9. Conservation of Energy
Once the others explained the Enyrgias to Ardex, he was able to see them too. But the other part of their explanation, that they showed movement and that’s that, didn’t feel right to him. Something that didn’t move could still have energy, could it not?
The number of Enyrgias always had to stay the same throughout the universe. So what when the wind stopped blowing and the waters developed no waves? What of all the time before the gods existed here? The amount of energy had to be the same back then, but nothing moved.
Ardex caressed a boulder. He slowly pushed it up the hill, just to see what happened. It took him effort, of course. He had to put energy into pushing that boulder, because gravity tried to pull it down.
So where did the energy go? If it had to be “conserved”? He leaned against the boulder, perfectly still, a tree’s length above the ground. And he saw that it was still surrounded by Enyrgias. Boulder not moving—still pulsing with energy. How?
His siblings lay at the feet of the Impossible Wall, defeated. He had a great overview of the area from here; the Impossible Wall perfectly opposite their Bacteria Barricade, with Bella stuck behind it. It was up to Ardex to give the final jolt of energy and come up with the final plan, before …
“Listen up! If we … if we all push boulders up the hill, at the same time, then surely they can’t all slip out of our grasp!”
“That’s foolish—”
“You’re getting better at joking—”
“DO IT! Just try! Believe me for once. Trust me, just, for once, please? All of this could’ve been prevented. If Darus had felt free to explain his discoveries to us without being laughed away. If Bella hadn’t wandered off alone. We are a family.”
Feria instantly grabbed her boulder.
After some hesitation, the others followed her lead. Without knowing why, probably all thinking about Mother’s story of Sizzlefish, they grabbed a boulder and pushed it higher and higher.
Being surrounded by your siblings, who also struggle with their own boulder, did not make it any easier. But it did make it more bearable. Ardex, still weakened from his fury, fell behind more and more.
At some points, Feria considered dropping her own boulder just to help Ardex move his paws again. The saber-toothed tiger said it wasn’t needed, even as his voice was failing.
Feria trusted him. As she trusted Darus to be making headway, maybe already creating a hole on Bella’s side. She, Eeris, Cosmo and Gulvi were together in the same place for the first time in a while, and she didn’t know why, but she teared up at the realization.
And they strained, and cursed, but kept rolling their boulder further up the mountain.
The sun set. They had to walk the final stretch in darkness. It was easier when they focused on the Enyrgias: their arrow-shaped bodies would reveal their paws and the boulder by showing the energy acting on it.
Eeris’ long neck gave her an advantage. By digging her heels into the mountain, she could push her boulder to the top without moving there herself.
At least, until it started slipping from her grasp. Time seemed delayed. The world staggered, as everyone saw what happened, saw the boulder slowly slide off her snout as if it was suddenly made of ice, but nobody was able to stop it.
Eeris simply stopped pushing it. As long as she didn’t make that final push, the boulder would just about stay within reach.
Everyone else froze too. This was pointless. Why push further, if that next step would just make the boulder roll back down?
They called to Ardex below. He still had a long way to go and was swallowed by darkness.
Feria looked at the Bacteria Barricade behind him. The regular ones and the Mitos were falling apart more and more. And even when they did find each other, that small burst of energy the Mitos created—from the oxygen the other expelled—was not enough to attack that wall.
What was Ardex’ plan?
He shuffled to a plateau that jutted from the Impossible Wall. The tiger, God of Fire and Death, looked dim and wary.
“Yes, yes,” he said. “You were all right. We can never create more energy than already exists. Never create more matter than the universe has right now. Now that I know where to look, I can see how every firebreath of mine has to pull energy from somewhere else.”
His words echoed across the valley. His siblings stood in anticipation, straining to keep the slippery boulders in their grasp. If they made no decision, the boulders would make the decision for them—roll back down and probably flatten Ardex along the way.
“But …” said Ardex with a grin.
Feria had forgotten how much she loved that mischievous grin.
“That also means that energy used, an action taken, a boulder moved to a higher location … is never lost.”
He let go of his boulder on purpose. He nodded to the others to do the same. Feria took her final step to the mountain top and the boulder slipped from her fingers of its own accord.
The boulders picked up speed. They rolled faster, and faster, and faster, as they aimed for the floor again. Gravity pulled on them. It made them twist rapidly enough to slide, twist, twirl, and break all other stone in their path.
“Energy is not necessarily movement,” Ardex said. “Every point in space has energy, simply by virtue of being there and not somewhere else. Like stretching a rubber band: if you let go, the band snaps back, because you put it in a position where it contained energy.”
“Or,” continued Ardex, as the boulders neared the ground. “The further you remove a boulder from the floor, placing it in a high position, the more energy it stores to be used. The energy you used to put it there in the first place is now converted.”
And once they let go of their boulders in that position, the stone balls were eager to use that energy and start rolling back down. The Enyrgias that had swarmed around them at first, were slowly converted into speed and collisions with other objects.
A barrage of five massive boulders stormed the ground below. Their speed surpassed what the eyes of gods could follow, and they often lost sight of them in the night.
But they’d aimed well, though their target was obviously quite large.
The boulders made straight for the Bacteria Barricade and slammed into it with overwhelming force.
The night sky lit up. The invisible wall crackled as if thunder inhabited it, as large swaths of bacteria exploded into the air. Some even landed near Ardex’ feet, even though he was up on a mountain. Other parts of the barricade were pushed deep into the dirt, as if a meteor had carried them and struck there.
A gap appeared.
A large gap. Too large to patch it up immediately. A gap that showed Bella, crawling on the floor, her limbs turned to dust, biting her lip and trying her final push.
She stumbled through the gap, groaning, moaning, head first.
She was swallowed by the bacteria barricade—then spit back out.
Her siblings ran down the mountain without care for their own safety. One might have thought they were wild boulders themselves.
Her connection to life restored, dust and particles swarmed around Bella and repaired her body. Her gray and weary face lit up again. It even produced a smile bright enough to see from up high.
By the time Ardex cradled her in his arms, she was almost able to stand on her own feet and talk.
Feria kept her distance and looked past her, for something else had changed too.
The impact of the boulders had squashed several bacteria together. They’d been crushed and blended with such force, that a regular bacteria and a Mitos were now merged.
Some Mitos had found a new home inside the regular type of bacteria.
They could never lose each other again! The bacteria that converted sunlight into oxygen could instantly, without loss, give that to the Mitos. Which ate the oxygen and converted it back into piles of energy.
The consequences could be easily spotted at once.
Those handful of new bacteria were the only ones to survive the crash. But the life force on Somnia had only diminished briefly, for the new bacteria immediately repopulated the land. They called them complex bacteria now, but would surely have many a debate about a more fun and exciting name.
They hadn’t broken out of their cage, not permanently. But this time, the colorful carpets of bacteria stretched across the entire space with ease, and Enyrgias swirled and danced around them in droves.