The Conspiracy Game: A Tully Harper Novel: A Tully Harper Novel (The Tully Harper Series Book 1)

by Adam Holt

  Compared to the cargo hold, Queen Envy’s room was a mess, like a snowglobe that had been shaken too hard. A million bits of celebrity debris floated around me like those fake plastic snow pellets—guitars, sitars, a keytar, keyboards, glowing blue wigs, fake eyelashes, and even a piece of sushi slowly spun past my visor. I’ll take the orangutan carwash over this dump any day! I thought.

  In the midst of all this mess, the world’s most famous diva floated cross-legged, her pink wig bobbing to the beat of the music. She wore a shiny black jumpsuit with an enormous black collar and was totally unaware of my entrance.

  A thump came from the ceiling. I looked up and saw Queen Envy’s two spacesuits floating there. One of them gave me a thumbs-up, the other a friendly wave. Yes! I wanted to float right up there and hug them both, but that’s not what an orangutan would do, and just at that moment…

  “Scrubbles, baby bear, it’s about time you visited your Queen,” said Queen Envy above the music. She spun herself around to face me but just kept spinning, making us both feel dizzy. “The sweet robot said he would bring you to me soon.”

  She held a golden rope that was tied to the floor. She pulled herself to the floor, then pushed herself toward me. She gave me a bear hug. A baby bear hug. “When I was on my ‘Glitter Pop’ tour last year in Europe, I had the most fabulous choreographer. He was also my yoga and sign language instructor. He told me you knew how to sign, so let me try to say something you’ll understand. Your Queen knows your language.”

  Oh, no, I thought. She made several signs and frowned when I didn’t respond. What was I supposed to say? My sign language vocab included few words besides “Fire. Lions. Window. Pond. Go.” I had been a lot more focused on Tabitha than I was on learning sign language. Now I regretted it because a superstar in a glowing pink wig and leather jumpsuit was trying to communicate with me while microphones and slices of pizza plunked against my helmet. I was about to blow my cover again!

  Queen Envy reached for my visor. “Let me get a look at you, baby bear. You are acting dire strange. You don’t remember how to sign with me?”

  Boom! A big boom had come from the ceiling by the Queen’s spacesuits. We both looked up.

  “Oh, did they scare you, baby bear? I think my spacesuits are possessed or something. The pink one kept floating into me earlier this week when I was singing. I think it was flirting with me,” she laughed.

  Oh, it was, I thought.

  “Now pop off this crazy helmet and let the Queen see your sweet monkey face.” Just as Queen Envy reached for my helmet, the purple spacesuit (Tabitha), gave me a sign. Literally.

  I performed the sign, not knowing what it was.

  Queen Envy frowned. “More what, baby bear?”

  That’s it! I thought. I made a talking sign with my hand.

  “Oh, more talk? Well, sure, you like my voice. Everybody does. Okay, baby bear. You want an update on your Queen? I haven’t been able to get into the flow of my music yet. Sometimes it’s like that—the creative process. I’ll just go a few weeks and all I’ve done is gone dancing in clubs, worked through my yoga poses, and holophoned with some fans. They eat those up, you know? Me popping up as a hologram in the middle of their room. Sometimes I let them hologram back. I had a hundred holograms fans in my studio before the launch! We had a mad karaoke sing-along. It was dire fun, baby bear. I wore this outfit that made me look like I was on fire. Swaggy beautiful. Anyway, after that night, a song just fell in my lap from outer space, and then the Space Alliance call and told me they wanted me on this mission…”

  She paused. More, more, I signed.

  “It’s good to have somebody to talk to, baby bear. Talking to Sawyer is about as interesting as looking out the window at all these stars. No, no, wait. That’s not like me. The stars are beautiful. Everything is beautiful, isn’t it? Everything, even crazy boring Androids!”

  Stars sparkled outside her window, the slash of the Milky Way. We had left the Earth’s orbit, and the Moon was getting closer. It was gorgeous, a better view than my cage.

  More, more, I signed.

  “Anyway, I haven’t seen enough of that Commander Harper since takeoff. He’s an absolute space babe, but he’s always so busy. Maybe I should write a song for him. That could slow him down. I wish he had found me on Mars instead of that crazy red thingy. Oh, that’s it! You crazy sweet baby bear, that’s it!”

