The Demon Conspiracy (16 page)

“There’s somebody else coming!” a voice
called.

Travis held his breath. He didn’t like to
admit it, but secretly he hoped it was Jon. He knew it was selfish,
but Jon was his brother and he really wanted to see him again. When
Anton Edwards stepped into the light, he was happy for Yvette. But
he was also really disappointed.

KELLY

Anton got past the light and smiled like the
others. Then he said his piece.

“Thank you for helping me. Really, I’m fine.
I’m Anton Edwards. I’ve got much work to do. I must work hard and
fast.”

Yvette ran to him and wrapped her arms
around his neck. He smiled again as she kissed him.

“Baby, where’s Chris? And Jon?” she asked.
But Anton just smiled and walked off toward the ranger station like
the others. Yvette clung to him, but looked back at Angie. “I’ll
find out where they are.” She went away with her husband.

I couldn’t believe it. Travis looked at me,
his jaw slack, Angie collapsed to her knees. Parrish knelt on one
leg beside her.

“Something’s not right
here,” said Parrish. “They’ve
got
to be okay.”

Murmurs arose within the crowd.

“How come they left the people behind that
they went in to rescue?”

Somebody cried out. “Here comes another
one!”

I looked up hopefully, but what I saw next
wasn’t even possible. Chris walked out of the cave as if he’d never
been injured, and he wasn’t wearing the splint Travis had made for
him. He didn’t even show a slight limp as he stopped before the
crowd.

“Are you Chris McCormick?” said one of the
troopers.

“Yes, I’m Chris McCormick and I’m fine. But
I have much work to do. I must work hard and fast.”

“We heard you had a broken leg!”

Chris ignored the comment just as he ignored
Angie. He would have walked right by her, but she caught his arm
and turned him around. She hugged him hard.

“Oh, darling, I was so worried! Are you all
right? What about your leg?”

I also ran to him but stopped short of
giving him a hug. “Where’s Jon? And what happened to your leg? It
was broken!”

Chris gazed down at us. When he spoke, his
voice was cold. “It was only a sprain. I’m fine now because the
rescuers fixed it. Excuse me, I need to meet with my new friends.”
He pushed us away and marched to the station. We gawked at each
other, startled almost to tears.

“His leg was broken! It was bent like this!”
I tried to demonstrate the angle with my arm. “We got a picture of
it. It’s on Jon’s cam….” I stopped. “We don’t have the camcorder.
Where’s Jon?”

I looked at the ranger station where all the
people from the cave had gone. Chris stood among the group of
rescuers like he belonged with them, which was very weird. The only
guy there he even knew was Anton. I tried to scan Chris’ mind from
outside, but I was too upset to concentrate. Through the window I
watched them gather in a tight circle, almost like a football
huddle. I hung my head, moving slowly toward the cave. Travis came
up behind me and took my hand. My eyes burned.

“Jon should be here,” I said.

Travis could only nod slightly. He choked
back the urge to cry.

Something moved in the shadows of the cave.
I heard footsteps. My blood ran cold. Was it demons? Travis glanced
over his shoulder and tapped me on the arm. We were the only ones
left by the cave. If it was a demon we were in deep trouble.

A moment later, Jon walked out into the
bright light. He ducked and covered his eyes, just as the others
had done. He seemed completely disoriented.

“Jon!” We ran to him and hugged him hard.
I’d never felt so happy in my life…until I looked into our
brother’s eyes. Something wasn’t right about him, but I couldn’t
tell what.

Travis must have noticed
it too.
Ghost fingers!
he thought to me. I saw Jon glare down at him with cold
hatred, as if Travis had personally caused all the troubles in his
life. Travis released him and backed away.

“I am Jon Bishop,” he said in a crisp,
British accent. “I am fine. But I have much work to do. I must work
hard and fast.” He pushed me aside and went to the ranger station
to join the others. Travis and I stood behind bewildered and
hurt.

“What’s he mad at
me
for?” asked
Travis.

“Maybe he’s mad because it took us so long
to send help?”

“Well, he’s the one who made us go! I don’t
get it.”

