Drafted Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  To Read the Next Book Of This Series...

  THANK YOU!

  Drafted

  Homeworld Trilogy Book One

  By Holly Hook

  Copyright 2017 By Holly Hook

  Chapter One

  "I am sick of Mars."

  Lin clapped her hands together as my class stepped into the Great Frontiers Solar System Museum. She skipped into the dome and reached the giant model of the Solar System, stopping right under Jupiter as it floated over her head. For someone who was tired of the classes about the Red Planet, she was excited to be here.

  I faced Winnie and grinned. She picked at her green uniform and shook her head. "Lin needs to stop taking energy tablets," she whispered.

  "I'm going to have to cut her off," I said. "They're not natural."

  Lin ducked as the holographic Saturn floated over her head. She jumped and swung at it. "Stop being such an Earther, Tess. Natural this. Nature that."

  "At least swing at the right planet," I told her. "There's Mars." If we weren't friends, we would fight.

  Winnie wasn't listening to us. "I don't like this field trip. They're just getting us ready for the draft."

  I didn't like it, either. The Great Council was sending more and more people to the Mars colonies lately. They said it was their way of saving humanity from the crushing pollution problem. I thought that they could do that by shutting down the factories and the mines, and that wasn't just because I was an Earther. Everyone felt that way.

  I was no psychologist, but I had the feeling that was why Lin took so many energy tabs and Winnie was depressed. No one ever heard back from the Red Planet.

  "I don't like it, either," I told Winnie, keeping my strong face up. "But it's just a field trip. We'll get through it. I bet it's just part of the Mars Unit."

  Lin stepped away from the center of the hologram, footsteps echoing in the enormous dome. A notice appeared in my contacts, filling the center of my vision with bright blue text.

  WOKING HIGH SCHOOL GROUP A, PLEASE FILE TO THE MARS ENTRANCE. YOUR TOUR BEGINS IN 2 MINUTES.

  Everyone silenced. It seemed like a cold way to start the tour. Usually, a guide robot greeted museum-goers. Perhaps it had broken down.

  "Great," Winnie said. She ran a hand through her messy, curly hair.

  Winnie's tension flowed into me, but I didn't dare show it. I had to do something. "We're sneaking out of this tour," I said. "Want to look at the Terminus exhibit? There's one for each planet. As long as we're in the museum, the computer shouldn't give us detention, right?"

  Winnie frowned. "I don't want to get in trouble."

  "Come on, Winnie. If we get detention, it'll be together. There are worse things out there."

  I tugged on Lin's sleeve. I told her the plan, and she nodded in silence. Checking out another museum would be better than having propaganda about the virtues of Mars shoved down our throats.

  "What are you doing?" Blake asked, drawing closer to us.

  He made me a little dizzy. "Sneaking out when the tour starts," I said. I blushed again. "Do you want to join in?"

  I eyed the rest of the students in our class. Paj was too busy looking at something on his contact display, and everyone else was gathered into their groups, murmuring. I envied the people who could go through their daily lives, not thinking about how they could get disrupted at any moment.

  At last, the reflective door to the Mars Museum slid open and an actual human being stepped out, a man dressed in a blue jumpsuit with a name tag that read HENRY OGILVY. He wore zero emotion and also had the plainest buzz cut I'd ever seen. He wore a ridiculously high collar around his neck that must be choking. He let the door close behind him, but not before I caught a glimpse of the museum. Both walls were big, panoramic photographs of the Martian landscape, complete with images of the first rovers.

  "Greetings," the man said in a flat monotone. "I am Henry, and I will be your guide for the Mars Museum. If you would step in after me, I will begin your tour."

  People snickered. The guy sounded just like the Great Council. I wondered if he was an android since museums used them sometimes, but real veins forked under the skin of his hand, which was on the door handle. He was human. Besides, androids were usually programmed to sound cool.

  Henry sounded the way all of the members of the Great Council did when they spoke. It was unnerving.

  He held the door open and looked at each of us in turn. He might be boring, but he was observant. My hopes of sneaking over to the Terminus Museum dwindled. Maybe we still could once Henry got talking. It wasn't like the door would lock behind us.

  Lin walked into the museum behind the rest of the class. The four of us stayed behind, keeping close. I hoped that Winnie got up the bravery to sneak out with us. Our assignment was only to come to the museum. The computer hadn't specified that we had to follow the guided tour. Everyone just assumed that was what we were supposed to do.

  So we filed inside. The air got colder as if the museum wanted to simulate what it was like to stand on a dead planet. The light above was a pinkish hue, and for a moment, I felt like I had changed worlds, and that suffocation was next. A bit of panic raced through me until I took a breath. The museum made this look real. Even the pink sky appeared genuine, and the landscape around us stretched to infinity, a series of reddish rocks, hills, and craters.

  "Welcome," Henry said. "Follow me through the center walkway. We have done our best to simulate what it would be like to stand on Mars. Safely, of course."

  "At least we didn't get Venus," Blake whispered.

