She screamed. Her hologram outline dimmed.
“You…witch!” she uttered angrily.
“You are correct. This small girl, impossible to lose; she now finds no way to move.” The Evil Queen waved her index finger in a tight circle.
Willa tried to run. She could hardly lift her legs. She was quickly surrounded by cathedral guards. Behind them, on the points of the compass, four crash-test dummies on Segways.
Cruella De Vil stepped out from behind the Queen.
“Well, well. I have to compliment you, dearest,” she said to the Evil Queen. “You’re quite the little Venus flytrap.”
The Queen ignored her. “The judge asked you a question, little girl,” the Queen said to Willa, her eyes squinting. “I fear you were rude to him. Let me explain that being rude to me will have far more…devastating results. Hmmm? Do I make myself clear?” The Evil Queen stepped forward. Willa found her beauty bewitching and powerful.
She nodded against her will. The sensation in her limbs slowly returned. Her legs no longer felt like they weighed a ton.
“Then out with it,” the Queen ordered. “Or suffer!” Another flick of her hand and Willa bent over in a convulsion, like she had been punched in the stomach. This despite her being in her state of partial DHI. She hated to think how that would hurt when flesh and blood.
The Queen waved her hands again and her lips trembled as she chanted some kind of incantation.
Spiders appeared out of cracks in the pavement. Hundreds, thousands of them. Small ones. Red ones. Black ones. HUGE ones. They swarmed at Willa’s feet, leaving her in the center of an oozing circle of hairy spiders. If she moved even slightly…
She was terrified, which dampened her DHI, making her more vulnerable. She was outmatched. The Queen got what the Queen wanted.
“WHAT DID JEZEBEL DRAW?”
“A face! A man,” Willa volunteered, still bent over, her stomach in a knot. The spiders encroached.
The witch cackled with laughter that sounded like breaking ice. “Who? What man? And be careful you don’t lie, little thing.” She began to sing. “‘The Itsy Bitsy Spider…’”
The ring of spiders tightened at Willa’s feet.
“A man…in uniform.”
* * *
Finn’s DHI climbed the stone steps running up the center of the Mexico pavilion, a Mayan temple with balconies of flowers on either side of the center staircase. He’d taken this same route with Philby; he knew what he was doing. Maybeck’s DHI had already reached the top, climbing as effortlessly as a cat.
“Wait up!” hissed a humiliated Finn.
“Move it!” Maybeck said. He watched Finn climb. “It’s only a set of stairs.”
Tiny stairs, steep stairs, Finn felt like saying, but he kept his mouth shut.
“Memo to Whitman: I don’t think you’re going to be able to see Willa from up here. So what, in the name of cream cheese, are we doing here?”
“Doing what Philby told us to do,” Finn whispered back. “Into the booth.”
“The IllumiNations booth? How’s that supposed to help Willa?”
“Remember in The Wizard of Oz, the man behind the curtain?”
“Sure. The old guy. What about him?”
“That’s you. You’re the man behind the curtain. You’re the one controlling things.”
“I’m liking this plan more and more, Whitman.”
I knew you would, Finn nearly said. “Okay, so pay attention.”
* * *
The longer he sat there staring at his computer monitor, the more concerned Philby grew. The webcam view was of the Park as a whole. He could see a few black specks move from time to time, but they looked about the size of ants. He couldn’t tell who or what they were, or what they were up to. If Finn is going to send me a signal, he thought, it had better be something good. Otherwise, I might miss it. So he focused intently on the most recent development: a thick group of ants had congregated between Spaceship Earth and the office building near the entrance. That couldn’t be good. It might be a meeting of Security, or a cleaning or maintenance team getting ready to deploy around the Park, or it could easily be Overtakers.
When Philby heard rustling in the bushes outside his window, he looked away from his computer.
The window was unlocked. Not good. What if there was a serial killer creeping around their house?
When he heard more brushing of sticks against the side of the house, goose bumps raced up his arms—something was out there, and it was too big to be a dog.
More like a person.
