Kingdom Keepers VII

by Pearson, Ridley

  “Don’t go there,” Willa says through the headset. “Tia Dalma tricked you, Finn. You can’t go on blaming yourself. It wasn’t your fault. It’s—”

  “They’re murderers,” Finn says bitterly. “They’ve killed two people, maybe more. For all we know, they’ll kill us without a second thought.”

  Philby’s voice: “‘An enemy within.’”

  “I caught that the first time,” Maybeck says. “That’s trash talk, and we all know it.”

  Finn says, “A secret midnight meeting to talk about a rumor? I don’t think so. If they’re going to that kind of trouble, they must have evidence. Right or wrong, they think it’s at least a strong possibility.”

  Collective silence floods the airwaves. In the silence, sparks of spitting static echo like fireworks.

  “We can talk about this later,” Philby says. “I’ve got to get the bugs out of v1.6. If we’re facing murderers, we need every advantage we can get. Besides, I’ve got a surprise for you all.” He pauses. “Maybeck?”

  “Here.”

  “Get your butt over to the Legends statue. Make sure no one sees you. Bring back our guests.”

  “Guests?” Finn says.

  “That’s my surprise,” says Philby.

  * * *

  “Well, what are you waiting for? Go say hi!” Jess says, nudging Amanda.

  A flood of emotions ripples through Amanda: the rush of crossing over as a DHI; of vanishing from her bed in Mrs. Nash’s house in Florida and appearing in Walt Disney Studios in California; the idea of helping the Keepers take down the Overtakers; and more than anything, seeing Finn for the first time since the prom. They are magically within reach of one another.30

  The group, standing scattered around the green-screen stage, waits awkwardly, sensing the moment between Finn and Amanda.

  Finn can’t read her, has no idea what she’s feeling. Is she happy to see him? Angry because of his ditching her at the prom? He resists an urge to hug her; doesn’t know how she’ll react; can’t risk it.

  After several tense seconds of staring, Finn rubs the back of his neck, trying to disperse his nervous tension. He can feel the eyes of each of the other Keepers on him; his stomach twists into knots, and he can’t make himself talk. He is so pleased to see Amanda, but he doesn’t know how to express himself. First, he tries a grin. Seeing disappointment on her face, he summons a burst of courage and steps in for a kiss. On the cheek.31

  Maybeck, who has returned to his lookout, groans and says over the headphones, “I heard that.”

  Amanda awkwardly glances away as fast as possible. Throughout her time as a Fairlie, she has struggled to remain independent. She’s only given her full trust to Jess, and only then after a long, testing friendship. She feels she can trust Finn; they have an undeniable connection. But their pasts are so different. Is it possible they are more than the closest of friends? After all this time, can she still be unsure? Sometimes life is about learning to surf the waves you can’t stop. She can’t recall who told her this, but it seemed important at the time. Should she heed the advice now?

  “Hey!” Finn’s voice breaks apart her thoughts. This is it.32

  She finally allows her face to break into a giant, lovely smile. He grins back with that same sweetness she always sees in him. She knows she’s supposed to say something, but a lump catches in her throat. Memories flood her: the prom, the cruise. Tears spring up in her eyes.

  “You okay?” Finn asks.

  Butterflies swarm in her stomach. She hears fireworks in her head. She wants to hug him, to burst into honest tears and tell him how much she has missed him.33

  “Doing great,” she says, lying.

  Philby exits the control room and enters the stage area. After confirming that Willa and Maybeck can hear him over their headsets, he addresses Jess.

  “Tell them what you told me in your e-mail.”

  “Another dream,” she says, reaching into her pocket with a rueful smile. “The more things change—hey, guys?”

  She attempts to hand Finn a folded piece of paper, but his fingers pass through its projected light, and it sticks to Jess’ hand like flypaper, a part of her hologram. She and Amanda are less experienced as DHIs; Jess seems uncomfortable with her present state of immateriality.

  Philby eyes the sheet of paper, still impossible to disassociate from Jess’s DHI. “There’s an interesting bug. The fob has never had that problem.” For a brief flash, he sounds like Professor Philby. “I can work on that as well. We need to get started.”

