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

by Adam Holt

  “What happened to me?” Sylvia just smiled and stroked my hair. Someone else answered.

  “You interacted with the Harper Device.” Lincoln Sawyer emerged from the corner of the room. “I was getting some tools from the cargo hold when I heard a thud. When I went to inspect, I found you beside the Device. It seems to have electrocuted you—among other things. Notice the entry point of the electricity—your hands.”

  Faint lines ran across the backs of both of my hands. The lines reminded me of the lightning I had seen jumping between clouds as we orbited the Earth. “Are they scars? They’re white.”

  “Those are Lichtenburg’s figures, or lightning flowers.”

  “Lightning flowers?” I flexed my hand. The skin crinkled painfully.

  “They sometimes occur when electricity enters a conducting material. In this case, your hands were the entry point and you were the conducting material. They show where the electricity first entered your body. They aren’t scars. They will disappear with time and treatment. How do your hands feel?”

  “Not that bad. They just look weird. But you said ‘Among other things.’ What else happened?”

  “I ran some tests. You had some strange brain activity while you slept—overactivity, really. Your mind showed evidence of being awake and asleep at the same time. Very strange. Also, your heart stopped beating for a moment.”

  “Stopped? Like, I died?”

  He smiled. “No, but you would have. I defibrillated your heart to start it again. No damage occurred, which is fascinating. You are fortunate that the ship’s doctor was the closest person to you. And how is your head? Do you remember what happened right before the incident? How you came to interact with the Device?”

  “Uh, no.”

  “Are you sure?” He stared at me with his cold, blue gaze.

  “I’m sure. Stars, my head is pounding.” I didn’t want to tell him too much, especially after seeing the strange visions, but I don’t think Sawyer believed me. He was about to ask me more when Sylvia interrupted.

  “Tully, your father wants to see you as soon as possible. It’s a miracle that you’re okay,” said Sylvia, stroking my back.

  But I wasn’t okay. The water looked like pink lemonade, my ears rang, every joint in my body ached. Not to mention I saw some strange visions before the Harper Device tossed me across the room. On top of that I was discovered. Nothing was going to be okay.

  I ripped off the monitors and pushed myself away from them both, floating toward the ceiling. Immediately I felt dizzy and sick, but I tried to hide the feelings.

  “No, dad can’t know.”

  “He already does, honey.”

  “He, he can’t,” I mumbled. “But he does. Wait, how many days since we launched?”

  “Four days, Tully,” she responded, floating toward me. “Now take my arm. We need to get to the Flight Deck.”

  Four days. It was too soon. I couldn’t believe our bad luck.

  Several things are about to happen, I thought. First, my dad grounds me for all eternity. I will never leave my room again. Second, I confess about Tabitha and Sunjay. Everybody will learn about our whole plot. Third, the crew crams us in an escape pod and sends us to the Moon Base Tranquility. We then ride back to Earth on a lunar mining vessel, which is probably like being stuck on a city bus for an entire week. I go back to Alaska and survive the rest of my life on asparagus and caribou meat. And all because of that stupid Device.

  My body felt sluggish, like I couldn’t move in all this red haze. Sylvia seemed to understand. She gently took my arm and steadied me on the magnetic walkway, passing the crew quarters on our way to the Flight Deck. My head throbbed and each step on the walkway seemed impossible.

  URGENCY AND DISCOVERY

  Dark thoughts floated through my mind as Sylvia Moreline and I stumbled through The Adversity toward my doom. The ship was empty and quiet, like we were the only people on board.

  That all changed when we emerged from the walkway onto the Flight Deck. I floated there for a moment and took in the surroundings. The Flight Deck was a semi-circular room. All the seats pointed outward from the center, and in front of each seat was a holographic workstation. When it was turned on, the crew could focus on the hologram in front of them—sometimes it was a blueprint of an engine, other times they watched video from cameras inside The Adversity, and occasionally someone from the real Mission Control on Earth would call them for an update on the mission. No one looked at us at first.