* * *
Willa was not scared of spiders; she was terrified of them. They moved as a mass around her bare feet within inches of touching her. Her DHI was anything but pure, making her physically vulnerable.
“What kind of uniform?” the Queen asked.
She’d said too much already. She hated herself for having said anything. “A security officer,” she lied. “Like at the airport.”
There were two huge vultures following behind her. Cruella steered clear of the birds as she walked around Willa, studying her.
Willa’s eyes followed Cruella.
“I don’t think so,” the Evil Queen said. She waved her hand. The spiders swarmed over Willa’s feet and started up her ankles. She cried out and kicked with both legs, like running in place, but the spiders kept coming. Screaming, she brushed them away, but there were thousands of them, and each time her bare feet landed she felt them squish beneath her while a hundred more climbed onto her.
“Get them off!”
Willa jumped out of the oozing black circle, but a vulture came at her, flapping its large wings, and stuck its grotesque bald head and curved beak into her face, driving her back. She leaped to her left, and the second vulture blocked her there as well. She fled back into the swarm of spiders. Some had reached her knees. As fast as she could brush them off, they gained on her.
“STOP IT!”
“What kind of uniform, dear?” the Queen said in a perfectly calm voice.
“Military, I think. Those things on his shoulders.” She jumped and hopped and swatted at the spiders.
The Queen waved the spiders down and off her. They formed the doughnut again, with Willa at the center.
“That’s better, my little ugly duckling,” the Queen said. “More details, and I’ll keep them off you.”
Willa collected herself and looked up, intent to meet eyes with the Queen. But what she saw just beyond the Queen nearly stopped her heart: Finn. Her friend Finn, not the Queen’s copy of him. He wore all black and was carrying the shimmering blue line that said he’d crossed over. Finn, who’d come to rescue her.
The Evil Queen caught Willa’s eye movement and, without looking behind her, made a sweeping, surprisingly graceful motion toward Finn, her lips moving, but making no sound. Whatever she had expected to happen to him did not. The blue line around Finn’s DHI shimmered, though only slightly—he was only part hologram. He rushed Willa, lowered his shoulder, and hit her like a football tackle, throwing her onto his shoulder. He took off at a run.
Spiders raced up his back, Willa brushing them off furiously. She looked down: the stream of spiders had stretched into long black line like a…
Snake.
Gigabyte, the twenty-foot python, was a matter of yards behind Finn. The vultures flew on either side of him.
Back at Gigabyte’s tail, the remaining spiders turned into rattlesnakes.
“Finn…” Willa gasped, laying atop his shoulder. “Snakes.”
The rattlesnakes moved faster than the giant python.
“Finn?” she said.
He could feel himself slowing down—the more frightened she became, the heavier she was to carry.
“Don’t…look!” he said. He followed the path past Innoventions West and aimed for the fountain plaza, now in sight. Maybeck’s timing was going to have to be perfect, or between the snakes and vultures they would lose their chance to Return.
The
fountain was now only a matter of twenty yards away. A figure appeared on the far side, toward the lake: Maybeck, running at a full sprint, two CTDs on foot chasing him.
* * *
Maybeck counted down in his head: thirty-nine…thirty-eight…thirty-seven…
He had a pair of robots on his tail, pursuing his DHI at lightning speed. One of them had gotten close enough to fire some kind of Taser, but because of his DHI state, its electrodes and wires had passed right through him.
Up ahead he saw Whitman carrying Willa on his shoulder, and some kind of broken shadow slithering behind him. Behind the shadow came the Evil Queen and Cruella. If this had been Philby’s plan, he was out of his skull. They’d walked right into a nest of Overtakers.
“Uncool!” he shouted as he skidded to a stop, seeing the snakes—not shadows but snakes!—braiding themselves around the feet of Finn’s DHI.
“Do NOT look down!” Maybeck added.
Finn looked down. His blue hologram line faded and the tangle of snakes locked around his partially mortal ankles, and Finn fell, dumping Willa, whom Maybeck caught in his arms.
Maybeck had lost count. Eighteen? Twelve? Whitman had told him he had to keep count.
