“LET’S GET LOST,” Finn said to the two girls.
DisneyQuest was a maze, a place where it was difficult to know where you were. An electronic funhouse filled with virtual rides, video games, and interactive attractions, the enormous building in Walt Disney World’s Downtown Disney consisted of five floors subdivided into virtual worlds and activities, all interconnected in a way that seemed designed to disorient. Finn Whitman actually was currently lost-he couldn’t quite figure out where he was or how to get out of there-but his suggestion to “get lost” stemmed from his spotting Greg “Lousy” Luowski at the other end of the gaming room, over near the Guitar Hero consoles. Luowski was the ninth-grade bully. Roughly the size of a kitchen appliance, the zit-faced, fingernail-chewing Luowski had it out for Finn, and Finn knew enough to stay clear of trouble. At least, avoidable trouble.
Over the past few years, trouble had defined him, had followed him as he and his four friends-now known as the Kingdom Keepers-had gained notoriety for their efforts to save Disney World from the Overtakers, a group of fanatical Disney villain characters within the Parks bent on taking over and “stealing the magic.” Guys like Luowski didn’t appreciate sharing the spotlight with anyone, and at the moment Finn was roughly a million times more popular than Luowski.
“How about the simulators in CyberSpace Mountain?” Charlene said. Charlene was to beautiful what Mount Everest was to high. A cheerleader and phenomenal athlete, she was the poster child for the Kingdom Keepers. Her Facebook page had more friends than Ashton Kutcher’s-well, not really, but close enough. Boys liked her. Girls liked her. Teachers liked her. Parents liked her. It was enough to make you hate her. But no one could. She was too ridiculously Charlene to ever have an ill thought aimed at her.
Finn considered the suggestion and glanced over to Amanda to get her read. Amanda was a different kind of pretty: mysterious, her looks often changing from slightly Asian to Polynesian or Caribbean. Amanda was not officially one of the five Kingdom Keepers, but she and her “sister,” Jess, had unique qualities and unusual abilities that made them important to the team.
Amanda and Jess had once been part of a group of foster kids called the Fairlies-as in “fairly human.” Kids who could bend spoons just by staring at them, or hear clearly at absurd distances, hold their breath underwater for ten minutes at a time, light fires by concentrating, dream the future, see the past. Kids labeled freaks and weirdos; kids once studied by the military but dismissed to a special home in Baltimore when scientists failed to duplicate or explain what was termed their “controlled phenomena.”
Currently, Amanda and Jess lived in an Orlando foster home for wayward girls run by the iron-handed Mrs. Nash. Despite sharing not only the same address, but also the same bunk room, they now attended different high schools; Jess had qualified for an AP program and went to Edgewater High along with two of the Kingdom Keepers, Willa and Philby.
Amanda had come to DisneyQuest this evening because the event was a school-sanctioned function. She’d brought Jess as her one allowed guest. To Finn, it seemed like the entire ninth grade of Winter Park High was there.
Finn liked Amanda, which roughly translated to: he couldn’t stop thinking about her, was often tongue-tied when trying to talk to her, and made a fool out of himself when trying to come off as cool. There was a friction that existed between Amanda and Charlene that he knew had something to do with him, but which he didn’t like to think about. In general, he didn’t like to think about girls all that much, but he couldn’t seem to help himself.
“Okay,” he said. “I guess.” Finn didn’t like roller coasters-actually was terrified of them-but wasn’t about to admit it.
The other three Keepers were also in DisneyQuest somewhere, as was Jess. Even though only Finn and Amanda attended Winter Park, it had been months since the whole group had done anything fun together. Their last outing, to Disney’s Hollywood Studios’ Fantasmic!, had led to an encounter with the Overtakers that nearly got Finn killed. The idea tonight had been to meet here and stick together, but they’d separated by ride and interest-Philby and Willa had gone to the ground floor to battle pirate ships, while Maybeck and Jess had gone to the bumper cars. Charlene had taken off to the bathroom a few minutes earlier, and Finn had considered ditching her in favor of being alone with Amanda; but it had only been a passing thought and one he didn’t fully understand. He liked Charlene. A lot. But not in the same incomprehensible way he liked Amanda.
Luowski spotted Finn and made a face like a football player who’d taken a knee in the wrong place. Finn didn’t want to get drawn into that.
“Come on, let’s go,” he said, as Charlene returned.
The three took the stairs to the second floor, and Charlene led them to CyberSpace Mountain.
The ride was a virtual roller coaster that allowed visitors to pick preexisting twists and turns or to design their own. There were five levels of challenge, from easy to terrifying.
“I’ll take mine lite,” Finn said.
“Me, too,” said Amanda. “I get sick on roller coasters.”
“We should go together,” Finn said, confessing, “because I’m basically a chicken.”
“Oh, right,” said Charlene. “You a chicken? I don’t think so.”
“Seriously! The Barnstormer is about as tough as I can take.”
Both girls laughed. Then they exchanged looks that had they been Taser shots would have dropped each other to the ground.
