by Dave Corrick
Chapter 14
Some New Powers are Discovered.
It was a Sunday morning, the sun was shining. Louie and Lulu were sitting on the deck outside their house just watching the stream go by.
‘Lulu’, said Louie. ‘Let’s go through the quartz and have a bit of a fly around together’.
‘Good idea’, said Lulu. ‘We haven’t got much else to do today. I’ll just tidy up the breakfast dishes then let’s go’.
While Lulu did the dishes, Louie went around to the back of the house and brought in some more firewood for the stove. It was still quite cool in the evenings and it would be quite good to have a reasonable stock of it. Yes two happy bees doing their domestic chores.
At about 10.00 a.m. the pair were ready to go.
‘Don’t forget to bring the matches Louie’, said Lulu. The matches of course were needed to light the beeswax candles in the tunnel.
The pair took off together, flew down the stream then west to the tunnel entrance.
Louie and Lulu, having been through the quartz many times now, were full of confidence and the process had become second nature.
Louie lit the beeswax candles as they progressed along the tunnel. Once at the end of the tunnel the quartz started to pulse with the blue light they had now become so familiar with. Louie and Lulu stood close together and marvelled at the blue light for a moment before going on through, it was actually quite beautiful in a cold sort of way.
On the other side, the village was fairly quiet being a Sunday.
The pair explored the village for awhile then headed along the stream towards the hills.
‘I’ll show you part of the way to where we are going for our honeymoon’ said Louie.
Louie took Lulu to the falls. Being able to fly much faster than they could as insects meant it only took a few minutes. The falls looked magnificent as they cascaded into the pool at the base. It never failed to be an awe inspiring sight.
The pair landed on the flat piece of rock where Virgil had taken Louie much earlier on. Louie explained about the cave at the top of the falls where they would go and head to the cave overlooking the sea.
Louie and Lulu having come through the quartz were too large to go into the cave at the top of the falls and on through the tunnel to the sea. They sat and relaxed on the rock at the bottom of the falls instead.
Next to Lulu was a clump of buttercups, a sign that spring must be on the way. The flowers fascinated Lulu because if she was back at home on the other side of the quartz, she could actually fly onto the flower and enjoy the nectar, but on this side she was too big and stood many times taller than the plant.
Lulu lay on her back and did a lazy stretch, arms outstretched. With fists clenched she lowered her left arm towards the buttercups.
She was about to unclench her fist and pick one of the buttercups when she noticed there was a blue aura around her fist. Not only was there a blue aura but the clenching of her fist had caused the buttercups to shrink!
As soon as Lulu unclenched her fist the blue aura disappeared but the buttercups remained in the shrunken position.
Lulu fascinated by this, rolled towards the buttercup and then clenched her right fist quite firmly in front of the clump of buttercups. A blue aura appeared around her right fist as it had done previously with her left fist. To her amazement the buttercups started growing back up again; in fact they kept on growing then shrivelled and died!
‘Louie! Louie!’ said Lulu excitedly. ‘Come and see this’.
Lulu squeezed her left fist in front of another buttercup. The blue aura appeared and the buttercup went back in time and became smaller. When she squeezed her right fist in front of the same buttercup, again a blue aura appeared and the buttercup grew up, advanced in age then withered and died just as the other one had done.
Louie couldn’t believe what he was seeing. ‘Let me try’.
Sure enough, it was the same for Louie. If he squeezed his right fist close to any living plant, a blue aura appeared about his fist and the plant advanced in time until it died. Conversely if he squeezed his left fist it had the opposite effect and the plant went back in time.
Louie looked at Lulu in disbelief!
‘Let’s try it on a piece of rock’, said Louie amazed at what they had found.
Louie tried it first with his right fist then with his left. The blue aura appeared as before but the rock didn’t change. ‘Looks as though it has to be something living’, said Louie.
Louie squeezed his fists looking at them in amazement. He had to squeeze really hard but the harder he squeezed the brighter the blue aura became.
‘Tell you what’, said Louie. ‘Let’s try it on that little Kauri tree over there. Lulu you squeeze your right fist on this side and I will squeeze my right fist on the other’.
