Kingdom Keepers VII

by Pearson, Ridley

  “I don’t get it,” Philby says. “Why would Walt Disney not share the Osiris myth? That doesn’t make sense.”

  “Timing,” Joe says. “Maybe he didn’t want the illustration made whole because it might have been stolen again. He may not have known how powerful that first illustration was. It could have caught him by surprise, even scared him. He was protective of his mouse, of his kingdom.”

  “So he gave it to Wayne in case it was ever needed,” Charlene says.

  “For a moment like this,” Amanda says, nodding to herself.

  “Maybe so. Our guys are trying to see if it means anything at this point, or if, over time, it’s lost its meaning. We’re only missing the one piece. It’s hard to see how the reference to the Osiris myth could help much with that.”

  “But it must mean something!” Willa stands on her tip-toes as she speaks. “First the invisible ink. Then the watch!”

  Finn clears his throat. “We should get on with the green-screen work.”

  The Keepers, Amanda, and Jess shoot him looks that border on disdain. Finn’s expression remains intense, even grim. Amanda is the first to pick up on it.

  “Finn’s right,” she says. “There’s no time to waste. We need our DHIs to be as able and capable as possible.”

  “Let’s get to it,” Joe says.

  Finn intentionally bumps into Philby, who’s about to object, whispering, “We know something they don’t.”

  Philby’s lips clamp shut.

  “Everything all right?” Joe asks.

  “Couldn’t be better,” Philby says.

  HAIR STILL DAMP FROM THEIR SWIM, the five Keepers, along with Jess and Amanda, cross over onto Disneyland’s Plaza shortly after the fireworks’ grand finale. The Dillard’s projection awaits them. It’s a balmy southern California night. Amid the commotion of departing guests, whose attention is focused on Main Street and the gates, the arrival of the DHIs goes unnoticed by all but a few children. And even with the Disney magic, their parents don’t believe their claims that a kid wearing 3-D glasses materialized out of nowhere.

  By previous agreement, the team divides into two groups of four. Philby leads Charlene, Maybeck, and Jess to inspect all the clocks in the park—Wayne has referenced time persistently, after all. Finn takes Amanda, Willa, and the Dillard on a mission to search for where clues might have been left.

  The Keepers have agreed that the “king” in the Osiris hieroglyphs must be Walt himself—who else? Any location known to be both original to the park and specifically associated with Walt thus falls onto their list of places to visit. Somewhere in the park, the Keepers believe they will locate at least one other Osiris hieroglyph. Quite possibly, this will identify a missing piece of the torn Mickey illustration. Because of the Dillard’s reference material about the Manto Manuscripts, they have the option of the 3-D glasses, which they hope might reveal the ancient symbol.

  “I am now connected to park Wi-Fi,” the Dillard announces.

  “What’s with that?” Willa asks Finn in a whisper.

  Finn says, “Pause,” and addresses the girls, who stare at the frozen Dillard. “Listen, even though Joe told us about the Dillard’s abilities, they are mind-blowing.”

  “‘The Dillard’?” Willa asks.

  Finn hears concern in Willa’s voice, and wonders if she’s just worried about Philby or if there’s something more. “Yeah, the Dillard. Philby is not going be too excited when he realizes the Dillard knows more than he does.”

  “I’m sure that’s right,” Willa says.

  “Hey, you’re all right with the Dillard, aren’t you?”

  “Of course.” But she doesn’t sound persuaded.

  “Trust me, he’s a big help.” Finn makes sure Amanda’s listening. “We’ve got to remember he’s pure hologram, like our park DHIs. He can’t touch anything, and nothing can touch him. He’s a simple hologram…if that isn’t contradictory. He can’t help us physically, but his knowledge base is bottomless.”

  “You are so right about Philby not liking him.”

  “He’ll adjust. The Dillard grows on you.”

  “Fine,” Amanda says, trying to close the discussion. “So where to?”

  “Resume,” Finn tells the Dillard. Willa looks on dubiously. “What location inside Disneyland gives us the highest-percentage chance of finding a symbol hidden by Walt Disney?”

