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

by Adam Holt

  “This has to make sense to you! I’ve seen things. I have imagined things.” I pointed to Tabitha. “You got sucked away in a red mist.”

  “You imagined things?” said Tabitha. “Was this after you almost died with the Harper Device? Why don’t we get Sawyer to check you out again?”

  “What? He’s a murdering lunatic,” I said. “No way he’s examining me.”

  Tabitha frowned, Sunjay shook his head. I took a deep breath and thought about why they didn’t believe me. It dawned on me that my explanations would sound crazy unless they knew about the Red Visions, and I had done everything in my power to hide them from my friends. My friends thought I was insane, not Trackman. I was seeing things, overreacting to things, and apparently believed in aliens, which was now quite true. Talking more wouldn’t help in the least. It was just like Cassandra talking about the Trojan Horse.

  “Okay, when we reach LG Alpha in a few hours, if there’s anything weird, or, like, wrong, just remember this conversation. And be ready for anything. I’ll be in my cage, sleeping.”

  “That’s probably a good idea,” said Tabitha. Nothing to argue there.

  I shook my throbbing head and headed back to my cage.

  A CHESS MATCH

  I settled down into my cage and prepared for bed, but only a few minutes passed before the hatch opened at the far end of the cargo bay. I thought it might be Tabitha, coming to see if I was talking to myself about aliens.

  Instead, in floated Gallant Trackman.

  My heart skipped about twelve beats, and by the time he floated to my cage, I could feel a cold sweat starting on my forehead.

  “Did I catch you sleeping?” he asked, his big sharp teeth gleaming.

  I didn’t answer, just glared at him. Was he here to kill me or to tuck me into bed?

  Neither. In his hand was what looked like a briefcase. “Dr. Chet Chan’s Space Chess” was written on the lid.

  “I haven’t found a single opponent on board worthy of playing against me, not even our dear Commander Harper. Let’s play a game, Tully.”

  It wasn’t a request. It was one of those “offers you can’t refuse.” He opened my cage and floated inside. He released the briefcase, which folded open to reveal a chessboard. The red and black pieces began to arrange themselves. At the same time, the bottom of the board transformed into a high table, with one leg that attached to the floor and two seats on either side for the opponents. We sat across from one another.

  “This has been quite an adventure for you,” he said, as the board finished arranging itself. “You know, I went on some adventures when I was a boy, too. I never impersonated a primate, of course, but they were quite memorable.”

  “I’m sure you did. Where did you go?” I asked.

  “Oh, you know, here and there. Met some very intriguing people, saw some things that I will never forget,” he said, adjusting the knight and rook. His beady black eyes gleamed like his teeth. “I imagined you’ll see some things out here that you won’t forget either.”

  “I already have,” I said.

  “You don’t have to tell me,” he said. “I know what you’ve seen. Ah, why don’t you take the first move in our game? I’ll be black. That makes you red.”

  It appeared he was here just to play and talk, but I would rather have fought him hand to hand. He wasn’t that much bigger than me, but I had a feeling he was a lot smarter. I looked over the army of red pieces on my side. Aunt Selma and I sometimes played chess back in Alaska. She taught me some basic strategies. Now I wished she taught me more. I took a gulp and moved a pawn. He did the same.

  The first game didn’t last long. He always seemed three moves ahead of me as we played in silence. When it was his turn, Trackman kept his eyes on the board. When it was my turn, his eyes never left me. He took my knight with a pawn, then took my castle with his rook. And so on until…

  “Checkmate,” he said, sucking air through his teeth.

  The first game was over. He clearly had a lot more experience than I did, but after that game I knew my opponent much better. He liked to make dramatic moves with his rook, and he gave me one hint before an attack: the wicked hiss of air going through his teeth.

  “Well, you’re really not terrible,” he said. “Maybe not a worth adversary, but I’ll play you another game. Maybe you were just a little, hmm, nervous.”

  Well, he had that right. I was fearful. But something else pumped through my veins when he said that. I could feel my pulse quicken, but it wasn’t from fear this time. It was anger. I was right to be angry, too. I looked at Trackman, and the red haze seemed to fill the room.

