The boy followed. As Finn put pencil to paper, he briefly glanced up and into the reflection in the store window. Three brooms, one holding a bucket of water. He spun quickly around, dropping the autograph book. The boy bent to retrieve it.
The brooms stood facing him.
“Thank you!” the boy said, cherishing his autograph.
Finn had nearly forgotten about him. “No problem.”
Then something occurred to him. “You see those brooms over there? They look real familiar, but I can’t remember why.…”
“Fantasia,” the boy said.
“Fantasia,” Finn said. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen that one.”
“It’s a pretty weird movie,” the boy said. “The brooms show up in ‘The Sorcerer’s Apprentice,’I think. Mickey, the apprentice, can’t control the magic—you know? It gets all out of hand. The brooms are part of that.”
Uncontrollable magic, Finn thought. Yes, he knew exactly what that was about, just like uncontrollable holograms. The brooms were there for him. He felt certain of it all of a sudden.
Finn thanked the boy, who ran back to his mother’s side.
Were the brooms part of Park Security? Were they going to bust him for being in the Park? Or were they something more sinister: uncontrollable magic?
The brooms swept their way across the street and drew closer.
He walked quickly away. He looked back: the brooms were definitely following.
Up ahead, he heard music from High School Musical. A huge crowd of onlookers formed a half moon around a street show of cheerleaders and basketball players dancing and singing.
Finn worked his way into the dense crowd, glad to see the brooms stop at the back. But then the three split up. The one with the bucket went around the crowd in one direction; one stayed put; the other swept off in the opposite direction. He was surrounded. If they weren’t Security, then they were something much worse.
The leader of the High School Musical street show called for volunteers to dance with them. A number of kids raised their hands. Finn followed one of the kids as the music started. He kept his back to the crowd and headed toward the movable stage.
The brooms all were trapped with the crowd.
Finn dodged his way through the cheerleaders and ducked behind the stage. He hurried through the plaza beneath the sorcerer’s hat, running hard now. He arrived at The Great Movie Ride.
The brooms regrouped and moved through the crowd—but they didn’t seem to be in any hurry.
Finn entered the ride. He was directed into one of the cars, joining a family of three on a long bench. He lowered his head to keep from being seen. But he looked up to steal a peek toward the entrance.
For some reason, the brooms hadn’t followed him inside.
28
TWENTY MINUTES LATER, with no sign of the brooms, Finn joined the line for Voyage of the Little Mermaid. The ceiling was painted to look like water. His heart beat excitedly: he was “under the sea.”
There was no telling what he might find. Big or small, ordinary or out of the ordinary, it could be anything.
He heard a commotion behind him—the people waiting for the doors to open were oohing and ahhing. Finn turned carefully around and spotted the three brooms. They danced and bowed and entertained as they progressively moved closer.
Finn nudged past several people. “Excuse me…I got cut off from my family…pardon me…I’ve lost my family and I think…” He never quite completed a sentence, thinking this made each excuse less of a lie.
People complained, but no one physically stopped him. He pushed to the very front of the line, putting a good distance between himself and the brooms. What did they want? he wondered. Would they possibly try to hurt him with all these people as witnesses?
The doors swung open. Finn hurried across a row in the middle of the large auditorium. If he kept going he’d have reached the seats closest to the exit doors, but he was afraid he might be more easily spotted there. So he took a seat near the middle.
The theater filled quickly. The brooms appeared at the end of the line. They spread out and moved along the wall to the back of the auditorium.
Before he had time to think, the lights dimmed and the theater went dark. Very dark. As an artificial rain began to fall, Finn took a chance and peeked over his shoulder. The brooms seemed to be watching the show along with the crowd. A wet mist blew from the stage, surprising the audience. A child cried out. Then there were laughs as the audience settled in for the show. The theme music rang out: “Under the Sea.”
