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

  The Conspiracy Game: A Tully Harper Novel

  Copyright ©2013 Adam W. Holt. Adamholtwrites.blogspot.com.

  Cover art by Allen Quigley. Allenquigley.com.

  No portion of this book may be used or transmitted without consent of the author.

  The text for this book is set in Garamond.

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN 10: 1940873010

  ISBN 13: 9781940873015

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  It took several million keystrokes to write The Conspiracy Game; however, those keystrokes wouldn’t amount to much if not for these fine folks: Peggy Turlington, whose wisdom and encouragement shaped the story; Kristen Ball, my capable editor and steadfast friend, who finished the work Peggy began in exacting, Kristonian fashion; Denny Holt, my technical adviser, NASA historian, and father, who filled those roles beautifully and introduced me to Lagrangian Points; and the Koehlers, who went out of their way to support me in launching a new career.

  Then there is the cast of folks who funded the novel via Kickstarter. Benevolent Benefactors include: Carson Dunn & Family, Simon Mayhew, Jim & Lennie Diaz-Granados, the Stones, the Duffys, the Pellegrinos, and Mom & Dad. Helpful Conspirators include: Julie Gallington, Jan Dunn, Sara Fitzgerald, Charlie Pellerin, Mark Stewart, Linda White, Ernie & Gina Harvell, Mary Dunn, Peggy & Buddy Beaird, Marilyn Bullard, Chad, Krystal, & Case Collins, and Max Harberg. And Taylor Cole, the Aussie I met in the Louvre, who ran a one-man campaign for my book half way round the world for no other reason than he likes sci-fi and is generally a great guy.

  I must also acknowledge the inspiration for this novel—the 3 year old that sat through the “R” rated movie Prometheus on opening weekend. As her mother explained to me when I asked her why she brought a toddler to a gory sci-fi blockbuster, “Oh, she loves scary movies.” At the time I felt powerless to do anything about the situation, but now I don’t. I wrote you a book, little girl. I’ll never know your name, but I’m sorry that all those awe-inspiring yet captivating images invaded your sweet mind before you could appreciate their meaning and artistry. I hope that one day, when you’re old enough to read this book, your view of space will be redeemed. It’s a place that some of my readers, maybe even you, will one day explore. Have fun out there, share your journey, and bring back stuff from the stars that will make us all more human, more like the good God that created the Heavens and Earth.

  Finally, you’ll notice that I didn’t thank any of my students. If I tried to recount all those names or any of what they’ve given me over the past decade, it would stretch into another novel. And then what if I forgot to mention someone by name? Frankly, Kevin, that would be unfair.

  -A

  October 20, 2013

  Friendswood, Texas

  CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE

  THE ADVERSITY

  PART ONE: “GO, AND DO NOT DELAY.”

  IN TWO PLACES AT ONCE

  THE CRATER

  THE UNEXPECTED

  WEIRD THINGS ABOUT FAME, HOLOCLASSING, AND DOODLES

  ALL HAIL THE PROPHET OF THE UNIVERSE

  A SUDDEN CHILL IN THE SUMMERTIME

  LITTLE SPIES, BIG PROBLEMS, AND A STRANGE COMMAND

  COMPANY

  NERVE

  PART TWO: HOW TO SNEAK INTO SPACE AND SURVIVE

  GRAWWLLL!

  PRIMARY OBJECTIVES

  SUNJAY IN LOVE, ME IN PAIN

  A MOMENT IN THE HALLWAY

  HOW TO SNEAK INTO SPACE IN THREE EASY STEPS

  PART THREE: THE CONSPIRACY GAME

  SAVING MY BACON

  OXYGEN LEAKS AND UNINVITED GUESTS

  “MY SECRET FRIEND”

