Zero 'g' (7 page)

Carly c
ouldn’t help
but laugh as Henry slowed down the motorcycle once
again.

Linus shook his head as Henry joined
in the laughter.

They started moving again
, and Henry backed up so that he could make the right turn
that time. Without gravity, it was practically impossible to turn
the vehicle by using the handlebars and their body
weight.

“
Stop
, Henry, I have an
idea. We can use the rocket principle of moving in zero gravity,”
Carly said.

He stopped and watched as she started to kick at the
exhaust pipe. It was beginning to rust
, so it was easier to get off than she’d thought it would
be. She heard a crunch and ripped it the rest of the way off. She
handed it over to Linus and asked, “Just turn the exhaust pipe in
the direction you want it to go, and it will turn so much
easier.”

“
Yikes
! This thing is
too hot.”

“
Oh
, gosh, sorry. I
hadn’t noticed .”

“
I’m not sure I’m going to be able to turn
it
, it’s so hot.”

She turn
ed to David,
who was smiling. He was still young enough to be in a diaper, which
gave her a brilliant idea. Carly removed the wet diaper from the
child and handed it to Linus.

“
What am I supposed to do
with that?”

She laughed
.
“Improvise. Hold the exhaust pipe in it, and it won’t burn you. At
least till its gets evaporated and the diaper gets burned
completely.”

“
That’s so gross
, but I
guess we don’t have another choice.”

Smiling
, she said,
“Don’t worry, Linus. He didn’t go for a number two.”

Henry started laughing
, and Linus rolled his eyes.

“
Cool
. Great idea,
Carly. Thanks.”

“
Hey, Toto, I
am not going to leave you like this ‘
Nangu-Pongu
’ . We will use this
handkerchief as a diaper for now.”

She smiled
. “No
problem, Toto. Let’s get going.”

Linus used the exhaust pipe
to try to change direction, but instead of turning right,
the motorcycle kept revolving.

Linus, Henry, and Carly
feared that they would hit a wall or building and get
killed, but little David just laughed and enjoyed the
ride.

“
Stop accelerating
,
Henry!” shouted Linus.

Henry stop
ped
accelerating, and David stopped laughing, hoping to have more
rotation.

“
I will tell you when to accelerate
,” said Linus.

The plan w
orked with
the help of Linus’s instructions. He sat backward on the motorcycle
to see well. They drove like that for more than an hour before they
ran out of fuel.

They all got off the motorcycle in dismay.
“Well
, it was fun while it
lasted,” Carly said, trying to keep the tone light. They didn’t
need to lose hope. They had already come so far, and they weren’t
far from Linus’s place now.

“
We will just have to use the parachute
again
; that’s all, And we can
only use the parachute as long as there is air present,” she
added.

All four
again
attached themselves to the parachute. It wasn’t long before they
arrived, exhausted, at the house where Linus’s family lived. Even
the house seemed to be suffering from the loss of gravity, as it
leaned at an odd angle with mud and trees floating in the
air.

Carly
wondered if this
plan would work. Then again, the house was still on the ground,
maybe because of Linus’s room.

“
I guess my family isn’t home
, after all,” he said with no small amount of
disappointment.

Carly put her arm around him. “I’m sorry
, Linus. I’m sure they’re OK. How about you show
us this moon room of yours?”

Chapter Eight

The four of them made their way slowly through the hallways
of Linus’s home. The house was a fair size
, so it took them some time to cross the main floor.
It wasn’t easy for any of them to travel; it was almost like having
to swim everywhere. It was worse if you weren’t a very good
swimmer. It was a painstaking adventure, one that Carly wished she
didn’t have to deal with. She had a hard time not thinking about
Rose, and she wondered where the little girl was. The thought of
Rose being hurt or in danger was enough to make Carly want to crawl
into the fetal position and never come out. That sort of fear could
immobilize her and make her useless to the team. She needed to
focus on the fact that Rose was probably just fine and unharmed in
any way. She hoped that Annette was handling the situation OK and
that she hadn’t had a heart attack. Her mother was a healthy woman,
but no one would ever expect anyone to deal with the situation they
were in without a little bit of shock and fear. She hoped they were
both OK and unharmed; that’s what she needed to believe.

Carly stayed ahead of the team
, making her way toward Linus’s room. She wasn’t sure what
was going to happen when they found it, but she had confidence in
the kids. Both of them seemed very bright. She had never met Jim
Iverson personally, but she had heard enough about him from her
friend Karina to know that he knew what he was doing in the field.
He had a bright kid, and Linus seemed to be the same way. This moon
room might be the best place to look for answers, and maybe they
would be lucky enough to find more people. At the very least, the
room would allow them a break from fighting through the
air.

It was too bad that Iverson wasn’t with them currently. She
could use another adult’s advice
, especially since he had been working with the space
program. Who better to get answers from in finding out what went
wrong and how to fix it? He had been privy to information that she
just didn’t have. He might actually know what had caused the
problem. She felt at a loss being in charge of a bunch of kids,
despite their intelligence. She just hoped that Linus and Henry
would be able to pull off their plan without a hitch. If they
couldn’t, they would have to start over at square one and figure
out another way. She had no idea how much time they had before the
gravity would be completely gone from the planet. When that
happened, things would really start to get scary.

