GAME SPACE - Full Novel

by Peter Jay Black

  The taxi driver looked disgusted at the request, but after a quick thumb through the dollars, he gave a small shrug.

  I took that as a yes and headed back to the porch. I sat in a rocking chair, wondering what Grandpa John was up to.

  Now I kinda regretted telling him. The last thing I wanted to do was to stress him out.

  What if the old guy’s heart pops because of something I’ve said or done?

  I thumped my forehead, cursing my stupidity and selfishness. Why did I tell him?

  I should’ve waited until after his operation, but I’d been so excited, I hadn’t thought it through properly.

  Besides, nothing even remotely thrilling had ever happened to me before.

  I glanced at the front door.

  No, what I should have done was kept quiet until he got home. Played the game, then told him.

  Idiot.

  Five minutes later Grandpa John returned, out of breath and mopping his brow with a handkerchief.

  I stood. “What’s going on?”

  He stared at me for a few seconds with an expression of—

  pride? Admiration? Gas? I couldn’t quite make it out, and it didn’t fit with our earlier conversation.

  “I’ve left some tourist brochures in your parents’ room. Ask them to take you somewhere interesting. Maybe your dad could fly you down to Mesa Verde.” He turned, strode to the taxi, and called over his shoulder, “Two weeks. I’ll explain everything then.”

  Dazed, I waved him goodbye.

  Yeah, there was no way I would wait that long—I was definitely going back inside the game.

  The nanosecond the taxi swung out of view, I spun around and jogged into the house.

  In my bedroom, I slid the box out.

  Locked.

  “What the—?” I tried prising the lid open, but it was no good. “Grandpa,” I growled, then looked about for the crystal key.

  Missing.

  He’d hidden it somewhere.

  Now I really did regret telling him. I’d wanted Grandpa John’s blessing to go into the game, not have him lock me out.

  Tires crunched gravel. Had my grandfather forgotten something?

  I balled my fists. I’d ask for the key back.

  Beg if I had to.

  I slid the box under my bed, leapt to my feet, and ran to the front door.

  To my surprise, a silver car pulled up. My mother beckoned me over as the side window rolled down.

  I groaned.

  If this was the universe’s way of testing me, seeing if I could keep my mouth shut about the alien spacecraft and CodeX game—not to mention my grandfather’s pending heart operation—well, it wasn’t bloody funny. Or fair.

  I shoved my hands deep into my pockets and traipsed over to her car.

  “Get in,” she said.

  “Did you see Grandpa John?”

  “I got stuck in traffic.” My mother checked her rearview mirror. “I needed to talk to him, but the taxi didn’t stop.” Her focus returned to me. “They cancelled my morning surgery, and I’ve got a couple of hours before I have to head back to the hospital.” She nodded at the passenger seat.

  Uh-oh.

  With reluctance, I climbed in. As Mum turned the car, I hoped Milo was awake, because he was now the sole defender of the CodeX.

  Images of the silly pooch chewing the box open and transporting to Horizon Eighteen flashed through my brain, along with Ayesha explaining the rules of the game to him.

  Captain Milo Cooper.

  I shook my head.

  Doomed.

  Nine

  Mum drove us into Silverthorne. We bought a coffee and a tea to go and sat by Blue River, watching the water cascade over the rocks and boulders and listening to the sound it made, combined with the birds overhead.

  After a couple of minutes of quiet contemplation, Mum looked at me. “I’m sorry, Leonardo,” she said in a soft voice.

  “Sorry for what?”

  “For not being around enough. For working too hard.” She sighed and shook her head. “Being alone at the lodge is not what your father and I wanted for you. We thought you’d be in school by now.”

  “It’s not your fault,” I said. “You’ve both got important jobs.”

  “We also thought Grandpa John would be there for you. That’s why we chose to come to Colorado.”

  My stomach tightened. Mum had the uncanny ability to know when I was lying, and I prayed she didn’t ask too many questions.

  “I’m worried about your grandfather,” she said.

  Ah, man.

  Seriously?

