"Why do you call the wall bat?" Valerie asked, while she was trying to catch a real bat with the goggles, to scare her brother. She didn't find a single one, as she was told, but the girl didn't lose her enthusiasm.
"It is not bat, but BAt. This wall separates the Island to two section. It is running in a line from the Boron Kingdom to the Astatine Kingdom. That's why we call BAt."
"It could be named after something less frightening." Conrad said, and there were just a little bit of shaking in his voice.
"It's old name was BPo line. Boron-Polonium. It was similar to a famous man's name' shortening. But it was in the old times. Nowadays Batman is more popular, so it was renamed to BAt.
"Why is this wall here in fact?" Conrad asked, completely reassured.
"It divides the the element into two groups. One side of the wall there are metals, and the non-metallic element are on the other side."
"Why are they separated by a wall? Are they in war?" He guessed.
"How could they?" Valerie asked, laughing. " The Island is circular. On the other side they are freely connected!"
"On that side they are separated by the Noble gases." K.O. informed them. "They are very placid little ones. So even if they were at war, they could not have to involve the calm, lazy noble gases."
"The Heliums were really very calm Little Ones..."Valerie was thinking loud about her former experiences with little ones, who belongs to the Noble gas group.
The two kids were thinking hard for a while, and the adults let them do that.
"Who made that wall? Is it natural, or artificial?" Conrad asked in the end.
"Well, it is clearly artificial." K.O. answered. "Man-made."
"Why?"
"The previous Islanders probably tried to differentiate the metals and non-metals."
"Why?"
The two adults looking at each other. Neither of them was ever questioned the existence of the BAt line. Moreover the constant question-tsunami was tiresome for them. K.O. wanted to concentrate for the driving, Elie was tired, not being able to sleep in the previous night. But they tried their best to answer to the curious kids.
"They probably felt like easier to navigate, or the temples founded it more convenient for them." Elie answered. " The metals have similar qualities. They are mostly gray, solid and easy to work with them, because of the nature of the metallic bond. There are a few exceptions, but they are like that."
"Which ones are the exceptions?" Valerie asked curiously.
"For example Copper an Gold are not gray, but yellow and red, and Mercury is a liquid. But all of them could make alloy with each other, since they have metallic bonds. It means you could mix any of them with another metal. The juggling hands remain similar, like in the Lithium."
"What about the non-metals?" Conrad asked, he wanted to confirm, that his assumption was right.
"They are fairly different from each other. Sometimes the same elements are different from themselves. You will see them, when we will reach the mine!" Elie hyped up the twins.
"But it seems cruel to separate the little ones from each other!" Valerie said, and took down the goggles, not wanting to see the wall.
"Oh! Don't worry! The little ones are very creative, and they don't mind that wall at all!" K.O. said to cheer up her. "It doesn't even bother them.
"Really?"
"Really. They behave like that wall wouldn't be there. But around the wall the little ones became tricky."
"Tricky? What do they do?" Valerie asked, excited.
"Their nature are mixed with their neighbors. There are metals, who disguise themselves as a non-metal, and the non-metals look like metals. Moreover they are behaving like non-metals. So they are confusing ones from the viewpoint of the researchers."
The kids were running out of questions, and began to look around the land under them. They needed some time to digest the new information, so Elie and K.O. could relax for a while. For a long time, because the way above the Kingdom of Boron was boring. Elie gave some basic information to the twins about the Kingdom of Boron, but Valerie and Conrad were not interested in ceramics, glasses, or enamel. Crafts also did not make them excited, neither of them wanted to make an art to bring home to their parents and friends. This time even Valerie didn't want to stop in the kingdom. It was not interesting at all. At least from a child's viewpoint. Maybe that's why the twins were so calm. Or they had to digest the tons of information, they had got previously. Anyway, they were uninterested, so they had fallen to a half-sleeping, meditating state.
Suddenly four loud chirping sounds pulled them out of this state.
"We are close to the border of the Kingdom of Carbon." Elie told to the wondering children, while she was quickly closing their seatbelts. "Get ready! It will be a little bit uncomfortable!"
***
Valerie was the first one, who regained her senses. She realized, that she was lying in the grass, and there was a wet, cool rag on her forehead. Her head was spinning, and hurt a bit. Just a bit, so she was sitting up. Her brother and K.O. was lying next to her, but they probably experienced more pain, because they were lying on their back, and both were curled up. Elie was nowhere to see, and this made the girl frightened.
"Elie!!!" She cried, like an abandoned baby.
"I'm coming!" Elie answered from a distance, but it was really her voice, so Valerie calmed down.
Her friend was coming from the trees, with two wet handkerchiefs in her hand.
"Did you wake up?" She hurried to her, and when she realized, that Valerie wasn't ill, she turned to the boys. "Are you all right?" She asked, while taking the handkerchiefs to the boys' foreheads.
"My head is spinning a bit."
"Lie back, and take a rest. It will pass soon."