This was unbelievably amazing! With the two fists held close and glowing blue, the Kauri tree started to grow bigger and bigger, in fact it doubled then tripled in size. The expanding trunk actually pushed Louie and Lulu away.
‘Right’, said Louie. ‘Let’s try squeezing our left fists and see if we can make it grow smaller again’.
The Kauri tree shrank back down again. Louie and Lulu took their fists away when it was back to the size they thought it had been.
‘Am I dreaming this Lulu?’ said Louie.
‘I don’t think so’, said Lulu.
There was a dead leaf lying on the rock beside them. ‘I wonder if we can revive this leaf?’ said Louie.
The pair tried by squeezing their left fists near the leaf. Again, the blue auras appeared but nothing happened. Obviously for anything that was no longer living, it just didn’t work.
Louie tried holding his left fist some distance from the remaining buttercups and squeezing. There was no reaction until his fist was moved close to the plants; in fact nothing happened until the blue aura engulfed part of the plant. With Lulu it was exactly the same.
‘Look over there’, said Lulu pointing, ‘there is a sparrow sitting by the water. Let’s try it on the sparrow’.
Louie crept slowly closer. The sparrow couldn’t see him of course. Louie squeezed his right fist hard so the blue aura was glowing brightly. He then carefully moved his fist so the blue aura engulfed the sparrow. The sparrow sensed something and immediately flew off.
‘The sparrow must have sensed something was affecting it’, said Louie. ‘I guess with that short time it might be a couple of seconds older, I hope I haven’t harmed it’.
Louie and Lulu amused themselves making plants older and younger, still not believing that it was for real.
Lulu had a good idea. ‘Louie I wonder if this just applies to being on this side of the quartz. Does everything change back when we leave?’
Lulu paused for a moment then went on to say. ‘Louie opposite our house on the east bank is a tree that blocks the sun a bit in the mornings. Let’s go and see if we can make it younger and smaller. Then we can see when we get back if it is still in the changed condition’.
‘Brilliant Lulu’, said Louie.
The excited pair raced back to where their house should be but naturally couldn’t see it. However they could see the tree that would be blocking the sun and alighted beside it.
‘Here goes’, said Louie.
Louie clenched his left fist tightly, squeezing until the blue aura appeared. He moved his fist close to the tree, sure enough, as soon as the blue aura touched, the tree slowly reduced in size.
‘Enough do you reckon Lulu?’ said Louie.
‘Spot on’, said Lulu excited about this new find. ‘Wouldn’t it be great if it works!’
Louie and Lulu sat down for a moment. ‘I wonder what causes this’, said Louie’. I have a feeling that when we clench our fists we must be doing it with a force similar to that which makes the quartz glow at the end of the tunnel. Some sort of electromagnetic radiation must be emitted as Pearl was explaining to us earlier on’.
‘Maybe you are right’, said
Lulu getting excited about an idea she had.
‘Louie’, said Lulu. ‘If we have such strength to this with our fists, maybe we have tremendous power to lift things as well, let’s face it, we have never tried it!’
‘You are right Lulu’, Louie was excited by this possibility too.
Louie looked around for something that they could lift and then said, ‘Lulu, see that fallen tree trunk over there, that quite large one that has been lying there for years, let’s try lifting it’.
Lulu went to one end of the trunk and Louie some distance away took the other. On the count of three the pair lifted for all they were worth. They were both surprised; they could lift the huge trunk with ease! Not only were they able to lift the trunk but they were able to keep holding it up without any difficulty.
‘I can’t believe this!’ said Lulu. ‘Let’s try flying with it’.
Louie and Lulu could hear their wings beating hard. The surrounding grass flattened in the downwash of air. No matter how hard the pair tried, no, they couldn’t fly with the trunk, it was a physical impossibility.
‘Well that’s that’, said Louie. ‘Let’s put the trunk down again’. The pair lowered the trunk.
‘I wonder’, said Louie. ‘Can we lift any weight at all and fly with it? Let’s try something smaller’.
Louie selected a rock which was in fact quite heavy. Yes he could fly with it. There was no problem at all.
