Talking about destroying the ring turned out to be a whole lot easier for Billy then actually destroying the ring. When they got to his family’s house and headed into the garage, he put the ring in a crucible, but then he couldn’t force himself to move forward from there. “It’s just such a great piece of technology,” he said. “I can’t destroy it. Maybe if I just kept it for a little while and could study it very secretively and—”

“Sorry, Billy, it’s just not a good idea,” Jason said, lighting an acetylene torch and starting to heat the ring with the flame. “I don’t want to stand in the way of science, but I also really don’t want Scorpina coming back here anytime soon.”

“I understand,” Billy said, looking glum. “There’s so much cool stuff in the world to study; I can’t get hung up on this one thing.”

“What do we do with it now?” Zack asked, looking at the lump of hot metal once it had melted.

“I don’t know,” Jason said, using some tongs to dunk it into a bucket of water to cool it down. Then he reached in and pulled out the chunk of metal that used to be the Eclipse Ring. The stone had survived the heat and was imbedded in the blob. “It makes a pretty cool paperweight.” Turning to Billy, he said, “Do you want it? You’re the one who got erased into another dimension.”

“No thanks.” Billy shook his head. “Seeing it all the time would remind me of the technology we had to sacrifice.”

“I’ll take it if nobody else is interested,” Zack said. “I think it would be something good for me to have around.”

Just then the garage phone rang, and Billy picked it up. “Hello?”

“Helloooo,” said someone using a weird-sounding, high-pitched voice. “I saw on a flyer that you found my ring. My sister and I are just so delighted because we’ve been worried about my ring. It was our grandmother’s, you know.”

“Oh . . . um . . . hold on a second.” Billy covered the mouthpiece of the phone. “I think it’s Bulk pretending to be an old lady. He and Skull are trying to get the ring.”

“You’re kidding,” Zack said, shaking his head. “Those two are—”

“Just tell them to get lost,” Kimberly said. She was sick of those two lugs always causing problems.

“No, wait a minute,” Jason said. “Maybe we can have a little fun with this. Tell them to meet you at Ernie’s Juice Bar in the Angel Grove Youth Center and you’d be happy to return their ring.”