Oops …
Finn rose to his elbows, but surrounded by hissing rattlesnakes, he froze.
“Welcome, boys,” said the Evil Queen, finally catching up.
Maybeck helped Willa keep her balance as he put her down. It was a clever move—it put her within an arm’s length of Finn. If she dared to reach across the snakes, they could hold hands.
* * *
Philby stared out his window. It was not a serial killer; it was Hugo Montcliff, and more important, he had Elvis in his arms. Elvis, an inside cat, had disappeared earlier that afternoon and Philby’s mom had been distraught. Hugo would be a family hero for years to come.
Philby threw open the window. “You found him! My mother’s going to saint you.”
“He was wandering around the Evans’ house.”
“Need the couch tonight?” Philby knew Hugo couldn’t suffer his parents screaming fights all night.
“You mind?”
“Climb on in,” Philby said, making a gesture like a hotel doorman. Hugo passed him Elvis and followed through the window.
Philby felt a shiver, but blamed it on the night air.
“Sorry, I’ve got to be rude,” Philby said, shutting and locking the window, “but I’m jamming.” He pointed to his desk. “It’s late, so be as quiet as you can. Wouldn’t want to wake up my mom. Towel’s in the closet. I’ll catch you in the morning.”
“Maybe I shouldn’t stay.” Hugo’s voice had dropped an octave. He spoke softly, sounding hurt.
Philby, who was now a step closer to his desk, looked back at his friend, feeling sorry for him. “No, I didn’t mean that. I’ll be done in a couple minutes.”
“Is that Epcot?” Hugo said, stepping closer.
“That’s amazing you could recognize it,” Philby said. His screen was nothing but some lights, the shimmering water of the lake, and…the little ants had moved to the fountain plaza.
That has to be Finn and Maybeck. But there were way too many ants on the screen—if it was Finn, he and Maybeck weren’t alone.
“Can I play?” Hugo asked.
“Ah…it’s not exactly a game, and, ah…You know, if you don’t mind, I’m a little busy right now.”
“Oh, but I do mind,” Hugo said. “Don’t touch that keyboard.”
Philby spun around. With Hugo having been outside in the dark, he hadn’t gotten a good look at him, especially given that he’d been holding Elvis. The cat had won Philby’s attention—by design, Philby thought. Because Hugo’s eyes were a vivid green.
Hugo had brown eyes.
Philby couldn’t believe it! Hugo? Of all people! After all Philby’s family had given to the boy! He felt overcome with anger and disbelief.
He saw his terry cloth bathrobe and belt lying on his bed. The belt would work to tie Hugo up.
Philby charged.
Hugo knocked him out of the way and onto the bed. Where had that kind of strength come from? Philby did a somersault and sprang from his haunches, launching himself at the boy.
To his right, a burst of color erupted across his computer screen.
The signal.
* * *
The lake burst into flames, flooding the night sky and illuminating every pavilion in a wash of golden light. It reflected off the face of the Evil Queen. It danced in Cruella’s eyes.
Finn hopped to his knees and stood, leaning to reach across the tangle of rattlesnakes and touch Willa’s outstretched hand.
It was not only the water burning. A dozen towering torches surrounding the lake had also burst into flames. But the water effect, part of the IllumiNations show, was a spectacular sight: giant balls of orange flames boiling off the water’s surface and rising into the dark, looking like the surface of the sun.
The timing of the effect had been Maybeck’s job: to schedule the pyrotechnics that Professor Philby had discovered on the control booth’s computer when he and Finn had visited two nights earlier. More than a thousand different pieces of ordnance on water barges, and a half-dozen laser projectors mounted on top of pavilions, were all synchronized by the IllumiNations computer. Following their spotting Willa and the Queen on the Security video, Maybeck had scheduled the fire events, giving himself five minutes to leave the control room, climb down the Mayan Temple, and catch up to Finn. With it nearing one am and the scheduled manual Return, maybe the pyrotechnics would offer a needed distraction.
Given that it looked like all of Epcot was on fire, there was no way Philby could miss the signal.