“Me either. He acted like he didn’t even
know us. Chris, too!”

We suddenly looked at each
other, thinking exactly the same crazy thing.
Did Jon just speak with a British accent?
We took off to the ranger station at a sprint, determined to
hear our brother talk some more.

***

When it was finally time to leave Pandora’s
Cave, Travis was still concerned about why Jon was angry at him. I
mean, Jon and I were close, but Travis and Jon are real pals. I
suggested that since Jon had been trapped in a cave full of demons
for over seven hours, he was probably exhausted. Jon was always
grumpy when he got tired and he had to be totally wiped out by now.
I told Travis to leave him alone until he’d eaten something and
gotten a good night’s sleep.

Of course, being tired didn’t explain Jon’s
new accent. When we were younger, Jon had sometimes tried to use a
British accent when he practiced with his swords, like he was
pretending to be a knight, or something. But the accent was
horrendous and we laughed at him so much he never spoke it again
until tonight. Tonight, though, he sounded more British than an
Englishman!

On the way to the van Angie asked Chris if
he wanted to drive home. Chris looked at her as if he had no idea
what she was talking about. We heard Yvette say the same thing to
Anton.

“Anton, if you don’t drive your car home
it’s going to be in the park all night. Why don’t you want to
drive, honey?”

“I can’t drive,” said Anton. “I’m…too
tired.”

“Well, I don’t know what we’re going to do.
We can’t leave it here.”

A nearby policeman offered his assistance.
“Ma’am, would you like me to drive his car to your house? I could
follow you home.”

Yvette quickly nodded.
“Thank you, officer. Thank you very much. Anton
must
be exhausted if he wants me to
drive him some place. He says I drive too slow.”

Chris looked at Angie and smiled a big,
goofy smile. “I’m too tired to drive, too! You drive.”

Angie smiled sweetly back at him. “Okay,
honey. Get in.”

The whole way home Chris acted like a little
kid, getting excited about nearly everything he saw. He clapped his
hands and pointed at traffic lights and cars and brightly lit
stores. He even yelled once when he saw a woman walking a dog. It
was like he’d never seen any of it before. If that wasn’t weird
enough, Angie laughed and laughed at every odd thing he did or
said. She must have thought he was playing. Either that, or she
figured he was just really glad to be alive.

When I scanned Chris’ mind I got nothing,
which came as a complete surprise. I tried again, but either he
blocked me the way Jon did, or something was different with his
brain. I wasn’t sure what to think about it, but I had to wonder if
he had a head injury or some other problem. Of course, even with
head injuries I usually got TV snow or broken thoughts. It got me
thinking about what might have happened to them after we got out of
the cave.

Unlike Chris, Jon stared straight ahead like
a statue. He seemed to have absolutely no interest in anything,
especially us. I leaned my head on his shoulder and tried to hug
him, but he totally ignored me. Maybe he was thinking about Maria,
I don’t know. I tried to check his thoughts, but he blocked me
right off.

Angie was so grateful to have everything
back like it was that she never noticed how different things were.
I couldn’t figure her out. She talked endlessly to Chris and smiled
at him a lot. Sometimes she’d squeeze his hand and pull him close
to her so she could kiss him. She nearly wrecked the car twice
doing that.

“Honey,” she said. “I’m so glad you’re okay.
It was brave to take the kids caving, but from now on let’s stick
with bowling, or putt-putt golf, okay?”

Chris grinned at her like an idiot. She
looked in the rearview mirror and smiled again, this time at Jon.
“Jon, you’re quiet tonight. I guess it was a pretty long time to
spend in a cave, wasn’t it?”

“Yes,” Jon responded coldly, still using the
British accent. “Three thousand years is a long time.”

Travis blinked at me in
disbelief.
That’s gotta be the dumbest
thing he’s ever said!
I quickly
agreed.
Jon wouldn’t say somethin’ like
that.

Travis had a point. I’d never heard of
anyone acting different just because he went into a cave. And I
didn’t believe demons could make themselves look exactly like a
specific human, so I had to assume Jon and the others might be
possessed.