  Set it aside.

  Those words echoed through my mind. What did I have to set aside? My fear, my anger, everything? Just focus. Set it aside. Was he a killer, conspirator, alien, and spy? Whatever he was, he was just an opponent, and an arrogant one at that.

  “Nervous?” I said. “Someone once told me I have a lot of nerve.”

  “Ah, that’s not news to me. You don’t think Sawyer tells me these things?”

  “I’m sure he tells you everything. Still, you’ve got reasons to be nervous.”

  “So what in the wide expanse of space should I be concerned about, boy?” he said, setting up the pieces again.

  “Operation Close Encounter,” I said.

  He stopped putting the pieces back in place. “So you heard the Android and I chatting one day in the garden. You know nothing.”

  “Plotting, you were plotting Phase Two. It seems everything has gone your way so far. Congratulations,” I said.

  His face reddened. His clenched his teeth yet didn’t suck in air like he had earlier. He broke into a grin, and I saw uncertainty on his face.

  “Well played, boy,” he said. “It has gone brilliantly thus far.”

  Game two began. Once again, Trackman motioned for me to start. This time the board looked different to me, like I hadn’t really seen it before. I had been looking at each piece instead of the whole board, but now I could picture them all moving together, like an army going to war. There were so many options. Several moves gave us advantages for a moment, but they wouldn’t last. I looked for a slower strategy. I focused.

  Before long, most of the pawns disappeared from the board, but I held back my best pieces. Then Trackman began to move his rook again, and when I heard that sucking sound through his teeth, I tried to look a few steps ahead. I moved my knight just in time to avoid his attack. He nodded in approval.

  “Oh, much better,” he said. “You have something going here. You know the only, uh, person I haven’t tried to play on board beside you?”

  “Tabitha or Sunjay?”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t even consider your two playmates. Just children. No, I haven’t played Sawyer.”

  “You’re scared that you would lose,” I said, taking one of his bishops. He looked annoyed.

  “Oh, I know I would lose. All Androids are programmed to play chess perfectly. If I did beat him, it would only be because he let me. And I don’t like that idea. I don’t like it when people hold things back from me.”

  He sucked air through his teeth. His rook took my castle, but I took his rook with my bishop. Then the red haze in my mind swirled around several pieces on the board, showing me where they could move next. There were hundreds of different moves, from boring defensive plays to overly aggressive attacks, but Trackman’s strategy seemed simpler now: to make aggressive moves that would make me doubt my abilities. If he kept doing that, he would overreach and I could counteract. I tried to look a few plays ahead, and I saw that I had a chance in this game.

  “Much better indeed,” he said. “So, Tully, what do you think we will find at LG Alpha anyway? Nothing? Aliens? I mean, really,” he laughed and then hissed. I didn’t respond.

  His queen took my castle, but two moves later I took his queen with my own queen.

  “I think you may have some wrong ideas about what all you have heard,” he said. “This is just another bori
ng trip into space. I’ve been on a few. I’ll go on a few more. Too bad Anderson won’t,” he said, moving his other rook. “Check,” he said.

  I lost my cool.

  “Who do you think you are?” I yelled. “You come into space, kill people, plot to take over my dad’s ship—“

  Trackman looked at me with his beady eyes shining.

  “Yes, go on, what else, boy? What else? Tell me!”

  “—You promised the Android he’ll be like a human, that they’ll help him—“

  I stopped myself just in time. Trackman was sucking air through his teeth like a snake. This is why he’s visiting me, I thought. This is the real game. He wants me to get angry and spill my guts. Well, now I can see a play ahead. I have an advantage.

  So I continued, with a bit of a lie. “—You, you’re horrible! You send your Android to play games with my mind just because I spied on you that one time. Then he caught me in the hangar back on Earth and let me go.”

  “He caught you? What hangar?”

  “I bet you gave him the orders. Then, when I finally get on board, he told me about The Conspiracy Game and made me keep all those secrets.”

  Trackman looked confused. “Sawyer has no secrets from me, boy.”

