“There’s only one guy I know who can answer that. And he’s also the guy who holds the button. The remote control that can cross them back over.”

“Wayne!”

“If I can get that remote from him, and we can get close to those cages, we can release the sleeping Willa and Philby—wherever they are. And I happen to think I know where they are.”

Maybeck didn’t dignify that with a question, but he also couldn’t wipe the curiosity off his face.

“Animal Kingdom Lodge,” Finn answered. “Those are the closest beds to the Park. You can reach the lodge from the savannah, and we know the Overtakers are on the savannah.”

“I’ve got to admit: it does make sense,” Maybeck said. “When exactly did you figure all this out?”

“Back there,” Finn said. “When Charlene described the cages, it all fit.”

“And now we’re headed to find Wayne.”

“Yeah. There’s the terminal in Camp Minnie-Mickey. I can access VMK there,” Finn said.

“I thought Philby never came back from that terminal.”

“Which is why we’re doing this together,” Finn said. “Charlene will stay and keep an eye on the enclosure. I’ll use the terminal to try to get to Wayne, and you’ll stand guard. We’ll use the DSs. You see anything weird, you can text me.”

They started walking again.

“But what if we’re wrong about the cages?” Maybeck asked.

“We’re not,” answered Finn.

* * *

Finn’s avatar stood by the bench in the VMK’s central plaza, while Finn himself occupied the small booth near the Lion King pavilion in Camp Minnie-Mickey. The air was burning hot, and he picked up the smell of popcorn, which made him realize how hungry he was. He knew that soon his parents would start to worry. They would expect him home from the water park. But he had things to do.

Knowing it would not print, he typed WAYNE into his dialogue box. Sure enough, it turned red in the text frame and wouldn’t print.

Players’ avatars entered the plaza, pausing below the billboards or circulating while waiting to meet each other. Finn’s patience was wearing thin when a white-haired avatar finally appeared from his right. Wayne’s avatar never stopped moving as Follow me appeared in the dialogue box.

He led Finn to the same room where he had taken Philby. Wayne locked the door with a special code.

[ ]: we’re safe here.

Finn: philby and willa have gone missing, we think their DHIs are being kept in cages behind the bat enclosure, i need the button.

[ ]: I spoke to philby not long ago. right here.

Finn: he never showed up. i think Maleficent is holding them to protect the second server, we can’t crash the server with willa and philby stuck in Sleeping Beauty Syndrome.

[ ]: this is most disturbing.

Finn: can you get me the button—the remote control?

[ ]: yes. of course, though i’ll have to use a messenger…. may i suggest the talking recycling bin. a few minutes from now, near the ticket gates, the remote will be taped inside the recycling bin. reach in and feel along the top.

Finn: i’ll be there.

[ ]: if she’s trying to protect the second server, then I fear the worst: she will either turn herself into a DHI to fool us or do harm, or she will compromise the animal DHIs created for Animal Kingdom and use them to her advantage, this is a grave situation, in the magic kingdom she recruited Overtakers from within the attractions, most notably the pirates and the small-world dolls, in animal kingdom there are few, if any, such characters she can recruit for her army, it is our fear she has corrupted the animals themselves, five more orangutans have escaped, along with a half dozen gibbons, several snakes cannot be found, a wildebeest rammed one of the electrical fences attempting to break out. she is clearly gaining strength.

Finn: we want our friends back. Jez drew some things in her diary that have already come true, we think the diary may be—

He stopped typing as Maybeck shouted: “Mayday, dude! Mayday! Mayday!”

40

MAYBECK KEPT WATCH from the side of a popcorn cart, where a multicolored umbrella was angled to throw shade onto the Cast Member behind the cart. The tilted umbrella offered Maybeck a screen from behind which he peered, spying on Finn and the Park guests milling about Camp Minnie-Mickey, as well as the surrounding jungle. Nearby, a gardener was watering some plants and hosing down the base of two tall trees, allowing the water to pool.

Because of his personal experiences, Maybeck also kept an eye on the sky, alert for any birds. But it was a lizard, not a bird, that caught and held his attention.

Small lizards inhabited most of Florida. He’d grown so accustomed to seeing them zip up trees, across sidewalks, and down the walls of buildings that he almost didn’t notice them at all. His aunt Jelly, who was as close to a mother as Maybeck would ever get, called them “little dragons” and considered them close relatives to the cockroach and mouse. She wasn’t beyond trying to beat them with a broom as she shooed them from the house. He’d been catching them since he was five; if you grabbed one by the tail, the tail came off. For a while he’d kept the tails—he’d had about twenty—but Jelly had found them and thrown them out, never saying a thing about it, then lying to him when he asked.

But the lizard he saw wasn’t like other lizards. For one thing it was fairly big—five or six inches, instead of the typical three or four. It was also some kind of chameleon, quickly changing from the brown of the wood chips in the jungle to the grayish black of the paved path as the reptile emerged into sunlight. But more than anything, it was the way the lizard headed straight into trouble that won Maybeck’s interest. Despite dozens of running shoes and sandals slapping down around it like mallets, the creature never wavered from its mission, dodging this way and that as it risked getting crushed. The lizards that Maybeck lived with spooked easily and skittered away as fast as lightning when approached. He’d never seen a lizard as bold as this one. It headed straight for…

…the Disney Vacation Web terminal.

Maybeck looked back toward the jungle from where the lizard had emerged. From there, in the shaded darkness held in place by tangled vines and leaves the size of tennis rackets, two sets of green glowing eyes stared out. He fixed his attention on them, trying to strip away the camouflage of plants and undergrowth in order to see to what those eyes belonged.

Monkeys…he thought at first. But the eyes were too widely set for a gibbon, and too far off the ground. Orangutans!

It was then that he saw the chameleon stitch its way back through the slalom course of legs and slither into the jungle, heading directly for the green flash of eyes.

As much as he resisted the idea that any of this was actually happening, he sorted it out quickly: the lizard was some kind of messenger; the monkeys were on a mission; Finn was their target.

A moment passed, and he realized he’d almost had it right.

Almost, but not quite. That’s when he saw a lion slink out of the jungle. He fumbled with the DS, but it was going to take too long.

“Mayday, dude! Mayday!” he shouted.

The Park visitors saw the lion as well. A man screamed as a woman grabbed her children by the hands and started to run. The crowd scattered.

Finn turned around and froze.

Maybeck again glanced to his left—the gardener. He knew what to do.

41

FINN SPUN AROUND to see a lion strolling toward him. A big lion. A lion with a thick collar of fur, a huge head, beady eyes, and glistening white teeth. He instantly knew this was not a case of bad luck: the lion was coming for him just as the bats had come for Maybeck.

The lion lumbered toward him, now only a few yards away. The guests had scattered but now encircled an area about twenty yards across, with the beast at its center.