  Everyone was hard at work in the cramped room: Redshirt Anderson was looking at a 3-D image of the cargo hold. Buckshot Lewis plotted the rest of our trip. He drew one red line from The Adversity to the Moon. “ETA: 12 hours,” it said. Then another line, from the Moon to a point in space. “LG ALPHA— 3 DAYS.” Our destinations.

  My dad was strapped to a chair in the center of the room that was slightly taller than the others, watching their progress, asking questions, and spinning his pen. I always wanted to see the Flight Deck in action, with my dad in command—but I wanted to be here as a guest, not a captive. In a minute, his attention would be on me.

  “Buckshot, give me an update on LG Alpha. How much time until we arrive?”

  “Thirty-six hours to destination from the Moon. The space station is still cloaked though. We won’t see it until we are practically standing on top of it.”

  “How confident are we of its flight path?”

  “Certain, but if it’s damaged, it could be off course.”

  The base on the far side of the Moon, I thought. Sawyer had explained it to me already. And he also saved my life. I didn’t even thank him.

  My dad grabbed the pen without even looking. Then he turned around and looked at me. The red haze had faded, so I saw him clearly. He frowned and studied me for a moment, like he was making some calculations in his head. I shoved my scarred hands into my pockets, which hurt like crazy. What was he thinking? Something like, “Buckshot, I need to launch my son into space for eternity. What would you recommend?” “Leave him on one of Jupiter’s moons, sir.” But dad didn’t say a thing. The pen twirled. No emotions showed on his face. He was in command of the ship and of himself. And of me. Finally he spoke.

  “Okay, let’s go ahead and get this over with. Sylvia, escort Tully to the Observation Deck. We’ll be right behind you.”

  A hatch popped open below our feet. Sylvia gave me a gentle push and we descended to the lower level Observation Deck, a spacious, tidy room without all the buttons, levers, screens, and holographs of the Flight Deck above. A dinner table and eight leather chairs filled the room. The walls seemed to be solid steel at first, but they turned into clear glass as soon as we touched the magnetic floor. It was a beautiful view of space from all sides, but I wasn’t interested in the view. Sylvia seated me at the middle of the table. The rest of the crew took their seats. Gallant Trackman sat at one end, my dad at the other. Even Queen Envy was there, wearing a formal black evening gown and glowing, heart-shaped earrings. Lincoln Sawyer didn’t look my way, but all others eyes descended upon me. I wondered what was going on in his Android mind.

  My stomach had gone ice cold, my throat tightened, and my heart was pounding. My dad sat at one end of the table. Once again, he spun his pen. Finally, he pretended to poke something in the air with the pen, at which point I heard the voice of the on-flight computer: “Recording has begun, Commander Harper.”

  “Very good, DORIS,” he said, in his “on the record” voice. “Commander Harper, crew, and one stowaway present—four days since liftoff, 36 hours to final destination,” he stated. “Now, the facts are as follows: on board The Adversity we found one of the three children that authorities have been searching for on Earth for the last several days. Apparently they created a diversion and made people believe that they were camping. Tully, is that correct?”

  “Uh, yes.”

  “So I am assuming you had help getting on board. Correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “And since the
other two are nowhere to be found, could you tell us their locations?”

  The red haze clouded my vision for a moment. I didn’t say anything. He hasn’t even asked if I’m okay. He’s just grilling me with all these questions like we don’t even know each other.

  “Tully, where? We don’t have time for secrets.”

  “Okay. Queen Envy’s spacesuits.”

  Everyone seemed shocked, especially Gallant Trackman, who shot a look at Lincoln Sawyer. I remembered their conversation about using too much oxygen. Sawyer smiled faintly, as if to say, “I told you so.” My dad, on the other hand, was not smiling. He twirled his pen. Queen Envy laughed and slapped her forehead.

  “Oh, Baby Bear, you wild crazy thing. Your friends have been hanging out in my spacesuits? And you came to visit—oh, that is just wild! Commander Harper, your son is just the wildest beastie in the whole zoo. I should be mad but whatever. My fans will go roasters for these crazy stowaways. Oh, I can’t wait to tell them…or can I?”

