The Gravity Keeper Read online

  SIMON BLOOM,

  THE GRAVITY KEEPER

  SIMON BLOOM,

  THE GRAVITY KEEPER

  MICHAEL REISMAN

  DUTTON CHILDREN’S BOOKS

  A division of Penguin Young Readers Group

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4P 2Y3 (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) • Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England • Penguin Ireland, 25 St Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd) • Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd) • Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd, 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi-110 017, India • Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, North Shore 0632, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd) • Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty) Ltd, 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa • Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  This book is published in partnership with Walden Media, LLC. Walden Media and the Walden Media skipping stone logo are trademarks and registered trademarks of Walden Media, LLC, 294 Washington Street, Boston, MA 02108.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2008 by Michael Reisman

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages in connection with a review written for inclusion in a magazine, newspaper, or broadcast.

  The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  CIP Data is available.

  Published in the United States by Dutton Children’s Books,

  a division of Penguin Young Readers Group

  345 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014

  www.penguin.com/youngreaders

  ISBN: 978-1-1012-0070-4

  This book is dedicated to my parents, without whom I wouldn’t be here.

  Acknowledgments

  First, I want to applaud the late Douglas Adams, whose The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy really is my favorite book. I need to thank my mom, dad, grandma Elsie, sister Michele, and the rest of my family for moral, emotional, financial, and genetic support; Damon Ross for introductions and advice; my agent Nancy Gallt for her prowess and patience with me; Debbie Kovacs and Eloise Flood for my first book sale; supercool Margaret Wright for her aid in shaping my manuscript; and Mark McVeigh for shepherding the book to publication.

  I am truly grateful for friends’ reading and feedback: Yaniv; Jo and Angela; Ira; Laura, Jonathon, and Danielle; Julia; Larry; Stacy; Daniel; and more. Eternal thanks for wisdom, listening, and computer help, especially from Amir, Russ, Kenny, and Alison. Special gratitude goes to physics consultant Leigh, and to Lucia and the Insomnia Café gang for providing a great writing environment. I also want to acknowledge some teachers who showed me that school isn’t all drudgery and number two pencils, most notably Mrs. Fenster and Ms. Brangan for encouraging and guiding my writing; and Mr. Friedman, Mr. Giglio, and Mr. Oliver for showing me that science can be fun. (Um, and if any of my former teachers think they recognize themselves…I hope they smile about it.)

  Last but definitely not least, I want to thank everyone for reading this or, in fact any book (but especially this one)!

  SIMON BLOOM,

  THE GRAVITY KEEPER

  CONTENTS

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  WELCOME TO MY CHRONICLE

  CHAPTER 1

  SIMON BLOOM FEELS THE BREEZE

  CHAPTER 2

  A CHANGE IN THE WEATHER

  TIME-OUT

  CHAPTER 3

  THE POWERS THAT BE

  CHAPTER 4

  A MATTER OF PRINCIPAL

  CHAPTER 5

  SIMON FOLLOWS THE BREEZE, OWEN MEETS THE TREES

  CHAPTER 6

  THE BROKEN CHAIN

  CHAPTER 7

  THAT FRESH VACUUM CLEANER SCENT

  THE UNIVERSE WASN’T THE ONLY THING TREMBLING

  CHAPTER 8

  A BOY AND HIS BOOK

  CHAPTER 9

  WHAT NEWTON SAID (AND SIMON’S DIRTY CEILING)

  CHAPTER 10

  LICENSE TO FLY

  THIS KEEPER IS A KEEPER

  CHAPTER 11

  FOLLOWING THE TRAIL

  CHAPTER 12

  THE DIRT CAPADES

  CHAPTER 13

  GRAVITY IS FOR SUCKERS

  THIS CHRONICLE KEEPS GETTING BETTER

  CHAPTER 14

  SCHOOL’S OUT FOR PHYSICS

  WHAT CAN A NARRATOR DO?

  CHAPTER 15

  THE DARK SIDE OF THE WOODS

  CHAPTER 16

  THE HOOD COMES OFF (AND SPARKS FLY)

  CHAPTER 17

  WEAPONS OF WAR

  CHAPTER 18

  THE SPY REVEALED

  CHAPTER 19

  FROM THE MOUTHS OF BIRDS

  CHAPTER 20

  BETTER LIVING THROUGH IMPRINTING

  CHAPTER 21

  OUT OF THE FIRE AND INTO THE FIGHT

  CHAPTER 22

  THE TATTOOED LADY

  CHAPTER 23

  GOING OUT WITH A BANG

  CHAPTER 24

  THE ORDER GETS DISORDERLY

  CHAPTER 25

  PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT

  CHAPTER 26

  A TIME AND A SPACE FOR EVERYTHING

  CHAPTER 27

  CHOSEN SIDES

  CHAPTER 28

  A SWEET YET BITTER VICTORY

  I WAS WORRIED THIS WOULD HAPPEN

  CHAPTER 29

  THINGS GET REALLY HAIRY

  CHAPTER 30

  THIS ISN’T SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN!

