Episode 1: The Morning Bell Floated
Bell discovered she was becoming lighter on a Tuesday morning.
Not metaphorically lighter.
Not “I finally finished my homework, so what a relief” lighter.
Actually lighter.
By exactly ten percent.
She discovered this because her bedroom ceiling fan had started looking suspiciously close.
Bell opened one eye.
The fan turned slowly above her, chopping the warm morning air into lazy circles.
Whup.
Whup.
Whup.
She stared at it.
Then she looked at her bed.
Then back at the fan.
“Eh?”
Bell sat up.
Her hair was sticking out in six different directions. Outside her window, Kuala Lumpur was already awake. Motorbikes buzzed along the road. Someone downstairs was calling for a missing cat. A pressure cooker hissed in a nearby apartment.
Everything seemed normal.
Except Bell was not sitting properly on her mattress.
She was floating about three centimetres above it.
She dropped back onto the bed.
“Okay.”
She blinked.
“Okay…”
She jumped.
Instead of landing immediately, Bell remained in the air for almost two seconds.
Her knees bent.
Her arms flapped.
Her schoolbag, which had been sitting beside her bed, suddenly looked very heavy.
Bell landed with a soft poof.
She stared at the floor.
“Nope.”
She climbed onto the weighing scale.
The numbers appeared.
Bell frowned.
She stepped off.
Then on again.
The number was lower.
She checked the scale’s batteries.
She checked whether she had accidentally left one foot off.
She even took off her pajamas.
Nothing changed.
Bell was lighter.
Much lighter.
And she had absolutely no idea why.
By breakfast, Bell had decided there were three possible explanations.
Possibility One: The weighing scale was broken.
Possibility Two: She had discovered some extremely strange medical condition.
Possibility Three: She was slowly becoming a balloon.
She was not particularly happy with Possibility Three.
Her grandmother placed a plate of toasted bread and eggs on the table.
“Why you look like you saw ghost?”
“I think I’m losing weight.”
Grandma glanced at her.
“You ate yesterday?”
“Yes.”
“Dinner?”
“Yes.”
“Snack?”
Bell hesitated.
“Maybe.”
“Then you’re fine.”
“Grandma, I’m floating.”
Grandma stopped buttering her toast.
Bell pointed at the chair.
“I jumped and didn’t come down properly.”
Grandma looked at her.
Then at the chair.
Then back at Bell.
“Again.”
“What?”
“Jump.”
Bell sighed.
She jumped.
For a moment, she hovered.
Grandma’s eyebrows rose.
“Hm.”
“See?”
“Hm.”
“Grandma!”
Grandma calmly returned to her toast.
“Don’t panic before breakfast.”
“I’m floating!”
“Still need eat.”
Bell stared at her.
Sometimes Grandma’s ability to remain calm was honestly annoying.
At school, things got worse.
Bell’s first warning came during assembly.
She noticed her shoes weren’t touching the ground.
Only slightly.
Perhaps half a centimetre.
Nobody else noticed.
Then the morning breeze moved through the school courtyard.
Bell moved with it.
Her friend Mira grabbed her sleeve.
“Why are you leaning?”
“I don’t know.”
“You look weird.”
“I know.”
During mathematics, Bell nearly floated into the ceiling.
She had been reaching for a pencil when her body suddenly rose from her chair.
“Whoa!”
Her hands caught the edge of the desk.
Mira stared.
Bell whispered, “Don’t tell anyone.”
Mira whispered back, “You’re literally flying.”
“Not flying. Floating.”
“Same thing!”
“No, flying means control.”
“Fair.”
Then the classroom door opened.
Their teacher walked in.
Bell immediately grabbed her chair.
“Good morning.”
“Good morning, teacher.”
Bell’s feet were hanging six centimetres above the floor.
Mira covered her mouth.
The teacher looked around.
Nobody noticed.
Bell slowly lowered herself.
Thump.
She landed.
Mira leaned toward her.
“Something is seriously wrong.”
Bell nodded.
“I know.”
At lunch, they went behind the old science block.