"What's happened?" The girl asked, and laid back to the grass. "Were we attacked? Was it really a war?"
"No, of course not!" Elie said. "We have just entered to the Kingdom of Carbon. Sorry, but I forget to tell you about the resizing process."
"What resizing? I don't understand."
"Wait, you will understand in a minute!" Elie said enigmatically, and hurried to the inside of the caravan.
When she returned, there was something in her hand. She held her fist in front of Valerie's eyes.
"What do you think, what's in my hand?"
"I don't know." Valerie sat up. "My head is not spinning anymore."
"That's good. You are over the side-effects of the resizing. Do you want to see, what's in my hand?"
Valerie nodded. Elie opened her fist, and held the content with two fingers.
"It looks like a Hydrogen molecule." Valerie said in doubtful voice. "But those are bigger! This one is too little."
"You guessed right. These little guys are a Hydrogen molecule. Hold them firmly, or they would escape!"
The woman handed over the little ones to the girl. Valerie examined the small guy thoroughly.
"Are you sure?"
"I have just picked them from the balloon!"
"They have shrunken. So tiny!" Valerie was amazed. "They resemble to a keychain!" She laughed.
"In reality, you are the one, who has grown. At the border of the Kingdom of Carbon there is a transformer, which makes the size of the humans, and their belongings double. This doesn't affect the size of the little ones. So they look like they would have shrunken."
"Amazing!" Valerie smiled. "But the feeling of growing is very unpleasant."
"Sorry, we have forgotten about this. I am used to it, but newbies, like you, and those ones, who don't travel so much, like K.O., could suffer more from the side effects of the procedure."
K.O. began squirming, and held his head in his hands.
"Damn!"
"Don't move!" Elie ran to the man, and tried to keep him down. "Do you want to eat something? Or drink a bit? There is a small stream nearby."
"I feel like everything could just dive in my stomach..."
"Just rest for a bit more. Tell me, if you want something!"
"The kids..."
"Valerie took it easy, Conrad is still asleep. Please rest a bit more!"
"Are you ill?" Valerie asked him worried.
"He is just suffering from the side effects of the resizing. It was hard on the boys, that's all." Elie told her, and she steered the little girl away. "What do you want to do, while the boys are resting?"
Valerie didn't answer. She couldn't think anything else, but staying there and take care of K.O. and her brother.
"There's no meaning in sitting beside the sleeping boys. Why don't you go and hunt for little ones?"
Valerie was stunned. Hunting for little ones? K.O. didn't allow them to catch wild little ones in the Lithium Kingdom.
"Don't worry, you don't have a permission here to hunt for molecules. There are a lot of them in the grass, and beside the stream. So you are free to catch any of them. By the way! I have forgotten about another thing." She pulled out the repaired old device from her pocket. "Here you are. It is for you." She handed the device to the girl.
"Thank you very much!" Valerie said, touched.
"It is my old device, but my former colleague tuned up a bit, so it would be enough for you. Sorry, the pattern a bit old-fashioned…"
"It is perfect!" The girl interrupted the woman, and hugged her. "Thank you, I like it!"
"I hope, you don't mind if it is an old device..."
"Originally I wanted to buy a really cool and fashionable hand device. I picked up one I really liked on the advertisement wall in the Capital of Hydrogen, but… That girl had the same device, that I wanted to buy, so I decided not to buy one for myself. This is a beautiful device, and nobody has one like this."
Elie swallowed back the remark, that no one use such an old fashioned device nowadays, and showed Valerie how to use her newly gotten device. The little girl's righteousness and joy strengthened Elie that her decision was good, not buying a new device for the twins.
"Don't wander too far!"
"Okay!" She said, but didn't really hear what she was asked for. Valerie went for hunting.
It was midday, when the boys rested enough to be able to continue their travel.
"It is cruel to resize the people!" Conrad stated, as he was rolling the small Hydrogen molecule in his hand. His head still hurt a bit.
"It is necessary, because the atoms are getting bigger with the increasing number of electrons in one line. In a row, the size is shrinking a bit, but their size could cause inconvenience even to adults. That's why people are resizing by passing certain borders."
"Where will be the next one?" Conrad asked, shivering for fear.
"Don't worry, your hand device will notify you before a resizing border, and the more you resize, the more you get used to it." Elie caressed the boy's back. "We don't go near another one in this kingdom."
Conrad looked at K.O., wanting him to confirm the information.
"Elie is right. There's no more border for a while. It was enough for me, too. I wish I could drink something strong before leaving!" He sighed. "Where is Valerie?"
"She is not far from here, and coming back." Elie said, after she had taken a look on her hand device. She put a spying software on her former hand device, so she always knew where Valerie was.
She was right. Valerie were hurrying back to them, with a molecule in her arms.
"Elie, Elie, Elie!" She was radiated with joy, and show the salient molecule. "I have found a puppy!"
"A puppy?" K.O. asked suspiciously.
Elie started to laugh. She already recognized the molecule, that the girl had found.
