Chapter 4: Money, preparation, demons tail

Because there is a law such as gravity the universe can and will create itself from nothing. Stephen Hawking

Waking up bright and early, cough 10 am is definitely early. Sun is shining a total of not at all. Overcast everywhere foretelling or a normal day. Damn and I was hoping for a lovely dawn to start my new adventure, I guess this is not a fantasy its reality, far from the abnormalities pertained to unicorns and candy corns. Now my rhyming is done my morning begins.

With a bowl of cereal I get some info off the internet, it should be more reliable than the news outlets pumping out fear and misinformation. People who managed to get the material have started to produce videos throwing it, playing with it, some guy even started his own zero G room and is selling tickets. That was fast. Lots of people think it’s an amazing new material but there is clear neglect of any potential risks and safety precautions of warnings. This will end badly for them. Either through military intervention, since they announced they own some or through accidents. If I'm gonna mess with this stuff I'm going to do it right.

I check my emails, with a beam of golden light its here a reply from one of the researchers. The message as follows

“Dear Novis, your email found me well, could you please enclose a photo of the material to prove the validity of ownership then we can discuss prices.”

I noticed he didn’t enclose a name, I suspected his name on the internet was phony, for the best ti suppose. I realize if I show him a lot he might bump the price down so I find a piece the size of a fingernail, 2 of them, and send that in an email with “I hope we can now discuss prices.”

Hopefully, with such an open-ended email il be able to milk this puppy dry.

I go outside for a walk the sun beams through a little from the overcast, trees swaying in a subtle breeze, a random house floating passed, a good start. I go shop I plan on buying everything I think I could need for working with this new material. I did a bit of googling earlier my shopping list is as follows.

Lab equipment, this one is going to set me back a lot, the materials for a kiln (melting metal obviously), Small anvil and assorted blacksmithing tools, Leatherwork tools, Assorted metals, and fabrics. I also have on my list gardening tools, assorted equipment like pickaxes, a few electronics, wires switches, small circuit boards enough to make a basic program like moving something back and forward stuff like that along with a ton of other crap. This list will easily set me back £1500 which Is buying the cheapest stuff. I can't afford this right now not on an unsafe gamble so I settle with lab equipment and some random assorted items. Il purchase the rest when I can. No point buying blacksmithing items when I know nothing of blacksmithing the same with leatherwork but if the plan in my mind works they are going to be important skills to learn.

Heading home with a lot of stuff I call my brother and ask if he wants to be part of my research. He accepts and will be at mine for 1 pm its noon now so it's fine, I set up my lab in the basement, down £500 already, didn’t see that coming crazy. I bought a notebook as well, thick well made it will be valuable.

As I wait for my brother I start wondering what I'm going to need to figure out and ideas on how to do it. Obvious questions like what it is made off, how its made, questions like atomic structure I don’t have the tools for with my measly lab shambled together wit cheap and or second-hand parts. First, let's start basic, how do you weigh something that creates zones of zero gravity the scales will just float away. I need the weight of a pure sample to calculate the radius based on weight and assess any fluctuations between tests to see if other factors impact it. It's also vital for figuring out how much lead and other materials insulate against its effects.

As my brother gets in I start asking him any ideas after greetings.

I jokingly say “I see you found the door fine”

Connor “funny; so what's the plan what are we doing”

Seriously I say “weighing it”

I can see the question flicker in his eyes from confusion to clarity.

He quietly says “I see the problem”

We go back and forward through several ideas. We failed a good 7 times before we had an idea. We needed a piece with its weight being measured outside of its antigravity zone. We smashed a bit into shards and extracted the purple crystals discarding the rock. We tied some string to the rock and measured it by hooking the string onto scales and hanging it below. We made sure the string was very light not to screw with the reading.

Now we have a way of weighing it we suspend a crystal in the air and bring items closer until we find its radius based on weight, they are pretty light for its size but accounting for issues we access its 10cm per gram. This will be important.

It's very difficult to measure this material in any normal method as we have methods for standard materials not almost supernatural ones. Who could of know? Well, Connor helped he is not a smart person by standards but his genius in DIY and hands-on skills were vital. I told him of my money plan and said il divide the money with him somewhat and ask him to work with me on researching and making a flight suit. He agrees not for the money but because he wants to fly first. I wanted to go first but sometimes you must bite the bullet.

Time flew by I send him home for the day and check my emails, a reply it’s a good 6 pm.

“Okay I will purchase any samples you offer for about £25000 for both”

Trying not to be giddy from the shock I reply calmly and collectedly

“I accept that offer but I also have some more I'm willing to offer”, enclosing a photo of a good chunk of materials I have and ask for the mind-boggling sum of £100,000.

With a quick reply, he says he will offer me “80.000” I accept, and now my bank is “80000” heavier. I immediately send “20000” to my brother he deserves it. He messages me one message “You crazy, but I have more rocks I picked up if you want them”.

Perfect even more of the strange new material. I tell him to stash it in the cave and from this point on were partners in this new world of strangeness. I gather the materials I plan on selling and get to my brother's house he drives us to the drop off point as we drive away we see a black car with no number plate collect the materials. We notice a tail, a normal car seems to follow us so we drive to my brother's house to throw them off since my lab is at home, none of these materials are located here. Hopefully, they don’t trace me back to my house.

I get an email, drop off confirmed we will always accept samples, feel free to contact us in future with this email. Black*******@hotmail.co.uk. Good to know. Il attempt to sell off some more to the other 2 researchers before the price drops massively if they don’t reach back il sell to this new buyer until I have a massive sum of cash while still having enough for experiments.

Getting home I start drawing up my plan for a flight suit. Knowing the radius instead of creating a zero gravity zone on the entire body I'm going to place small crystals strategically throughout the body to reduce the weight massively so I can add wings to the suit that will work effectively. I also order a parachute off the internet. My first plan is to have about 5% of the bodyweight remaining if possible, but il plan a non-customized one if I plan to mass-produce them. It's not actually going to be a suit closer to smartly placed straps with crystals inside with a parachute and sturdy fabric wings to use air to move. I should work in theory. The parachute in case It fails. As far as we can tell mass doesn’t affect the power of the antigravity radius its less like a charge and more like an on-off switch. If half your body is outside the radius it will reduce the weight inside to zero but outside of it your weight still functions normally. Done properly we should be able to control how much your body weights, while not having a massive zone around the body that affects other people. Without the wings, it will be like very low gravity but with it should allow functional propulsion from air displacement. Flight, I can't wait for tomorrow. Future improvements will likely be small fuel-efficient jets attached to the limbs like iron man, with the low weight it should be possible to produce propulsion and use the arms to control directions. But I don’t have the tools for that right now, a future idea. I have other ideas but we should start basic. Learn from birds, they reduce there body weight to allow effective propulsion from wings we are doing the same.