The place was usually quiet because nobody liked the cracked pavement and overgrown bushes.
Mira folded her arms.
“Okay. Tell me everything.”
Bell told her.
The floating.
The scale.
The strange feeling in her stomach.
The fact that every time she jumped, she stayed in the air longer.
Mira listened carefully.
Then she said, “Maybe you’re becoming a superhero.”
Bell frowned.
“Why would that happen?”
“Maybe you were bitten by a radioactive…”
She stopped.
“Never mind.”
“Good.”
Mira pulled a notebook from her bag.
“Let’s record your weight.”
“Why?”
“So we know whether it keeps changing.”
Bell stared at the notebook.
“You’re taking this seriously?”
“Of course.”
Mira wrote:
TUESDAY — 90% NORMAL WEIGHT
Bell looked at the words.
Something about them made her uncomfortable.
“Don’t call it normal.”
“Why?”
“I have a bad feeling.”
She was right.
That afternoon, Bell became lighter again.
And the next morning, lighter still.
Ten percent every day.
No exceptions.
Episode 2: The Rule Nobody Knew
By Thursday, Bell could jump over the school gate.
By Friday, she could float from her bedroom floor to her window.
By Saturday, she could lie on her back and drift slowly toward the ceiling.
This was not fun anymore.
At first, it had been exciting.
Bell had imagined herself gliding over rooftops, drifting above traffic jams, and perhaps winning every high-jump competition forever.
But the novelty disappeared when she realized she could no longer trust gravity.
Gravity had always been one of those invisible things you never thought about.
You dropped your spoon.
It fell.
You jumped.
You came down.
You sat on a chair.
You stayed on the chair.
Simple.
Now every ordinary action had become a problem.
Bell had to sleep with straps around her waist.
She wore a weighted backpack around the house.
She stopped opening windows.
She avoided balconies.
And whenever the ceiling fan was switched on, she stayed far away.
Mira came over after school.
Bell was sitting on the floor with two textbooks tied around her ankles.
“This is ridiculous,” Mira said.
“Thank you.”
“You look like you’re training to become an anchor.”
“I need to stay down.”
Mira crouched beside her.
“Yesterday you were ten percent lighter.”
“Today I’m twenty percent lighter.”
“And tomorrow?”
Bell didn’t answer.
Mira’s expression changed.
“Bell…”
“I know.”
“What happens if this keeps going?”
Bell looked toward the window.
Outside, clouds were gathering over the city.
“I don’t know.”
That evening, Bell’s grandmother found something strange.
She was cleaning an old wooden cupboard when a small book fell from the top shelf.
It landed on the floor.
Thump.
Bell picked it up.
The cover was made of faded brown cloth.
There was no title.
Only a silver symbol.
A circle.
Inside it were three small stars.
Grandma froze.
“Where did you get that?”
“It fell.”
Grandma took the book.
For several seconds, she said nothing.
Then she sighed.
“I thought this thing was gone.”
Bell’s heart began beating faster.
“What is it?”
Grandma opened the cover.
The first page contained a handwritten sentence.
For the one who becomes lighter.
Bell swallowed.
“Grandma?”
Grandma looked at her.
“You’re not the first.”
The book belonged to Bell’s great-grandfather.
His name had been Arun Bellamy, although everyone called him Grandpa Arun.
He had lived in a small riverside town when he was young and had been obsessed with strange natural mysteries.
Unusual stars.
Magnetic stones.
Weather patterns.
Things that ordinary people ignored.
But one summer, according to Grandma, he began losing weight.
Exactly ten percent every morning.
Bell stared at the book.
“Exactly?”
“Exactly.”
“And what happened?”
“He disappeared.”
Bell’s stomach dropped.
“Disappeared?”
“Not died.”
Grandma shook her head.
“He simply went away.”
Bell opened the book.
Most of the pages were filled with drawings.
A person floating above a street.
A house with ropes tied around it.
A strange stone covered in symbols.
And, on one page, a map.
Bell leaned closer.
The map showed the outline of Kuala Lumpur.
But beneath it were tunnels.
Hundreds of them.
Some ended beneath old buildings.