Bill Nye the Science Guy tutored Charlene as she scrolled through selections to create a wildly scary roller coaster for herself. Maybe she was trying to make a point to Amanda, maybe she just loved roller coasters; but it had enough loops and jumps to make an astronaut puke.
She used her entrance ticket to store it. Then she quickly worked with Bill Nye to make another, very basic, ride. She saved it onto Finn’s ticket.
“I love it as scary as it gets,” she said looking directly at Amanda. “It’s awesome.”
They headed for the short line of people that waited for the next simulator. Charlene was bumped into by someone, so hard that had she not possessed the grace of a dancer, she would have fallen to the floor.
Greg Luowski.
She dropped the two tickets in the process. In a surprisingly polite gesture, Luowski asked if she was okay and collected the tickets and returned them to her. Finn caught this look in Luowski’s eyes-the jerk liked Charlene; his bumping into her had been no accident.
“Lay off, Luowski,” Finn said.
Amanda took Finn by the arm.
“Lay off what, Whitless? My bad for the knockdown. Can’t I help her up?” He faced Charlene. “I really am sorry.”
“No problem,” she said. But Finn was still seething. “As in: we don’t want any problems.” She said this slowly, making sure Finn heard every word.
“I’ll be around, Whitless. If you want me, you can find me.”
“Try some deodorant, Luowski.”
Charlene cupped her mouth, hiding her smile.
Luowski didn’t just smell like a jock, he smelled like an entire team that had been working out in the summer heat for five hours. He smelled like a guy who hadn’t showered since sixth grade.
“Or maybe I’ll find you,” he growled at Finn.
“I’m not worried,” Finn said. “I’ll smell you coming.”
The line moved. Finn and the girls were shown up the stairs. The simulators were designed for a maximum of two people. Charlene lined up in front of door 1, Finn and Amanda, door 3.
“No holding hands, you two, if you get scared,” Charlene called down to them.
Finn faked a grin; he was scared already.
A Cast Member wearing a name tag that said megan accepted Finn’s card from him and chose the only predesigned ride it contained. The door opened and Finn and Amanda were escorted into the simulator chamber. They climbed down into the padded seats of the red metal capsule. The seats faced a large flat-panel screen. Megan directed them to stow anything loose in their pockets. That was when Finn started to worry. She then pointed out the two red stop emergency buttons, one for each rider.
Finn’s stomach turned. He didn’t like the idea of taking a ride that needed panic buttons. He pulled down the black padded chest brace as directed. Amanda did the same. Megan double-checked everything.
“You’re good to go,” she said. She hit a button and the simulator’s lid closed slowly, locking in place. The only light came from the flat-panel display where the ride’s parallel tracks stretched out in front of them.
“This was a stupid idea,” he mumbled.
“You’re telling me,” Amanda said.
“But did you see the course Charlene created for herself? No way I would go on that thing in a million years.”
“She wanted to impress you.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“Trust me. She picked the scariest stuff possible. It would terrify the guy who designed it. But she’s going to come out of there and tell us she loved it.”
He wanted to disagree, but thought she was probably right.
The lights dimmed. The ride began.
“If I scream,” Finn said, “it’s just to make it feel all the more real.”
She laughed. But not for long. Her amusement was cut short as the roller coaster car began to move forward on the tracks in front of them. A light flashed in their eyes. Sound effects roared from unseen speakers and the car banked sharply left. Finn clutched the safety harness and shut his eyes.
“I hate this already,” he said.
The capsule banked left, did a complete flip in that direction, and then lifted into a double loop, dumping them upside down twice in a row. Amanda’s hair fell like a curtain. Finn squinted open his eyes: the track dropped straight down, about a thousand feet. They plummeted down, like on the Tower of Terror.
Finn screamed a word that would have gotten him grounded for a week if his mother had heard it. It just flew out of him.
“This…is…not…right!” Amanda cried.
They reached bottom, leaving Finn’s stomach somewhere at his feet. He re-swallowed his dinner. The car shot up like a NASA rocket launch.
He screamed the same word again.
“She…tricked…us!” Amanda hollered. Then she screamed at a pitch so high it should have shattered the flat-panel display.
“Puke alert,” Finn gagged out as they entered a triple loop.
“Please, no!” Amanda said. “Try shutting your eyes.”
“Only makes it worse!” he choked out.
“Tell me this thing can’t actually crash.” She released another shriek at a volume that might have been heard in Miami.
“It can’t actually crash,” he said, though he wasn’t so sure. What if the simulator was put through stuff it wasn’t designed to handle? he wondered. What if its bearings froze or its motor overheated? The thing was, even Charlene’s ride, as crazy as she’d made it, hadn’t seemed this bad. Had she tricked them, in order to sabotage Amanda?
That was the first time he realized that maybe Charlene wasn’t the only one involved. A ride this violent carried the fingerprints of the Overtakers.