  CHAPTER 31

  GREYGOR GERYSON HAS HIS DAY

  CHAPTER 32

  HAIL AND FAREWELL

  CHAPTER 33

  RUMBLE IN THE JUNGLE GYM

  CHAPTER 34

  A SHOCK TO THE SYSTEM

  CHAPTER 35

  LIKE FATHER, LIKE SON

  CHAPTER 36

  ONCE MORE INTO THE WOODS, OLD FRIENDS

  CHAPTER 37

  HER FINAL OFFER

  CHAPTER 38

  IT’S ALL FUN AND GAMES UNTIL SOMEONE GETS HIT BY LIGHTNING

  CHAPTER 39

  THE LAST STAND

  CHAPTER 40

  TOO MANY KEEPERS

  CHAPTER 41

  THE FATE OF OUR HEROES

  FORTUNATELY, I LOVE ANCHOVIES AND BLACK OLIVES

  WELCOME TO MY CHRONICLE

  Look around you. What do you see? If you’re inside, you might see walls, carpeting, furniture. If you’re outside, you might see grass, buildings, sky. But the world is a lot more complicated than it seems.

  What do I mean? Here’s an example: people. Most are just, well, people, but certain others are special. I’m one of those others. That person next to you could be, too, and you’d never know.

  What makes us so special? The Books.

  I’m not talking about the books you read for fun or for school or, in fact, anything you could buy in a store or find in a library.
No, the books I mean are so important, they deserve a capital letter. They are called Books.

  You see, everything around you—everything in the entire universe—has rules. Laws. And the Books contain the laws. Explain them. Control them. In ways that even I don’t fully understand, the Books make sure the universe doesn’t fall apart.

  Those of us who know about the Books call ourselves the Union. We are the ones who, through the Books, keep the universe running smoothly (aside from occasional glitches like psychic visions or the way pens sometimes vanish when you’re not looking).

  Everyone else who’s not in the Union is an Outsider—they don’t know about the Books or understand how the universe works. Even Outsider scientists making discoveries, inventing things, and trying to explain why the sky is blue, how birds fly, or why chocolate tastes so good know only a small part of the truth.

  The Union has always been somewhere behind the scenes, secretly watching over the Outsiders throughout history as they progress and evolve. Many pose as instructors—often professors or teachers—to better keep an eye on the Outsiders.

  Nobody, not even those of us in the Union, knows where the Books come from or what they really are. Several of us, and I’m one of them, are convinced that the Books are living, thinking beings that actually had a hand, so to speak, in creating the universe. We believe the Books are to be respected, cared for, and even propped up in front of the television when there’s a good show on.

  Everyone in the Union agrees that the Books must be kept secret: with all the power they contain, the Books have the potential to be the most dangerous things in existence.

  Why am I telling you all this? Because of my job—I’m a Narrator. I see what others see, hear what they hear, feel what they feel, and put it all in a Chronicle. But like all Narrators, I’m not allowed to interfere. This particular Chronicle is the story of how a magnificent and potentially devastating Book came into the hands of an eleven-year-old boy named Simon Bloom and how he changed the universe forever.

  CHAPTER 1

  SIMON BLOOM FEELS THE BREEZE

  Simon Bloom lived in the northeastern part of the United States, in the northeastern part of New Jersey, in the northeastern part of Bergen County, in the northeastern part of Lawnville. His bedroom faced south.

  His two-level house was on Jerome Street, a small road that ended a few houses down, turned a corner, and became the dead end Van Silas Way. Simon also lived a few blocks from Martin Van Buren Elementary, an ordinary school for students in kindergarten through sixth grade.

  Simon looked ordinary, too. He had light brown hair, a light sprinkling of freckles on his average-size nose (which had a slight but unspectacular bump in the middle), and wide blue eyes. He was average height for his age but, much to his dismay, was one of the youngest in the sixth grade: he wouldn’t be winning any tallness awards.

  On what seemed to be a perfectly normal Sunday, Simon was flying. He soared through the air over Lawnville and did a loop-the-loop. He laughed as he felt the wind wash over him—laughing because, let’s be honest, anyone who can fly and do a loop-the-loop without being strapped into a fancy jet plane has a reason to be in a good mood.

  Simon then hovered in midair and concentrated. His body vibrated and changed color, turning from pinkish peach to a yellowish red, then to blue and finally, searing white. Then he exploded in a brilliant burst of blinding light. Tiny, glowing Simon particles scattered across the sky like a human firecracker. Unlike most fireworks, these embers regrouped and turned back into their normal Simon shape.

  Next, Simon gazed at the daytime outline of the moon and concentrated again. He disappeared, instantly transporting himself from Lawnville and reappearing on the moon’s barren, airless surface. There he gleefully jumped about and ran around, leaving footprints all across the dusty moonscape. After a moment, he looked around and sighed at how empty it was. This wasn’t much fun without anyone joining in.