Others crossed beneath rivers.
One line extended toward a place marked with a handwritten label:
THE LOW PLACE.
Bell looked at Grandma.
“What is the Low Place?”
Grandma closed the book.
“That is what you must find.”
“Why?”
“Because your great-grandfather never finished the journey.”
Bell’s voice became small.
“And I’m supposed to?”
Grandma nodded.
“If you keep losing ten percent every day, eventually the ground will stop being your friend.”
Bell looked at her feet.
For the first time, she understood.
This wasn’t just strange.
It was dangerous.
Episode 3: The Handbook
The next morning, Bell woke up lighter again.
She didn’t check the scale.
She didn’t need to.
When she opened her eyes, she was already touching the ceiling.
“HELP!”
Grandma rushed in.
Mira arrived twenty minutes later.
Together, they pulled Bell down using a long rope tied around her waist.
Bell’s face was pale.
“I can’t keep doing this.”
Mira opened the old book.
“There must be instructions.”
They searched page after page.
Finally, they found a heading.
THE GRAVITY-DEFIANT’S HANDBOOK
Below it were seven rules.
Bell read them aloud.
Rule One: Do not fight the wind.
Rule Two: Never travel alone.
Rule Three: Carry something that remembers the ground.
Rule Four: Follow the places where gravity feels wrong.
Rule Five: Do not trust the silver stars.
Rule Six: The Low Place is not below you.
Rule Seven: When the sky opens, choose what you are willing to lose.
Bell stared at the final rule.
“What does that even mean?”
Mira shrugged.
“Old people loved dramatic sentences.”
Grandma gave her a look.
“Careful.”
“Sorry.”
Bell pointed at Rule Three.
“What does ‘something that remembers the ground’ mean?”
Grandma walked to the kitchen.
She returned carrying a small stone.
It was dark grey, smooth and unusually heavy.
“This belonged to Grandpa Arun.”
Bell took it.
Immediately, she dropped.
“Whoa!”
Her knees hit the floor.
The stone had made her heavier.
Mira’s mouth fell open.
“That is definitely not normal.”
Bell held it tightly.
For the first time in days, she felt anchored.
Grounded.
Safe.
Grandma smiled sadly.
“Now you understand.”
The map led them to an old drainage path near a forgotten section of the city.
Bell, Mira, and Bell’s younger cousin Jojo followed the instructions carefully.
They carried ropes.
Water.
Flashlights.
The heavy stone.
And the handbook.
The afternoon was hot and sticky.
Rain threatened overhead.
The city hummed around them.
Cars honked.
Food stalls sent spicy smells into the air.
People hurried beneath umbrellas.
Nobody noticed that Bell occasionally drifted sideways when the wind blew.
They found the entrance just before sunset.
It was hidden behind a wall covered in moss.
A narrow opening led underground.
Mira switched on her flashlight.
“Ready?”
Bell looked at Jojo.
“You don’t have to come.”
Jojo grinned.
“You think I’m going to let you two have all the adventure?”
“Honestly, yes.”
“Too bad.”
They entered.
Episode 4: The City Beneath the City
The tunnel was colder than Bell expected.
Water trickled along the walls.
Old pipes crossed overhead.
Their footsteps echoed.
After several minutes, something strange happened.
Bell felt lighter.
Not physically.
Emotionally.
Her feet barely touched the ground.
“Guys…”
Mira grabbed her arm.
“Hold the rope.”
Bell wrapped the rope around her wrist.
They continued.
The tunnel widened.
Soon they reached a huge underground chamber.
And Bell stopped.
The walls were covered in hundreds of silver stars.
Exactly like the symbol on the handbook.
Jojo whispered, “Whoa.”
Mira whispered, “Rule Five.”
Do not trust the silver stars.
Then the stars began glowing.
One by one.
Bell backed away.
A low humming sound filled the chamber.
The stone in her hand grew warm.
And suddenly, the floor disappeared.
Not physically.
Gravity simply stopped working.
All three children rose into the air.
“Grab something!”
They drifted upward.
Bell caught a metal pipe.