  A few people laughed, but most of the class was walking ahead of us. Winnie shifted like she was unsure. I hung back with Lin and Blake as Henry stopped at a scale model of the Curiosity Rover. We kept a bit of distance between the rest of the class and us, just enough to not look suspicious. Henry spoke in his monotone voice about the rover missions as we stopped at model after model. He was incredibly dull.

  Then we moved on to the pop culture exhibits, to where there was an original copy of The War of the Worlds in a glass case. An ancient radio played the audio program at a low volume. An actual scale model of a Martian tripod stood behind it, shining in the pink light. It looked like it was about to blast us with a heat ray. Henry spoke about the stories people used to make about Mars, focusing on the ones about evil aliens. He had to turn his back eventually.

  "And now," Henry announced, "we reach the most interesting part of the tour: the discovery of past life on Mars."

  Paj yawned. Henry backed around what I realized was a curve, keeping us in his sights, and a new exhibit came into view. This place was disorienting. It was no wonder you needed a guide here. The walls didn't look like walls. I couldn't tell where the path was, so we were helpless to follow Henry.

  It seemed like the guy was doing his best to make sure no one ducked out.

  The farther we got into the museum, the creepier this got.

  Once around the curve, we stood by an exhibit of fossilized microbe colonies that were supposed to be over four billion years old. They looked like strange lumps sticking out of the landscape where water had once flowed. There were also a few real meteorites in glass cases that scientists had studied. The air cooled
. I had a passing thought that the universe was trying to warn us back.

  I shivered.

  "The first evidence that there was once life on Mars came way back in 1996 in a meteorite," Henry said, patting a glass case with a piece of rock inside. "It was this one, in fact. More meteorites were studied, and more evidence began to pile up, yet for the next several decades, most scientists remained in denial."

  Henry turned his back to us to face the fossil model.

  Lin poked my arm. "Now," she hissed, smiling and facing the way we'd come.

  "I'm not sure about this," Winnie whispered.

  I wanted to sneak out but I also didn't want to leave my friend. "But you hate this Mars stuff even more than I do," I whispered. "Come on." I didn't want to say that this was creepy, because that would make Winnie feel worse. I forced a smile. "It'll be fun."

  "One brilliant scientist in the early twenty-first century studied photos of the Martian landscape and determined that she was looking at fossils of microbe colonies. Again, this got dismissed."

  The museum cooled even more. Henry was not speaking right at all. He looked like a human being, but he didn't speak like one. Something about him gave me the creeps.

  Something just didn't feel right here.

  Henry kept his back turned, talking about how the fossils hadn't been brought up again for many years.

  Lin and Blake took my arms. We were going, then. I crept back as quietly as I could. The rest of the class faced the exhibit. At least some people were interested, even though Paj was still obsessed with his contact display.

  Winnie stood there. I waved to her to come on already, but she didn't move. She was chickening out.

  I paused for a split second, not sure what to do, but then Lin pulled on my arm, and I followed.

  It was a bit confusing to go back through the Mars Museum since everything looked like an endless desert, but at last, we got around the curve and ran between the pop culture exhibits. Henry didn't yell at us. I wasn't sure if the guy was capable of it. I imagined he'd tell us in a flat monotone to come back or else. The thought was hilarious.

  At last, we found the door embedded in the wall. Lin pushed it open, and we burst out into the Solar System Room.

  The three of us burst out laughing. "I don't think Henry is going to notice us gone," Blake said. "I think only half of his brain is working."

  It was so much warmer out here. Relief coursed over my skin.

  "Where's Winnie?" Lin asked.

  "She wimped out," I said. "Oh, well. We'll see her once the tour's over. They'll have to come back out here, and the monorail isn't supposed to pick us up for another hour. Come on." I searched for the Terminus Museum, mostly to cast aside my guilt about leaving Winnie behind. We always stuck together, and she'd be angry with me after the tour. But this was just a field trip.

  The Solar System Room was empty, so no one stopped us as we made our way into the Terminus Museum. It was barren in here, and since the planet Terminus was so far from the Sun--and from Henry--only stars made up the background. The Sun remained a single bright one right over our heads. The silence was a relief.

  I thought of Winnie again and walked through the museum with Lin and Blake.

  "This is boring," Blake said, leaning against the screen that played the NASA announcement of Terminus's discovery in 2020.

  "No, it's not," I said. "Nature is exciting." I prepared to get teased about my Earther status again, but Blake didn't poke fun. It was a good sign. "Let's walk through the rest of this exhibit and take our time."

  There was no chance for anyone to respond.

  My contacts flashed with a new announcement, this time in red, angry letters that never meant anything good. At first, I thought it was a new detention voucher, but this time it was so, so much worse.

  MESSAGE: URGENT

  RECIPIENT: TESS SCOPELLI

  EFFECTIVE IMMEDIATELY, YOU ARE TO RELOCATE TO MARS. YOU WILL DEPART AT THE END OF YOUR TOUR.

  Chapter Two

  I froze in terror, not comprehending for the first few seconds. The red letters faded in and out, begging for my attention.

  They had just drafted me.