  Queen Envy hugged me and yanked herself over to a microphone floating on the other side of the room. She turned on her drum machine and began to sing:

  I tracked you down in outer space

  Space Boy

  You bring me back and watch me blaze

  Space Boy

  The purple spacesuit covered its ears. The pink spacesuit had its hands above its head like on a rollercoaster, rocking out to Queen Envy’s new song.

  Could this get any weirder? I thought. Queen Envy is writing a love song about my dad.

  The music absorbed her. She floated around the room singing:

  I blew a crater in your heart

  Space Boy

  Now we can never be apart

  Space Boy

  I’ll glow red, red, red, red, red

  When you kiss my f-f-f-f-face

  Red, red, red, red, red

  F-f-f-f-f-face

  She forgot her orangutan audience, so I pushed myself toward the ceiling and lifted my visor. Sunjay popped his open as well. He was smiling ear to ear and said above the music, “Free concert every night!”

  Tabitha rolled her eyes and removed her earplugs. In zero gravity, her tight curls filled her entire helmet, giving her a big, curly brown halo of hair. We yelled over the music while Sunjay kept grooving.

  “Queen Envy return to sender, my brain in a blender,” she said. “I can’t take much more.”

  “You won’t have to,” I said.

  “Good! And you don’t have to be an orangutan much longer.”

  “Uh, that kind of already happened.”

  “What?”

  “I’ll explain later. What are you eating?”

  “Whatever floats by. She eats a lot of pizza and sushi.”

  “How do you go to the bathroom?”

  “Very carefully. Whenever Queenie goes searching for your dad.”

  Tabitha stared at me with those lovely green eyes. It was the first time I had stared into human eyes for days. Queen Envy sang on:

  You can’t hold me, I’m burning inside

  Space Boy

  You’re in a trance nowhere to hide

  Space Boy

  Tabitha laughed and smiled. “We’re surviving, right? It’s so good to see you.”

  “Uh, yeah, so is for you for me also.” With the drum booming in the background, The Conspiracy Game on my mind, and Tabitha staring at me in her purple spacesuit, it was hard to get the right words together. “So it’s seeing you that’s good for me, too.”

  “What does that mean? Was that supposed to be a Tabism?”

  We had an awkward pause, so I changed the subject.

  “Uh, no. A Tullyism. I’ve been talking to Androids, not, uh, girls. Listen, I know more about the mission. And this Conspiracy Game—,” but there was no time to talk. Queen Envy was wrapping up her song.

  “Okay, we’ll talk about the mission and your game later.”

  “No, I don’t know if it’s a game. It’s—“

  “Tully, visor down! We’ll talk later.”

  “Don’t let Sunjay get us caught! No more hugging the Queen!” I shut the visor.

  “Don’t worry. The pink spacesuit gives her dire creeps. She uses me for a pillow. Ugh. Now go.”

  She flipped down her visor and gave me a shove, which propelled us in opposite directions. I floated toward the door and she to the ceiling, right beside the dancing pink spacesuit.

  Space Boy, I thought, as I left the messy room. She could have at least called my dad “Space Man” or “Space Commander” or something. I wondered how my dad would feel when
we revealed ourselves. It probably wouldn’t go very well, but he would realize the truth, too. He was stuck with me and would have to make the best of it. Anyway, if he could put up with Queen Envy, he could put up with the three of us. Her “Space Boy” song faded as I made my way to my tidy cage, planning to sketch Queen Envy’s room and Tabitha’s poofy space hair and brilliant green eyes. I took a nap instead.

  RED, RED, RED, RED, RED

  When I awoke, three things replaced my plan to sketch Tabitha in space. Well, not replaced. You can’t replace Tabitha’s eyes, but you can have distractions. Distractions are like waves that surprise you at the beach. They lick your heels while you scramble for safety, but every once in a while a rogue wave appears, dragging you into deeper water, where the coral grinds and your mind loses track of which way is up. The problem is the waves all look about the same until it’s too late. It’s the same with distractions.