Mira grabbed Jojo.
But the pipe broke.
They floated higher.
Twenty metres.
Thirty.
At the top of the chamber was a circular opening.
Beyond it was darkness.
Bell remembered Rule Six.
The Low Place is not below you.
She suddenly understood.
The Low Place wasn’t underground.
It was a place where gravity itself was weak.
A place where falling no longer meant falling down.
A place where the world had forgotten which way was down.
“Bell!” Mira shouted.
Bell looked around.
The silver stars were moving.
They were forming a path.
A beautiful glowing staircase leading upward.
Mira shouted, “Don’t follow it!”
Bell remembered Rule Five.
She looked for another way.
Then she saw something.
A tiny crack in the wall.
Wind came through it.
Real wind.
Fresh air.
Bell smiled.
“Rule One.”
“Don’t fight the wind,” Mira said.
Bell released the pipe.
The wind caught her.
Instead of moving upward with the silver stars, she allowed herself to drift sideways.
Mira followed.
Jojo followed them.
They entered the crack.
Behind them, the silver staircase vanished.
Episode 5: The Room That Had No Floor
The passage ended in a room.
There was no floor.
No ceiling.
Only a vast blue-black space filled with floating objects.
Old bicycles.
Books.
Broken chairs.
Leaves.
Coins.
A child’s red kite.
Everything hung perfectly still.
Bell stared.
“What is this place?”
A voice answered.
“Where lost things wait.”
They spun around.
An old man floated in the darkness.
His hair was white.
His clothes were worn.
And around his waist was a rope tied to the same kind of stone Bell carried.
Bell’s heart stopped.
“Grandpa Arun?”
The man smiled.
“Not quite.”
He looked older than the photograph Grandma had shown her.
But his eyes were unmistakable.
He was Grandpa Arun.
Or what remained of him.
Bell drifted closer.
“You’ve been here all this time?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you come home?”
Arun looked toward the darkness.
“I tried.”
“Then why didn’t you?”
“Because every time I became lighter, the world became farther away.”
Bell looked down.
“Why is this happening to me?”
Arun sighed.
“Because the Low Place wakes once in every generation.”
“Why?”
“To correct a mistake.”
“What mistake?”
Arun pointed toward the floating objects.
“Long ago, someone tried to remove gravity from a place where it didn’t belong.”
Mira frowned.
“Who?”
Arun smiled faintly.
“That’s the wrong question.”
Bell looked confused.
“What should we ask?”
“Why?”
Silence.
Arun continued.
“Gravity is not only a force. It is a relationship. It keeps things together. People. Places. Memories.”
He pointed toward Bell.
“Your family once helped close the Low Place.”
“And now?”
“Now it has opened again.”
Bell looked at the silver stars.
“They’re pulling me in.”
“Yes.”
“How do I stop it?”
Arun looked at the stone in her hand.
“You cannot.”
Bell’s face fell.
“But you can choose what brings you back.”
Episode 6: Ten Percent
The chamber began shaking.
The floating objects spun.
The silver stars appeared in the distance.
The Low Place was opening wider.
Bell felt herself becoming lighter.
Ten percent.
Again.
She looked at the stone.
It wasn’t enough.
Her feet were drifting upward.
Mira grabbed her hand.
“We’re not letting go.”
Jojo tied the rope around both of them.
Arun shouted something.
Bell couldn’t hear him.
The wind grew stronger.
The entire room began turning.
Then Bell saw it.
A tiny wooden box floating in the darkness.
Inside it was a photograph.
She recognized it immediately.
Grandma.
Young.
Standing beside Grandpa Arun.
Bell reached for the box.
Her fingers touched it.
And suddenly she understood.
Something that remembers the ground.
It wasn’t the stone.
Not really.
The stone remembered the ground.
But so did the photograph.
So did the people she loved.
So did every ordinary thing she had taken for granted.
Her school desk.
Her grandmother’s kitchen.
Mira’s terrible jokes.
Jojo’s noisy slippers.
Rain tapping against the window.
The smell of breakfast.
Home.
Bell grabbed the photograph.