  THE CELEBRITY SNOWGLOBE

  RED, RED, RED, RED, RED

  LIGHTNING FLOWERS

  URGENCY AND DISCOVERY

  NEW PROBLEMS, NEW SKILLS

  NO SUCH THING

  BURDENS

  PHASE TWO

  CASSANDRA

  WHAT HAPPENED IN THE HALLWAY

  PRAYERS

  SPEECHES

  PROOF

  A CHESS MATCH

  PART FOUR: LG ALPHA

  THE DIRTY SNOWBALL

  SWIMMING IN THE AVALANCHE

  THE RING

  UNBREAKABLE GAZE

  JUMPER

  CLEAN

  A PRESENCE IN THE HALLWAY

  MELT

  HANDS

  TWO AND TWO TOGETHER

  SEVER

  DUELS AND DEALS

  THE NEXT LEVEL

  LOST AND FOUND

  THE WAY HOME

  FOOTPRINTS

  “IT’S THE BEGINNING AGAIN…”

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  PROLOGUE

  July 20, 2069.

  On this day, one hundred years ago, man first walked on the Moon. This was the day I began my account.

  THE ADVERSITY

  My dad and I sat at opposite ends of a conference table, deep in thought. From his jumpsuit pocket he took out a silver ballpoint pen. He leaned forward, clicked the pen a few times, and twirled it between his fingers. Then he withdrew his hand. Instead of falling to the table, the pen spun in mid-air with no signs of slowing down. I watched the magical pen, and my dad watched me.

  The rest of the room seemed normal at first glance—shiny silver chairs, black lacquer table, and an enormous bay window with an expansive view. I wore jeans and a t-shirt. Nothing magical there. My dad’s pen wasn’t really magical either. Ballpoint pens can spin forever. They just have to be in the right place—on board a spaceship, which is where we were, and where I was not supposed to be, sitting in a magnetized chair directly across from my dad, the ship’s commander.

  He ran his hand across his short-cropped hair. “Now that everything has settled down, I need your account of what happened. Why, and how, did you sneak on board my ship? And when did you first learn about The Conspiracy Game?” My dad didn’t look mad, just stern, and stern was scary coming from the Space Alliance’s most famous astronaut. I kept quiet and stared out the bay window at the bright Moon with the Earth still a faint blue speck in the distance. He already knew most of the story, and I wasn’t ready to talk about The Conspiracy Game.

  After a moment of silence, my dad caught the spinning pen and pushed it toward me across the long table. “Maybe writing this down will be easier. I know that you don’t want to say some things out loud, but you must understand. I can write an official report, but your account could prove useful in the days to come.”

  “Does ‘my account’ just mean ‘the truth’?”

  “Yes, the whole truth. I need everything you know about The Conspiracy Game, Operation Close Encounter, and especially the Harper Device.”

  Gulp. I caught the pen and looked at the back of my hand. The white scars there looked like lightning branching out through a cloud. The scars would fade, but my hands would never be the same. Neither would I.

  “Son, I know this won’t be easy, but you’ve never liked to do things the easy way. You like the hard way, just like I do. Remember, we both suffered defeats on this mission, but we had our victories, too.”

  He was right. We had our wins and losses on this mission, and now it was time to add up the score. I owed him a full account—The Adversity is his ship, and I came into space to help him.

  He added, “Just pretend like you’re writing to a friend, okay?”

  I nodded and clicked his pen a few times. That was it. I could write my account as a story for someone who wants to
see the universe or feel weightlessness for the first time. Maybe someone who has deeper reasons to explore space and will take some risks to get there. A “misguided youth,” as someone once called me. If you’re reading this, I guess that’s you.

  Sorry, I need to back up a few steps. I haven’t even introduced myself. I’m Misguided Youth Number One, but I prefer my name—Tully Harper. I’m going into 9th grade next year, and I begin this account on board the spaceship Adversity.

  Was it my idea to sneak into space? Mostly. Did I need assistance? Definitely. My best friends Sunjay and Tabitha helped out a lot, as well as an orangutan named Scrubbles, but let’s take one thing at a time.

  If you’re up for an adventure or might want to explore space someday yourself, feel free to turn the page. Heck, I’ll even dare you. Just be prepared for disasters, miracles, criminal mischief, sports, and, of course, the unexpected. My account certainly starts in an unexpected place. In fact, it starts in two places at once. Then there’s that third place, Mars, which makes a sudden entrance.

  PART ONE: “GO, AND DO NOT DELAY.”

  MAY 20, 2069.