Finn remembered Megan telling them about the panic buttons. He reached down to punch the red emergency stop button. Just as he did, the car lurched left, and he leaned so sharply in that direction that his hand missed the button.
“Did you see that?” he hollered. “I think it knew I was trying to stop it!”
“You’re losing more than your cookies,” Amanda said. “So this thing can think?”
The car dropped again. Rose and fell. Leaned ninety degrees left and stayed there. Jerked totally upside down and did three more upside-down loops.
Amanda struggled to reach her stop button. But as she did, the track dropped away. She and Finn were thrown forward against their restraints. She punched down and hit the red plastic button.
“Got it!” she yelled.
The ride continued.
She hit it again.
They were flipped over seven times to their right, like rolling down a steep hill in an oil barrel.
“I swear I pushed it,” she announced. “But nothing happened.”
“Impressive,” he managed to mutter to himself despite all the craziness, no longer thinking it was the work of the Overtakers, but knowing it. Wondering how they might have accomplished such a thing, and what, if anything, Charlene’s role had been in it. She had designed the ride, after all. If it was the OTs, how had they organized any kind of attack given that their two leaders, Maleficent and Chernabog, were currently locked up somewhere in a Disney holding facility? The Kingdom Keepers’ mentor and designer, Wayne Kresky, had believed that “With the head cut off the snake, the body cannot survive.” But someone had clearly taken over leadership of the Overtakers. The ride going out of control could not be considered coincidence. The Keepers were under attack.
Finn reached down, able to press his stop button. Nothing.
“It’s…them…isn’t it?” Amanda was no dummy. She’d figured it out on her own.
“Yeah,” he said. “It’s them. By now Megan knows” -he gritted his teeth as the track lifted and fell so hard and so many times in a row that his neck hurt-“something is wrong. She’s working to fix it.”
“You’re dreaming.”
“Probably. But at this point, she’s our only hope.”
Outside the simulator bay, Megan was in fact hitting every switch and button possible. The system’s mechanicals included a warning-light display used to alert Cast Members to potential simulator hardware failure: a single light that ran a solid green, amber, or red. It was currently flashing red-a warning level never seen before and one that attracted the concern and attention of three other Cast Members, including the ride manager.
“It’s going to come off the gyros!” the manager shouted. “Like a wheel coming off a bike. The thing is going to basically explode if we don’t stop it!” He, too, hit every known control trying to stop the ride. “What the heck?” he asked Megan, as if it were her fault.
“The power!” she said. “Call down and tell them to cut off the power.”
“It’s coming apart!” Finn yelled. On the screen, the parallel tracks rushed toward them at impossible speeds, reflecting the velocity of their virtual roller coaster car. Finn could barely look at it-another five loops coming up, then a series of left corkscrews and what appeared to be the edge of a cliff-another of the thousand-foot drops. It was no longer the pattern of the animated tracks that frightened him, but the sounds of grinding metal and the way the seats in the simulator were no longer level, but leaning heavily left. It was being made to do things it was not designed to do. Its parts were failing-the bushings, the bearings, servos, and gyros; it was like a car going down the side of a mountain with no steering and two of its wheels loose. It was going to crash.
“How could they know where we are?” Amanda cried out. “How is that possible?”
Finn didn’t answer. He knew that when it came to the Overtakers, anything was possible.
“We have to stop it,” he said, looking for options. He shoved his back against the seat and tried to slip out of the chest restraint. It was the same kind of restraint used on real roller coasters-a padded pipe that pulled down over your head. There was some slack in the way it fit. He got about halfway out before getting stuck.
“You’re going to crush yourself!” she said.
The simulator spun sideways and rotated forward in full circles seven times. Finn felt his dinner coming up again. Each time he took his eyes off the screen he felt sick. He tried to focus on the screen the way his father had told him to focus on the horizon when seasick. The nausea passed. He was okay.
They fell hundreds of feet, facedown.
Finn squeezed back into his seat, unable to free himself.
“We…have…to…do…something!” he said.
“I’m up for suggestions,” she answered. Oddly, Amanda sounded suddenly collected and unaffected by the flips and twirls and drops. She could actually string a sentence together.
Then it struck him: Amanda had a unique power.
“Push…it…open,” Finn shouted over the roar of the simulator’s disintegrating parts. Amanda flashed him a look, her dark hair hanging fully upside down, her cheeks vibrating like Jell-O. Her eyes strained to find the hatch door that Megan had closed electronically. Neither of them knew exactly what was up or down any longer.
“It’s too strong! I heard it lock,” she said.
So had he, but what choice did they have? “You…have…to…try!”
If the seal broke, maybe it would initiate an automatic shutdown.
“Could be dangerous!” she said. For me, Amanda was thinking. How would they explain the damage to the simulator? Damage that would come from the inside? So far in her life her “gift”-as some called it-had only gotten her in trouble or made her the object of teasing. Subjugated at the age of eight to a foster home for freaks in Baltimore-the Fairlies-she’d been studied by scientists, doctors, and soldiers until she’d had no choice but to run away with Jess. She had no urgent desire to make a scene with her gift and bring all that down on herself again.
