"Float?" Levro questioned Kathy, ignoring the cheers of his sisters. "Is there a pool?"

"No." Kathy pulled what appeared to be a tiny bar from her pocket. "Oh captain? The girls here want to fly, do you think that could be arranged?"

"They want to fly? Have our new passengers been given the safety briefing?" A voice from the little bar, probably one of those 'radio' things he had seen from time to time.

"I can handle it."

"Fine, but injuries are on you. Fast or slow?"

"What is this all about?" Levro spoke mostly to himself, Kathy and his sisters completely ignoring him.

"We should take it slow for first timers." A devious grin spread across Kathy's face as she returned the bar to her pocket. "Attention all passengers! We are about to engage in the favorite in-flight activity of most Nekh. Before we begin, I must provide you with the quickest of safety briefings!" Kathy's mood seemed to change completely. "Let us start with the basics. At all times, we ask you to keep your arms, legs, and head inside the craft at all times. We also ask that you keep a tight hold on all valuables not already secured to your person as there is always the chance they may float away and get lost in some nook or cranny! Once you have taken care of that, the most important thing to remember is to not panic."

A brief whoop sounded in the room as the lights temporarily dimmed.

"That was the signal that indicates that the captain has either turned gravity on," Levro started feeling strange. He could feel the contents of his stomach rising but no urge to puke. "or off. The feeling of weightlessness is known to be a nauseating sensation to many people, but I strongly encourage all of you to keep your breakfast, lunch or dinner in your stomach instead of plastered on our walls, ceilings and floors."

In a few moments, Levro found himself feeling noticeably lighter. His mother's hair looked a bit poofier as well.

"In order to not strand yourself in the open, it is strongly suggested that you push yourself off the ground. Be careful not to hit anything too hard, your arms are not as strong as your legs and won't stop you as fast as your legs can launch you. Have fun!"

Kathy then proceeded to make Levro's heart leap - a backflip, but far too slow for her to land on her feet. An old lady like her would surely break her neck if she landed on it, but that never happened. She didn't even begin to arc back down towards the floor, 'landing' gently on her feet before kicking off down the hallway. Much the same, his sisters were doing flips midair, catching themselves on the ceiling or floor with their hands before they slammed into it with their heads. 

Levro, on the other hand, was left suddenly adrift in the middle of the air. How had it happened? He wasn't sure, but he could tell that he was in for a bad time if he didn't get this figured out.

"Uh, a little help?"

"Idiot . . ." Kathy's aide threw a small leather bound packet at Levro as he followed Kathy down the hall.

"What's this for?" Levro caught it, with his face. Why did that guy seem to hate him so much?

"It's a bean bag, dear. Throw it at a wall and it will move you in the opposite direction." Kathy zoomed by with a sack in hand, spinning as she did so.

"What? How?" Levro looked down at the puny little thing. He wasn't particularly large, but he still couldn't see how something this small could ever move him.

"Momentum and Force, the Great Sir Isaac Newton's First and Third Laws of Physical Motion!"

"An object shall retain it's present velocity unless acted upon by an outside force." The aide whizzed by as well, launching another bean bag at Levro.

"And the second?"

"Any action force imparts an equal and opposite reaction force."

"What about Charlie's Addendum for Split Interference?"

"Any change in energy not explained by the interference of traditional matter or energy can be directly attributed to the presence of Split in the region, the effect of which is to be determined by experimental means."

"Very good Douglass. What does that mean for our friend here?"

"If he throws the bean bag, the bean bag will throw him." As if to demonstrate, Douglass threw another bean bag at him as he passed, sending him slightly adrift towards the floor. "If the bean bag hits him, he will hit the bean bag . . ." Douglass suddenly twisted his body as a bean bag whizzed by, making use of his tail to aid his dodge. ". . . and lose points."

"I don't think we need to keep score, Douglass." Kathy had procured another sack from somewhere, and was in the middle of unfastening the openings to them, her foot propped underneath a cloth strap on the wall. "He barely even knows how to move around in zero g yet."

"His dad seems to have a handle on it."

Bahn was bouncing straight up and down using his arms and legs, enjoying himself.

"Thompson liked to play these sorts of sports, so he dragged me along to the Gym in the Terran Sector quite a bit. I'd like to say I got pretty good at space grappling, but I never won a round. Is this similar to . . . was it Dizzy Dodgeball?"

Douglass returned fire at Kathy, who simply leaned backwards. 

"That is exactly what this is, we just use bean bags for safety reasons. Balls with a bit of bounce to them are nice, but with less athletic individuals and more delicate objects abound, a malleable object that pretty much stops when it hits a wall is less dangerous. Ricochet hits are impossible as a result, but for beginners it is quite a bit more manageable." Kathy then jumped, spinning, a sack in each hand. A rainbow of colored bean bags emerging from each. "I imagine some of the crew are on their way to join us."

As if on queue, the door at the end of the hallway slid open and two men in predominantly white and grey clothing swung through.

"Douglass! Care for a match?"

"You'll lose!" Three bean bags were already on the way, sailing past Levro's head and nailing the third man coming through the door. "That's three already!"

"ONE! That's ONE point!" The man seemed ever so slightly angered by the unannounced attack. "You know the rules! You can't score points on somebody until they return to their base!"

"You were in your base, dummy!" Already more bean bags were exchanged between the extremes of the room, the three men lobbing the projectiles at an appreciable rate while Douglass expertly avoided them, retaliating with more accurate fire.

In all honesty, the way in which he could maneuver around the hall whilst collecting and sending off the bean bags was graceful. Levro simply wondered if it was possible for him to aim at something else. Not every bag hit him, but a large enough percentage clipped his legs or arms that he got the message. 