  The Dillard’s eyelids lower for five seconds. Then they blink open. “Top three locations in descending order of importance are: Walt Disney’s private apartment at sixty-eight-point-eight percent; the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse at twenty-seven-point-two percent; Pirates of the Caribbean at eighteen-point-seven percent.”

  Willa gives Finn a look that prompts him to say, “I know.” Then Finn asks, “Who votes we start at Walt’s apartment?”

  The Dillard raises his hologram hand at light speed. Amanda and Willa follow.

  “It’s unanimous,” says the Dillard.

  Yes, Finn thinks. Willa is jealous, just as he expects Philby will be.

  * * *

  Philby has assembled a list of clocks and timepieces in Disneyland. They head first to the Haunted Mansion. “The later it gets, the scarier,” is how Philby defends this decision. “Going now is better than going in at two in the morning. Trust me!”

  “Charlie and I disagree,” Maybeck says. “We didn’t like our last visit so much.”

  “It’s only to look at the clock,” Philby reminds him. “In and out. Besides, the park is in a soft close. It’ll still be running. We’re all right.”

  “I’ll go with you,” Jess volunteers. “Terry and Charlene can stand guard.”

  “I’m not saying I’m afraid,” Maybeck says.

  “No worries,” Philby says. “One of you takes the front, one the exit. Jess and I go in through the back and cut through the ‘chicken-door’ passageway to the clock, since it’s near the front.”

  “How can you look so calm?” Charlene asks Jess.

  “We’re DHIs,” Jess says.

  “But when we’re scared, we’re mortal.”

  “When I’m scared, I have my dreams. Nightmares, whatever you want to call them. So this is kind of an opportunity for me.”

  “In a sick kind of way,” says Charlene.

  “Definitely. Now you understand why I cringe when people call it a gift.”

  “I guess I do,” Charlene says. “I hadn’t really thought about it.”

  “Let’s go,” Philby says.

  He and Jess sneak into the exit, through the unobtrusive door that offers a shortcut through the building for any riders who get too spooked, are too chicken to continue to the end. Moments later, the two are heading for the Doom Buggies. The attraction is surprisingly quiet, given that park hours have just ended. Typically, there would be Cast Members around at this hour, but not tonight. The ride must be “down” for maintenance or cleaning.

  The few lights left on cast ghoulish shadows on cobwebs, portraits, and props. The v1.6.3 holograms glow slightly, forming a haze around Jess and Philby as the two slip past the buggies, feeling their way through the gloom.

  “You picking up on anything?” Philby whispers.

  “Not yet.”

  The sound of swirling wind comes from up ahead, swishing in waves like ocean water licking the shore.

  “Wraiths!” Philby whispers, his voice cracking with tension. “Hurry!”

  Jess follows him, but they’ve lost their all clear, so pushing past the Doom Buggies is slow work. It’ll be just as slow trying to get back out, she thinks, and feels a cold rush of fear.

  “There!” Philby spots the grandfather clock to the right. The rush of wind intensifies. He turns. “Jess?”

  She’s not behind him.

  “Jess?” Torn between the clock and Jess, Philby calls, “I’ll be right back!” and heads toward the clock.

  Jess, sitting in a Doom Buggy with her eyes closed, is overcome by a vision of broken earth spewing black smoke and orange
fingers of fire. The images shift—she sees flags flapping and wraiths dive-bombing from overhead. Her arms extend to fight off imaginary ghouls. An instant later, her eyes pop open and she catches herself flailing in the dark. It takes a moment to reorient herself.

  She spots Philby, wearing his 3-D glasses, standing in front of the grandfather clock. As she joins him, he speaks in his level, Professor Philby voice, the one with a tinge of a British accent. “It’s quite clever, really.” The clock is numbered for thirteen hours, not twelve. “I might have missed the hieroglyph altogether, but I was intrigued by the clock only having one hand, and happened to look where the hand joins the mechanism.”

  Jess dons her pair of glasses. On the metal stub that connects the clock’s one hand to the mechanism behind the face is a tiny Osiris hieroglyph, no bigger than a collar button.

  “Thirteen,” Jess says, “as in the thirteen pieces of Osiris.”

  “Yeah. And a hieroglyph to make sure that number is noticed.”