  “Oh, I know that now. You were both just playing games with me, trying to ‘earn my trust,’ like he said. I should have just done what he told me.”

  “What did he advise you to do?”

  “To tell my dad about The Conspiracy Game.”

  Trackman jumped to his feet and accidentally floated to the ceiling. “Damn,” he said, pushing himself back to the floor of the cage. He shook me by the shoulders. “What did he say? Tell me more.”

  “No,” I said. “He didn’t say anything else. I said enough. Coming to play chess with me? I’m just a kid, Trackman. Leave me alone. I’m sorry I got on board this ship, I just wanted to be with my dad, and you hate me because I messed up the mission. I get it. I’m just a waste of space. Just stop messing with me, okay?” I started crying and rubbed my eyes. My tears floated in salty blobs toward Trackman. He brushed them away like they were flies and frowned at me. For a moment I thought he might leave. Instead, he blew out a frustrated breath that smelled like stale coffee. He watched me closely, trying to see if I was telling the truth.

  “It’s my move,” I said after a minute of tense silence. I sniffled and moved my queen. We played out the last few moves. I played poorly, too, right into one of his traps. He took my queen with his other rook in a few moves and once again…

  “Checkmate,” he said. There was no look of triumph in his eyes even though he had beaten me. “Well, much better that time, boy. You fell apart at the end though. Just absolutely collapsed,” he said, eyeing me carefully. “Almost like you meant to.”

  “Just leave me alone, will you?” I pleaded.

  “I don’t know if I should. Something seems wrong here. If you’re lying to me about Sawyer—and you, you could have played better there at the end.” He pushed a button on the board, which collapsed into a briefcase again, and prepared to leave. “If we ever play again, try to think several more steps ahead. You showed great promise—just too little too late.”

  He was right. Getting a few steps behind Trackman would mean losing at more than chess. I nearly spilled my guts about everything I knew. That’s what he wanted, but the world turned red for a moment and helped me turn the tables on him. I hadn’t convinced him completely that I was just a confused kid, but maybe he would doubt Sawyer and wonder what we discussed in private. That might turn his focus away from me and from his goal—taking the ship and the Harper Device. A glimmer of hope goes a long way sometimes in space.

  Tabitha and Sunjay wouldn’t understand the importance of the chess match. “Maybe he was coming to keep you company,” they would say. “That was his awkward way of trying to help you.”

  However, I was starting to see the whole board now. The chess pieces were all in place, we were almost at LG Alpha, and the real Conspiracy Game was about to begin.

  PART FOUR: LG ALPHA

  THE DIRTY SNOWBALL

  I didn’t sleep long or well. A shadowy blur with long, flowing tentacles reached for me in my dreams. I woke early and made my way to the Observation Deck for breakfast. The lights stayed dim when I entered, so it must have been before 6 a.m. No one else was there that early. The stillness of the room made me uncomfortable, so I started to hum. I looked out the bay window at the Moon in the distance. Beyond it was the Earth, a white and blue marble. We were now at the Lagrangian Point.

  The whole idea of the Lagrangian Point reminded me of a scene I once saw in an old pirate movie. One day the sails on the pirate ship went completely slack. The wind died. There was no current, and the ocean looked like a mirror without a single ripple of movement. The pirates sat there for months, running out of water and praying that the winds would wake up. Finally the winds blew the pirates on to their destination…only after some guy apologized to the sea god. Hey, it was a movie. I guess I had the ocean on my mind. Either way, the Lagrangian Point was the same sort of place, where if you stopped, you had to find a way to start moving again.

  My father’s voice came from the intercom. “All personnel, good morning. We have arrived. We will start the search for LG Alpha today. Gather on the Observation Deck in a quarter hour. Commander out.”

  Still alone on the Observation Deck, I worked through a rough plan in my mind that went something like this: My dad knows something’s wrong. Trackman or Sawyer will make a move. I will be ready for anything. Tabitha and Sunjay will probably just say, “Oh, Tully. Stop overreacting! They just want to chop off one of your arms, not both!” I thought about the karate moves I knew from watching cartoons and all those kung fu movies that Sunjay loved. I imagined myself fighting Sawyer, taking down Trackman with a roundhouse kick. What I really wanted was a light saber. How scared would Trackman be when he saw that in my hands instead of a chess piece?