As they made their way up to the floor where Linus’s
bedroom
was, Linus explained a
bit of his plan to the group. Carly was shocked at how in-depth he
was about it all; he had definitely put some thought into things.
Most boys his age would be on the football team and chasing girls.
They would be dealing with pregnancy scares and where the next big
party was, not dealing with the end of the world. Not too many of
them would have any idea how to solve a real-world problem,
especially one that was causing deaths all over the world. The sad
truth was; he probably knew more about what was going on than she
did. Henry at least had been in the office with his dad on numerous
times while she was pushing a mop bucket around. She blushed. She
had no reason to be embarrassed about her position at NASA; it was
still a really good job.

“
My father has been a great
influence on my life. He’s trying to get me into the best schools
in the country. I have been working on a few projects myself. But
Linus here really did something extraordinary. He seems to care
less about academics and more about what he can sneak into through
hacking.”

Linus beamed with pride
. “I have been working for the last year on creating a
moonlike environment in a small space. I never thought I would get
the chance to use it. But it works, and it has gravity in it, so we
got lucky. It’s probably the only place in the world that has
gravity at this point. We can sit in there and rest, if we have
to.”

Henry nodded
. “Well,
my father never mentioned that losing gravity was even a risk. I’m
surprised that he wouldn’t have known something like this would
happen. I would think all the scientists at NASA would see
something like this coming a mile away. But he never said anything
to me about it.”

Carly turned and looked at Henry with interest. He was
clearly a smart kid. “Is that right? He m
ight not have had any idea.” Though she really didn’t
believe that, she actually found it hard to believe that a
scientist wouldn’t have known that losing gravity was a risk. She
wondered if it was a conscious choice to continue research, knowing
that disaster could strike. She had heard enough from Karina to
know that there was something going on behind the scenes at NASA
that could have some serious consequences for everyone. Was this
it? Had something finally happened that the scientists could no
longer control? She would give anything to have Karina by her side
to discuss these issues. She hoped that her friend was
OK.

“
Yeah, I’m not sure if
that’s true. But anyway, yes. The same idea can be applied here. It
would help us to live as if there was gravity in the
room.”

“
How so?” Carly asked. She wondered why Henry thought his
father might be involved in what was going on around them. She
wanted to question him further about it
, but they were almost at Linus’s room, and they had
bigger problems at the moment.

They continued down the hall until they reached the
stairs
. Thankfully, it wasn’t
a long flight of stairs they had to climb. They all started up the
stairs, bracing themselves against the wall to avoid floating. They
looked uncomfortable, and Linus had to use extra effort to ensure
that David didn’t get hurt. She still wasn’t sure what they were
going to do with him. What if they never found the kid’s parents?
What would she do with him? She could take him home with her and
Rose. But then what? She certainly wasn’t prepared to raise another
child, but she had also thought the same thing when Rose came
along. She wasn’t about to abandon the child. He would stay with
her as long as he had to, and they would just keep looking for his
parents.

Henry piped up. “This is getting exhausting. You really
don’t realize how much you take the simple act of walking around
for granted. Who thinks of using gravity
? It’s just there. But now, it’s all we can think
about because we are helpless without it. I could have been to my
room in seconds, but I think it’s been fifteen minutes since we
entered the house.”

Carly laughed
. “You
are incredibly bright, Henry. Your father must be very
proud.”

Henry grinned
. “Oh, he
is. He lets me know it all the time. I think my father has a bigger
plan for my future than even I thought about. But I guess all
parents are like that.”

“
Oh
, trust me—they are.
Parents just want the best life possible for their kids. So please,
Linus, continue to explain the room. I’m fascinated that a kid your
age would even be interested in something like that.”

Henry
interrupted.
“He’s not the smoothest with the ladies.” He started laughing, and
Linus swung at him playfully.

“
I’ll have you both know that I have a girlfriend. I just
don’t know where she is right now
.” He chuckled sadly.

“
I’m sure she’s OK
,
Linus. I’m sure all our loved ones are.”

Linus sighed deeply and continued with his
explanation
. “We can live
there in that room with gravity in the same way you can on the
moon. All we would need is one-sixth of Earth’s actual gravity. So
I can mimic the same thing on Earth, like I did with this room. It
will also boost the suit, Carly, so you can actually wear
it.”

“
Really?”
she said with
a smile.

“
My room
'
s really small, so it
'll be a
tight fit for all of us, but at least we'll have
gravity
.
”

The idea was incredible
, and the fact that Linus had pulled it off was even more
amazing. A room with gravity—it was the best thing she had heard
about all day. Who would have thought? And he had created it just
in time. Was that a coincidence, or did Linus know more than he was
letting on? She looked at him with interest, but she couldn’t read
his expression. It had to be a coincidence, right? Regardless, they
would be able to utilize the room and figure out their next step.
The four of them couldn’t just live in a room together and forget
the rest of the world. No, they needed to save it. Carly just
didn’t know how yet.

Chapter Nine

One by one
, the
countries all over the world began to lose gravity. Chaos ensued as
people frantically tried to find places to hide and wait out the
disaster. No one knew what was going on, and panic mounted, causing
more chaos. Governments were at a standstill trying to determine
the cause and hoping desperately that scientists could be found to
fix the problem.