  “Hold on a second!” Finn says, a little too loudly.

  Jess holds up the unfolded sheet of sketch paper for all to see. It shimmers, framed by a thin blue line. Like so many renditions of her dream visions, this is a collage of images and words, some faint, some bold. They mix and combine on the page in a sprawl of abstract confusion. Her visions are more foretelling than fortune-telling; they often lack specifics or misread entire parts of a message. Jess is no Rembrandt, but she’s capable of telling stories with images. She’s a good enough illustrator to capture her recollections of her dreams and depict them boldly.

  Then again, sometimes Jess’s dreams are nothing more than night-bound fantasies, fears, and hopes taking flight in an overactive imagination; sometimes her dreams probe deeply into a crystal ball, defying all understanding of time’s hold on human consciousness. Only Einstein might be able to explain Jess’s supernatural ability to see around the curve of the present into the blur of the future.

  But she has repeated this feat too many times for the Keepers to consider it mere luck or diagnose it as the result of some chemical or hormonal imbalance. Her vision makes her more than special; it makes her unique, important. She is a lens through which the Keepers can anticipate the ambushes of the Overtakers.

  The collage is busy and requires thorough study, for which none of the Keepers presently has time. It contains, among other images, a ski lift gondola; the bolded words If Cars, Ice; a long climbing flight of stairs reminiscent of what the Imagineers have dubbed “Escher’s Keep” in the Cinderella Castle; the horns of a monster that all recognize as Chernabog; a doll; and the Mexican temple where Dillard died at Finn’s hand. In the center of this confusion is a magic lantern—an ancient oil lamp—puffing a series of translucent steam clouds from its curved spout. It’s beautifully shaded and realistic. Among the clouds of steam float words A wry snake is the key, partially obscured by shading. Shoe prints and cat paw prints wind confusingly like a net around and across the other images.

  “What does it mean?” Finn asks.

  “In my dream, the lantern was important. I saw you, Finn, out of breath and facing it. You rubbed it and—”

  “I rubbed it?” Finn says.

  “And then disappeared,” says Amanda anxiously.

  “Yeah,” Jess says to her sister, as if continuing an argument, “but maybe I awoke then, before I could see what happened.”

  “You did not awake. You saw a snake.”

  “But it could have been a different dream.”

  “You were scared. You woke up scared. You told me that. Finn was in trouble.”

  “Finn is always in trouble in your dreams, Jess,” Willa says.

  “Not always,” Jess replies disagreeably.

  “In a large percentage of them then.”

  “Explain the words,” the Professor says. “The ‘Cars’ thing, the snake thing.”

  “Cars Land,” Willa says into the headsets. “California Adventure. Ice? Maybe the mountains in the scenery?”

  Finn repeats her words for the sake of Amanda and Jess, who don’t have headsets. Heads bob. Only Philby ever beats Willa to such instant analysis. It’s a competition between them.

  “The snake,” Jess says timidly. “It’s true what Amanda said: I did have a nightmare involving this humongous snake and Finn. But the words…I don’t know. I draw what I see. You know? That’s where the words—those exact words—belong on the page. I know that sounds stupid�
��”

  “It doesn’t.” The Professor is the final arbiter of what is and is not considered stupid. He has passed judgment. “The brain’s subconscious functions cannot—”

  Maybeck makes a loud snoring sound over the headset. Charlene covers her smile. Philby reddens, highlighting his ginger complexion, but recovers quickly.

  “Any explanation for the articles and the verb being less important? Only ‘wry,’ ‘snake,’ and ‘key’ are shaded.”

  “You’re killing me here, Philby,” says Maybeck.

  Jess levels sympathetic eyes on Philby as she shakes her head. “I draw what I see.”

  “Why so urgent?” Philby asks. “Your text—” He pauses, then explains to the others, “Jess texted me, saying that they needed to cross over, needed to see us tonight.”

  “Actually, I asked you first what color shirt Finn was wearing,” Jess says.

  “True. I forgot that part.”

