Mission 16: Zero Gravity [Archive]

Spoonpuppet

August 15th, 2009, 04:43 pm

It was a warm day with the sun hanging high in the sky between the sparse clouds as Lacha made her way to Ferrison. She walked steadily along the wide footpath through the peaceful forest which only emitted the occasional faint bird’s chirp or a rustling in the bushes as a small animal scuttled by. Along the route was another village and she had planned to stay there for the night. With her eyes glued to the cheap map in her hands, she deduced that the village was just around the next bend.

She carefully tried to fold the map back up again, but after failing to get it back to how it originally was, she impatiently stuffed it into her brown bag slung over her shoulder. Her feet were starting to ache slightly after the long trek in the sun and she was glad she could take a break soon. The coarse dirt crunched gently and rhythmically under her boots as to her left she saw a bird flutter away. A small breeze wafted through the woodland.

“Pfft.”

She hated it when hair got in her mouth, just like now. She had a habit of trying to blow it away first, but it never worked so she stroked it to the side. She didn’t like her hair being out of place either. Not only did it look clumsy, it felt uncomfortable – which is how it felt right now.

The ends of her long, white hair were slowly drifting upwards. Lacha wondered what was happening and tried to use her hands to smooth her hair back down, but to no avail. She continued walking down the forest path as it took a final bend before the village with her hands clasped to her head to keep the strands of hair down. “I must look so strange right now with my hands like this…” she sighed to herself, knowing that having floating hair would have not been an improvement anyway.

Lacha was glad when the village came into view. Small stone cottages surrounded by colourful plants stood in no obvious pattern, with dusty pathways twisting between them like string. A circular fountain was situated in what seemed to be the village square with a notice board covered in announcements in the corner. It looked like a picturesque setting, an easy place for retirement.

Still with her hands holding down her hair, Lacha walked towards the centre of the village while looking around. As she moved, however, her steps started to feel lighter and lighter… until her feet were no longer touching the ground.

“Huh?! What’s happening??”

By now she let go of her hair - personal appearances didn’t matter if you were floating in mid-air for no reason. Her feet were a few inches from the ground, but the bag on her shoulder was definitely still under the normal effects of gravity. Hoping there might be somebody in the village who could help, Lacha tried to propel herself through the air towards the square. After a few moments of squirming about and not getting anywhere, she managed to get the hang of it, even though it was nowhere near as efficient as walking normally. It felt like she was swimming through invisible water, which wasn’t a bad thing.

As she floated around the corner to reach the square, she was greeted with a peculiar scene. She was not the only one with the floating problem – everybody in the square was also hovering above the ground at various levels. Villagers were bustling to and fro. Some people were even floating higher than the rooftops and others down below frantically tried to pull them down with a rope. Nonetheless, a number of villagers seemed to be enjoying themselves, particularly those floating higher up, as they were giggling, smirking or laughing their heads off.

One young man who had been observing the commotion above his head spotted Lacha and floated over towards her. He was wearing a dirty apron and had scruffy brown hair, and grinned at her.

“Just passing through, are you?” he asked. Lacha was really wondering what he was smiling about.

“Yes…” she started. “Why are there –“

“People floating about?” he finished the question for her. “If you ever find out, let us know.”

Lacha heard a shout from one of groups of villagers pulling people down, probably to secure them before they floated away.

“You really have no idea?”

“Not a clue.” He gave an even bigger grin this time, and then a chuckle. “It just started four days ago... tee hee… and then... ha ha… oh no…”

The man started chuckling louder, then eventually he was laughing almost uncontrollably with his arms around his torso. Lacha wondered what was so funny; perhaps it was her floating hair which made her look like an animal. He tried to form a sentence between the hilarity but Lacha could not understand him.

“Quick, we’ve got another one over here!” Lacha watched as a group of three other villagers rushed over and escorted the laughing man into the nearby village hall. She followed them into the building, from which she could hear even more laughing echoing inside.

“Oh my…”

The village hall was packed full of people and noise. Villagers of all ages, all of whom were floating, rushed about with bits of rope. One man with a bushy moustache seemed to be keeping a list of names. Then Lacha looked up, and saw about a dozen people floating at the high hall ceiling. All of them were laughing hysterically, and each had a rope tied to their leg. The other end of the rope had been tied around the leg of an old, large, wooden table. They looked like balloons children could buy at fairs, except instead of balloons it was laughing people.

Lacha saw the man she had been talking to before surrounded by three other villagers who tied a length of rope to his leg while holding him down as he flailed about laughing. When they were confident the knot was secure, they let go of him and allowed him to float up to the ceiling and join the others.

“It’s terrible, isn’t it?”

Lacha turned around to see the man with the list. His thick moustache quivered under his nose when he talked. He was rather plump and wore a shiny gold badge on his purple jacket.

“I’m supposed to be the mayor of this village, but I can’t do anything about this problem!”