The song was the connection to Jez, and Finn searched the stage for possible clues as dozens of brightly colored sea creatures, glowing in the pitch black, began swimming across the stage to the music. Ariel arrived onstage, and the audience applauded.
Flashes of color drenched the auditorium. He stole a look to the back: only one broom.
He fought off a sense of panic. There! Midway down the auditorium, a broom on each side. To his relief, they still appeared focused on the show, not the audience. To play it safe, he lowered his head and pulled the brim of his cap down farther. How long until they spotted him? And then what?
The crowd laughed, but not Finn.
A cell phone rang in the audience. Several heads turned in his direction. His father’s BlackBerry was ringing in his pocket. He’d forgotten all about it. He fumbled with it and shut it off, but by the time he had, it seemed as if half the theater were looking at him.
Including the two brooms on either side.
The music grew louder. The auditorium darkened once again.
Finn dropped to all fours and began crawling to his left toward the exit doors. Guests moved their legs to allow him past, creating a commotion. A storm erupted onstage. Finn reached the end of the aisle and hesitated. Light flooded the theater. People applauded.
Finn jumped up and made for the exit.
He ran straight for the broom and pushed it over.
Hitting the blinding sunlight, he took off at a full run, unwilling to look back to see if a crow was following, or a broom chasing him. It seemed to him he’d picked up nothing of value. A waste of time.
Or maybe not, he thought. Had the Overtakers been following him? Why had the brooms seemed more interested in the stage show than in finding him? Maleficent’s powers clearly extended throughout all of the Disney Parks—the existence of the brooms confirmed that much.
On his way back to Animal Kingdom, he sent a text warning to the others.
Four members checked in on D-Gamer: Philby, Maybeck, Charlene, and Amanada. All but Willa.
Finn tried several times to reach her, finally giving up and hoping her DS was somehow off-line.
But it didn’t make sense. There was free Wi-Fi all over the Parks.
So why wasn’t she answering?
29
WILLA TRIED TO USE HER ID to jump the line for Mickey’s PhilharMagic, but to no use. So she joined a long line that moved in waves, as a group of three hundred guests was admitted into the auditorium.
With each surge in the line, she passed more posters—all with a funny play on words. The line moved ahead, and it wasn’t long before she faced the one Maybeck had mentioned. It showed Ariel and Triton, as Maybeck had remembered. It was titled, “A Must Sea!”
A plaque on the bottom of the frame read: ARIEL BROUGHT PART OF HER WORLD INTO OUR WORLD.…
Willa knew this was somehow significant. She sat down to make a note of it, to copy it out exactly as it was written.
Some of the smaller kids were also waiting out the line by sitting on the floor.
Jez had brought a part of her world into our world, as well, Willa thought. She’d brought her dreams about the future. She had foreseen things happening in the world that had now taken place: the lightning striking the castle, for one. Finn was right. If they were to find Jez, her drawings were the answer! The poster seemed to confirm it.
Willa wrote the note and put it in her pocket. Then she leaned h
er head back—just for a minute, she told herself—and tried to think of what else the message might mean. The more she concentrated, the heavier her head became. Her eyes began to blink away the stinging fatigue.
She fell asleep.
The rest was a dream. She saw herself being helped to her feet by—of all things—two bears from the Country Bear Jamboree. The kids around her, bored with waiting, were thrilled to see the bears. As she was taken out of the line and through a Cast Member door, she felt her entire body tingle. Not a nice tingle, but like when a foot falls asleep—the same kind of tingle she’d experienced on the nights when, falling asleep, she’d crossed over as a DHI.
Where the bears were taking her she couldn’t tell, but there were voices and the sound of an engine. A few minutes later came the sounds of car doors and more voices. A friendly voice welcoming people. She heard the Animal Kingdom mentioned. It wasn’t long until she felt incredibly comfortable, and it was quiet again. Beautifully quiet. Wonderfully quiet.