  I sipped my tea and made a noncommittal noise. “Hmm.”

  Mum turned to me. “He’s lying.”

  I considered throwing myself into the river, but I decided it would be far too cold. Plus, the part we sat near wasn’t deep enough to whisk me away from her stare.

  “Do you know anything?” she asked.

  I did my best to look innocent, even though my cheeks burned. “Nope.”

  “Are you sure?” Mum wasn’t giving up. “You haven’t noticed anything unusual about Grandpa John? The way he’s been acting?”

  I sipped my tea. “Wait, there’s no sugar in this.” I started to get up, but she grabbed my sleeve and pulled me back down.

  “Please, Leonardo. I’m worried about him.” She let go of me. “I don’t think he’s gone on a hunting trip.”

  “He’ll be fine,” I assured her, crossing my fingers by my side.

  Mum cupped her hands around the paper cup as if gaining strength from its warmth, then spoke in a quiet voice, “I told you my mom died forty years ago, didn’t I?”

  “Yeah,” I said. Another reason why I wanted us together as a family.

  Tears welled up in Mum’s eyes. “Your grandfather never accepted her death.” She looked at me. “I think us coming here has made him think about her. Forced him to remember. Dredged up old memories.”

  “Grandpa John seemed okay to me,” I said in an attempt to ease her obvious worry and pain. I couldn’t guarantee that, of course, and I felt awful for not telling her the truth.

  I wanted to spill my guts and say she was wrong, that it had nothing at all to do with her dead mother, but I didn’t want to explain the real reason. Besides, I’d given Grandpa John the impression I wouldn’t let on to anyone.

  Mum looked at her watch. “We have to get back.”

  Relieved our awkward conversation had ended and pleased that I hadn’t spilled my guts or made any life-altering slip-ups, I stood, and we strode back to her car.

  However, when we got there, my heart sank as Mum fixed me with one of her ‘I’m about to ask you to do something and I hope you do it’ looks.

  Awesome.

  “Can you do me a favour, Leonardo?”

  Here it comes.

  “What?” I said in a tense voice.

  “Go up to Penny Hill Observatory.”

  My eyebrows knitted. “What? Why?”

  “Find out where he’s gone. Your grandfather has an office. There might be clues there.”

  “Mum, I’m not a detective. And I don’t think anyone should rummage through Grandpa John’s private stuff.”

  “You’re right,” she said with a sigh. “I’ll go myself.” She got into the car, and I squeezed my eyes closed.

  She would find the spacecraft.

  Could I move the damn thing somewhere else? Or lock the basement door? Knowing my mother, that wouldn’t stop her. A vault guarded by highly trained soldiers would not prevent her from getting to the truth.

  With my stomach twisting into knots, I tried to come up with something to distract her from snooping around the observatory. I couldn’t begin to imagine her reaction when she laid eyes on the alien taxi. I shuddered.

  Finally, I climbed into the car too. “Okay, okay.” I fastened my seatbelt. “I’ll go.”

  Mum’s shoulders relaxed. “Thank you.”

  Yeah, yeah, I thought, knowing I had been emotionally trick
ed into it.

  As we drove away, I knew Mum wouldn’t take me at my word when I told her I’d found nothing in Grandpa John’s observatory, and I could bet my life she’d still take a look for herself.

  I was in deep trouble.

  Ten

  I had that feeling people get when they don’t want to do something, have no intention of doing it, and yet they still find themselves doing whatever the hell it is anyway. I grumbled to myself as I headed up Penny Hill.

  To my utter dismay, Mum had known where Grandpa John kept the spare key to the observatory—behind the kitchen door, in case you were wondering—so I couldn’t even use being locked out as a good excuse not to rake through his belongings.

  I had no choice but to make the best of a bad situation, and vowed to see if there were any movies among my grandfather’s extensive video-game collection. There probably weren’t, but it was worth a shot. I was sure he wouldn’t have minded, given the circumstances, but hoped there might be a game or two I didn’t completely suck at. Doubted that too.