Louie lifted a piece of dead tree that was lighter than the rock he had picked up. No he couldn’t fly with it?!
It didn’t make sense. Louie and Lulu experimented with lifting various objects and trying to fly with them. Some they could, some they couldn’t
It was Lulu who worked it out eventually. It wasn’t the weight so much. It was the size! What Lulu had discovered was that they could only fly and lift an object that was smaller than or equal to the size of them! It was quite possible to lift and fly with really heavy objects as long as the object didn’t have a height or width greater than themselves. Louie was slightly bigger in size to Lulu so he could lift objects that were slightly bigger in dimension. It was all very interesting.
‘Let’s go and let Pearl know what we have discovered Louie’, said Lulu.
‘Can’t wait to tell her’, said Louie. ‘When we get back on the other side again let’s first check the tree we have reduced in size and see if it has stayed the same’.
Louie and Lulu took off and flew back to the quartz wall at the village bank. To help avoid detection from the sound of their wings they had learnt too come in high then glide down and through the wall.
On the other side Lulu rushed up to Louie and hugged him. She was partly relieved that they were safe on the other side again but she was also excited about what they had found.
Louie was fascinated by what had happened on the other side and clenched his right fist now as an insect. No there was nothing there, no blue aura at all. It must be something to do with what Pearl had said that on the other side their molecular structure was similar to quartz.
Louie put his arm around Lulu, the pair walked back to the tunnel entrance and out into the sunshine again. It was good to feel its warmth after not being able to feel anything when on the other side.
‘First of all let’s go and look at the tree’, said Louie as they flew off towards the stream.
Louie and Lulu hovered above their house and looked over towards where the tree should be that they had reduced in size. Yes! It had worked so they would have more sunshine in the early morning!
Louie and Lulu descended to the deck.
‘This is really exciting my wonderful bee’, said Louie picking Lulu up and holding her.
Lulu giggled and squealed with delight.
‘Let’s go and tell Pearl all about it’, said Lulu.
Off the pair went, on and up to Pearl’s apartment. ‘Hope she is home’, said Louie.
Pearl was home.
Pearl was a religious sort of moth and being Sunday she was religiously checking stocks of red wine and chocolate cake, doing the vacuuming, washing the windows and preening herself for the coming week.
Oh and yes, Pearl had her faith, absolute faith that if she ran out of red wine or chocolate cake, her subjects (usually Louie) would be only too glad to remedy the situation.
Louie banged on the door of Pearl’s apartment and shouted ‘Are you there Pearl? Are you there Pearl? It’s me and Lulu. We have something exciting to tell you!’
‘Who’s me? Said Pearl pretending she didn’t know it was Louie and thus giving herself some time to make herself look presentable. ‘Louie’, said Louie.
Louie and Lulu had caught Pearl a little by surprise. She wasn’t really expecting them and she still had her feelers in curlers.
Pearl opened the door and laughed. ‘Gosh you two what’s up? You will have to forgive me; I wasn’t expecting anybody and I haven’t finished doing all the stuff that I religiously do on Sundays!’
Pearl looked beautiful in spite of her reservations. ‘Come out on the deck and tell me all about it, I haven’t seen you so excited for a long time, are you two getting engaged again?!’ Pearl laughed.
Louie and Lulu explained and went over everything they had found and observed.
‘I believe you could be right about the pressure created by clenching your fists’, said Pearl. ‘In fact it probably now confirms that on the other side our molecular structure is indeed some abstract form of quartz. I am sure this is why we can’t feel heat or cold. It also explains why we have a translucent blue appearance similar to the quartz in the tunnel. I am sure you are right in assuming that the pressure created in clenching your fists also creates the blue aura you have described’.
‘Well’, said Pearl ‘I am afraid I can’t wait to try all this with you, have some lunch with me now and show me this afternoon!’
‘Yes, Yes’, said Lulu, you will be so excited Pearl.
After lunch Pearl removed her curlers, and the three headed back through the quartz.
Everything Louie and Lulu had described earlier on, Pearl could do too.
‘This is incredibly exciting’, said Pearl. ‘It’s hard to know just yet what we can use all this for, no doubt we will find out soon enough. – As indeed they did!
