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[The Blog of Phileas Fogg: 1883 onwards] October 14th 1884

From: Harry Hayfield <harryhayfield~at~googlemail.com>
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 2009 16:50:03 -0700 (PDT)
To: jvf~at~gilead.org.il

It's been a very worrying few hours but somehow (and do not ask me how)
I am still a father. William seems to have recovered from his
interaction with that Selenite gun and might just have gained something
as a result.

I was the first to wake up this morning and was about to check on
William when I heard a yawn, followed by something cracking. I looked
around and there was William sitting up yawning his head
off. "William!" I shouted and hugged him as hard as I could. My
exclaimation awoke Passepartout and Mr. Barbicane and when they
realised what was happening, they also joined in the hugging, but then
Passepartout was struck by a thought as was I at the same time. If the
device the Selenite fired was supposed to increase William's internal
gravity by a factor of six and crush him to death, why was he still
alive?

I instantly made for the box of tricks and found that it had pondered
the same question. Placing it on his chest, it made several
measurements of his pulse and breathing before setting out to find the
answer. William sat up and attempted to stand but was a little woozy
after his experience and as I and Mr. Barbicane helped him to his feet,
Passepartout gasped. "Mon Dieu" he exclaimed, "holes!"

As Mr. Barbicane helped William sit down, I examined the holes and
realised that they were in the position that William's hands had been
when he yawned. I gave the wall a tap and found it was made of
something akin to concrete and asked Passepartout to assess how strong
it was. Passepartout laid his hands against it and declared that it
was "stronger than on Earth". Just then the penny dropped (and the box
of tricks pinged to indicate it had come to an answer as well), and for
the first time in many a year we had both come to the same conclusion.

Asking if William felt up to it, I asked him to jump up and down for a
minute. William thought this an odd request, but agreed and as he did
so I explained my theory. "What if" I started, "instead of increasing
William's internal gravity, that device reduced it?". Both Passepartout
and Mr. Barbicane looked at me extremely puzzled. I then went onto
explain that when William throw that rock at the Selenite who then
dropped the device perhaps because it was such a new invention, perhaps
this was an instance that had not been planned for. "A mistake?" said
William as he finished jumping. "Indeed" I replied, "and a mistake that
just might help us escape".

As you can imagine, all eyes and ears were focused on my words. "This
box of tricks has summised that William's internal gravity has indeed
been reduced by a factor of six. As we know, the gravity of the moon is
one sixth that of Earth, so say for instance Passepartout you can lift
400lbs on Earth, then you would be able to lift 2,400lbs here on the
Moon!". Passepartout smiled and started to bend his arms. "Now, thanks
to that device that the Selenite fired at William, if he was as strong
as you, he would now be in a position to lift not 2,400lbs, but
14,440lbs!"

"How much?" exclaimed William, sitting back down on the bed with a
bump. "Are you telling me?" he asked slowly, "that I am 36 times
stronger than I was on Earth?". "Yes" I replied, "and when we get back
to Earth you should be 6 times stronger than before and it is William's
newfound strength that's going to get us out of this mess!".

I went to the bars of the cell and gave them a tap. "Passepartout!" I
said, "bend these bars!". Passepartout, ever ready to use his strength
tackled the bars with gusto but after ten minutes had only made a gap
large enough for me to put my head through. "William?" I gestured, and
with a little caution he made his way to another section, grabbed two
of the bars and pulled creating a hole big enough to walk through
within moments.

Everyone looked at William and a huge smile crossed his face. "Those
Selenites are going to feel what it is like to capture a Fogg" he
said. "Not until tomorrow!" I replied, as I asked him to close the bars
again, after which we formulated our escape plan which will start the
moment we wake up tomorrow. The only question mark I have over the
whole plan is that we will still be stuck on the moon though (and I
have no idea where we could hide where the Selenites would not be able
to find us). That's a question for another day though.

--
Posted By Harry Hayfield to The Blog of Phileas Fogg: 1883 onwards on
7/28/2009 12:25:00 AM

Received on Tue 28 Jul 2009 - 02:50:22 IDT

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