  “Your fans will love this story, but for now you can’t breathe a word of this. Redshirt, would you mind fetching the other stowaways? DORIS, as I was saying, all three stowaways entered The Adversity in spacesuits: two in Queen Envy’s extra suits, and one, well, pretended to be a monkey.”

  “Sir, an orangutan, to be precise,” added Sawyer. I could feel my face getting red.

  “Yes, an orangutan. The three stowaways kept on their suits until one of them, Tully Harper, engaged the Harper Device, at which point he nearly died. Sawyer saved him. He appears to have recovered almost completely. Now, the solution would seem simple. We could still carry out our mission—drop off our stowaways on the Moon as well as the Device. Then we could continue to LG Alpha to investigate and repair the station. However, we can’t do that. I’ve received information that changes our mission.” Everyone in the room stirred. The mission changed? “This is now a rescue mission. Mr. Trackman, would you like to share?”

  Gallant Trackman sat at the other end of the table, looking composed. He cleared his throat to speak.

  “Certainly. This is a surprise to us all. LG Alpha is a secret space station. We all knew that. However, the Space Alliance told us something more today. It is a manned space station,” said Trackman.

  “There’s a crew on board?” Buckshot yelled. “Well, we’ve got to get out there right now and help.”

  “My thoughts as well,” said my dad. “There’s no time to delay. We’ll skip the Moon and head straight to LG Alpha. We can drop off the Device on the return flight.” Everyone nodded in agreement except for Sylvia.

  “What about the children?” asked Sylvia. “Let’s not put them in harm’s way. We could still send them in an escape pod to the Moon.”

  “That’s the problem. We only have two pods. If we launch one, we put our lives at risk. We may need them for injured people or for the rest of the crew,” said my dad. “We’re stuck together, it appears. So Tully, Tabitha, and Sunjay decided to stow away. They’ll have to share in the risks, same as the crew, same as Queen Envy.”

  Moreline looked frustrated but nodded.

  The crew headed back to the Flight Deck. My dad stayed behind. He sat at the table for a minute staring out the window at the Moon, running his hand through his hair.

  “It’s beautiful, isn’t it? When you’re this close, you can really see the all the features. The asteroid craters, the hills, even the miners if you look through that telescope.” I didn’t know what to say, so I listened. “Son, you must know how angry and disappointed I am, but I just want to know if you’re okay.”

  “Yeah, I’m fine. Just a headache.”

  “You don’t look like you have ‘just a headache.’ You look like you need some rest. Why don’t you head back to the infirmary? We can talk later.”

  “Dad,” I said, “I’m glad we’re still on board. We can definitely help out with the mission. Just let us know what we need to do.”

  “Oh, you’ve done plenty already,” he said. “You almost got yourself killed. You are just three more problems in a difficult mission right now.”

  “No, we’re not,” I said. “I already found out some important stuff that I need to tell you.”

  “More important than planning a rescue mission to a damaged space station?”

  “Yeah, maybe,” I said, but I didn’t get to finish. Behind me the door slid open. In came Redshirt with Tabitha and Sunjay. They both looked shocked, and they both looked at my dad, not me.

  “Commander Harper,” said Tabitha, “we’re really sorry to cause you all this trouble. You just don’t know how miserable it is for Tully when you’re gone. We just wanted to help him.”

  Sunjay raised his hand. My dad nodded for him to speak. “Are you going to throw us into prison when we get back to Earth, sir? If so, for how many years?”

  Commander Harper sighed. “I’m an astronaut, not a judge, so don’t worry about that. Besides, you’re a bit young for prison, Sunjay. You will get the grounding of your life, I’m sure. Look, I understand what you were trying to do. I know Tully doesn’t like Alaska, but this wasn’t the best solution. It’s not the end of your lives, but don’t expect a very warm welcome from me or from anybody else in the universe.” He looked my way. “Especially from your Aunt Selma. You scared her to death. Redshirt and I will leave you three here for now, but you should all know where to go afterward.”

  There I was, alone with my two best friends on the Observation Deck. Not exactly a happy reunion.

  “We’re going to jail,” said Sunjay. “I’ll never be a free man again. I’ll never get my doctorate in Physics or become an astronaut. We probably won’t even survive. We’ll get hit by flying paint chips and never even make it to the space station.”

