The Demon Conspiracy (8 page)

“I can see rocks and stuff down there that
came from our cave,” I said. “There’s water everywhere, it’s a
mess. I guess sometimes nature makes a mess in order to get things
cleaned up better, you know? Like a forest fire or a flood.”

“I guess.” Travis crawled up beside me. “See
that big, roundish rock? That’s makin’ it all red. It sorta glows.
It looks smooth, too, like the walls.”

Jon returned to the ledge above us and
called down. “The main tunnel caved in. I’m not going in without a
light. I found Dr. Parrish’s backpack with the rope. I’m coming
down.”

“No!” I was afraid the sound of my voice
might cause another quake. “We won’t be able to get back up!”

“Sure we will. Watch out.”

I waited anxiously while Jon tied his end of
the rope to something I couldn’t see. Then he threw the other end
below. I caught it and pulled on it several times. I even swung on
it to test its strength. “It’s good.”

A moment later Jon scampered down the rope
and joined us. When Travis went back to Chris, he found something
under a pile of rubble.

“My hat!” He dug it out and tested the
headlamp. It still worked, but it flickered again. He spotted
something else. “Mr. Edward’s backpack.” He pulled it from the
debris and dumped everything out. “A first aid kit! Water! And
batteries!” He held up a pack of batteries and passed them to me. I
replaced the batteries in my flashlight and right away the yellow
beam turned bright white again. In the first aid kit Travis took
out seven rolls of tape. “This backpack has a metal frame.”

I was confused. “It’s aluminum. So?”

“So I need a splint.”

I watched our little brother separate the
nylon pack from the metal frame and toss the pack aside. He held up
the frame. “This’ll work. We’ve got plenty of tape.”

“You sure about this splint?” said Jon.

“We can’t move him without it.”

“I don’t think we’re gonna move him as it
is.” Jon looked up the steep ledge. “He weighs more than we do. If
it’s just us, it might be impossible getting him up there. One of
us should go for help.”

“Not yet,” I said, trying to take charge of
my squeamishness. If I didn’t get over my fears in a hurry I’d be
utterly useless to everyone. Right now we all needed to be alert
and ready to help. “Let’s get this splint on before he wakes up.
What do we need, Travis?”

“Something kinda soft to wrap around his
leg. Jon, can you break the frame so we can splint his leg on both
sides?”

“Let me see it.” Jon took the frame and
started twisting it. He fought with it for a while, until finally,
it broke into several pieces. “How’s this?”

“That’ll work great!”

Meanwhile, I went through the available
backpacks and brought out some extra clothes. Jon took my
flashlight and shined it on Chris’ broken leg as he videotaped
it.

“Why are you doing that?” I asked.

“Because it’s gross. Brandon would want to
use it in a movie.”

When Jon was done taping I passed his
backpack to him and he carefully placed Brandon’s camcorder inside
it. I held up some clothes. “Travis, will these work?”

Travis nodded. “Yeah. Lift
his leg, Jon, but be
real
careful.”

Jon gently raised Chris’
leg, doing his best to keep it immobile. Even so, Chris moaned
softly. I stood to one side biting my lip while I watched. I was
scared and grossed out.
You’re amazing,
Travis! Just amazing! I’m sorry I can’t help you much.

Travis looked up and smiled to let me know
it was all right. He began groping around the point of the break,
touching the leg itself and concentrating. As sickening as it was,
I watched every move he made.

“Jon, pull his leg,” said Travis. “I’ll show
you. Kelly, you have to hold his shoulders so he won’t move.”

“You going to set the bone?” asked Jon.

“Yeah. When I touch it I can feel how things
need to go.” Travis spoke like it was no big deal.

I wasn’t so sure. “You can’t set a break
without X-rays.”

“I can. Hold him tight. Pull, Jon. Straight
away from his body.”

I exchanged a disturbed glance with Jon and
dug in my heels against a rough edge in the stone. I gripped Chris
by the shoulders and held him fast. At the other end Jon had the
ankle.

