Jon turned and looked over at his sister's friend Athena. What was she doing here? Wouldn't she be off at the club with Zoe? Then he noticed she had something in her hand. It was the empathy device! But if Athena had the device, where was Karyn?
He walked straight towards Athena, leaving his mom to fume over what his stupid sister had done. "Where did you get that?" he demanded to know.
"You know what this is?" she asked.
"What happened to Karyn?"
"Karyn? Oh, that's your friend, right?"
"Don't play games. You know exactly who I'm talking about. The last time I saw her, she had that," Jon said, pointing at the device. "You obviously took it from her, so where is she?"
"Listen, I don't like being accused of things I haven't done. It was just sitting here on the floor. I picked it up and looked at it, and then I accidentally ..."
Jon's eyes went wide, realizing what she was about to say. "You pressed it?"
"Yeah, and the weirdest thing happened."
"Tell me," Jon said.
So Athena (or rather Karyn/Athena) did.
Jon turned around and looked at his mom. It was so weird to now realize that she wasn't his mom at all, but rather his sister Zoe. But that was how the empathy device (that's what Karyn called it) worked. Only the person who pressed the button saw the change. Everyone else thought it was normal.
But what happened to Karyn? And now that he thought about it, what happened to him?
He turned back to Athena. "Why am I back to normal? It hasn't been three hours yet."
"I told you," Athena said. "The second time I pressed the button, you appeared out of nowhere. And then Zoe started acting like your mom."
That was what she said, but that didn't make any sense. The device didn't work like that. Jon sat down on the living room sofa and thought for a moment. Then it came to him. He didn't just come out of nowhere. He was sure of that. Just like when he was Mrs. Finch, he remembered everything after Karyn zapped him with the device. He remembered meeting Karyn, thinking he was Zoe. He remembered running up to his sister's room, locking the door behind him, and turning on her metal music full blast. He remembered all of it. He thought he was Zoe. Athena said that before she pressed the button the second time, she witnessed his mom acting like her friend Zelda. That was it! It was like some sort of domino effect. At first, it was Jon/Zoe and Mom/Zelda. But now it was just Jon, Zoe/Mom, and Zelda ... Zelda what? If what he thought happened really did happen, then where did Zelda go? Someone else nearby must have "merged" with her the same way his sister and his mother had. Now there was someone out there that had Zelda's body but didn't know it. And Zelda's mind was trapped inside like a prisoner in her own body. Until the three hours were up, anyway.
He had to figure out a way to get things back to normal. His seemingly harmless game of "hide and seek" with Karyn had turned into a disaster. And now other people knew about the device. He had to fix this. He couldn't just wait until the three hours were over.