Travis was about to ask Jon what he meant,
when a sudden wave of anger and nervousness washed over him. I saw
Travis shudder like he’d just bitten into a lemon. A moment later
he realized the prickly feelings had all come from Jon. He looked
at me, alarmed.

He’s
tired
, I thought back to him.
He needs rest
. Travis
wanted to believe me. I wanted to believe me too, so I didn’t say
anything about demonic possession. Not yet. I wanted to be sure
before I told anybody else. Neither of us spoke to Jon again for
the rest of the ride home.

13

MEMORY LOSS

KELLY

Maria stood by her car at the house when we
drove up, still wearing her waitress clothes. She ran to Jon when
we got out of the van and hugged him hard around the neck. Jon
stood passively and didn’t hug her back. When she kissed him, he
didn’t kiss her back.

“Jon, are you okay? What happened?”

Jon shot her an ominous glare, then
redirected his gaze at the front porch. “I am fine. I must work
hard. I have much work to do.”

Maria released him and stepped back,
bewildered. “Are you mad at me? I only just found out what happened
a few minutes ago. Dr. Parrish called my dad and told him about the
earthquake. I didn’t notice it, but some of my friends did. Jon?
Can you hear me? Jon?”

Jon pushed by her and went into the house. I
got close to Maria and lowered my voice.

“He’s been really weird like that since he
came out.” I wanted to say something about my demonic possession
theory, but I didn’t have any proof yet. Even if I did she probably
wouldn’t believe me.

“He acted like he didn’t know me.” Maria was
taking this hard, like the rest of us. Her eyes got moist and she
wiped them with the back of her hand.

“He did the same thing to us,” I explained.
“He gets grumpy when he’s really tired.”

“I’ve seen him grumpy. He still knew who I
was. Does he also pick up a British accent when he’s tired?”

“I don’t know where that came from.”

“Kelly, what do I do?”

Angie answered her question. “Go home,
Maria. I’ll call you tomorrow. Thank you so much for coming by,
we’ll make sure Jon knows you were here.”

Maria nodded and gave me a lingering,
questioning look. All I could do was shrug and shake my head. She
left in a hurry.

When Angie and I got inside, Jon was looking
around the house like he had no idea where he was. He asked Travis
a very strange question.

“Where do I sleep?”

“In your bed,” said Travis. “Where do you
think you sleep?”

“Show me.”

“Show you what? Your bed?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll do it if you tell me who taught you
how to speak with a real British accent.”

“What do you mean?”

“Your accent. You’ve been practicin’, or
somethin’. It never sounded this good.”

Jon’s tone became severe. “Show me my
bed.”

TRAVIS

Travis decided it might be
better to find out about the accent
after
Jon had gotten some sleep. He
led his brother upstairs to their bedroom and jumped into the top
bunk.

“That’s yours,” said
Travis, pointing to the lower bunk. “I sleep on top cuz I’m the
coolest.” Ordinarily when Travis said something like that, Jon
would have a snap response about how
he
was the coolest and Travis was
just lucky to share his universe. Then they’d both laugh and maybe
wrestle a little. But this time Jon ignored him.

“Can I have those swords?” asked Jon. “And
the computer?”

“You’re kiddin’, right? All that stuff’s
already yours, the computer, too. But everything on the other wall
is mine, so don’t mess with it.” For the first time Travis realized
how bare his wall was. There was only one poster he’d gotten from
an Army recruiter and a calendar he made at school.

“They belong to me?” Jon immediately took
the swords off the wall and laid them on the floor. Next he turned
off and unplugged the computer, monitor and printer. He looked at
Travis, emotionless. “I need a large box.”

“There’s boxes in the basement. Why are you
takin’ everything down? How come you unplugged your computer? It’s
the only computer in the house!”

Jon looked up thoughtfully. “I’m selling
everything. I need money.”

Travis’ mouth dropped wide open. Was Jon
insane? Lost in the cave, or not, this was pure madness! “You can’t
sell your swords! How can I do my homework without a computer? Why
do you need more money? You have a job! You get paid every
week!”