"Sir, your wish has been fulfilled. All you have to do is convince Valerie, to let you drink that!"
The travel became more interesting. Elie was sitting at the wheel, and chatting with Valerie about her "puppy" and the other hunted molecules. The boys were eating candies, and looking straight at the horizon. They were slowly recovering from shock of the resizing.
"K.O.!" Conrad cried out suddenly. "Why can we still flying?"
"Why couldn't we flying?" The old man asked perplexedly.
"Because the size of the Hydrogens are the half, than it was before! Aren't we going to crash?"
"Oh, it doesn't matter!" The old man replied. "The Hydrogens in the balloon are now in gas state, and the gases always fill the available space. Only the number of the molecules count, not the size. If you measure the balloon on the caravan, the size would be the same. So don't worry, we won't fall down. Do you want another candy?"
Conrad shook his head, he felt much more better. He didn't want to mention, but he didn't believe, that size doesn't matter. That Hydrogen molecule was too tiny…
***
The excitement of the children did not last long. Arriving to the coal mine was much more boring, than flying over the Kingdom of Boron. There were blackness on the ground as far as the eye could see. Elie put down the caravan in the middle of the blackness.
"Come on! We have to register in the temple, before you could go to the mine!" She said, and pulled the company out of the caravan.
"Everywhere is this black dust." Valerie said, and she behaved like a princess. She wanted to avoid soiling her clothes. But Conrad neither like the blackness. They were walking on tiptoe.
"It is just energy residue. There are showers in the temple, so you cold get rid of it, before you go to bed!" Elie informed them.
The Church of Coal had several other curiosities in store. Around the building there were big hangars, pipes and greenhouses. Elie and K.O. told the kids that they would work in them, so they would see the inside of the buildings. After the registration, all of them got a machete-like objects. Valerie and Conrad started to fence with them, because they were similar to light-swords.
"Hey-hey-hey! "K.O. said and confiscated the knives. "These are expensive things! Don't ruin them!"
"But they look cool!" Valerie riposted.
"You will need them in the mine." Elie told her.
"How?" Conrad asked laughing. "You said Carbon atoms are not wild."
"We don't have to defend ourselves!" Conrad said.
"You won't laugh when you have to feed the carbon atoms in the mine by hand!" Elie warned them.
The twins fell silent and looked intently at the young woman. They were waiting for her explanation.
"You will use them to cut bonds between the Carbon atoms. The energy is dosed to the atoms by their hands, and they will eat the right amount by themselves."
"It is much more faster, and convenient, than feeding them with energy one-by-one." K.O. nodded.
The kids showed a serious face and nodded. They understood. Not a toy. The old man showed them how to fill the knife. Valerie and Conrad became impatient to use the new tool.
"You will soon use them in the mine!" He laughed on the eagerness of the children. "You will even get bored of using them!"
The twins protested at once. Surely they will not get tired of the new tool and mining either.
"Then we can go to the mine to collect coal!" K.O. cried, and held his hand up. So did the twins.
"Hey, don't you want to change clothes before going to the blackness?"
The other three looked at her with incomprehension in their eyes.
"Why would we?" K.O. asked.
"Because you will be covered by the black residue from head to toe! Do you really want to wear your best clothes for mining?"
"We don't have another set of clothes, which is more worn out, than this one." Valerie stated.
"Okay, go in these clothes!" Elie gave up. Still, she couldn't send the kids in school uniforms to the mine.
"Elie, aren't you coming with us?" Conrad asked suddenly. Elie shook her head. "Why?"
"I didn't sleep at all last night, so I am terribly tired. I will sleep a bit, while you are in the mine." The twins were suddenly saddened, so Eli tried to cheer them up. "Tomorrow I will accompany you, I promise." She held her thumb up.
Valerie and Conrad was smiling again, and left with K.O. to the mine. The two children hugged the old man and, jumping beside him, asked him about mining. K.O. answered them patiently. Elie was watching them for a while, then she returned to the caravan.
The old man pushed his bed to the wall, so she had place for her mattress. She hadn't slept on it for a long time, but now that she was so tired, it seemed very inviting. Elie was very tired, but she was not allowed to sleep yet. Her hand device was vibrated by five times, while they were in the temple. She was aware, why. Will had taken his moves. He was quick. Elie couldn't do anything, bit response. She opened her messages. Four from the investors, and co-owners of her former temple. The fifth was from Will.
The former reported that it was considered a good idea for Will to be the new priest. They all unanimously supported the new project. Electra didn't want to read Will's message. She was sure about the content. But she had to read anyway. She didn't guess wrong. Will called on her to resign. She pushed her thumb to the documents, and sent them back to the sender, and the investors, and co-owners. At that very moment Electra Oly was no longer the nun of the Temple of Lithium. Just jobless young researcher.
Elie called out a prepared letter, pushed her thumb on that, and sent. As the beep indicated that the letter had been sent, her hands began trembling and the device fell out of them. Tears streamed down Elie's face and she started sobbing.