They jerked violently left, right, front, back, and left again. Finn’s head felt as if it was going to come off his neck. Dangerous? he wanted to say. Really?
Amanda couldn’t risk Finn’s getting hurt. She released her bloodless grip on the chest restraint, reaching toward the screen with outstretched arms. Finn watched her close her eyes, bend her elbows, and flatten her hands, palms facing out like a traffic cop’s. She pushed up over her head-all at once, and with every ounce of strength she possessed.
The metal bulged like it had been hit with a battering ram. Red paint flakes rained down. Sparks flew.
“Again!” he hollered.
“Too strong!” she complained.
“You’re all we’ve got.” The vibrations climbed toward a climax. The push had made the simulator lean even farther to the left; the grinding of metal was now louder than the sound effects.
He smelled electrical smoke. They were going to suffocate.
“EVERYTHING YOU’VE GOT!” he shouted.
The act of pushing drained Amanda. At low levels she could briefly levitate a person or object-cause them to float for a few seconds. Using up more of herself, she could shove a car a few feet in a parking space, or knock a group of people-or Overtakers-off their feet. Or bend a simulator hatch door. Finn needed her to give it her all.
“O…M…G!” she screamed.
On the screen, the track ahead of them rose, fell, and tilted to the right before…disappearing. It looked as if someone had simply erased the track-it broke off in space. Below the break was a rock canyon so deep that Finn couldn’t see the bottom.
The simulator shuddered. The smell of an electrical short-like the air before a storm-continued to flood the cabin. Their screams were lost amid the groan and complaint of the failing mechanics.
The car reached the end of the track and flew off into space.
Amanda thrust her arms toward the overhead door, but this time like she was lifting an incredibly heavy set of gym weights. Going for an Olympic record.
“STEADY!” Finn shouted, as the car tilted down, now plummeting into the depths of the rock canyon.
The hatch door rumbled and bent, bulged and shuddered, the seal cracking open, first a fraction of an inch, then wider.
“MORE!!!!” Finn said, as the ground-a rock bottom, like a dry riverbed-rushed toward them at over three hundred miles per hour.
The cry of the metal hatch now overpowered any other sound. Amanda’s face was scarlet and sweaty, her arm muscles bulging as her bones seemed to bend to breaking.
The sheet metal tore at the location of both pneumatic hook locks that secured the hatch.
Two inches…three…
The lid blew open.
The ride shut down. Smoke coiled from motors and servos.
A group of Cast Members rushed inside, aiming fire extinguishers that belched a yellow foam.
Finn and Amanda hung against the chest restraints as the simulator rotated forward ninety degrees, facing the ground. It made it hard to see what was going on. Some guy was shouting a bunch of orders.
Finn heard Megan say, “Are you okay? We’re getting you out! Hang on, you’re almost out.”
The chest restraints released without notice. Finn and Amanda fell, crashing into the flat-panel display and cracking its safety glass. Finn helped Amanda up, and Megan offered them her hand. They climbed out.
“Wow,” Finn said, “that’s incredibly lifelike.”
Amanda played along. “Must be expensive if they do that every time.”
They exited from the smoke and chaos. Charlene stood there, her full attention on their joined hands. Finn hadn’t even realized that he and Amanda were holding hands. He let go a little abruptly.
Charlene leaned in to examine the twisted wreckage. Smoke and steam and the gas from the fire extinguishers commingled. She fanned it away from her face.
“What happened in there?” she asked.
Amanda said, “I think next time I’ll design my own ride.”
“You don’t think I had something to do with that…that…” Charlene stammered, “…with whatever happened in there, do you?”
“You mean just because you talked us into coming here in the first place and you designed our roller coaster? Now, why would I think that?” Amanda said.
“Finn?” Charlene pleaded.
“You gave us the card, Charlie,” he said, using a nickname for her only he used. “You designed the ride.” And Maleficent’s locked in a jail cell, he felt like adding. Use of her nickname was an attempt at intimacy, to remind her that he still considered her a close friend, despite what had happened. But it backfired. Amanda heard him and clearly resented it.
“Really?” Amanda said to him. “You’re going to sweet-talk her after she almost killed us?” She stormed off down the exit stairs.
“Amanda! Wait!” Finn called after her.
“I promise you,” Charlene said, “I didn’t do anything! I had nothing to do with this. It wasn’t me!”
They’d been close friends for more than two years. Finn said, “Listen, do I want to think you sabotaged the simulator? Come on!” But she’d designed the ride, he reminded himself.
Finn couldn’t let Amanda get away. He hurried out after her. Charlene followed at a run.
The building seemed more crowded. He recognized nearly everyone-even though there were four hundred kids in his grade.
“KK rules!” he called back to Charlene. His team had long since agreed that when in the Parks no one flew solo. The Overtakers took advantage of Keepers off on their own. In pairs or teams their chances for survival increased.
