Chapter 5
The Suit
Polka galloped into the yard and slid to a stop, breathing hard. Jenny quickly dismounted, and took his saddle off. She wiped him down, gave him some water, grabbed her saddlebag and ran into the house, excited about her new discovery. The front door slammed behind her and she thundered up the stairs.
"Jenny, is that you?" Relli called.
"Yes, it's me."
"Are you okay? You're early," Relli shouted from a room in the rear of the house, but Jenny was already upstairs in her room.
Jenny put her saddlebag on her bed, opened it, and slowly pulled out the wondrous sweat suit. It was so unbelievable, she thought this must be a dream, or she had been hallucinating back at the lake.
"Where did this thing come from?"
Removing the control from the front pocket of the suit, Jenny pushed the activation button, and the suit shifted in her arms. She then rotated the control dial, until the suit floated freely in front of her. Sitting on the edge of her bed, Jenny looked in awe at the suit just hovering in front of her.
"Maybe it's filled with helium," Jenny said, searching for a logical explanation.
"I wonder what would happen if I put it on? It was obviously designed to be worn. I'm going to try it. I'll just be careful."
Turning the suit off, Jenny cautiously slipped her legs into the baggy pant legs and then leaned over to pull on the shoes. The shoes were made of a stretchy material that easily pulled over her feet and fitted snugly, although; they were a little long for her. The jacket was open at the front, with no visible means of fastening it closed, no buttons, no zipper, no hooks, nothing. She pulled on the jacket and put on the hat. The baseball cap was too big and came down over her eyes. She tilted the hat backwards on her head a little so she could see, and walked over to her mirror.
"Oh, very attractive, Jenny. Well, here we go, the moment of truth."
She took a deep breath. Jenny could feel her heart pounding in her chest as she pressed the button to activate the suit. The hatband suddenly sized to her head and the front of the jacket snapped closed as if suddenly magnetized. This startled her a bit. She adjusted the hat and pulled at the seam that had just closed. It was stuck solid. Feeling a little claustrophobic and trapped, she pushed the button again. The suit relaxed, the jacket fell open at the front, and the hat fell back down over her eyes.
Feeling a little more calm, Jenny powered the suit back up. Again, the hatband automatically sized to her head and the jacket front closed. The further Jenny turned the dial, the lighter she felt, until she felt almost weightless. She tried a little test jump and hit her head on the ceiling, then slowly descended to the floor, landing very lightly.
She rubbed her sore head. "Whoa, I'd better be careful."
The further Jenny turned the dial in the opposite direction, the heavier she felt, until she could barely move a muscle. Jenny preferred the lighter end of the scale, so she turned it back. She started to dance and leap about the room, performing jumps that until now, would have been impossible. Standing in one spot, Jenny continued to turn the dial, until she actually began to rise up off the floor. The incredible suit was capable of providing complete weightlessness.
"Unbelievable," she said softly. "I've got to go outside and try this thing out, before I kill myself in here." Her room suddenly felt very small.
With a twist of the dial, Jenny dropped slowly back down to the floor. She left her room and headed outside. Martin was coming up the stairs with a sandwich as Jenny was on her way down.
"Nice sweats Jen, where'd you get those, Barney's Bargain Basement?" he teased.
"Ha ha, very funny."
Jenny ran outside and looked for a private area where she could try out the amazing suit. She selected a secluded area in a small open field just behind the barn. Turning the control dial towards the lighter side as she ran, Jenny's body became lighter, and her strides lengthened. Feeling more like a deer or an antelope, she hurdled the barnyard fence, clearing it by a good foot. "Wow! I feel like super girl." Once she reached the middle of the field, Jenny began experimenting by jumping up and down on the spot. Jenny adjusted the suit until she was feeling quite light, and then jumped with only about half her strength. She sprung straight up, twenty feet into the air. Even though she half expected this, the height still scared the daylights out of her. To be that high up in the air with nothing supporting her was a very precarious feeling. She came back down to Earth very slowly and softly. It took her awhile to get used to the dizzying heights she could achieve, and to have confidence in her equipment.
.
As the Traveler approached Jenny's home, a large window panel opened. Born could see the rooftops of Jenny's house and barn off in the distance, partially obscured by the green treetops. Obos had all of the living things on Jenny's property on its sensors.
"The Earth human is outside of the dwelling," Obos informed.
A few moments later while Born was watching, he saw a small figure rise above the barn roof, hover for a while, and then slowly descend.
"I think the Earthling is using my gravity displacement suit now, Obos," Born said, in an annoyed tone.
Obos confirmed Born's suspicions. It backed the Traveler off, and proceeded to land as quickly as safety would allow in an open field about one kilometer from Jenny's home. The large trees surrounding the field provided the huge ship with a good hiding spot.
Born put on the flamboyant gravity suit. "I'm going to scout out the situation," he told the computer. "Let's test the communication device between us before I go."
It still was not working.
He shook his head. "I don't have time to fix this right now; I'll just have to be careful."
Before exiting the Traveler, Born powered up the gravity suit. The streamers and tassels on the arms and legs, and the decorative balls on the hood began to float freely, as the suit displaced Earth's gravity. He walked across the fields towards Jenny's home, lightly jumping over the rusted wire fences separating the open areas. He felt very exposed out there in such a vibrant, eye-catching garment and with no communication with Obos. He crept along until he could see Jenny through the trees and bushes. Getting down on his hands and knees, Born crawled to a hiding spot, providing him with a good view of her performance.
I can't just walk up to her and ask for my suit back, Born thought, shuddering at the prospect.
He watched Jenny playing outside for a while, and she ran right past where he was hiding, with long, bounding, effortless strides.
"She's having a fine time at my expense," Born whispered.