Trying his luck, Levro chucked the bean bag in his hands toward the ceiling, hoping it would send him towards the ground. The bag went wild, Levro not used to throwing things without gravity. Still, it seemed to work, and Lev moved towards the floor whilst spinning. 

pap

A bean bag hit his projected landing zone with quite a bit of force, glancing off of the floor. This one wasn't thrown by the crew members, nor was it one of the numerous projectiles directed his way by Douglass.

"Lev! This looks fun!" It was his father who had provoked him, currently holding on to one of those handles on the wall. "Grab a bag or two!"

"Can I please just try to -" Lev, struggling to keep himself oriented, had to arrest his movement with his arms. "I need to get used to this first."

"Eh, whatever." Bahn pushed off the wall, snagging a few of the bean bags as he floated to the other wall. "You guys mind if I join in?"

- - - - -

Levro spent the better part of the next hour getting a handle on moving around the ship without gravity. While he wanted to equate it to swimming in certain ways, the inability to move himself in different directions at any time precluded such a comparison. Instead, he felt a rising appreciation for the designers of the interior swell within him. He had to imagine that designing an interior for this type of movement was not easy, and they had done so incredibly well.

Every doorway had a lip around the exterior, allowing him to easily latch on to it with his fingers and swing himself through the doorway as opposed to finding an angle through which he could jump. The ceilings and walls were made of a material that gave in just a little bit, allowing him to push off at a steeper angle than he might have otherwise. Handles and pockets seemed to be everywhere, the presence of which he had questioned before but now understood to be a necessity. Honestly, the whole process of moving without weight was starting to be a bit more relaxing than just walking.

He didn't need to think about it, just point himself in a direction, push off a wall, wait a few seconds, and then stop. It took the weight off of his shoulders - literally - and he found himself much more relaxed by the time he wandered somewhere he probably shouldn't have.

"-and yes, he's been behaving well. He gets a little stubborn from time to time, and he can get a bit hostile towards certain people, but he has definitely gotten better in the behavior department." Kathy floated aimlessly in the middle of a mostly empty room, speaking at a thin plate.

"What about on the business end? Has everything gone well?" A voice from the slab, from the sound of it belonging to a beautiful lady. "Is there anything that needs to be smoothed over?"

"There was a slight hiccup with the acquisition of a few market rights and a particularly assertive noblewoman, but nothing went outside of what I could handle. I might consider preparing something of a present for a few of our more problematic customers though."

"Business as usual then. And the results of your special assignment?"

"I feel I have managed to keep them from boredom."

"Perfect! I know this task is a pretty big for you to handle on your own, but it really is important that-"

"Sorry, but I may have to cut you off there. One of our guests of honor poked his head through the door."

Levro immediately grimaced. "I'm sorry if I was interrupting something important."

"Not important, but definitely private." Kathy grabbed the tablet. 

"We can pick this back up in a few minutes. I have the time."

"I find that hard to believe." Kathy then pressed a button on the side, turning the light side of the tablet to darkness. "May I help you?"

"Ah, um." Levro gulped. "I was just wandering around, getting used to floating around like this. I didn't mean to intrude."

"I doubt you did. In any case, it would be inappropriate to have you in the room whilst addressing matters of business. Where you needing anything?"

"Ah, no, seriously. I was just moving around." Kathy fully extended her leg, the tip of her toe pushing up against the wall. "But, um, I am curious . . . were you talking about your aide?"

"My aide? Oh, Douglass. He isn't so much an aide as he is my ward." In a few moves the aging Nekh had tidied up what little of the room was disorganized, a shocking display of the race's agility. "He has always been a bit of a problem child, so his mother tasked me with taking care of him. The idea behind it has been to expose him to places and people with a variety of different temperaments and means in order to mellow him out, and I think I have been fairly effective."

"And that woman was-"

"His mother. You can think of her as my boss, though the only real authority she has over me is the delegation of excess funding. We technically work in separate departments, she handles money and product acquisition while I handle customers and contracts." Kathy deftly maneuvered past him, her tail only slightly brushing his extended arm. "I think it should be obvious, but you and your family fall under the 'customer and contracts' department."

Levro found that she wasn't as opposed to divulging this information as he would have thought. Perhaps it wasn't that important. "What of that special assignment?"

"That would be you and your family, more specifically your vacation. I know it probably doesn't sound like much, but the results of your assessment mean a lot to our company. The better we can adjust the experience for future customers' enjoyment, the more money and prestige we can expect in the future. I cannot express to you just how important that last part is. As a whole, we have worked far too hard and made too many expectations for the project for it to only do 'okay'. Hence, you are a 'special assignment'."

"That makes sense."

"Oh, and please don't let that knowledge influence your responses. If there is anything, anything at all that you believe could be done to improve the experience, we want to know. Should the lessons learned from your experience be valuable enough, we may invite you back again."

"Wouldn't that be expensive?"

"Certainly, however those in the upper echelons believe it to be a good policy to provide kickbacks to those who have willingly assisted us in our business endeavors generously. It builds trust, and makes helping the competition seem less appealing. In your case, it would really be more a case of honest gratitude."

"Makes sense." Levro didn't understand the logic, but he felt it better to simply nod to keep the conversation moving when dealing with the Nekh. They would explain it to you if you didn't. "Where are we headed?"

"The cockpit. I feel it would be interesting to you."

Levro recoiled in shock. "Aren't I not allowed in there?"

"Hm? Would you understand anything in there?"

"No?"

"Do you feel yourself immature enough to touch something without being told you could?"

"No."

"Do you have any plans to commit suicide by attempting to wrest control from the captain?"

"Certainly not!"

"Then I see no issue. Besides, the whole process is really quite interesting, and I imagine that he would like some company." Kathy twirled around, her tail hitting the button for a larger door at the end of the hallway. "Watch the gravity, it's always on in there."