Finn shoved his way through the crowd, catching only fleeting glimpses of the back of Amanda’s head. She was wasting no time trying to get out of there. She disappeared down the staircase-much too far ahead to hear him calling after her.
Charlene closed in from behind him.
He glanced over the rail, looking down, hoping to catch a glimpse of Amanda as she reached the bottom of the stairs.
His breath caught.
Not possible.
Snow White’s Evil Queen stood amid a torrent of admirers, all begging for autographs. But the Evil Queen wasn’t looking at her fans; she was locked onto Finn like a laser-guided missile.
He jumped back from the rail, out of the way of her gaze. A shudder of terror flooded him. If it was a legitimate Cast Member, fine. But if it was an Overtaker-if it was the real Evil Queen-then she could throw spells, conjure curses, mix potions to transfigure herself into an ugly old peddler offering a poisoned apple. In short, she was nothing to mess with.
Amanda!
He yanked his phone out of his pocket and sent a group text:
Possible OTs in DQ. Head 2 bus ASAP
Hopefully that would get the others moving. Presently, his job was to get Amanda and Charlene out of there.
The four other Keepers had smart phones just like his-gifts from Wayne and the Imagineers. Amanda and Jess didn’t have phones. Even if they’d had the money to buy them-and they didn’t-Mrs. Nash didn’t allow her girls to have phones.
Charlene caught up to him and he launched himself down the crowded stairwell, fighting through the throng. As he neared the bottom of the stairs, Amanda came into view again.
The Queen turned to look at Finn. He averted his eyes, fearing a spell. She walked toward him, the bubble of her admirers moving with her. He stole one more glance in her direction only to realize she wasn’t looking at him but over his head. He looked behind him…
…at Charlene.
From the step above, Charlene lowered her eyes to Finn and said, “What’s she doing here?”
“You know who that is?” Finn asked, surprised.
“Of course I know who that is!”
“I’ve never seen her before. Not the real one.”
“The real one? Is that the real one?”
“What do you think? You feel like giving her the pinch test?”
“AMANDA!” Charlene cried out loudly. She waved furiously, trying to get Amanda to turn around and join them. But Amanda was too caught up in the reason for her running off in the first place. Even more furious seeing Finn and Charlene on the steps together, she heaved through the crowd, ever closer to the Evil Queen.
“I texted the others,” he tried telling Charlene. But then he saw what she was up to: she was taking a photo of the Queen.
Charlene mumbled, “What’s she doing outside of the Parks?”
“Technically,” he said, “we’re on Disney property.” He led her down the stairs, fighting his way toward Amanda. Charlene followed.
“Technically,” she said, calling over his shoulder, “she belongs in the Magic Kingdom. The afternoon parade. Some autographing. Not inside DisneyQuest.”
“Maybe it’s part of our school event,” Finn suggested. He wanted an easy explanation; he wanted to be told this was a Cast Member, maybe a college student in costume.
The Queen was slowed by her fans.
Amanda had disappeared, hopefully into an elevator or down another stairwell to the ground floor, where a variety of rides gave way to a long hallway and an exit that passed through the gift shop.
The Evil Queen seemed caught up in her popularity-a woman pulled in two directions, but favoring admiration over purpose. Finn and the Keepers had long since learned that the by-products of fame-the adoring crowds wanting autographs and souvenirs, the people invading your space away from the Parks-was a different, but very real challenge.
Charlene grabbed Finn’s hand. He led her through the crowd, coming incredibly close to the Queen, but her fans formed a wall, and they passed by as quickly as they’d arrived. He let go of Charlene’s hand and bounded down the less-crowded stairway.
He ran and caught up to Amanda, turning her by the shoulder.
“Wait up!” he said.
She spun around, her face streaked with the snail lines of fallen tears.
“Let go!” she said.
“I knew it was the OTs. They’re here.” His eyes refocused toward the entrance of the hallway that led outside. “There!” he said.
Cruella De Vil was looking right at them. Gaunt, pale, and wearing fur in Florida with her trademark cigarette holder in her right hand. She, too, was surrounded by a knot of fans wanting autographs. She raised her cigarette holder and pointed with her long, gloved finger.
“Look, kids,” she said in her creamy voice, “it’s the Kingdom Keepers.”
The mass of fans turned toward Finn and Amanda, just as Charlene caught up to them. “She’s right!”…“It’s them!”…“Let’s go!” Voices echoed off the ceiling and walls.
A mass of kids abandoned Cruella and rushed toward them.
Finn pulled Amanda to him protectively.
Amanda said, “Oh…no…” pointing back toward the stairway.
The Evil Queen.
The three of them were sandwiched.
Charlene’s attention was on the low ceiling decorated with fishing nets and metal sculpture.
“I can handle this,” she said. “Stay with me! I have an idea.” She broke away from them just before the fans enveloped Finn and Amanda.
