Finn asked Maybeck if he’d found out anything about the DHI servers. Any clue as to why they all fainted at the same time. “Was Wayne right about that?”

“You remember we had to sign those releases before they started turning us into DHIs?”

Maybeck replied. “Some of these imaging techniques have never been tried before. That’s what makes it look so cool, right? It’s, like, totally new stuff. The DHI servers clearly control our holograms, but why they could affect us as humans is really weird. In crossing back over we must take something of our DHIs with us. We don’t see it, we don’t feel it, but it’s there. That might explain how messing with the servers made us feel faint. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m not real keen on someone else controlling me. I’m not loving that idea. I think the time will come when we’d rather have control of the servers ourselves. So that’s what I’m working on.”

Murmurs rippled through the group. No one objected to the idea of gaining self-control.

“The Fall Games are tomorrow,” Charlene said. “Is everyone here going?”

They realized they would all be there, participating in various sports.

“That gives us a chance to meet again,” Finn said. “Let’s meet by the snack bar before any of the sports get going.”

“Psst!” Maybeck’s arm appeared briefly as he reached across the doorway and pulled Charlene’s knee back inside. In the shadow her leg became invisible.

Finn then heard what Maybeck had heard: the sound of footsteps, the crunching of gravel.

Nearby. Security guards? At the same time, he felt a sudden draft, like when he stepped into an air-conditioned room. He shivered.

“I feel you…” It was a woman’s hoarse whisper, raspy and dry, as if she had sand in her throat. Gooseflesh rippled up Finn’s arms and down his spine. He was freezing now. “You don’t belong here. Go away.”

The sound of footsteps moved slowly away from their teepee, and continued on to the next.

Finn held his breath. The sound stopped, and then headed back toward them.

Inside the teepee came a soft shuffling sound as the invisible Maybeck and Charlene moved farther away from the door.

“I feel you,” came that awful voice again. “You can’t hide from me.”

It wasn’t just any woman’s voice. Finn had heard that voice before. But how was that possible?

The footfalls circled the teepee and came around front again. Two legs appeared, with black stockings that ended at low-heeled, shiny black shoes. An invisible Willa reached over and found Finn’s hand and clutched it tightly. Hers was warm and clammy.

The black-stockinged legs bent as a hand appeared in the teepee’s doorway.

A green hand. The hand emerged from the end of a long black sleeve. Green as a lizard, the knuckles bent and bumpy, the nails as long as claws. Charlene gasped aloud. Too loud.

The air grew colder still. The woman bent over fully and peered into the dark teepee. She wore a robelike black dress with jagged purple fringe and a purple stripe running up the middle—

some kind of costume.

“Interesting,” she said, staring into an empty teepee.

Now Finn understood how he knew this voice: it was from one of the Disney movies. But which one?

He racked his brain, as Willa’s hand grew colder in his. She squeezed so hard, it hurt.

The woman bent lower, and lower still. The air grew colder and colder.

A green neck appeared, then a green chin, a green nose, and finally her full face. Wretched, yet somehow beautiful.

It was Maleficent, the mean-spirited witch from Sleeping Beauty, the most ill-tempered and dreaded witch of all.

His eyes were stinging with ice, Finn looked away, thinking the cold might kill him. When he looked back, she was gone. Two footprint-shaped patches of ice showed where her shoes had been. The ground was frozen solid where she had stood.

No one spoke for several long minutes. Finn was the first to break the silence, in a faint whisper. “Was that an illusion?”

“If it was, it was one solid illusion,” Maybeck said.

Philby asked. “What about the cold? Was I the only one who felt that?”

“No way!” they all chorused.

“I had my eyes shut,” Charlene confessed.

“Me too,” Willa admitted. Only then did she let go of Finn’s hand. He was glad they were all invisible. He wouldn’t have wanted to explain their holding hands.

Maybeck scooted forward, and as he did, partially reappeared at the mouth of the teepee’s open door. About a third of him peered outside, the rest of him invisible.

“She’s gone,” Maybeck said.

“She?” Charlene asked.

“Her skin certainly looked real enough,” Finn said.

“That was green skin, not green makeup. Mark my words,” Maybeck said, “I know the difference.”

“Are you suggesting what I think you’re suggesting?” Willa asked.

Finn offered the only explanation he could think of: “I think we just met an Overtaker.”

14

The Wide World of Sports complex housed eleven baseball diamonds, a separate major- and minor-league baseball stadium with seating for nine thousand, five sports fields, a tennis complex, and a 400-meter running track. The facility had as many parking lots as an airport. Various buildings, all painted yellow, were scattered around the grounds and housed a cafe, locker rooms, and meeting halls.

On this October afternoon, nearly a thousand local students and their families jammed the complex for the annual Fall Games.

“You’re not telling me anything,” Amanda complained, as she and Finn walked toward the snack bar. “All you care about is hooking up with the others. What, I’m suddenly not your friend?”

“It’s not like that.”

“Looks that way to me.”

“Listen…all sorts of weird stuff’s happening.”

“Well, that certainly clarifies things.”

“It’s complicated.” Suddenly Finn spotted Philby and Maybeck, both in their gym clothes, as they climbed the steps to the central facility that housed locker rooms and an indoor-outdoor snack bar. A TV news crew was picking out kids to interview. Finn steered well clear of the cameras; his celebrity as a DHI made him a prime target for TV.

Finn felt the curious warmth on the back of his neck that he always felt when someone’s eyes were on him. Through the chaotic crowds of kids and parents, coaches and referees, volunteers and Wide World employees, Finn spotted a girl looking at him. Not just any girl. She was beautiful, with pale skin that set off her jet-black hair. Her deep-set gray eyes captivated him, even from a distance. He’d never seen her before.

It didn’t take Amanda long to notice Finn gazing at the girl. She stared long and hard at her.

“Who’s that?” Finn asked.

“Who?” Amanda tried to pretend she hadn’t seen her.

“The girl you’re staring at.”

“Never seen her before.” Is Amanda upset with me? Finn wondered. She turned and hurried off.

Finn called out to stop her, but she pretended not to hear.

The pale girl with the black hair smiled at Finn, who couldn’t avoid passing next to her on his way to join the others.

“Hey, Finn,” she said, as if they knew each other.

He stopped. “Hey.”

“I’m Jez.”

“That’s an unusual name.”

“Short for Jezebel. It’s from the Bible.” She wasn’t proud of this. “My mother. You know how that goes.”

“Lawrence Finnegan Whitman. My parents actually thought they’d call me Larry. Larry! Can you imagine? I switched it to Finn in third grade, though it’s not much better.” He couldn’t stop his mouth from talking. He told himself, Shut up!, but he kept on going. “And then all the fish jokes started coming. Fin, this. Fin, that.”

“What’s your sport?”