  The wind grows louder and closer, pressing against them. Jess’s hair lifts. Philby wrestles with the door of the clock, but it’s locked.

  “If the missing piece is in there, it’s worth breaking it.”

  “No,” Jess says.

  “I know what to do.” Philby pockets his glasses and kneels. Jess tucks hers away as well. “You watch for trouble!” he calls, trying to sound confident. Philby holds his breath and, confident of his all clear status, eases his hologram head into the base of the clock. His DHI’s faint glow illuminates dust, cobwebs, and a set of tarnished keys. Nothing resembling a torn piece of paper. Next to the keys is a stick of caramel-brown wood, too small to be hiding the missing piece behind it. The chunk of wood seems out of place inside a grandfather clock.

  Philby spins his head to look up and see if the bit of wood broke off of something. A black, hairy spider the size of a Ping-Pong ball creeps from a corner. Philby jerks back—but can’t move. His fear of the spider has partially solidified him, sending a band of intense pain through his shoulders where they meet the wood of the clock.

  “Hurry!” Jess calls. “Wraiths!”

  He feels Jess pulling on him, but he’s frozen, locked half in, half out by his fear. He curses v1.6.3 for its limitations; he’s corrupted in part by his mind’s relentlessness, his inability to turn off his thoughts. The more he thinks, the less chance of all clear. The idea is to let go, to find internal quiet, but quiet is not in his repertoire.

  Jess’s voice arrives, muted by the wood of the clock, the increasing roar of wind.

  “Think of Willa,” she says. “Your best times with Willa.”

  The mention of her name brings a rush of emotion. It’s as if a dark cloth is laid over that part of Philby’s brain that refuses to slow; a gateway to a part of him he rarely explores opens. His feelings. The resulting flood of joy and laughter momentarily blots out all thought, and Philby stops straining against the clock’s hold on him. In that moment of relaxation, he sits back, falling out of the clock, caught by Jess.

  The four wraiths are upon them, charcoal ghosts bearing down, arms outstretched and mouths agape. The stream of ghouls aims to suck the life out of them. Philby and Jess duck. The wraiths miss. The kids are up and running scared, weaving through the Doom Buggies, back toward the chicken door, the nearest exit.

  Despite her forward motion, Jess sees her hair blow in front of her and knows the wraiths have recovered and are closing in.

  “Duck!” She pulls Philby to the floor of the waiting line. Once again, the wraiths miss.

  They reach the chicken door and vanish through it. The wraiths smash into the wood, howling in agony and rage.

  Once outside, Philby hisses at Jess and motions Charlene off the path. The kids scurry into the graveyard, hiding behind gravestones. The wraiths soar out of the exit line and hover briefly before darting out into the park, looking for the Keepers.

  Jess starts to move. Philby whispers, “Stay!”

  He’s guessed correctly. Just a moment later, the four wraiths return, hover once more near the exit, and then bleed like smoke into the hallway. Jess, Philby, and Charlene hurry away from the mansion, gesturing to Maybeck, who sees them and follows.

  “Fantasyland!” Philby says, and they’re teamed up again.

  Maybeck and Charlene demand an explanation of what happened, and Jess and Philby relay the story, panting with shock and nerves.

  “They look so transparent,” says Jess, “so ethereal. But when they hit the wall—”

  “Yeah. I saw that, too.” Philby isn’t slowing down. “At least we know they aren’t holograms.”

  “I think I might have liked it better if they were.”

  “And the clock?” Maybeck asks. “What about the clock?”

  “The clue was thirteen,” Jess says, glancing at Philby for confirmation. “The Osiris hieroglyph means it’s important.”

  “It’s a minor clue,” Philby says. “A hint, more like. It’s something to get someone thinking, but not enough to put it all together.”

  “It must go back forever,” Charlene says. “Forever and ever. To Walt himself.”

  “He wasn’t going to leave this to chance,” Philby says. “Multiple clues ensured that the myth would be uncovered, that questions would be asked. I mean, what if something had happened to Wayne before we showed up?”

  “The Imagineers know most of this. They’ve been looking for that thirteenth piece for a long time.” Maybeck sounds discouraged.