Finn had learned that the only thing worse than a hyper fan was an angry fan. No matter what, he didn’t want to make any of the kids mad or they would harass and glue themselves to him, complaining and shouting and taking an attitude.
“Hey! How ya doing?” he said.
Amanda looked curiously at Finn, wondering what he was starting. But he knew what he was doing; he’d done it plenty of times before. Offered a pen, he started signing forearms, hands, the back of shirts. The crowd pressed in more tightly, everyone eager to get an autograph. This was what Charlene had immediately understood: their fans would protect them.
Given the distraction, Charlene had scrambled up the wall like a tree frog and was currently hanging upside down from the lights attached to the ceiling. As she moved, so did the human wall surrounding Finn and Amanda-the fans were leaping up and trying to touch her, applauding her, screaming her name. As long as Finn and Amanda stayed below her, the protective wall of fans that encircled them moved with her, keeping the Evil Queen and Cruella at a distance.
The two Overtakers-they had to be Overtakers-were also trying to push through to Finn and Amanda, but it was no use; they weren’t going to beat out fifty wild fans.
Charlene continued on the ceiling toward the hallway. Finn and Amanda and their fans moved with her.
As the group reached the hallway, the room narrowed. Charlene dropped. Finn pushed rudely through that side of kids, dragging Amanda with him. A gloved hand caught his shoulder.
Taller than the young fans, the Evil Queen had reached above their heads and caught him.
She said, “You cannot stop us. We will do this with or without your help. If you run, you’d better keep running.”
He ran.
Down the hall at a sprint, twenty of the screaming kids close behind. Through the turnstile, the gift shop, and into fresh air. Finn had rarely ever run so hard, and yet both girls were several paces ahead of him and increasing their leads.
When a good distance away, he dared to look back. Cruella and the Evil Queen had made no attempt to run after them.
If you run, you’d better keep running…
Instead, Cruella was heading to a…pay phone.
She reached it and brought the receiver to her ear. It was the last Finn saw of her, but it struck him as so out of place, so odd, despite the fact that Cruella used telephones in her movies. Not pay phones. Not in Downtown Disney.
He arrived at the bus stop out of breath just as a bus was about to pull away. The driver braked for him and opened the door, and as he climbed on, he saw all six of his friends clustered in the back by the door.
Maybeck, a head taller than anyone his age, caught Finn’s eye and nodded, clearly relieved to see he’d made it.
A telephone, Finn was thinking.
Philby contained his surprise when a pop-up window appeared on his lab computer. A bright-eyed sixteen-year-old with reddish hair and freckles, Philby was a geek in disguise. He looked perfectly normal, but his British upbringing and slight accent, along with having a brain like Einstein, set him apart from other kids.
Edgewater High’s computer lab security software blocked pop-ups, prevented cookies, and limited Web access while simultaneously recording keystrokes. It was like working in the offices of the CIA or the NSA.
The lab had five long countertops with chairs, and eight laptop stations each. Currently, thirty-one students all faced forward where their instructor, Mr. Chambers, was stationed to the left of a large, interactive whiteboard mounted to the wall behind him. The whiteboard could carry anything from a mirror of one of the computers, to a PowerPoint presentation, or video. The instructor monitored software that showed a real-time thumbnail of each computer screen active in the lab. Mr. Chambers could click on any one of these at any time, seeing exactly what a particular student was doing. Chats were forbidden, as were aimlessly browsing the Web, downloads, or entertainment.
The pop-up on Philby’s screen displayed an invitation to a video chat. Technically, because of the security software and firewall, a pop-up was impossible, which only made it all the more intriguing to him. Despite his computer expertise, Philby had never been able to hack the school’s firewall-but not for want of trying.
Making matters worse, Philby and his fellow students had all signed ethics contracts, making it their responsibility to report any breaches or misuse of the system. By not raising his hand the moment the pop-up appeared on his screen, Philby had already violated that contract. It didn’t escape him that Mr. Chambers could easily be watching his screen, could already know about the pop-up himself.
If caught in violation of the contract, Philby would be suspended from lab for a week, possibly expelled from the class for the semester. It called for diversionary tactics, nothing new to Philby and his friends, who had long since established a system to distract Mr. Chambers away from his monitoring software.
Philby caught the eye of Hugo Montcliff, a neighborhood friend with droopy eyes, greasy hair, and shirts that carried unidentifiable food stains. Hugo’s father was a hard-drinking former policeman who couldn’t hold a job. Hugo occasionally sneaked out at night because he couldn’t take the screaming between his parents. Some nights he’d show up at Philby’s house and sleep on the couch. Philby’s mom had come to think of him as a kind of adopted son, and Philby considered him the closest thing he’d ever have to a brother. Philby signaled Hugo by tapping the desk twice and then pointing to his screen. Hugo nodded.
Philby then turned his attention to Mr. Chambers, knowing Hugo would open a drawing program when he was supposed to be creating a PowerPoint. As Mr. Chambers reached for his computer mouse, suggesting he’d spotted Hugo’s divergence from the assignment and would therefore briefly only be monitoring Hugo’s activities, Philby made his move.