“Why are people floating up like that?” asked Lacha.

“We don’t know. It just started four days ago when all the villagers began floating. We don’t know what caused it, only that after a while you end up floating higher and higher while in a fit of giggles. It only affects people and animals in the village though… I assume you’re just passing through the village?”

“Yes, and I started floating when I got here.”

“Well, you shouldn’t be reaching the laughing stage any time soon. But you’d better stay here with us. When you start laughing, that’s when things get bad. There’s no way to get back down!” The mayor shook his head and sighed. “Luckily we’ve caught everybody so far and put them indoors so they can’t drift away. We had a close call yesterday when somebody got stuck in a tree before we nearly lost him.”

Lacha and the mayor then had to step out of the way as another group of villagers came running in with another sufferer.

“There must be something that’s causing all this, though…” Lacha muttered.

“As I said, we have no idea. Some of those poor souls have been up there for three days and haven’t slept. At this rate we’ll all die laughing on the ceiling.”

A small boy tugged on the mayor’s jacket and looked up at him.

“But I told you what’s happening and you won’t listen, grandpa!” he chirped.

The mayor excused himself, then leant down to his grandson.

“I told you already, Benjamin. Leave it to the grown-ups and we’ll sort it out.”

“No!” yelled back Benjamin. “You’ve taken ages and it’s getting worse! If you just listened…”

“Benjamin, I’m not going to say it again,” replied the mayor sternly. “Just because your dog is acting strangely doesn’t mean that he can help us. You have no idea what is going on either.”

“But Lucky always knows when something’s wrong…” Benjamin mumbled.

“Not one more word about that dog. Now let us take care of it.” And with that the mayor marched as best he could in mid-air to the other side of the hall to add more names to his list.

After the mayor was out of earshot, Lacha looked down at the small boy who was glowering at his grandfather’s back.

“He never listens,” he muttered, while trying to hold back tears of frustration.

Lacha felt a bit uncomfortable at this point. There was a little boy almost in tears, she felt obliged to comfort him in some way.

“Hello… Benjamin, right?” she said to him gently.

He nodded, sniffed, then rubbed his nose without looking up at her.

“My name’s Lacha,” she continued. He gave her a quick glance then looked back down again. Lacha tried to think of something to get his attention. “Erm… you were saying you had an idea related to what is happening in this village?”

The young boy looked up at her again, then without a word, grabbed her hand and pulled her through the doorway and back outside. Then he took her round the side of the village hall where a small brown shorthaired dog, floating of course, was tied to a post. The dog spotted Benjamin, gave a few sharp barks and wagged its tail gleefully.

“This is Lucky,” said Benjamin. He went over to the dog and patted its head. It looked up at Benjamin and barked a few times, as if it was expecting something. Lacha stayed a little way back – she had had not much experience with dogs, although this small one seemed tolerable.

“Lucky’s really clever,” Benjamin carried on while stroking the dog’s ear. “He can tell if something’s wrong, and I just know that he can help us with whatever’s making us float.” Lucky barked again. “I don’t know how he knows, but he’s been acting strangely ever since this whole thing started.”

“So why don’t you go investigate by yourself?” asked Lacha, knowing full well her suggestion was hugely inappropriate by allowing a young child run off on his own.

“Oh, I want to… just that I’m scared I’ll float away,” he replied. “You saw what happened to those other villagers. What if I suddenly started laughing like them and floated away?”

Lucky started sniffing the air, then barked loudly.

“He’s been doing that a lot, always sniffing when there’s nothing to smell.”

Lacha thought for a moment, then said, “Well, dogs have a much better sense of smell than we do. Maybe Lucky can smell something in the air.”

“Maybe…” Benjamin continued to pat his dog. The look on his face clearly said “but I don’t want to get in trouble.”

“All right, I have an idea,” Lacha announced. Benjamin looked up at her. “How about I go investigate this with Lucky? I’ve only just arrived in the village so I shouldn’t go floating off anywhere anytime soon. You can stay safe here while I go have a look. How does that sound?”

Benjamin’s face lit up. “Really?? You’d do that?”

Lacha nodded. “I don’t see why not. Your grandfather advised me to stay in the village, so I’m stuck here for a while.”

****

Lucky barked loudly as he dragged Lacha around the village. She held onto the lead tightly and tried to keep him from running too fast, but having no contact with the ground this was very difficult. Every now and then Lucky would stop and sniff the air before carrying on, twisting and turning along the village paths. For a village, Lacha thought, it covered a large area.

Eventually they reached a lonely cottage at the edge of the village which was almost hidden from view due to the overgrown garden. Lucky suddenly leapt into the shrubbery which took Lacha by surprise and she lost her grip on the lead. Lacha sighed and stepped into the garden calling for the dog.

“Lucky!”

