Chapter #13The Unraveling Conspiracy by: Seuzz   "So what are you gonna do while I'm at work?" you ask Caleb as you and he trudge out to the student parking lot when classes are over. You're wedged inside a small mob of Westside students, all surging down the covered walk toward the breezeway that runs in front of the gym. Basketball practice will be starting soon, but you feel safe enough in the crowd that you don't feel like you have to keep an eye out for assholes.
"I dunno," he grumbles. "Why don't you let me go in? Are you even up to speed on what to do out there?"
"Sure I am. I put my— Uh, I got up to speed last night." You hastily correct yourself so no one in the crowd will hear you talking of "masks" and "getting" or "putting" memories into them. "We were in perfect synch last night before I sent, uh, that guy out to help you."
"Oh! So it's like it really was you out there with me," he sneers. "I don't know why I broke my promise never to speak to you again."
You roll your eyes. For awhile you thought Caleb was over the "prank" your golem played on him last night, but you're tired of apologizing for what that your twin did (or, technically, in this case, didn't) do at the cemetery.
"Look, I should earn at least one day's honest living," you tell him. You don't add your real reason for going in to work yourself: You're afraid that Caleb might get revenge on you for what your golem did last night by fucking things up for you at Salopek. "Tomorrow, maybe I'll let you cover for me."
"Fuck that. Send your gay twin."
"Shut up," you hiss, for even though you're out of the breezeway and into the parking lot, there are still students around. "If we can get him figured out, then sure, we can start using him. But I'm with you," you add. "These things are slippery."
Then, when Caleb doesn't reply, you repeat your initial question. "So what are you gonna do while I'm at work?"
"I guess I could start on a new project," he says, and adds more acidly, "After all, I did get the dirt we need."
"I dunno," you mumble. "You're not having the best luck with those things. Maybe you better wait until I can meet up with you. After supper, maybe. How about you start on another mask," you suggest after a moment's thought. "We'll need one if we want to do that thing with the girls like we were talking about." You hope that will mollify him.
It doesn't. "Jesus. First you tell me I can't get lucky with a dirt pile, then you suggest we turn the dirt pile into a girl I can't get lucky with!"
"That's not what I meant! We'll get it figured out." Eventually, you add sotto voce.
* * * * *
Work is relatively relaxed, at least for the first hour, for Andy sends you and Sean to help out at the distribution center, where an audit of the inventory has been ordered. "Yeah, everything's all balled up," Jack says. His manner is very peevish, and you think you catch him shooting you dirty looks. "Make it fast but make it accurate, guys," he tells you. "I got people screaming at me to get their shit delivered, but I been told by His Exalted Poobahness"—and here you're certain he's shot you a look of loathing—"that nothing gets shipped or sorted until we know exactly what we got in here."
So important is the task, you discover, that other employees have been pressed into service, and you and Sean join a dozen others who swarm through the postal-style back rooms with clipboards and inch-thick sheaves of invoices and vouchers.
The all-hands effort has been going on long enough, and has enough workers attached to it, that it winds down before five, and the building clears and packages begin to move again. But Andy comes to find you and Sean while you're relaxing and splitting a Coke to tell you that you're both wanted again. Sean gets sent back to the distribution center, and you're sent to see your dad.
Your knees are quaking as you cross the reception area and knock on his door.
He's on the phone when you enter, and he looks even more pissed off than usual. We waves you into a chair, tells the person on the other end of the phone there's a difference between "possessing proprietary information" and "having your head up your ass" and hangs up.
"Last Monday you delivered a box to me," he says to you. "You remember. You thrust it at me in the middle of the complex with a smartass remark."
"Oh. Yeah. But that was just a joke! The remark, I mean, not the—"
"You didn't get a voucher from me."
"Huh? Oh. No, I didn't know that— Didn't Sean get one from you? He went to—"
"I gave him the box to take back. Because I didn't order it." He leans across his desk to glare at you. "What happened then?"
"I don't know! Ask Sean."
"Did you go to the distribution center with a message about that box?"
A warning bell goes off in the back of your head, and sweat breaks out all over your body. "Uh. Yeah."
"What was the message?" Your dad's eyes are fixed hard on you.
"I don't know," you stammer. "I was just told— You told me—"
Ulp. Did you just make a mistake by starting to tell your dad that he was supposedly the one with the instructions for handling that box?
Too late now. You press on. "You called me, told me to go to the distribution center and give the phone to Jack, you had a message for him."
Your dad's eyebrows go up. "I did?"
"Yeah! I recognized your voice and everything!"
White spots show in your dad's cheeks. Your eyes water as, unblinking, he holds your gaze in his.
Then he puts out his hand. "Let me see your phone."
With infinite reluctance, you hand it over. He scrolls through it, quickly at first, and then carefully.
He looks up. "My number isn't in here."
"Huh? Well maybe you—"
"None of my numbers are in here. In fact, you never got a phone call on Monday." He turns the phone around to show you. "You called Caleb that afternoon, but you never got—"
You swallow hard, and pray for an earthquake that will bury you alive.
"So who did you talk to?" your dad says with barely restrained anger.
There's nothing to do but persist in the lie: "You! I don't know why my phone didn't record your call! Maybe it messed up! Or—! I think erased all my calls from that day!" You grab for your phone but your dad pulls it away. "Because I know I got calls that day from people!"
"Your call history goes back to before Monday."
"Then I don't know what happened! Why it didn't record the number! Because I talked to you, and told me to find Jack and give him the phone! Talk to Jack! He'll tell you—"
"I already did." Your dad slumps back in his chair and drums his fingers. He frowns fiercely at his desk. "This phone call from me," he says after a moment's thought, "did it come before or after you talked to Caleb?"
"Before. I mean after!" You grin weakly at your dad. "Let me think." You wrack your brains, trying to figure out the safest answer. "After," you finally decide. "I remember, because when you called I thought it might be him calling back. The phone calls were right next to each other. I was taking a bathroom break at time."
Your dad slumps further in his chair. "Did I do something wrong?" you ask him.
"No," he says after a heavy sigh. "And if anyone asks you about this, tell them the truth." He dismisses you with a wave.
But he stops you at the doorway. "Did it really sound like me?" he asks.
You nod. "You even yelled at me."
You're not sure, but you think he winces at your words.
* * * * *
You sweat out the rest of the day alone, for Sean doesn't return before quitting time, and you race away from the complex as fast as you can. Not until you're away and rocketing back home do you remember that you forgot to get your phone back from your dad.
So you stop by Caleb's house to see if he's there; he isn't, and as his mom has just got back from work herself, she can't tell you where he is. You take a guess and race out to the elementary school.
Caleb's car is parked in front of the basement door, and the lock is off. Your heart is pounding as you burst in.
Halfway down the stairs, you freeze.
A guy who looks like you is staring back up at you from the basement floor. His eyes are very wide.
Wide too are the eyes of Caleb Johansson, who is standing a few feet behind and to the left of your twin.
And on the other side of the conference table, another Caleb Johansson goes bug-eyed as he looks up at you. A heavy book—the grimoire—falls from his nerveless fingers with a loud thud.
"Caleb?" you squeak.
One of the Calebs raises his hand. Then the other raises his. Your doppelganger does a double take back at them, and raises his hand too.
And at that bit of tomfoolery, you lose your shit.  You have the following choice: 1. Continue |
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