Now all he had to do was remotely tell the DHI server to Return them.
* * *
Philby witnessed the wash of flames engulfing Epcot’s lake and stretched for the computer’s Return/Enter key.
But Hugo held him by the shoulders, struggling to get his arms around Philby’s chest and squeeze the wind out of him. Philby stumbled back, his fingers hitting the spacebar instead of the Return key.
He threw an elbow into Hugo’s stomach, and groaning, Hugo let go. Philby regained his balance…took a step toward his desk…and was tackled to the floor.
He went down hard, face-first. Philby rolled over and kicked out, catching Hugo in the face. But Hugo scrambled on top of Philby, pinning his shoulders and winding up with a balled fist. As Hugo drove the fist toward his face, Philby jerked his head. Hugo punched the floor. Philby’s hand found the wicker trash can; he raked it across Hugo’s face and the boy went off him.
Philby rolled and shoved his hand into Hugo’s face—the fake green eyes staring back, unflinching and terrifying. Philby couldn’t look at those eyes. He turned away.
Hugo grabbed both of Philby’s wrists, pushing up, trying to get Philby off; Philby pushed back, trying to hold Hugo down. Their arms began to tremble, then to shake.
Light flashed from the computer, the lake alive with fire.
Philby managed to pin Hugo’s left arm with his knee and reach for the computer with his right hand. Hugo rocked side to side attempting to free his arm, and making it impossible for Philby to properly aim his fingers. He missed the Return key three times in a row.
Hugo kneed Philby in the back, freeing his hand, which he used to palm Philby below the chin and propel him back toward the bed.
Hugo jumped up and reached for the Escape key, which would close the current window—Philby’s link with the DHI server.
Philby had bit his lip; he tasted the salty tang of blood in his mouth. He was mad.
Elvis was just standing there on the bed like a spectator. Philby grabbed him and held him just behind the front legs and lunged for Hugo using the same technique his family members used to train Elvis to use his scratching pole. It forced Elvis to extend his front claws—claws that now tore through Hugo’s shirt, leaving eight narrow tracks of blood behind as Philby dragged him down
the boy’s back, and then tossed Elvis back onto the bed as Hugo let out a gut-wrenching scream.
Philby spun Hugo around, tripped him, and dumped him to the floor. He stabbed for the Return key.
THIS ACTION CANNOT BE UNDONE
DO YOU WISH PROCEED? Y/N
He hit Y.
The bedroom door burst open. A wrinkly-faced woman with no makeup, an adhesive strip across the bridge of her nose stretching her cheeks, and wearing a pair of pajamas covered with cartoons of Marge Simpson, shouted: “BOYS!”
Both Hugo and Philby stopped cold.
“What in the devil is going on, young man?” Philby’s mom said to him. The next thing she said was, “Elvis?” in a loving and kind voice of pure affection.
Hugo stood up, unlocked the window, threw it open, and dove outside.
Philby watched the bandwidth meter spike in the bottom right corner of the computer screen. The DHI properties of the holograms were being saved back to the DHI server. The Return. The whole process could take anywhere from ten to sixty seconds.
Precious seconds.
“Dell?” his mother said.
“Please, Mom, no!” Philby said, seeing his mother march toward his desk. “Remember what happened to me?” he said in a begging tone. “If you shut my computer, it’ll happen to all three of them—Finn, Willa, and Maybeck. Mom! You don’t want that to happen.”
Shutting the computer, putting it into sleep mode, would send his friends to sleep along with it. Stuck in the Syndrome.
* * *
Finn couldn’t take his eyes off the trembling hands of the Evil Queen held high above her head. She reminded him of a major league pitcher in his windup. She was about to deliver some kind of spitball, sinker spell, that would make the spiders and rattlesnakes look like kids’ stuff. Something nasty.
The flames licked off the lake.
Tears ran down Willa’s face as she mouthed, “Thank you,” to Finn.
The Evil Queen threw her hands at them with a witch’s fury, her lips spouting an incantation.
“Children in peril
Children in fright—”
But she stopped before completing it.
Willa had disappeared.
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