“Think about it,” Jeremiah said. “Louie knew it. Remember how he just suddenly turned on me? Started growling at me for no reason? He knew that wasn’t me! When have you ever known that dog to treat me like that? Remember how you thought that was so weird? You asked me if I kicked him or something.”

Parker said nothing, just picked up the headset again and tried it on for size.

“Look, I can prove it to you, Parker. I can show you that everything I’ve told you is the absolute truth. But you need to be prepared. You need to understand. I don’t want you to freak out on me.”

“I don’t think I’m the one freaking out, Dad.” He twirled a finger at his temple.

Jeremiah touched a button on a remote control Scott had supplied him with, and the entire wall in front of them flickered on like a television, resolving into a clear image of the clone sitting in his ViMed office, twelve floors above them.

“That’s him,” Jeremiah said as Parker stared at the wall and then back at his father. “That’s him, right this minute. He’s at work. He’s up on the twelfth floor, and I’m sitting here with you.”

Parker said nothing, but a slow smile crept over his face. “What is this?” he asked. “Are we on one of those TV shows on the Science Channel or something? Okay, you can come out now Mr. Announcer Dude—I don’t believe you! You failed!”

“Parker.” Jeremiah took him by the shoulders and looked him directly in the eye. “Look at my face. This isn’t a trick. It isn’t a joke. There’s no TV show, no secret announcer dude. This is the truth. You’ve been living with my clone all this time. The whole thing was a ViMed experiment, something for work I agreed to take part in. But it’s over now. And you and I need to leave. We have to get away from here. Everything’s been taken care of. We’re going to start over. Have a new life, just the two of us. Everything’s going to be different now. Everything’s going to be better.”

As he spoke, he watched several expressions come and go over his son’s face: disbelief, confusion, shock, something approaching acceptance and then finally full disbelief again. He looked at the scene playing out on the wall and then back at his father several times and shook his head. Jeremiah never let go of his shoulders.

“That’s just a video or something,” he said. “You set this whole thing up.”

“Look at the clock on the wall behind him,” Jeremiah pointed. “It’s the same exact time, down to the minute. It’s true, Parker.”

“Dad,” he said, and didn’t finish the thought.

“Do you have your phone on you?”

“Yeah, of course I do.”

“Call me.”

“What?” Parker looked even more confused.

“Call me at my office right now.”

Parker slowly took his cell phone from his front pocket, pushed a few buttons and held it to his ear, staring at Jeremiah the whole time.