Far, far in the distance she heard the calls of exotic animals—as if someone had Animal Planet playing on their television.
Wherever she was, it felt like she could sleep there forever.
30
PHILBY APPROACHED THE Disney Vacation kiosk in Camp Minnie-Mickey, a stone’s throw from the Lion King pavilion. He clicked on Dream Vacations and typed in yensidtlaw. Presented with a Web page, he typed in the address: www.dgamer.com/vmk, as Finn had instructed. He next clicked on the logo and was asked for his username and password. A moment later, to his surprise, he arrived at VMK’s Central Plaza, in control of an avatar. He navigated the avatar toward a bench at the center of the screen.
Wayne? he typed. But as Finn had warned, nothing appeared, only the question mark. He typed the name again. His speech bubble showed only his ID—philitup—and a question mark. Growing impatient, Philby walked his avatar around the plaza. A minute passed, feeling more like five. For a third time, he tried typing the name. Nothing.
As he circled back around to the benches, a speech bubble appeared above an avatar with unusually white hair. Philby couldn’t remember having seen hair that color inside VMK before.
[ ]: were you looking for someone? appeared above the white head.
philitup: uncle wait’s pen. finn sent me.
[ ]: follow me
As Finn had done before him, Philby followed Wayne on a long trip through the Web site to a private room Philby had never seen before. Wayne’s avatar shut a door behind them.
[ ]: we can talk here, anything typed is encrypted.
philitup: okay.
[ ]: do you have a message from finn?
philitup: we need engineering blueprints for the AK, it looks like Jez may have messed with the sound system, if i can study the way it all works, maybe we can find her.
[ ]: messed with?
philitup: a song—Under the Sea—was played over the PA. not only does that song not belong in AK, but it played three times in a row, and amanda says it’s the same singer jez has on her iPod, not the singer disney uses.
[ ]: i see.
philitup: finn thought you could help me get the plans, i thought about that maintenance place you showed us, but how can i get past the workers?
[ ]: you won’t need to. besides, this time of day it’s too risky, there’s a better way. once we leave this room, we’re no longer encrypted, i won’t answer any questions out there, so i’ll explain everything now. once we leave here, you’re on your own, although i’ll show you the way. i’ll get you inside.
philitup: inside where?
[ ]: patience, my boy.
Wayne’s avatar moved back to the door. He typed in a code that showed only as asterisks in his speech bubble. The door opened. The avatar stepped out into the hall, looked in both directions, and returned to the room, again shutting and code-locking the door.
[ ]: can never be too careful, it would appear we’re all alone, which is good. VMK was not always a game, originally, the imagineers wanted to create a virtual control room for the various parks, essentially, they were lazy, they wanted a way to fix small mechanical problems, or study the schematics from remote locations—their homes, or while they were traveling, the more employees, the more sets of plans were needed, and the paper plans were constantly changing and needing updating as systems were improved or modified, a guy named alex wright came up with the idea of putting it all online, they would encrypt access for security reasons, and each Imagineer or employee would have his or her own avatar—a mock human being with hands and feet that could not only study the schematics online but could carry out some minimal maintenance or switching procedures: open boxes, pull switches, the area they created was termed the virtual magic kingdom—vmk—and in their spare time they began to create games with each other, they built rooms and attractions in their virtual world, it was only much later it occurred to someone to allow the public inside, at that time, they sealed off what they call the mechanicals, hiding them behind encrypted firewalls, last year it became apparent the Overtakers were trying to compromise VMK. the site was closed to the public, i can get you access to the mechanicals if that’s what you want?
philitup: does that include the music system?
[ ]: i would imagine, follow me. and don’t write anything until I tell you to do so. it is not beyond consideration that the overtakers are monitoring vmk. they should never be underestimated, they are devious and powerful, and it’s apparent they will stop at nothing to control the kingdoms, we must be vigilant.
Philby didn’t type anything. He guided his avatar toward the door and waited as instructed.