  Queen Envy interrupted my planning. Her outfit didn’t really look like clothing. It looked like an angry, golden octopus was attacking her. On second look, it was a golden octopus, and it had her wrapped in its tentacles. She noticed that I was “admiring” her outfit.

  “Morning, baby bear,” she said. “You like this outfit? I saved it for today. I tried to beam back an update to the fans that we were all doing okay on board, but the transmission failed. I need to talk to your dad about it.”

  “He’ll be down in a while.”

  “So will your girl Tabitha, I think.” She raised her eyebrow, like we had some secret between us.

  Tabitha isn’t my girl. That’s the last thing on my mind, I thought. Queen Envy could tell.

  “Oh, baby bear, I didn’t mean it like that. She didn’t sleep well last night, I don’t think. Still upset about the funeral. She helped me film a message for the Envy Squad last night and that took her mind off things for a while, but like I said, the transmission just cut off half way through.” She turned toward me. She wore gold contacts that glittered when she spoke. “How you holding up?”

  “Fine,” I lied. “My dad says you have to do the best you can with what you have. I think we’re all doing that.”

  “We certainly are, baby bear.”

  It was sort of flattering, having Queen Envy called me “baby bear.” I wasn’t sure why she picked that name for me. She didn’t have a nickname for anybody else. Except my dad. Space Boy. Even when she was wearing a gold octopus and calling me nicknames, I could still picture her singing at the funeral—she seemed like a real person now. She wasn’t just a crazy egomaniac—that was part of her act. I knew the difference.

  “Uh, thanks for yesterday,” I said. “The song. It was—it reminded me of my grandparents and church.”

  “Oh, I love that old hymn, Tully. My grandma used to sing it to me when I was a baby.”

  “My grandma did the same thing to my dad.”

  “Yeah, your father told me,” she said. “Those old hymn
s always set my mind at ease when things get crazy. ‘May the road rise up to meet you.’ That’s such a great line. I mean, can you imagine what that would be like? If the road just rose up to meet your feet, like the whole universe was guiding your every step?”

  I didn’t know what to say to that. It was a cool thought. Queen Envy gazed thoughtfully out the window beside me, her gold eyes twinkling like stars. I didn’t think she would be so deep, and I wondered if Tabitha had talked to her about me. Was she trying to make me feel better? One of the tentacles from her dress wrapped around my arm. I peeled off the suction cups carefully.

  “Maybe you should update that song. You could write some new lyrics,” I said. Like pop stars need my input, like she would have time to do that before we made it to LG Alpha, or our deaths.

  “That’s such a flash idea, baby bear, but I don’t know if I can write stuff that deep. I’m more glitter and glam than heart and soul.”

  “You could try.”

  “Maybe just for you,” she said, smiling at me, her gold lipstick sparkling. “I see a lot of good in you. You’re like your dad, just working to make things good like they ought to be. That’s hard work because life always goes crooked just when you want it to be straight.” The door at the far end slid open just as the lights brightened the room to indicate morning. “Oh, there’s your girl and your hungry friend.”

  “Oh, she’s not my girl. She thinks I’m crazy.”

  “Welcome to the party,” she said. “Everybody says the same about me.”

  “No, it’s true, they both think I’m crazy and—“

  “—And there’s that dad of yours. Just the man I wanted to see.”

  Queen Envy floated toward him with her octopus dress, which grabbed at everything in sight. My dad looked at her with a weary smile. He wasn’t sleeping much. His forehead wrinkled and creases formed around his eyes. We were too near LG Alpha to rest. There was no time to be tired. Queen Envy asked him about the failed transmissions.

  “Right, we’re having the same problem,” he said. “We lost communication with Earth and Moon early this morning. We prioritized rescue mission preparations but need to get that fixed. You’ll be the first to know when it’s done.”