  “And you said a blue polo.” Jess nods to Finn, who is, in fact, wearing a blue polo. “That did it for me. I was dreaming about…I saw Finn in my dream,” she says, lowering her head demurely, “in a blue shirt.”

  “But Finn isn’t crossed over,” Charlene says bluntly, “I am.” She reaches one arm through the other to demonstrate her current state as a DHI. Jess looks hurt by Charlene’s combative tone, and averts her eyes to the ground. “Philby is debugging version 1.6.”

  Finn addresses Philby. “Tell me you weren’t thinking what I was thinking, after what Charlie told us.”

  “I admit, it crossed my mind,” Philby says.

  “Whoa! Wait a sec,” Charlene says. “If he’s going, I’m going.”

  “I need you here,” Philby says. “I’m in the middle of coding. We won’t get chances like this. If Finn goes, it’s with someone else. You and I are busy.”

  “That would be me,” Maybeck says over the intercom. “A magic lantern? A giant snake? I gotta see this.”

  “That’s an effective team,” Philby says.

  “Can we go?” Amanda asks too hopefully. “Jess and me?”

  “I can’t reroute you once you’re crossed over in this version. That’s what Charlene was saying. I’d need to return you. You would then need to wake up, signal me, and go back to sleep. It’s complicated. And most of the time—for us, anyway—it’s pretty rugged trying to get back to sleep after crossing over. I’m usually wired. I think we all are.”

  “But we could try,” Amanda says. “As long as it doesn’t slow you all down.”

  Maybeck’s voice fills the headphones. “It would be awesome to have Amanda’s ability to ‘push,’ and Jess’s future vision along for the ride.”

  Willa calls out a warning: a Security patrol appears to be making the rounds, including a door-to-door check. Moments later, Maybeck confirms. Philby runs for the master light switch on a control board. “Behind the green!” he shouts.

  As a group, the kids move toward the immense green screen, which hangs a foot in front of the back wall. They slip behind it single file.

  When the lights pop, the building fills with the kind of darkness found only in outer space or inside intestines. “Not you!” Philby’s winded voice calls. “Mandy, Jess! I can see you back there!”

  The glowing DHIs look like one large luminescent blob behind the green screen cyclorama. Philby hurries, stumbling and tripping in the dark. He meets up with the Fairlies, opens a protective case on wheels, and directs them to climb into the virtual coffin. He locks them inside, twisting the last butterfly clasp shut as he hears the door to the soundstage open. He drops face down and belly crawls around and behind the wheeled case in which he’s hidden Amanda and Jess.

  “Cover up!” Philby hisses to Charlene. She wraps a soundstage quilt around her to mute her glow.

  The guard’s flashlight sweeps the cavernous space. The man is sniffing the air, a hound following a scent. Perfume? Philby wonders. The aroma of theater lights as they warm? Human sweat? Because by this point Philby is a geyser.

  The guard moves across the soundstage toward the green screen concealing the Keepers.

  The door sounds like a brush sweeping the floor as it opens.

  “You with me?” a gruff male voice calls.

  “Coming,” says the guard nearest to the green screen.

  “We got the Wells and the TDB to do, floor by floor. You want me to die of nicotine starvation?”

  “That’s your curse, not mine. And it’s against the rules, FYI.”

  “Yes, Mom. Sometime this lifetime would be nice.”

  “Ha-ha.”

  “Food! Turkey sandwich?” the gruff voice calls. Philby hears the sound of him sniffing as well.

  “See? I’m not insane. And it smells fresh!”

  “It’s probably the lights. This look like the commissary to you?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Exactly, what?” The gruff voice is unhappy and impatient.

  “It’s warmer in here. Did you notice? Noticeably warmer, like the lights have been on.”

  “So they shot something in here today.”

  “They did not,” the closer man answers. “Nothing scheduled.”

  “You work too hard. Gotta get a life.”

  “Or you, not hard enough.”

  “That stings.”

  “Fresh food. Warmth, from the lights. What’s that add up to for you?” The guard has not stopped moving. Philby, lying on the floor, can see the man’s black running shoes through the gap beneath the case. He’s getting closer.