  First distraction: Lincoln Sawyer’s cold blue Android gaze. He tapped on my cage, handed me another steaming cheeseburger, and bowed. I ravenously ate. After that we returned to The Hamster Wheel for more basketball and bo staff fighting. I fought much better, especially in 1/2 G, where I could flip and spin away from his vicious attacks. I asked him more about Operation Close Encounter, but he said nothing—just caught me off guard again and whacked me in the stomach. I almost lost my burger. “Rules #1 and #2,” he said.

  Second distraction: stargazing. I looked out the skylight for a while and tried to make out constellations, but it was really hard. Not because I couldn’t see any stars. No, it was the opposite. I saw too many stars. Slowly though I figured it out—there was Polaris, the North Star, and from that I made out Orion, with the three stars on his belt. He always was my favorite constellation—Tully Orion Harper is my full name. Then I thought about 300 billion again. I guess I got completely lost in my head, thinking about how big the universe was. But eventually my mind wandered on to the third distraction.

  The Harper Device.

  As I looked out the skylight, I started to picture the Device, how it glowed red, or “red, red, red, red, red” as Queen Envy sang. The only time I really saw the Device was back in Hangar Two. Lightning and lots of scientists kept me from inspecting it then. Now they were all gone, and the Harper Device was all by itself, just a beautiful glowing orb, and another addition to the space lab. I looked out the skylight, but I had a sudden urge to see that red glow up close.

  I punched in my cage code and floated across the garden toward the Harper Device, locked in its enormous clear plastic case. Such a huge cage for that small item. My dad was a really careful packer. As I looked into the case, shades of red filled my mind. Just as my mind wandered while looking at the stars, I felt lost in the beautiful red sphere spinning in front of me. Red wasn’t just one color but a thousand, and each one of them had its own personality, meaning, and mood.

  Red, red, red, red, red.

  The orb spun slowly in place, with tongues of mist that flicked the air and then disappeared. Something about the color, the movement—the Device mesmerized me. I don’t know how long I watched it floating there. I felt calm, and it didn’t matter that I was out of my cage or that the Android knew my true identity. The Conspiracy Game, Operation Close Encounter—everything melted away into a red haze. The Device inhabited my mind. It seemed larger, closer, more interesting with each rotation, with each wisp of red mist that reached toward me. It was like being next to a star, or being with a star, almost like becoming a star. I could almost feel jets of vapor rising from my skin. And then, suddenly, my nose bumped something.

  Without even noticing, I had removed my helmet and gloves. My nose was against the case, just a few feet from the Device.

  Maybe I had just lost myself again, but this felt different. I wasn’t drifting around aimlessly, I was floating toward something. No, the Device is drawing me toward itself.

  That was a startling thought. I turned around and headed toward my cage, but all the trees and vines in the garden and in my cage were also reaching toward me. No, they were reaching toward the sphere that was in the case behind me.

  I turned back toward the Device.

  It seemed to be spinning a bit more quickly, and I could feel myself being drawn to the glass case again. For some reason, I wanted into the room. It wants me in there, I thought. This isn’t close enough. It needs to tell me something, show me something.

  My heart pounded. I floated toward the access panel. If only I knew the code, I thought.

  You do know the code, whispered a voice. It was the same voice I heard in my dream of the Harper Device weeks ago. Go, and do not delay.

  I tried my cage code. Nothing happened. I tried again. Nothing. Backwards, said the voice. So I tried the code backwards. The door silently slid opened.

  My heart skipped a bit. Adrenaline rushed through my veins. The Device seemed brighter, closer, and more real than anything I had ever seen or felt.

  Red, red, red, red, red.

  It was pulling me toward itself, spinning quicker, and flicking mist farther.

  Red, red, red, red, red.

  The spinning increased and the mist reached my hand—a cool mist that made my fingers feel frostbitten. The sensation moved up my arm, and I could see the mist move through my suit, toward my chest, and I felt cold. Cold but alive. My mind felt the same way, like it was taking in some big new idea. How did I ever live without this feeling? I thought.

  “Show me something,” I told the Device. “Show me something I need to see.”

  The Harper Device stopped spinning, like it was listening to me or trying to make up its mind. Then the Device pulsated, and each pulse produced an electrical current that ran through my entire body. Once, twice, three times—each pulse felt more powerful. A red mist filled the room. All I could see was red.