The Low Place screamed.
Not with a voice.
With wind.
A giant force pulled her upward.
Mira shouted, “Bell!”
Bell held the photograph against her chest.
“I choose home!”
The chamber exploded with light.
Episode 7: The Fall
Bell fell.
For the first time in days, she fell properly.
Down.
Straight down.
She screamed.
Mira screamed.
Jojo screamed.
They plunged through darkness.
Then—
Splash!
Bell landed in shallow water.
Mira landed beside her.
Jojo landed on top of Mira.
“Ow!”
“Sorry!”
“You elbowed my ear!”
“You landed on me!”
Bell started laughing.
She couldn’t stop.
They were alive.
The chamber was gone.
The silver stars had disappeared.
The tunnels were dark and ordinary again.
Bell looked at the photograph.
The picture had changed.
Grandpa Arun was no longer standing beside Grandma.
He was gone.
But Bell noticed something written on the back.
She read it aloud.
You don’t have to carry the past. You only have to remember where home is.
Bell’s eyes filled with tears.
Mira nudged her.
“Come on.”
“Where?”
“Home.”
They climbed out just before sunrise.
The city was quiet.
For once, Kuala Lumpur seemed to be holding its breath.
Bell stepped onto the pavement.
She waited.
Nothing happened.
She jumped.
She landed.
She jumped again.
Still landed.
Mira grinned.
“Gravity?”
Bell smiled.
“Still here.”
Jojo stretched.
“Good. Because I’m hungry.”
Bell laughed.
They walked home as the morning sky turned gold.
Episode 8: The Final Page
Grandma was waiting at the kitchen table.
She didn’t ask what happened.
She simply looked at Bell.
Then at the photograph.
Her hands trembled.
“You found him.”
Bell nodded.
“He was waiting.”
Grandma closed her eyes.
For a long moment, nobody spoke.
Then she smiled.
A small, sad, beautiful smile.
“He always hated unfinished stories.”
Bell placed the photograph on the table.
“I think he finished this one.”
Grandma looked at the message on the back.
She read it twice.
Then she hugged Bell.
Very tightly.
Bell hugged her back.
For the first time since the strange journey began, Bell felt completely ordinary.
And ordinary felt wonderful.
Three days later, Bell returned to school.
Mira had already told everyone that Bell had been sick.
Jojo had apparently told three classmates that Bell had fought an underground monster.
Bell decided not to ask which story they believed.
During lunch, Mira handed her the old handbook.
“Keep it.”
Bell frowned.
“Why?”
“Because you might need it again.”
Bell laughed.
“Don’t say things like that.”
“Why?”
“Because weird things always happen when you say them.”
Mira considered this.
“Fair.”
Bell opened the handbook.
The seven rules were still there.
But beneath them was a new page.
One that hadn’t existed before.
Bell read it silently.
Then she smiled.
It said:
THE GRAVITY-DEFIANT’S HANDBOOK
Rule Eight: You are never truly weightless when someone is holding your hand.
Bell looked at Mira.
Mira looked back.
Neither of them spoke.
Outside, clouds drifted lazily across the blue afternoon sky.
Bell watched them.
For a second, she wondered what it would feel like to float again.
Not because she was afraid.
Not because she wanted to escape.
Just because the sky suddenly didn’t seem so far away.
She closed the handbook.
Then she heard Jojo shouting from across the school courtyard.
“BELL! YOUR BAG IS FLOATING!”
Bell froze.
Mira slowly turned.
Bell’s schoolbag was indeed hovering about twenty centimetres above the ground.
They stared at each other.
“Oh no,” Bell whispered.
Mira grinned.
“Looks like Episode Two.”
Bell grabbed the bag.
“Don’t you dare.”
Mira laughed.
And together they ran.
Because sometimes life did not need to make perfect sense.
Sometimes the ground disappeared beneath you.
Sometimes the sky came closer.
And sometimes the best thing you could do was hold on to your friends, keep moving, and remember exactly where you came from.
After all, being gravity-defiant wasn’t really about learning how to fly.
It was about learning what was worth coming back down for.
The End…