  TWO MONTHS BEFORE LIFTOFF.

  IN TWO PLACES AT ONCE

  “Tully, what time is it in Alaska?” Dr. Vindler asked when I materialized in his Science classroom one Monday morning.

  “About 5am, sir,” I said, rubbing my gloved hands together and checking the time. Whoops, 5:02am. Oh, no.

  “It’s 8:02 here in Houston. You’re late, but I must say, those two extra minutes of beauty sleep are working wonders for you! Class, don’t you agree?” Dr. Vindler sat on his desk and hiked up his khaki pants to reveal his favorite socks, which read “Science Rocks My Socks.” He was winding up for one of his classic “late to class” speeches. They were like birthday cards—he personalized each one. My classmates were getting out their pens and journals to take notes during his lecture, a few of them sneaking into their seats while I had his attention. He continued. “All of you have two more weeks to prepare for my final exam, which 18.6% of last year’s class failed. Now that is something to lose sleep over! So, Mr. Harper, let me give you this amazingly insightful suggestion. You may sleep until noon this summer, but materialize into this classroom no later than 4:59am your time.”

  “Yes, sir,” I said. Only Dr. Vindler could get excited about failed tests and sleep loss.

  “And finish your review packet. Did you know that many students do homework even when they’re away from home? You can, too. Janice Chan did Review Worksheet 8.9 on a hyper flight back from Paris last night. Didn’t you, Janice? Trés bien! Can you imagine anything more exciting than memorizing the periodic table of elements while traveling at twice the speed of sound? Can you?”

  “Um, maybe finding a new element?” I said.

  “Yes, you could name it after me. Vindlerium! But if you don’t finish these last few assignments while you’re in Alaska, you can name it Summerschoolium!”

  This was life when my dad was on a mission. He always shipped me off to my Aunt Selma’s cabin in the Alaskan wilderness, but I still “attended” my 8th grade classes at Space City Junior High in Houston. It was a new school program called Holoclassing that allowed students to attend classes from virtually anywhere. “Traveling astronaut dad” is a pretty good reason for Holoclassing, so they issued me the very first pair of hologlasses in the program. When I put on the glasses and a pair of earbuds, my aunt’s cabin seemed to disappear. After a few seconds of dark silence, Dr. Vindler’s classroom appeared in front of my eyes, and my classmates saw a hologram of me in my assigned seat. They called me “HoloTully” and said the hologram looked amazingly real. My body was definitely in my aunt’s rustic cabin though. The rest of the class wore t-shirts and shorts, but I was shivering, wearing an “I Love Alaska” sweater, my hands around a cup of coffee to stay warm.

  Dr. Vindler began to describe his grueling, two-hour final exam. He was a tough tester, but Science was my favorite class because of him. He was about fifty-five, had spiky “mad scientist” hair, and more energy than any teacher or student at Space City. His class was high energy, too. He made Science feel like a game, and his experiments often involved lasers and minor explosions. Discipline wasn’t his specialty, but he was just the right combination of scary and funny to make me listen.

  After finishing his speech, he pulled a stack of papers from his ancient briefcase. “Most of you probably realize that we only have two weeks of school left. Who would like to improve their final grade?” Every hand went up. “On the desk behind me is a periodic table with 120 blank spaces. Your task—if you choose to accept it—is to fill in the names of the elements. You’ll have five minutes. Break into teams of three and fill in the periodic table from memory. Winners receive two bonus points on the final exam. Well, what are you waiting for? Go!”

  That could take me up an entire letter grade! I thought. A lot of people felt the same. Chaos ensued as students broke into teams of three. Chairs and desks went flying.

  My hologram image sat still. There was no reason to command him to move yet. He could never have grabbed the paper or written down a single answer, but that was okay. I already had a team. I sat between Sunjay and Tabitha, my two best friends, and we knew how to work together.

  Sunjay Chakravorty was my next-door neighbor. He was my best friend since our first day of kindergarten, where he introduced himself to me and decided we should be friends. When we went to recess and played soccer, he would only pass the ball to me, even if I weren’t on the field. We were inseparable from then on. He was constantly asking questions and tossing his shaggy, black hair out of his eyes.