“He might yell,” said Travis. “I would.”
Travis closed his eyes and repeatedly traced his fingertips over
the broken area of Chris’ leg. Then he instructed Jon on how to
pull, turn, or twist the lower leg. “Ready? Pull.”

Jon tugged, gently at first, but soon he was
straining. Chris moaned loudly several times, but remained
unconscious. I scrunched up my face. It was gross, but I couldn’t
look away. All at once the leg was straight again.

“It’s set. Now the splint.”

I helped wrap some of the clothes snugly
around Chris’ leg. I even tore off the tape needed to keep it all
in place. Travis lined up two pieces of the broken pack frame with
the injured leg and wrapped more tape around it.

While he worked I entered Chris’ mind again
and caught flashes of his returning thoughts. He seemed okay. Chris
would wake up soon.

I got the camcorder from Jon’s pack and
recorded the rest of the first aid treatment on Chris. It took
nearly a half hour to get the splint done right. When we were
finished, Travis tested it. The leg was secure. Jon carefully
lowered the leg back to the rock floor.

“That looks great,” I said, studying the
repair work. I took some more video shots of the splinted leg. “How
could you do that?”

“I dunno.” Travis shrugged. “I just
could.”

“I’ll never make fun of the Cub Scouts
again,” said Jon.

“Listen, guys,” I said. “We’ve either got to
find Dr. Parrish and Mr. Edwards, or go get help ourselves. And
we’d better save the lights before they burn out. Just use one at a
time. The spare batteries won’t last forever. Jon, you should go
for help.”

“I can’t find my way out of this place. Do
you know the way, Trav?”

“I think so,” said Travis. “We can follow
the little arrows.”

“You and Kelly go; it’ll be safer that way.
I’ll stay with Chris. You can take both flashlights, too, since
we’ve got that red light down there. What’s causing that?”

“It looks like some kind of big rock is
glowing,” I said. “The cave we’re in now is humongous!”

“I want to see.” Jon crept to the edge of
the rock shelf.

“Be careful!” said Travis nervously. “We’re
on top of a ledge. If it breaks we’re dead!”

I watched, holding my breath. “Have you guys
ever heard of aftershocks?”

Travis shook his head. “What’s that?”

“It’s like extra tremors that come after an
earthquake. If we have a few of those, it could really shake this
place up.”

Travis gulped. “We gotta get out of
here.”

Suddenly, Jon turned back, looking almost
terrified. He pointed down, struggling to find the words. He kept
his voice low.

“We’re not alone.”

6

THE SALESMAN

KELLY

Travis and I crawled
beside Jon as he pointed at the cavern floor. At first I didn’t
understand why Jon’s voice sounded so shaky. Something had him
rattled, but what? Then I noticed the floor was moving. Only it
wasn’t the floor. In the audience area in front of the stage were
hundreds—no,
thousands
—of creatures. They gathered in growing numbers like it was
some kind of town meeting. As I studied them I got goose bumps.
Those things were the stuff of nightmares.

The creatures definitely weren’t human, but
they weren’t exactly animals, either. Most of them had one head,
two arms and two legs like people. But there were plenty with extra
limbs and extra heads. A few of them even had tentacles, claws, or
long feelers, like a lobster or a cockroach. Their skin was scaly,
slimy, or covered with spines, and some looked hairy. Most of them
appeared to be man-sized and their most striking characteristic was
color. Each showed colors ranging from deep red, to gray, to green,
to dark blue. A few were gold, and some were multi-colored, but
usually not in any recognizable pattern.

I passed the camcorder to Jon. After he
checked it over, he gave it to Travis.

“We’ve only got an hour left on the
battery,” he whispered. “And I don’t know where the other battery
is. Get everything you can.”

“Get what?” asked Travis. “What do you want
me to do?”

“Record what’s down there. Maybe we can sell
the video to TV news stations. You don’t usually see something like
this in a cave.”

“Something like what?” I asked. He offered a
slight shrug for an answer.

Travis blinked in
understanding. “What’re
you
gonna do?”

“I’m gonna watch.”