  “But it’s been left to us,” Philby says. “Specifically to Finn, not the Imagineers.”

  They slow, keeping to the shadows, trying to conceal themselves. Calmer now, Philby leads the way toward the Fantasyland clock tower.

  “Do you think the Overtakers are trying to stop us because they know what you’re—we’re—doing?” Jess asks. “Or just because we’re us and they know we’re the enemy?”

  “The OTs created the Hidden Mickey. Maybe they know the Imagineers have recovered all but the one piece of it. That might make them pretty desperate,” Philby says, shrugging and putting a hand to his side; if he weren’t a DHI, he’d have a stitch from all the running. “Obviously, they couldn’t harness the power of the illustration or they wouldn’t have shredded it in the first place. They fear the Kingdom regaining that kind of power. If they figure out that we stand in the way of that, I have no idea what they’ll throw at us.”

  “Are you ever optimistic?” Charlene asks.

  Philby is about to answer, but then stops and asks instead, “What happened to you back there, Jess? I turned around and you were gone.”

  “I had a…moment.”

  “And?” says Charlene.

  “The ground was burning. There were flags, and…wraiths. The four wraiths we saw, I suppose. I’ve never had one of my dreams come true so fast. I know it means something, but I don’t know what.”

  “Maybe it’s not important,” Charlene says sympathetically. Maybeck and Philby exchange a look.

  “It is,” Jess speaks with quiet resolve, peering around the corner of a building. “I’ve learned so much since the visions began. How often they happen, how often they take to come true—it’s all part of it. It’s all important. It connects, like one of those Christmas chains you make out of paper loops.”

  It’s a funny image, so specific. Philby smirks. “You and Amanda have never told us much about your Christmases, your pasts.”

  Jess doesn’t speak. Her hologram head hangs toward the ground, and Philby can sense contained pain, resistance, like something electrical heating up.

  “None of my business,” he says.

  “No, it is. You all deserve to know. We’ve entered your lives uninvited. I suppose when you think of an enemy within, one or both of us gets the top spot on the list.”

  Philby hasn’t forgotten about an enemy within, but he hasn’t exactly dwelled on the idea either. The reminder is sharp, like a prick of a fingertip to draw blood. He would like to deny it, but he resp
ects Jess too much to lie. “Suspicion is a poison.” This is why he’d given up puzzling about the enemy within: the process became toxic. But now the problem has surfaced again.

  “The story about a spy came from both Wayne and the Imagineers. It has to be true.”

  “None of us wants it to be. I’d rather not talk about it.”

  “Of course not. But I promise you, it’s not Amanda or me. I know—I’d say that same thing even if it was us. That’s why we haven’t said it already.”

  “Not knowing is the worst,” Philby admits. “Not knowing—and living with suspicion.”

  The Fantasyland clock tower appears before them.

  “What now?” Jess asks, her voice colored with caution.

  “Now it gets interesting,” Maybeck says.

  * * *

  “Interesting,” Finn says. The hanging chain that blocks off the stairs to Walt’s apartment is swinging loose to one side.

  “This chain is usually left closed,” the Dillard says. “Danger warning. Possible intruder.”

  “We don’t want to crash a party,” Willa says.

  “But you’re curious,” Amanda tells Finn. As if it’s news to him.

  “Always,” he says.

  “I will stand guard,” the Dillard says, his eyelids falling. “There is a light in the window that looks out onto the street. It once indicated when Mr. Disney was in residence in the park. It remains burning at all hours as a tribute to a great man. I can access the electrical circuit for that light over the local area network. I will terminate illumination from the light should I encounter anyone or anything untoward.”

  “Untoward?” Amanda teases.

  “You can do that?” Willa says simultaneously. Finn raises a hand to stop her, but it’s too late. The Dillard has launched into encyclopedia mode.

  “I have access to eleven hundred and sixty-seven switchable circuits. Another twenty-two hundred breakers, all public address—”

  “Pause.”

  Finn tells the others to limit the number of open-ended questions they direct at the Dillard—“Or you’re in for the full rundown,” he adds. Then he gathers Amanda and Willa together with his eyes. “Okay, we’re going up there.” To the Dillard, he says, “Resume.”