Already wearing a headset for the sake of his own PowerPoint assignment, Philby accepted the invitation to the online video chat.
The pop-up window grew in size and a fuzzy video image appeared.
Philby brought his fist to his mouth to muffle his own gasp. Although difficult to see clearly, the white hair and cool blue eyes revealed the identity of the caller: Wayne.
The Keepers had neither seen nor heard from Wayne in several months-not since his hospitalization following the Fantasmic! adventure. He was believed to be in hiding, keeping himself out of the hands of the Overtakers, who would use any means necessary-including torture-to obtain the top-secret location of their captured leaders, Maleficent and Chernabog, or possibly to obtain other secret information that the creator of the Kingdom Keepers possessed.
“Are you secure?” The old man’s voice was steady but troubled, even as heard over the static-ridden poor connection.
“Not exactly, but I’m okay for a couple minutes,” Philby whispered.
Wayne knew more about the behind-the-scenes operations at the Parks than any other Disney Imagineer. He had helped to create a new hologram technology, had recruited Finn, Philby, and the others to model for what would become hologram guides in the Parks-Daylight Hologram Imaging, or DHI. The new holograms were an instant success. Families could be toured through the Parks by a talking teenage guide who was nothing but light, yet looked and sounded absolutely real. Park attendance jumped. Tourists traveled from around the world to see the new Disney phenomenon.
But Wayne and his Imagineering colleagues had advanced the DHI technology so the five students who’d modeled for them could also “cross over” into the Parks as holograms when they went to sleep at night. Once in the Parks, the DHIs could spy for the Imagineers or battle the Overtakers for control of the Parks.
A call from Wayne could not be taken lightly.
Philby had so many questions he wanted to ask: How had Wayne managed to breach the school’s computer security? Why would he risk contacting Philby in this manner? When had Wayne gotten out of the hospital? Where was he now? Did his call have anything to do with Maleficent or Chernabog? But time was precious; he kept his mouth shut and listened.
“As you know, these are dangerous times,” Wayne said. “Dangerous times require risk taking. My daughter, Wanda, whom you’ve met, has been my eyes and ears of late. She has been extremely busy carrying on my work-our work. But something has happened. She has been jailed by the police.”
Philby wanted to cry out, but he held his tongue.
Wanda arrested?
“I need Finn to offer bail for her release. This will require an adult, and we know Mrs. Whitman to be…supportive…of our cause. Wanda knows things that you five must know. Must act upon. Quickly.”
The Evil Queen, Philby was thinking. Cruella De Vil. It’s happening again.
“Tonight the five of you must be in Norway’s Stave Church at eight pm. Not your DHIs, but your real selves. A picture is worth a thousand words.”
“I have so many questions.”
“Prepare for remote access to the server. You may need it,” Wayne said. Philby knew this was a call to battle.
Since Maleficent and Chernabog were imprisoned by Disney, Wayne’s concern suggested that the Over-takers had reorganized. But if Wayne was risking breaching the school’s computer security, it implied something else as well.
“You believe they’re monitoring our home computers,” Philby said, guessing.
“You see why I contacted you? You understand the bigger picture. Finn is the natural leader, but you, Philby, are the navigator. Steer Finn in the right direction and he will lead you well.”
The Overtakers were spying on them. It gave him the chills. He’d been IMing with Willa on a regular basis, writing stuff he didn’t necessarily want anyone else seeing.
“Never underestimate their capabilities,” Wayne said. “We all have learned that lesson too many times.”
“Where are you?” Philby blurted out. “Are you all right?” Wayne looked old and tired. He must be worried sick about Wanda, Philby thought.
“Unimportant. Do as I say. Do what I ask. Good luck. We’re all counting on you.”
The window went black, the connection lost.
“Mr. Philby?” It was Mr. Chambers from the front of the class. He was not in a charitable mood.
Philby slipped off the headset expecting suspension and possible detention.
“No videos. You know the assignment. Voice is okay. No video.”
Philby realized that Mr. Chambers so trusted the school’s firewall that he couldn’t for a moment believe that anyone had managed to breach it. He must have assumed that the video on Philby’s screen was something Philby had created.
“Sorry, Mr. Chambers.”
Philby and Hugo met eyes, and Philby thanked him with a quick nod of his head. Hugo smiled and went back to work. He could see the curiosity on Hugo’s face-he wanted to know what had required the diversion. Philby would have to invent a pretty convincing story: Hugo was not easily fooled.
Philby’s heart raced. Wayne. Wanda. The Stave Church. The Overtakers were reorganized, still out there.
For the past several months he and his friends had not worried about such things. They’d actually had lives again.
But now, in a few short minutes, all of that had changed.
Again.