  I thought of the dead, alien planet. Of tiny glass domes. Of looking at the desolate wasteland for the rest of my life, never to see Earth again. That was if I even survived. Maybe people died on Mars all the time, and the government needed new bodies. Every horrible theory about the place swirled through my head.

  They were going to send me there, probably without my parents.

  The message faded in my vision, and I realized I had backed against the wall of stars. I waited for Blake and Lin to ask if I was okay, but both were absorbed in their contact displays.

  "Um...what?" Blake asked into the air. "Um...Lin and Tess?"

  "I got one too," Lin said, all the happiness gone. Her energy tabs weren't going to help now.

  We stared at each other. It was apparent without saying anything.

  They had chosen all of us.

  The field trip was a trap. The government had gotten the school to send us here, and the rest of the tour group must be headed for a ship right now. Now that I thought about it, the Solar System Museum was very close to Space Port Nine.

  Next door, in fact.

  I peeled myself from the wall. We faced each other.

  My friend had been worried about--

  "Winnie!" I screamed, bolting for the door.

  "Oh, crap," Blake shouted, running after me.

  We ran under the stars to the door. I pushed it open. I had left Winnie. Now she was scared and alone. They must have drafted my entire class. It was Winnie's worst nightmare, and I had abandoned her to it.

  I had to keep her, and myself, on Earth.

  I wouldn't get kicked out of my home again. That was NOT happening.

  We burst out of the Terminus Exhibit. No one was in the main Solar System Room now. No Task Force agents waited for us. Our stunt was the only reason we weren't already getting dragged away. I bolted to the entry of the Mars Exhibit and pushed the door open. I stood there, looking in. It was even colder in here now, as if they were trying to suck the life out of us. It was all silence. Even Henry's drone had vanished.

  "Tess!" Blake said. "Don't go running in there. I think this has something to do with that Henry guy."

  "We're not leaving Winnie," I said, keeping my voice down. There was no one in front of us on the path. The tour had ended on a surprise note.

  I should have stayed with her.

  I walked quickly, afraid that I'd run into the Task Force. There was no one here. We passed the model tripod and the pop culture section. We hurried through the fossil area and the meteorites. The three of us rounded another curve--it was so hard to tell if you were actually on the path in here--and came at last to a closed set of double doors.

  I stopped. No one waited to greet us. The double doors were steel and final. I had a feeling that they led right to the spaceport.

  We had left right before the rest of the group went through.

  "That's where they are," I said. I walked up to the doors.

  "Tess," Blake hissed. "You can't go in there. That's where the Task Force has to be."

  I wouldn't abandon my friend. What kind of Earther would I be? I walked up to the double doors and pulled on one. To my surprise, it opened.

  "Don't go in there," Lin said. "That's a trap if I ever saw one."

  Inside was an empty movie theater. Folded chairs stood in rows of ten. There must be forty seats, waiting for viewers. One of them was still down as if a body had occupied it recently. Every seat faced a Holo Projector, but no movie was playing on the platform. After whatever our tour group had watched, the summons had come.

  There was a second set of double doors across the room.

  "They're further in," I said, heart racing. Getting to Winnie wouldn't be easy. I had the sense that once I passed through these doors, they would shut. "Someone needs to stay and make sure these don't lock
behind me. I don't trust this."

  "I will," Lin said. She might have explosive energy, but she didn't have my guts.

  "I'm coming with you," Blake said.

  "You don't have to," I said. "Let me."

  "Now's not the time to be brave," Blake said.

  I ran across the empty theater. "Yes, it is."

  The second set of double doors opened as well. I pulled open a door and peered into a corridor that stretched for what looked like half a kilometer. A mop droid stood against the wall, turned off, and the tile shined underneath the lights. The hallway was empty. I could see all the way down to yet a third set of double doors.

  This corridor left the museum. It was a pipeline right to Space Port Nine. I imagined my classmates getting escorted this way by the Task Force, all while the tour guide tried to calm them with no emotion.

  Henry did speak like the Great Council.

  "That's too far," Blake said.

  "I know it is," I said, stepping into the corridor.

  "They're going to know that you're here!" He followed me.

  I didn't have an answer for that. I broke into a full run, leaving Lin behind. Blake and I bolted closer to the first set of double doors. It wasn't half a kilometer, but it felt like it. By the time I reached them, I had gulped down air like crazy. I jogged a lot, but this was testing me to the max.

  The doors came open for me, too, but something beeped as I pulled. They'd have the Space Port monitored. Another hallway, this one carpeted, spread out in front of me. Two sets of metal double doors waited on either side. I could see the main chamber of Space Port Nine from here, complete with glowing holographic departure times in the center. The room stood empty. People didn't hang out here. The two double doors I could see from here were labeled 1:30 and 2:40.

  I checked my contact display.

  1:20.

  Winnie must be in the 1:30 one.

  "We have ten minutes," Blake said. It was clear that he was sharing my thoughts.

  No one stood in the hallway. No one who entered Space Port Nine came back out except for the Task Force, and they didn't tell. I had a feeling that the doors here would all lock. They didn't want the condemned to escape.