Travis steadied the camcorder against the
rock and began taping the mysterious scene below. The viewfinder
was small and the three of us huddled close together in order to
see it.

“Zoom in,” said Jon. “It’s that button.”

Travis pressed the zoom button. The picture
in the viewfinder greatly enlarged, but now he had to work to keep
it from shaking. He eventually brought the creatures on the cavern
floor into focus.

“What are they?” said Jon in a low,
quivering voice. His eyes were wide with doubt. It was one of the
few times I’d ever known him to be truly afraid.

“Whatever they are,” I said. “I don’t think
it would be good for us if they knew we were here.”

Jon nodded. “You got that right. Keep it at
a whisper.”

Behind us, Chris moaned loudly. We looked
back in horror. He moaned again, even louder. I quickly crawled
beside him. Travis continued recording the amazing scene below.

“Chris,” I said in a low voice. “How do you
feel?”

Chris blinked his eyes open. “Everything’s
all red. Am I in Hell?”

I glanced over my shoulder and patted him
gently on the arm. “You might be. And your leg is broken. Travis
put a splint on it.”

“That would explain the
fiery pain.
Travis
did the splint? You kids amaze me. How is
everyone?”

“Jon, Travis and I are fine. But we haven’t
found Mr. Edwards or Dr. Parrish.”

“You’ve got to find them. Anton knows the
way out.”

“We’ll find them. Just be quiet, okay?
Something’s down there. Something dangerous.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Just be still.”

A collective roar went up from the creatures
below, as if they were cheering about something. Chris grabbed my
arm, terrified. I touched my index finger to my lips.

“Shhh. Not a word. We’re right over here.” I
crawled back beside Jon and watched.

A giant beast, scarlet colored with wide,
great wings, stomped across the stage. Its footsteps echoed through
the cavern like the booming of a bass drum. The beast fanned its
wings and folded them behind its back, sort of like a butterfly at
rest. But this was no butterfly.

Demons!
I thought to Travis. Travis nodded. The camcorder
shook. He used both hands to steady it.

Jon looked up suddenly. “Did you hear that?
Somebody said demons!”

I shushed him. “What else could they
be?”

“That big one must be the boss!” said
Travis. “He’s huge!”

The Boss Demon stood well over twenty feet
tall with long, powerful arms and hands the size of tractor tires.
One massive hand carried a long wooden staff as thick as a
telephone pole, the top end sharpened to a ghastly point. The beast
stood on two enormously muscled, deep-red legs with long ebony
claws in place of toes. Its belly was covered in grayish scales.
Its massive, ugly head had one long horn growing out of the
center.

I fought to keep my shaking to a
minimum.

The Boss stopped in the
middle of the stage. He looked out across the screaming, cheering
hoard and raised the staff, which he pounded on the stone floor
three times.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The creatures before the stage grew quiet. The
Boss spoke.

“Affkd gkdnki!! Gityyhlls
asinfoihen!!” His voice was powerful, like the diesel engine on a
tractor-trailer truck, but
much
deeper. And he wasn’t speaking any language I’d
ever heard. In fact, the words were so garbled that it hardly
sounded like language at all. But it must have made sense, because
every time the Boss paused, the other creatures cheered. Then the
Boss waved a hand as if presenting something on the right side of
the stage. It seemed like an introduction.

Travis sent a mental
message to me.
What are they
thinking?

I don’t
know
,
we’re too
far away. Either that or I can’t read them
.

Next came the greatest shock of all. A man—a
human!—walked out on the stage. He was tall with dark hair, wearing
a dark blue suit with a red necktie, and really handsome, like a
movie star. The Man carried a white clipboard in one hand and a
strange-looking object, like a silver fire hydrant, in the other.
He stopped in the middle of the stage beside the Demon Boss. He set
the silver thing down, turned and faced the grisly audience.

The demons in the audience glared at him,
like deer staring at the headlights of a car. I wasn’t sure if they
were surprised to see a human among them, or if they just didn’t
know what he was. Next, they traded disbelieving looks. Some shook
their heads. Others scowled. They waved their long claws in the air
or shook angry, scaly fists at the Man.