  Tabitha Tirelli moved down the street from us a few years ago. For some reason she hung out with us all last summer, even though she loved dance and drama while Sunjay and I liked sports, martial arts, and video games. She had zero interest in the first two activities, but we got her hooked on video games, especially Cave—In!. She hit a growth spurt last year—one that I completely missed—so she was about a head taller than me. She’s quirky, gutsy, and insightful—I could go on with adjectives, but you’ll see.

  Back to the Vindler’s pop quiz. Our team flew into action. Sunjay threw back his hair, and then his chair, hurdled a desk, grabbed the blank periodic table, and returned before most people had formed their teams. Tabitha was waiting with her pen, and when Sunjay threw down the paper on her desk, she started neatly filling in the elements with no help from us. That didn’t stop Sunjay from shouting every element he knew. “Hydrogen, oxygen, helium, boron...” I shouted a few fake elements to throw off our competition. “Hexablom, Frankfurtium, oooh, don’t forget Baconium. Did you write down Baconium, Janice Chan?” Janice frowned. She never approved of anything that I did.

  Tabitha slowed down when she reached the noble gases, so Sunjay took over and madly scribbled in the last few symbols. Finally, he threw her pen across the room, hopped a fallen desk, and slammed down the paper on Dr. Vindler’s desk.

  “Done!” he yelled. Work continued around us. Dr. Vindler pushed his oversized glasses up his nose and glanced at our work. Something was wrong.

  “Names?” he said. Are you kidding? We forgot to put our names on the paper? Tabitha saw it coming though. She had already retrieved her pen and tossed it to Sunjay from across the room. He scribbled our names on paper and guaranteed our victory.

  “Yes!” I yelled, thinking about those two extra points. “Trés bien!” Janice rolled her eyes. I floated toward the ceiling and started dancing on the light fixture. Being a hologram has its advantages sometimes.

  But before Dr. Vindler could announce our victory, something happened that changed my life forever.

  A three-toned chime sounded in the classroom. We had only heard the sound once before during the year, when the Presidential election results were announced. As the lights dimmed I floated back to my seat, wondering what the announcement might be this time. A 3-D image sprung to life in the middle of the room—a news studio with the
words “BREAKING NEWS FROM MARS” flashing behind the female newscaster.

  “There has been an incident on the Red Planet this morning,” she explained. “An asteroid impacted Mars a few hours ago. The crater is near where Commander Mike Harper and his crew are continuing their search for water.”

  An asteroid? That was big news, but at the mention of my dad’s name, every head in the room swiveled toward me. My face flushed, even though it was freezing in my aunt’s cabin.

  “Whoa, an asteroid hit Tully’s dad!” someone shouted.

  “That’s incorrect,” Dr. Vindler said. “Now keep quiet.”

  The newscaster continued. “We expect more information and live coverage from the Space Alliance soon, but we do have video. A high-Earth orbit telescope captured the moment of impact.”

  The newsroom disappeared and the planet Mars arose in its place, casting an eerie, red light upon the entire room. Then a small speck of white appeared on its horizon, burned through the atmosphere, and landed silently on the surface. A dust cloud rose. Everything looked so harmless from a million miles away.

  “Broadcast freeze!” yelled Dr. Vindler. His voice made me jump. He hopped off his desk and approached the now-frozen image. With his finger he drew two circles. “This is the impact crater, students. This second circle is clearly The Adversity. What a name for a spacecraft, don’t you think? But have no fear. It’s roughly thirty miles away. Quite safe.” He pushed his oversized glasses farther up his nose and squinted. Then he drew a third circle right next to the crater. “No, wait. This—a white spot with four black dots—what are those? They look like wheels. Something right next to the impact. That is a most likely a Space Alliance rover. That could be trouble. Broadcast unfreeze.”

  The video ran again, and we saw a dust cloud cover the third circle. My heart thumped against my shirt, and I felt a tingling sensation in my hands. Vindler scratched his chin and glanced at me.

  “Students, let’s take a moment for the explorers on this mission. Focus your good thoughts and prayers on those people and their commander, Mike Harper, and on our friend Tully, too.”