  “I have no idea where you’re going with this,” the gruff man says. “You want me to turn on the lights? Or can we get out of here?”

  The flashlight’s beam paints an arc across the gray concrete next to Philby’s left leg. Philby pulls into a ball behind the case, losing his view of the man’s shoes.

  “I’m telling you: someone’s been working in here tonight! I walked this stage not three hours ago. It wasn’t this warm in here and it didn’t smell like Chick-fil-A!”

  “Probably Joe and his team. It’s their job. How about we do ours and walk the Wells?” The gruff voice pauses. “What’s with you, anyway?”

  “Joe and his bunch had the conference room booked in the Wells. Do you read any of the memos?”

  Talk about smell: Philby can make out the man’s cologne or deodorant, a sickly combination of fruit and musk. He’s that close.

  The guard bumps the case. A girl’s muffled voice emits a cry of surprise.

  Then: silence. Total silence. The kind of silence that runs shivers up and down Philby, who twists his neck to look up at the back of the case. If he needs to run, he wants the benefit of a head start.

  He hears the click, click of the case’s butterfly clasps coming unlocked.

  Not good. The girls are in there.

  “You hear that? Come over here!” the guard calls to his partner. At the same moment, he lifts the lid of the case warily, only an inch or two.

  The DHIs of Amanda and Jess erupt out through the lid of the box, waving their arms overhead and bending from side to side, cooing and wailing in eerie tones. As the shocked guard jumps back and yelps, dropping the lid, the girls continue to writhe, visible only from their waists up, glowing, swaying.

  The man cusses and swings a nightstick at the girls—Philby sees the end of the stick overhead—but hits nothing but air.

  “Gho-o-o-o-osts!” he yells at the top of his lungs.

  In theory, the two men must have run from the soundstage, but in physical terms, Philby thinks it must have been closer to flying. The time between the guard’s cry and the slamming of the door clear across the vast building approaches the speed of light.

  The two DHIs hug and giggle.

  Philby stands. “That was brilliant!” he says, sounding more British than usual. His childhood accent—a consequence of his having grown up in England—comes out when he’s nervous.

  Charlene and Finn emerge from behind the green screen. When Finn asks what happened,
Amanda and Jess break into hysterical laughter.

  Over the next few minutes, Philby preps Charlene for her green-screen work; Willa repositions herself, climbing a ladder on the back of Stage 6 in order to reach its roof, where she becomes the only lookout; Finn returns to his dorm room and climbs into bed, well accustomed to calming himself in order drift off to sleep and cross over.

  Amanda, determined not to be left out, and giving everyone the sense she and Jess are keeping something to themselves, pressures Philby into returning the two, which will put them in their beds in Mrs. Nash’s house. Then she wants Philby to cross them over into Disneyland. Philby makes no promises.

  Willa, who operates on the same cerebral plane as Philby, has requested he photograph Jess’s illustration and text it to her. She promises to “begin analysis” immediately from her rooftop perch, using her smartphone.

  In a ten-minute period, the Keepers have delegated the needed responsibilities among them, assumed those responsibilities, and taken steps to spread themselves across a continent in order to rejoin forces in Disneyland, where, if all goes well—and too often, it doesn’t!—they will seek answers to questions that have yet to be asked. All they have is Finn’s blue shirt somehow telling them they must go tonight, and a magic lantern emitting steam-driven alphabet soup phrases that mean nothing to anyone.

  Just another night as a Kingdom Keeper.

  MAYBECK AND FINN CROSS OVER at the Partners statue on the plaza in front of Sleeping Beauty Castle. As soon as they’re stabilized, Maybeck drags Finn by the arm into the shadow of the Jolly Holiday café.

  “Cameras,” he whispers. “Philby’s worried about the cameras.”

  Disneyland’s already protective Security team may be on a state of heightened alert, given that recent activities point to Overtaker movement and interference. Park Security wouldn’t target the Keepers, but they aren’t about to overlook a couple of kids inside the park after closing, either.

  “Got it,” Finn says, shaking loose Maybeck’s strong grip. He looks down at where Maybeck’s hand was. “Don’t do that again, okay? It pulled me out of all clear.”