  Tabitha didn’t say anything at first. She didn’t have to. The colors in her lucky scarf swirled around like an angry hurricane of green and blue. Then the entire scarf burned bright red. She grabbed my scarred hands and looked at them. Then she gave me a big bear hug and punched me in the arm. Hard.

  “Why did you do it, Tully!” hissed Tabitha.

  “What?” I said.

  “You told me not to blow our cover, and then you go off and hug the Harper Device? You could have died. Device hugging space idiot. Nice work!” she yelled. “And you knew it, too! You knew the Device was on board weeks ago and didn’t even tell me. Stars, how stupid can you get? What else don’t we know?”

  “Nothing—just a lot has happened to me.” I thought about Trackman, Sawyer, and the Red Visions. How was I supposed to tell her any of that?

  Redshirt poked his head down from the Flight Deck. “Uh, guys, the doors aren’t that thick on board the ship. There might be a better place for you to talk.”

  We nodded okay, but Tabitha’s green eyes burned right through me. “Tully,” she hissed, “don’t talk to us again unless you want to explain. Come on, Sunjay. Queen Envy expects me in her room and you’re supposed to stay in Redshirt’s room. Tully can go wherever he wants. I guess we’ll do what we’re told for once.”

  “Yeah, go ahead,” I said, “but meet me in the Hamster Wheel in an hour if you want to know what happened to me in the lab. We might also have some fun, too. That’s part of why we came anyway, right?”

  “Oh, sure, we’ll have tons of fun,” she said, grabbing Sunjay by the arm and floating away.

  With that they left me alone on the Observation Deck, hurt and angry, looking at the lightning flowers on my hands, trying to figure out what to say.

  NEW PROBLEMS, NEW SKILLS

  Two hours passed before Tabitha and Sunjay arrived in the Hamster Wheel. Before they arrived I shot free throws, practiced with the bo staff, and tried to sort out what I might tell them. I made a mental list that would make me sound like a halfway normal human being.

  Now Tabitha stood there with a death-ray stare and her scarf on fire. “Okay, Space Boy, story us. Sunjay and I are ready.” Sunjay looked around the Wheel, amazed by all the endless possibilities for
entertainment, just like I had, but Tabitha pinched him. “Sunjay, remember prison. Remember our discussion.”

  “Oh, right. Sorry.” He scowled at me and crossed his arms.

  “Okay, okay, I blew it. I got caught.”

  “That’s not why we’re mad. Queen Envy would have found us soon anyway. Sunjay was jealous that he wasn’t her pillow.”

  “Then why are you mad?”

  “Because we planned this for weeks and you didn’t tell us everything you knew. The Harper Device was on board? Just a little detail.”

  “It didn’t seem that important at the time. I didn’t want y’all to freak out.”

  “Well, here we are, freaking out!” yelled Sunjay. “Freaking out in space! I’ll never breathe the free air again. And what I did to my dad’s car—“

  “What else haven’t you told us, Tully?” asked Tabitha. “There’s no room for secrets out here. Secrets cause problems. Secrets kill. Tell us everything that happened, everything you know.”

  Everything I know? I don’t know anything anymore, I thought. I have a weird secret friendship with an Android. I see Red Visions about space jellyfish. I wasn’t about to tell them that. They would think I was crazy.

  I began my story. I took them through the facts of my journey—getting the orangutan spacesuit, finding my cage, getting fed by Moreline, stargazing in the cage, and the first orangutan carwash. They asked about Little Bacon. I told them about how he saved me.

  “You kicked him across the lab? That was a jerk move,” Tabitha said.

  “It was my only hope,” I explained.

  “Yeah, he did save your bacon!” Sunjay laughed. “Did you shout ‘GOALLL!’ when you kicked him?”

  Tabitha shot him another look and he scowled again. It felt good to tell them some things, even if I did feel guilty for kicking Little Bacon. Still, it wasn’t enough. Tabitha popped her gum. She wanted more. I took a deep breath and told them about Sawyer, how he discovered me, fed me, kept my secrets, and took me to the Hamster Wheel. I did not tell them about our conversations back on Earth.