Philby compartmentalized his ideas. His mind worked like a filing cabinet. He held ideas in drawers, opening one or two while closing others. He didn’t think about it; it just happened. Once he had hung up from the chat with Wayne, he put all those ideas into a drawer and slid it shut, marking it as urgent. He’d been able to go about his classwork. But now, while other kids occupied the time between classes with hallway chitchat, Philby concentrated on the contents of that mental filing drawer. He made a list of what had to be done and in what order, with an emphasis on efficiency.
First, he would text Finn about Wanda. Next he would send a group text to all the Keepers about meeting at the Stave Church at eight pm. Then, once home, he would take his laptop over to Hugo’s house to get off his home network, where the Overtakers might be monitoring him. He would access the DHI server remotely and lock it down, making sure there was no chance that the Keepers might cross over unexpectedly after going to sleep. Crossing over was not the danger; it was getting stuck as a DHI, failing to come back, what the Keepers called the Return.
Philby spotted Willa up the hallway. In that instant, he became just another ninth grader with a crush. She was standing at her locker, one hand on its metal door, the other at her side while staring into space. He suddenly tensed. His legs felt like lead.
He recalled the exact day this change in his attitude toward her had occurred. They’d been sitting at a table at the Marble Slab with the other Keepers when he’d been overcome with a feeling of curiosity. It was something he still didn’t understand. But what it amounted to was: he wanted to be around her, to know more about her, to spend time with her. She was smart, funny, and thoughtful. Maybe not drop-dead pretty like Charlene, or the brooding kind of beauty like Amanda, but interesting-looking. Intriguing. More important to him was that they thought the same way. Often came to the same conclusions without any kind of communication. Like they were connected.
“Hi, there,” he said, reaching her locker.
“You ever know you’re looking right at something but can’t see it?” At the moment, Willa was looking right at him.
“Yeah, I suppose.”
“My sheet music is in here somewhere.”
One thing on which they differed: she kept her locker a mess; his was neatly ordered. He studied her locker carefully, reached in and withdrew the sheet music. Her eyes filled with appreciation.
“You’re awesome!” she said.
He wanted to hear her say it again.
“Wayne just video-chatted me in the lab,” he told her.
“Yeah, right.”
“I’m not kidding.”
The locker door slammed into place and she locked it. Philby could sense both Willa’s apprehension as well as her misgivings. He could see her think. She had an intensity that he totally got.
“But that’s not possible,” she said.
“I know. Isn’t it cool?”
“It had to be some kind of trick. The school’s firewall-”
“-was breached. Wayne breached it.”
Spencer Randolph was staring at them from across the hall. A gifted athlete and popular tenth grader, Spencer always seemed to be hanging around Willa.
“Don’t look now,” Philby said, trying to make it sound like he didn’t care, “but Spence can’t take his eyes off you.”
“He always does that.” Willa blushed. Philby didn’t like seeing her blush over Spencer Randolph. She looked back at Philby. “Why would he do that?”
Philby felt confused: Because you’re smart? Because you’re a Willa kind of pretty? “He probably wants to go out with you,” he said.
“Wayne, stupid!” she said. “Not Spence. I know all about Spence.”
“You do?” How had he let that slip?
“Why would Wayne go to all that trouble just to get a message to you?”
“That’s the thing,” he whispered. “He said it had to be here at the school, that it couldn’t be at my home, or Finn’s, or any of ours because he thinks the OTs are monitoring our home computers.”
“What!? But we…I mean, you and me…” Willa stammered.
“Yeah, I know. We have to stay off our computers. And no crossing over. Who knows what they’re planning?”
“Just when I was starting to feel normal again.”
“Yeah, I was thinking the exact same thing.” He added, “Normal, if you overlook that when we go to sleep we wake up in the Parks as our holograms.”
“We’ve all been overlooking that for a couple of years now. I don’t even think about it, you know? It’s just…a part of me.” Willa added, “We need to tell Amanda and Jess as well.” The Keepers had applied the hologram technology to Amanda and Jess months earlier. Philby could remotely cross them over as DHIs as well. But this meant they were now at risk along with the other Keepers. It didn’t seem exactly fair.
“Yeah. They’ll need to know.” Philby told her about the Stave Church at eight pm. He left out the part about Wanda for now. He wanted Finn to deal with that, as Wayne had asked. “I’m going to text the others, not IM. We have to assume that whatever we do online from home could be monitored.”
“That’s way creepy,” Willa said.
“Yeah.”
“But what about texting?”
“Probably safer than anything on the Internet. I don’t see the OTs hacking Verizon.”
“No. That’s true.”
The hallway bell rang, signaling another class for both of them.
Spencer had not gone away. The longer he stared, the more Philby felt like kissing Willa right there in the hall for everyone to see. Not that he would ever do it.
He shook his head and coughed out disgust at himself.
“What?” she asked.
“You wouldn’t understand.”
Philby wounded her by saying that. Hadn’t meant to. He longed for a rewind button, another chance to say something different. But Willa was already on her way down the hall, her back to him. Spencer peeled himself off the wall and came up alongside of her, and Willa’s step seemed a little lighter.
Philby stood there watching, sick to his stomach.