  Red, red, red, red, red.

  Through the red haze, dreams emerged. Not dreams, visions. Red Visions. First I saw Trackman and Sawyer appear amidst the haze. They stood in the space lab talking about the Conspiracy Game. Then Trackman disappeared in a puff of red dust, and the scene changed. A man stood in front of the escape pods, his back to me. Someone else was with him, but this person looked limp and pale, attached to the magnetic walkway by his feet. My heart skipped a beat as Sawyer turned toward me with cold blue eyes. I was thankful when that dream vanished. It was so real, but another rose up in its place, stranger than the first. The Moon appeared, and beyond the Moon in a field of stars I saw a strange sight—a fish gulping for air. The fish looked deeper into space, and as it did, I looked upon what was approaching. A jellyfish emerged from the depths, its tentacles brushing the stars on the approach. The fish wriggled but couldn’t move. The jellyfish reached for him, but just as he did so, the Moon blocked out my view of the terrible scene.

  That scene disappeared, and a final scene emerged. I saw myself back in Alaska at the foot of Mt. Denali, all alone with the cold wind in my face. A mountain towered over me. I looked up to the peak and heard a crack. The mountain was moving. No, it was the snow! An avalanche. I ran, but the avalanche tumbled down the face of the mountain toward me—an avalanche of red snow.

  Sawyer with the body. The fish waiting for his death. The avalanche booming down the mountain. These were my first Red Visions.

  Just as the avalanche hit me I came back to my senses. My mind couldn’t take any more. The visions vanished. The real world reappeared. There I was, spinning in the cage with the Harper Device. My mind returned to my body, which was freezing cold and spinning in the red mist. The Device and I were one.

  “No, enough! Too much!” I yelled. Then, suddenly, the red mist vanished. I was thrown against the door with a loud pop.

  I screamed in pain. My body felt broken. My hands felt like they were both frozen and on fire. I saw nothing but red, red, red, red, red.

  Somewhere an alarm sounded. I could hardly hear it and couldn’t move.

  Through the pain and blindness, I heard a voice: “Attention
Flight Deck—emergency in the infirmary. All crew stand by.” Then I felt strong arms scoop me up and carry me out of the space lab. The contents of the cargo hold flew past in a flash of color, and Lincoln Sawyer’s steady voice drifted into my mind.

  “One to infirmary. Commander Harper, please report.”

  “No, Sawyer. Help me.” My words came in spurts because of the pain. “Hide me. Keep our secrets.”

  “Tully, you are going into shock. I cannot help you and hide you simultaneously. Not if we want to keep you alive.”

  LIGHTNING FLOWERS

  I awoke from the blackness of sleep into a red haze. A steady beep droned on and on inside my head like a metronome. Tick-tock. Ticktock. Beep-beep. Beep-beep. Before I opened my eyes, I remembered the Red Vision again—clear as crystal. Not like a dream, not like living, but not like a fantasy either. That vision of someone floating beside Sawyer came back to me. What had I seen? The beeping accelerated, and as my eyes opened, I realized it was a heart monitor. I was in the infirmary, a dozen monitors strapped to me, and me strapped to an examination table.

  Sylvia Moreline floated beside me. “Hola, niño. How are you feeling?”

  My brain feels like grated cheese, I thought, but I remembered I was an orangutan in a spacesuit and could not speak. I was dire thirsty, so I motioned for water. Through the red haze my hand came up to my mouth, but there was no glove, only my swollen fingers. I reached for my helmet. No helmet. I felt my hair instead. I looked down and didn’t see a spacesuit at all—just my jeans and t-shirt. Of course I did. I was Tully Harper, and Sylvia Moreline knew me. She handed me a water bottle with a straw.

  “What is that?” I asked.

  “It’s water.”

  “Why is it pink?” I asked.

  “It’s not pink, Tully. Does it look that way to you?”

  “Uh, no.” I lied, looking around the infirmary. Everything looked off-color. The white lights and the ceiling looked pink. The red Space Alliance logo looked black. I saw the world through a red haze, like the Harper Device warped my brain, which was pounding with a terrible headache. From that day forward, this red haze came and went in waves, like fog blowing over the ocean.