  It was then that Simon Bloom felt a tug inside. He glanced at the Earth and blinked, transporting himself back to his bedroom. Where he was sitting at his desk chair, his eyes closed, imagining all this.

  Yes, it’s true: Simon only did those amazing things in his head. His was a very energetic mind. He was probably as active mentally as most professional athletes are physically, but Simon was a lot less likely to have his picture on a cereal box.

  Actually, he hadn’t left the house all morning, even though it was a beautiful day outside. His parents weren’t home to urge him to go outside and enjoy the weather; both had gone into their offices to catch up on some work. Even when they were home, they were usually reviewing charts or notes.

  His mother, Sylvia Bloom, was a high-powered advertising executive. She wore tailored business suits and tended to ask questions without waiting for the answer. His father, Steven Bloom, was an astrophysicist; he was completely obsessed with studying the universe. Sylvia often joked that Steven wouldn’t notice a bomb going off near him, but that wasn’t true: he’d probably study the nature of the explosion.

  Simon didn’t mind having workaholic parents. He kept to himself at home, at school, and everywhere in between. He was used to being ignored: his grades were good enough for his teachers to leave him alone, and he usually escaped notice from the bullies, too.

  Sitting in his desk chair, Simon opened his eyes and wondered where that weird tugging feeling had come from. He glanced around his room, looking over shelves and shelves of books, comics, and old toys: cars, spaceships, dinosaurs, superheroes, you name it. There were movie posters (mostly science fiction and fantasy), pictures of astronauts doing a spacewalk outside their space shuttle and bouncing on the moon, and a drawing by his all-time favorite artist, M. C. Escher.

  Escher drew the impossible—the rules of reality bending in crazy ways. The one on Simon’s wall was called Relativity. It was the inside of a house with people walking up different stairways set at every angle. Some people were completely upside down in relation to others, but each person walked as if his was the normal stairway.

  Simon looked at the book he’d been reading earlier: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams. It was his favorite book, about a perfectly ordinary British man named Arthur Dent who goes with a group of aliens on an incredible adventure throughout the galaxy. Simon loved it because he wished he was Arthur.

  But that book wasn’t the source of the tugging, nor was the Escher picture. It was something outside his window. Simon opened it, and that’s when he felt a breeze. No, the Breeze. Like the Books, it was important enough for the big B.

  You see, this was not a normal puff of wind. It was soothing and exciting as it washed over Simon. It made him tingle with thoughts and possibilities. It gave him the tiniest glimpse of a special, hidden part of the world. For a moment, he felt like he really was flying, really was a dazzling firework, really was teleporting to the moon…and more. Like he could do anything and anything could happen.

  The Breeze faded away and Simon turned back to his room. But he didn’t—he couldn’t—forget that feeling.

  CHAPTER 2

  A CHANGE IN THE WEATHER

  It was Sunday. Some religions view Sunday as a holy day. Many people consider Sunday a day of rest on which nobody should do anything but relax, watch sports, ride bicycles, bake muffins, or hurl wires with hooks at swimming fish.

  For most Union members, Sunday was a time for important meetings that the Outsiders knew nothing about. For those in my Society, it was a time to watch these meetings closely. And for the Union members that I watched, Sundays required raincoats.

  Although most of Lawnville, New Jersey, was experiencing a beautiful May day, around the corner from Simon Bloom’s house it was another matter entirely. It was raining there on quiet, dead-end Van Silas Way. Raining hard. The expression “cats and dogs” didn’t cover it; “tigers and wolves” was more accurate. The downpour was so fierce that the residents of Van Silas Way huddled in their nice, dry houses, unwilling to l
eave or even look out their windows.

  In the middle of the soaking-wet road, a glowing blue dot appeared. The dot stretched into a ten-foot-long line, which grew upward, silently forming a ten-foot-high wall. Though ten feet high and ten feet wide, the wall was paper thin; if viewed from the side, it would be nearly invisible. (Of course, nobody could see much with that amount of rain anyway, but I thought I’d mention it.)

  The wall was a type of door, known as a Gateway, which many in the Union use for traveling distances in seconds without having to deal with speeding tickets, shuttle launches, or airplane food.

  One by one, a group of people stepped out of the glowing blue Gateway and into the soaked street. Their hooded raincoats shielded them from the rain, but they were still cold and damp as they trudged along the water-drenched street. One chewed delicious strawberry gum, but the rain washed it away when he tried blowing a bubble.

  (I felt sorry for them…I was warm and dry and happily chewed my own gum. It was grape.)

  As they reached the end of the street and stepped into Dunkerhook Woods, they sighed in relief. This was the sacred meeting place of their Order, and it was perfectly dry. Outside weather was not allowed in Dunkerhook Woods.