  My heart skipped a beat as I thought about the crystal key. Perhaps he’d hidden that up there? I had all afternoon to hunt for it.

  Hey, if he didn’t want me to have it so bad, Grandpa John should have buried it somewhere or taken it with him.

  Oh no.

  I hoped he had done neither of those.

  My pulse sped up at the prospect of going back into the CodeX, and although I tried to resist the urge, tried to stop imagining myself as a spaceship captain flying through the cosmos, hunting for magical artifacts, I ached to return.

  I crested the hill and marched to the observatory.

  Using the key, I opened the door and stepped inside. I flicked on the lights and faced the telescope.

  Despite the million questions I had for my grandfather on his return, one thing high on my priority list was to come back at night—a clear one—and gaze at the heavens with him. I wanted a good look at Jupiter and all its moons. Was the telescope capable of seeing Europa?

  Ooh, Saturn too.

  I strode into the giant Blockbuster time capsule my grandfather called a warehouse, and as I made my way between the shelves, I kept my eye out for the crystal key. The quantity of games I passed overwhelmed me, and I was curious to know how many Grandpa John had gotten around to playing.

  Mind you, if I had access to the hyper-realistic CodeX game, I wouldn’t bother with anything less.

  I reached the end of the warehouse, turned, and scratched my head.

  Where was that crystal key?

  And what exactly did Mum expect me to find up here?

  My attention moved to the table in the corner of the room.

  On it sat an old, tube-style television encased in enough plastic to keep a Lego factory supplied for a year, a VHS tape player built into its base.

  A camcorder sat next to them, one of those giant red ones where you need to train at the gym for at least a decade to build the upper-body strength required to carry the damn thing. There was also a VHS tape in its colourful cardboard sleeve.

  Perhaps my grandfather had some movies after all.

  A handwritten label read, Alice Bowman.

  My grandmother’s name.

  That couldn’t be a coincidence.

  I chose not to mutter any silly comments about the VHS format; everyone’s heard those jokes a thousand times over, and they’re no longer funny.

  So, once I’d used a fossil hammer to chisel the tape from its sixty-million-year-old cardboard tomb, I inserted it into the Flintstones’ player, and much to my surprise—after several clunks, a high-pitched whirring sound, and a few ominous clicks—it worked.

  An image appeared—a view over the Colorado forest, framed by the mountains, with a lake glittering far below.

  Fuzzy, static lines moved up and down the screen, distorting the video, while a single word in bold letters flashed in the corner. Tracking.

  The picture straightened for a second, then wobbled, fizzled, popped . . .

  Tracking. Tracking. Tracking.

  “Come on,” I urged the little guy. “You can do it.”

  Finally, the video stabilised, now with only the odd sparkle and blip here and there.

  Hey, it was no mega-billion-pixel image, but it would do. I could make it out just fine.

  I pulled up a stool and studied the panorama of—

  The picture went black, sputtered, then snapped on again—a streak of colours as the sound crackled too.

  “Alice,” a man’s voice called.

  There was a rush of muffled movement.

  I leaned in.

  The camera aimed down as feet hurried across a concrete floor and out into the night, gravel crunching under the footfalls, running, racing, panicked breathing . . .

  “Alice.”

  The camera reared up. The focus swam in and out, then sharpened on a cluster of trees, the uppermost limbs and branches torn off.

  Something, and I knew what, had crashed through them.

  Blood pounded in my temples.

  More hurried footfalls. The image shook, dark, hard to make out, more trees, then sprinting between them . . .

  Panting.

  “Alice, slow down.”

  Standing between the tall trunks, lit only by moonlight, was a woman wearing a flowing dress. Grandma Alice.

  I gauged my grandmother to be older than the photograph I’d seen in my room, perhaps in her early thirties, and I couldn’t help but stare at her, soaking in every wobbly pixel. It seemed as though I could reach through the screen, through time itself, and touch my grandmother.

  “Did you see that, John?” Alice turned, saucer-eyed, looking like an excited child.

  “Wait for me,” the man’s voice said. It was clearly my grandfather’s. “Don’t get too close.”