She heard a familiar bark come from the side of the building and pushed aside the tall grass and tree branches as she made her way towards the source of the sound. Finally she spotted the brown dog, who barked at her and wagged its tail. Next to Lucky was an old, rotten door which seemed to lead underneath the house. The dog kept sniffing at the door and scratching it with its paw.

Lacha brushed some stray leaves from her hair before she grabbed the edge of the door and pulled as hard as she could. Lucky continued to bark as she tried to open the door. Suddenly the door cracked in two and Lacha snapped half of the door off, surprising her and making her fall backwards. Luckily she didn’t actually hit the ground due to still hovering in the air.

She stood back up and peered into the dark cellar. She couldn’t see anything apart from some dirty stone steps, but she could hear a mechanical churning noise. Lucky barked again and rushed down the passage. Lacha sighed again and followed the dog cautiously.

The air in here smelt damp as the Levian floated down the stairs. Lucky’s barks echoed from below as Lacha descended. Soon she saw a flickering glow and started to hear a man’s voice. He was laughing.

Lacha reached the bottom, and saw a machine as tall as her which was the source of the churning noise. It had a huge lever on one side and a pump rhythmically moving on the other. In the centre was a nozzle from which emitted silvery clouds which quickly disappeared again. Lucky was barking up towards the ceiling, and sure enough, there was a man floating up there, chuckling away. He wore a long, dirtied, white coat and had small, round spectacles. His hair was white and wispy and his face looked quite sunken with big bags under his eyes. He was too busy laughing at the dog to notice Lacha.

“Hello? Are you all right?” asked Lacha loudly. Of course he wasn’t all right, he was floating up on the ceiling in fits of laughter and it looked like he hadn’t eaten or slept for a long time, but she couldn’t think of anything else to say. To her surprise, the man answered.

“Oh!!” He chuckled between almost every word, but just managed to make a coherent sentence. “I’m… haha… so glad… hee hee… you’re… ho ho… here! Haha…You have to… tee hee… help me.” Then he laughed some more. With a shaky finger, he pointed at the big lever on the machine that was whirring away.

“Use… haha…” At this point he was laughing too much to be understood. But Lacha got the message and with a big shove, pulled the lever down. The machine shook and made a few loud popping noises before slowing down to a stop.

The man’s chuckling started to subside. He took a huge breath, and sighed a huge sigh.

“Thank you so much… tee hee… for that.” Lacha looked back up at him, concerned. “Don’t worry, now that the machine is… ho ho… off, things should get back to nor… ha ha… normal.”

“What is this machine? Did you make it?”

“Oh… yes, I did make it. You see, I didn’t mean to… hee hee… cause all this trouble. I was just trying to help the village.”

Lacha didn’t reply to his last statement.

“Okay, let me explain,” he continued. “I’m a scientist! I heard that in one of the big faraway cities they invented something called ‘laughing gas’.”

“Oh…” Lacha had an idea where this story would go.

“And I thought, ‘hey, why not make some for the village? That mayor is always so grumpy anyway.’ So I set about making some using this machine I invented and then released it into the air in secret.”

“Did you have any idea how to make it?”

“Not at all! At least, now I know how not to make it. I just guessed really. I thought of all the funny things I could think of and mixed them up, like bananas, feathers, fish…”

“Fish are supposed to be funny?” At this moment, Lucky gave a loud bark which echoed in the room.

“Oh ho, you like fish do you, little fellow? Of course fish are funny! They have that weird way of moving their mouths, going gob, gob, gob…”

Lacha suddenly realised what a weird situation she was in. She was in a cellar, with a floating dog and a floating scientist, talking about how fish are funny.

"Anyway, I guess this experiment resulted in some... undesired side effects. I couldn't find any gas to use on short notice, so I bought a hundred balloons from the fair in the next town and use the helium in them. Before I knew it, I was laughing on the ceiling with no way of reaching the lever to turn the machine off."

Lacha sighed. "All right. It seems like your laughing has stopped, but how do we get everybody down again?"

"Oh, I think it'll be all right in the end. Give it a day or two? Maybe if we had some rain it could help get rid of the gas."

Lacha nodded. "I can help with that," she said.

"Oh, and before you go," said the scientist, noticing Lacha was about to turn and leave, "could you throw me some of that bread on the table? I've been surviving on these breathmints in my pocket for the last four days, so I'm starving."

Lacha did as she was asked, then floated back up to the entrance of the cellar and out of the undergrowth. She pulled her staff out of her bag and muttered a spell under her breath.

Dark rain clouds slowly gathered in the sky, blocking out the warm sunlight. Rain started to drip down on the village until it became a downpour. Lacha's hair, absorbing the rainwater, finally started to droop down after all this time - the rain seemed to be working. Lacha gave a small chuckle to herself and thought she'd make the most of it and have some fun, before jumping up as high as she could and floated in the cool rain.

[Phew! Sorry this was so long!]