He soon retreated to the Traveler to formulate a plan of action with Obos on how to retrieve his gravity displacement suit.
"When do these Earth humans sleep, Obos?" Born asked.
"When this area of the planet is not illuminated by its star," replied the computer.
Born decided he would try to get into Jenny's house and search for the suit after she and her family had gone to bed. He studied diagrams of door lock mechanisms Obos had found in the country's patent files. Obos had the capability of retrieving any electronically stored data. It had already collected and stored a lot of Earth information. They figured out how a simple lock operated, and Born fashioned a self-adjusting key, that should work in manipulating a door lock open.
.
Jenny continued to experiment with her amazing new toy, and was having a blast. She started doing flips and spins in the air. She picked apples off the highest branches of the apple tree. Jumping over the roof of her barn, she gave the weather vane a spin as she went sailing by.
She jumped as high as she could and hovered there for a moment or two, enjoying the feeling of complete weightlessness. She stretched out into a flying position and the breeze blew her weightless body. Wow, what an awesome feeling, she thought as a gust of wind pushed her past the house and overtop of the next open field.
"I could fly like a bird now if I had wings," Jenny said to herself, and an idea struck her
.
"I've got to spice this up a bit," she said to herself.
She floated to the ground and ran back to the house, where she collected a bright red umbrella and two sturdy pieces of cardboard. In the barn, Jenny shaped the cardboard to size and cut two slots in each piece.
"There, that should do it," she said to herself. "But, I think I'll try the umbrella first." And she ran outside with it clutched in her hand. Jumping as high as she could, Jenny turned the control dial to complete weightlessness at the top of her jump, and then attached the controller inside of the top pocket of the gravity suit. The strong wind carried her along with it, and then, she opened the umbrella.
"Whee!" she squealed, as the wind filled the umbrella like the sail of a ship, and Jenny held on tight with both hands.
She zoomed across the sky, as fast as the air stream could carry her. The ground far below sped past, and Jenny felt invigorated as she raced with the wind.
"Oh oh, I'd better come down soon or I'm going to end up in Alberta," Jenny realized, as she collapsed the umbrella and reached into the pocket for the control module, which she adjusted to provide herself with more gravity.
Once back on the ground, Jenny ran a couple of miles back home, leaping effortlessly over any obstacle in her way.
"Now, my home-made wings," Jenny said, and proceeded to slide her arms through the slots she had cut into the cardboard.
Again, Jenny jumped high, and then provided herself with zero gravity. She tilted the cardboard wings so they would catch the wind current, and took off like a barn swallow.
"Awesome!" she shouted, as she streaked across the sky.
She dove and darted this way and that, with every slight adjustment of her wings. "Yahoo!" the big human bird yelled.
"Uh oh, here comes Alberta again." And she performed a wide looping turn until she was facing into the teeth of the wind.
Jenny flapped her arms vigorously, trying to fight her way back home, but she realized she wasn't making any headway, and her wings could not stand up to the stress. They collapsed under the strain and Jenny dropped herself back down to the ground. On her way down, two starlings went winging past her, against the wind. "Showoffs!" she yelled at them, and giggled to herself.
Once on the ground, Jenny rubbed her tired shoulders and caught her breath. "Whoa, that was hard work," she said, as she removed her crumpled wings, and again ran back home.
Jenny momentarily put aside all of her concerns for the future. She had the innate ability to be able to block out things that she may not looking forward to, and her natural gift did not abandon her now. She was enjoying the moment.
It took Jenny several minutes to get back home, where she discarded her makeshift wings into the recycling bin in the barn.
She walked back to her private spot behind the barn, and had a foolish idea, I'm going to try something daring, then jumped to a dizzying height, almost 200 feet above the ground. She floated there for a few moments, enjoying the view.
"Well, here goes," she said, as she gave the dial a sudden turn. Jenny dropped like a sack of potatoes. She let out a high-pitched squeal as she fell, and her stomach felt the same as it did when she went down the big dip on a roller-coaster ride. In a panic, Jenny turned the dial in the opposite direction, all the way to the complete weightlessness stage, anxious to stop her fall, but she had already created some momentum that even the absence of gravity could not slow down. She landed with a thud, her legs flexing hard to break her fall. She crumpled and rolled onto the soft ground. Once her downward momentum stopped, a breeze came along and picked up her now weightless body. Jenny dialed the suit to a level that increased her weight, and she rolled to a stop.
"Ok, that's enough of that," Jenny muttered, as she picked herself up, dusted off, and made sure all of her body parts still worked. Realizing what a risky stunt that was, Jenny stuck to safer maneuvers.
.
After a few hours of weightless fun, Jenny decided she had better go back into the house, before her father came home for supper. She had seen Relli's two clients come and go and she knew Relli would be busy preparing the evening meal.
Jenny wasn't quite sure why, but she felt as though she wanted to keep the suit a secret, at least for the time being. She walked past Martin's bedroom door where he was laying down looking through a car magazine.
"Hey Jen, did you hear the buzz? There was a UFO sighting in the area today. I heard it on the news just now," Martin said, sounding excited.
Jenny's jaw dropped, and she got a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach. She suddenly realized where the suit might have come from.
"Oh no," she whispered as her stomach knotted up.
"What's wrong? You look like you just saw a ghost or something," Martin asked.
"Oh, nothing. I was just thinking about UFOs and aliens."
"Don't worry, I'll protect you from the monster aliens," Martin kidded.
Jenny sneered back at him, and said, "Then I'm doomed."
She considered riding back to the lake and returning the gravity suit to the place where she had found it, but it is difficult to give up such a wondrous object, and something deep inside, directed her to hang onto it. She wondered if the alien sightings were true, and if this may be related to the faint hope they were waiting for.