  “It’s just here. Come see.” Alice gasped. “Oh my goodness. Someone’s hurt. Quick, John.” She darted through the undergrowth.

  My blood ran cold.

  I didn’t want to watch the next part, but I couldn’t look away.

  The camera moved with Grandma Alice, bouncing through the woods, the focus swimming in and out again until it stopped and stabilised.

  My grandfather gasped. “Is this real?”

  A mangled black object had gouged a trench into the forest floor, banking earth up on the far side. Its impact had uprooted several small trees.

  The view moved forward.

  “Incredible.”

  A hatch in the craft stood open, and a hooded alien passenger dragged himself along the ground, trying to reach the open box with the leather-bound CodeX.

  Alice knelt in front of him. “You’re hurt.”

  “Alice, get away,” Grandpa John said. “There could be radiation.”

  “He’s hurt, John,” she said. “Fetch the first aid kit.”

  I went rigid in my seat as the alien’s gaze moved to my grandmother, and he mouthed something.

  She leaned in.

  I did the same.

  The alien repeated the whispered words, but I couldn’t make them out.

  “Get away from it,” Grandpa John warned.

  Alice stood up and looked back at the camera, all colour drained from her face.

  “What is it?” Grandpa John’s voice trembled. “Alice, what did it say?”

  I held my breath.

  My grandmother opened her mouth to reply, but the crystal embedded inside the CodeX’s cover glowed blue, sending shadows dancing around them, growing in intensity, flooding the forest with light.

  Alice, silhouetted, faced the CodeX, and a golden locket around her neck glinted.

  I hit the Pause button and leaned in, close to the screen.

  Due to the poor quality of the image, the locket’s engraving was hard to make out, but I’d seen this particular symbol recently, and that couldn’t be a coincidence.

  It was a glyph in high relief—a letter ‘S’ or number eight on its side. The infinity symbol from the CodeX�
��s front cover.

  I let out a breath, pressed Play, and the screen turned white. Blinding.

  “Alice? Alice, no.”

  The light snapped off again, the scene reappeared, and the alien slammed the box closed.

  The camera fell to the ground, the view now side-on, and everything was calm. Tranquil. The only sound came from my grandfather’s rhythmic, raspy breathing.

  My grandma, Alice Bowman, was gone.

  Eleven

  I stared at the video monitor, tilting my head, scrutinising the spot where my grandmother had stood moments before and the alien still lying on the ground. My fingertips hurt from gripping the edge of my stool so hard. I let go, still refusing to tear my gaze from the scene.

  “Alice? Where are you?” Grandpa John’s feet moved into view and his voice cracked. “Alice, please.” He stepped toward the alien. “Who are you?” Grandpa John’s tone turned harsh, angry. “What have you done? Where’s my wife?”

  The alien lifted its head, looked up at him, and tried to speak, but its words came out in a wet gargle.

  “Where’s my wife?” Grandpa John shouted.

  The alien nudged the box toward him, slumped to the ground, jerked once, then moved no more.

  Grandpa John slid the box aside with his foot and returned to the camera. He snatched it up and scanned the undergrowth. “Alice?”

  His hoarse breathing came over the television’s antique built-in speakers, and I felt every painful, desperate moment along with him, watching in silence as my grandfather examined the alien, documenting every detail through the camera, hunting for clues to where his wife had gone.

  He drew a sharp breath and the view swung up to show the black spacecraft shifting, moving in and out, snapping back to its original form.

  “Healing itself,” I muttered.

  As the camera edged over and looked through the side of the spacecraft, the low battery warning flashed. The picture fuzzed, then went dark.

  I sat back, hardly believing what I’d witnessed, trying to imagine the immense pain my grandfather had gone through that night and every day since.

  She wasn’t dead. My grandmother had not died. She was in the game. I frowned as I pondered something else. Why had the CodeX taken her? When I’d gone into the game myself, though by accident, I’d chosen to return and had done so with no issues. Why couldn’t Grandma Alice do the same?