The CyberSquad wonders whether or not five cyber-fireflies, or gleamers, will be enough to power the Mini-Wreaker. By using the variable, B, to refer to a gleamer, they discover that a single gleamer provides six glows of power. Afterwards, they determine that, if they fill all five power slots with gleamers, they will have an output of 30 glows of power, which should be enough for the Mini-Wreaker.

After Digit brings back another gleamer bug to power the ship, the Cybersquad is surprised to learn that they have 30 gleamers of power, not 24. Jackie points out that the bug that Digit brought is actually two bugs stuck together. They use variable substitution to explain to Digit how they have 30 gleamers of power and to determine the number of additional gleamers they need to start the ship.

Toni the Baker makes cupcakes for Bill's niece and nephew, and she runs out of boxes for all of the cupcakes. Bill walks through how to determine the number of cupcakes in each box, without Toni giving him the answer.

The CyberSquad's ship needs 40 glows of power to take off. The group learns that Hacker changed the gleamer's power output from six to four, so they use algebra to calculate how many gleamers they'll need to reach the minimum power output of 40 glows. They determine that they'll need 10 gleamers, or three additional gleamers, to take off before the island turns inside out.

High school teacher Mr. Jaime Escalante teaches his students about negative and positive numbers. He uses a real-world example of digging into sand at the beach to help students understand the concept.