so lucky." They obviously didn't know that Tallulah was still out with Johnny.

"Oh yeah, I guess I hadn't thought of that. Even geniuses let things slip by. I guess that means will have to dissect the formula another way," Lewis sighed and went back to studying the machine.

"But I wanted to push the button," Wilbur groaned pathetically.

"If you hadn't pushed the button in the first place, we wouldn't all be standing here now would we?" Camila challenged.

"You know you like hanging out with me," Wilbur teased egotistically. "I mean, who couldn't resist the charming Wilbur Robinson."

"The only one who thinks Wilbur Robinson is charming is his mirror and oversized ego," Camila snapped back sarcastically.

"Ouch," Lewis couldn't help but commenting on that one. "And here I thought that me and Franny have our ups and downs," he said with a nerdy laugh as he narrowed his eyebrows to study a single line of the formula.

"Hey, that's different," Wilbur was quick to point out. "Franny's your future wife. Your fighting is nothing but lovers' quarrels."

Camila realized what Wilbur meant and was fast to add her agreements. "Unlike Wilbur and I who simply can't stand one another."

"Exactly!" Wilbur exclaimed. "Although I still don't get how come you don't find me irresistible like every other girl."

Lewis stopped what he was doing and turned and faced his future son with a skeptic look. "You're kidding me?"

"What? You just have to get used to the fact that your son is a total girl magnet," Wilbur answered, puffing his chest out a little. "Of course, I wish some of them would repel like Camila here."

Lewis and Camila exchanged glances and began laughing over what Wilbur had said. "Please! You haven't even been to any of the dances!" Camila accused.

"Oh and how would you know? Have you been to all of them?" Wilbur asked with an arched eyebrow.

"Well, no, but I'm on the student council so I've seen the lists of students who buys tickets to every school event…and so much more," Camila answered.

"Wha-what!? That's like an invasion of privacy!" Wilbur exclaimed with a huff and turned and looked at Lewis. "Are you going to just let the school do that to its students? I mean, letting just anybody have that kind of information!?"

Lewis sighed, "Complain to the other me…oh wait, you can't! Now could we get back to the problem at hand? I'm getting nowhere by myself over here. I'm smart, but it's hard to understand a bunch of formulas I've yet to invent."

"Well, you know what they say…" Wilbur was about to quote his dad's motto but couldn't finish.

"Don't say it!" both Lewis and Camila snapped at him simultaneously.

"Tough crowd," Wilbur rolled his eyes. "I think I'd rather go spend time with the old stiffs in the dining room."

Suddenly a light went off in Lewis' head. "You said they're in the dining room? I have an idea," Lewis said and they quickly followed him to the dining room.

"Still there," Wilbur stated the obvious as he entered.

"No, really?" Camila couldn't resist the opportunity to say something sarcastic.

"So what's there to learn in here?" None of it made any sense to Wilbur.

"Well, I just wanted to see it for myself for one, and for another thing, I wanted to see if there were any variables I could figure out by seeing the situation first hand," Lewis explained.

"You sound like my math teacher…and he doesn't make any sense either," Wilbur responded to Lewis' explanation.

"I think I get what he's saying," Camila scratched her head a little before tucking her hair back behind her ears. "I think he means that if there's anything else out of place besides the fact that their frozen in time, inspecting the situation first hand will be more effective than trying to guess based on the formulas.

"Exactly what I mean," Lewis replied as he walked around the room, tapping his chin and taking observations. The others followed his lead. "Do you see something obvious that I see?" Lewis asked the others as he pointed to the table.

"I see one big mess," Camila answered, referring to the food and drinks spilled all over the table. "I guess nobody thought to clean it up."

"Hmm, that's not like Lefty. Then again, he's tempermental…" Wilbur let his sentence trail as a new thought entered his head. "So if all of the drinks and forks and stuff are spilled than that means they must have dropped them all when they were affected by the machine."

"Very good, Wilbur," Lewis complemented genuinely. "Which means that the variable is for adult life forms only. Not even anything that they were touching when they were first affected. That's a good start. Now I just have to find the string in the formula that corresponds with the adults and maybe work from there in reversing it."

"Work backwards!" Camila exclaimed. "I get it!"

"Okay, sounds good to me," Wilbur said unenthusiastically. "Let's just get a move on."

"We're supposed to be looking for anything out of the ordinary right?" Carl asked suddenly, before the other three could leave the room.

"Yeah, why, did you find something?" Lewis asked hopefully.

"I think so. You see, I was scanning the room with my different eye settings, and using x-ray, I saw a piece of paper in the left hand pocket of Laszlo's jacket. It has some kind of formula on it," Carl explained.

Lewis hurried over to Laszlo and pulled out the paper that Carl described. "I don't know what this formula is exactly, but if my hunch is right, I think you just saved the day, Carl!"

A/N Cont. - Alright, so you can be sure there's lots of drama ahead now that Johnny's been introduced! So much so that the ending may shock you! In fact, it shocked me when it came to me! Anyways, I'm trying really hard to NOT make Johnny one of those characters where you feel sorry for him and end up shipping him instead. (Like how I felt with Prince Edward in Enchanted!) Of course, feel free to do so if you really want... Hmm, and for some reason I have this feeling I'm forgetting to credit someone for something...I dunno...if so, sorry!