Wayne approached. Asterisks appeared in his speech bubble. The door swung open.
Philby’s avatar followed the white-headed figure out into the hallway. Wayne knew his way around VMK, taking Philby to places he’d rarely visited. They entered a private room that didn’t look particularly interesting. Philby realized this was a trick: the less interesting it looked, the less interested anyone would be in spending time in there. Wayne coded the door shut and then approached the far wall. Again, asterisks filled his speech bubble. A door swung open, and the landscape changed considerably. The walls and floors were silver and black. Dark blue signs with white lettering acted as trail guides:
They turned left, following the signs to the Animal Kingdom.
Access through the door marked AK CONTROL required yet another code from Wayne. The door opened, revealing a room with a flow chart projected on a large wall. It reminded Philby of a war room, like he’d seen in movies. The flow chart showed: MECHANICALS, SECURITY, STRUCTURES, ATTRACTIONS, GATES/ACCESS, BACKSTAGE. Under some of these were smaller tides like ASIA, AFRICA, CAMP MM, DINO L. It looked like a giant outline or family tree, with branches connecting a main tide to its smaller subtitles.
Wayne’s avatar climbed into a cage on the end of a long mechanical arm. It reminded Philby of the cherry pickers road crews used to trim trees or repair phone poles. Wayne pulled the door to the cage shut, and Philby watched as he pushed levers and the cage rose to pass in front of the titles on the flow chart.
He maneuvered them to stop at MECHANICALS. Wayne reached out and pushed against the screen. Immediately, the projection on the wall changed. Now MECHANICALS was listed at the top, and there were dozens of subcategories, including—Philby noticed—PUBLIC ADDRESS SYSTEM.
Wayne reached out and tapped the title.
The lettering folded back, opening an entrance like a window in the wall. Wayne opened the cage door and led them through this new opening in the wall and into a massively complex room. Philby gasped. He heard his own voice and only then was reminded of where he was: standing in a small hut, in Camp Minnie-Mickey. For the past few minutes he had almost become his avatar. He’d been transported. He hadn’t remembered where he was. Now, glancing behind him, he looked out through the open doorway into Camp Minnie-Mickey and reminded himself to remain alert; the Overtakers were not to be underestimated.
&nbs
p; He then looked to the screen; Wayne was waiting for him.
[ ]: we’re safe now.
Philby moved his avatar forward. He faced a large sound-mixer projected on the floor in front of him. He studied it, realizing this was a photographic image, probably of the actual soundboard somewhere in the Animal Kingdom’s control room. And, like the real thing, the virtual soundboard would not only allow him to change volume or inputs throughout the Park, it also displayed cables to switching stations and the hundreds of speakers placed throughout the Animal Kingdom. With a click of a button, he could then overlay either a satellite image or a map of the Park, making it easy to identify the exact location of the various sound-system elements. Wayne was right: it offered an easy method for troubleshooting problems or identifying problem spots without being in the Park.
Slowly, he got the hang of the technology.
philitup: whoa…
[ ]: no one ever accused the imagineers of being stupid.
philitup: this is incredible, i can follow any wire anywhere.
[ ]: and perform tests on it i should think that was the purpose after all: long-distance testing and repair.
philitup: how much time do i have?
[ ]: no one will bother us here, take as long as you like, since i’ve gone into hiding, i have nothing but time.
Philby’s main interest was the separation of the Park’s background music, divided into the five sound areas. Each area had its own output, volume, and tone controls. He located the output wires on the back of the mixer—virtual speaker wires leading out into the Park.
philitup: what are the chances the Overtakers have jez locked up in the sound control room? she could input her iPod into this mixer pretty easily.
[ ]: i would doubt that but i can go check if you like.
philitup: check, how?
[ ]: all the security cameras are on the screen out there, where we just were: the main screen, i can go into the security control room and view any camera in the park.
Philby had an idea. He wondered…
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