PHILBY WHISPERED TO MAYBECK. “I don’t like this. Reminds me of Small World.”

“I hear you,” returned Maybeck in an equally soft voice.

They were inside the doors of Maelstrom, walking quietly through the empty waiting-line area, approaching the attraction’s loading dock. The main lights had been turned off. There was no music. As they arrived at the loading area, where guests would board the boats, the enormous painted mural facing them was barely lit, so that only the most brightly colored paint jumped out at them: a red-and-white striped sail, the top half of the sun, a village of white buildings.

“How do you spell creepy?” Maybeck asked.

A boat awaited them, the water gurgling around it.

“Why do I not want to get into that boat?” Philby said.

“It wouldn’t have anything to do with the Norwegian and his son who just happened into Wonders, would it?”

“And the axe he was carrying?” Philby said.

“I didn’t see that.”

“I didn’t mention it to any of the others, because I don’t think they saw it either, but oh, yes: the redhead was carrying a very large axe.”

“You’re so comforting.”

“I try.”

“Well, try a little less, would you?” Maybeck said.

“Get in the boat,” Philby advised. “I’ll turn on the ride,” he said, pointing to a control console, “and jump in as it’s moving.”

“And if you happen not to make it and I end up in there alone?”

“The sword,” Philby said.

“You’d better not chicken out and leave me to do this alone.”

“Don’t sweat it. I’ll make it to the boat in time.”

Maybeck climbed into the second row. Philby hit the START button on the console and ran to the edge and, with plenty of time to spare, climbed in alongside Maybeck.

“Okay, we’ve got problems,” Philby said, practically before he had sat down. He pointed to a curving bow of a boat that stuck out of the mural; it was wooden and three-dimensional.

“Yeah? So?” Maybeck said.

“That’s where the dude and his son are supposed to be.”

The front of the display boat was empty.

“Meaning?”

“They could be anywhere.”

“An axe,” Maybeck stated.

“True story.”

“In here somewhere?”

“Could be.”

“Why can’t we be normal kids?” Maybeck asked.

“I think we have Wayne to thank for that. Wayne and our parents who wanted the college funds.”

“College funds don’t do you any good if you aren’t alive to go to college.”

“True story.”

The boat began to climb. Into the dark. Into the sound of rushing water and the pounding of their own hearts in their ears.

* * *

“But what if she’s in trouble?” Jess demanded.

“Then she’ll get out of it, or she’ll call or text,” Charlene answered. The two were hunkered down where the bridge abutted the path, only a matter of thirty yards from the entrance to France. Street lamps cast a soft light.

Charlene led her to their right, along a retaining wall where a bicycle and canoe were fixed to the wall to simulate the towpath along the river Seine. Reaching the end of this retaining wall, they climbed over and into some well-manicured shrubs, and higher up, to just behind a bench, overlooking the plaza in front of France.

“But…”

“Our job is to get in there and find out if there’s a connection to Wayne. Willa is smart. She’ll think of something. If she needs us, we’ll hear from her. I’ll go first. You wait until I signal you. Okay?”

Jess clung to the rock wall, looking timid and afraid.

“Jess, we’re good at this. You have to trust me, the same way we all trust your dreams. We wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for you. All this, everything we’re doing is because of you, because Wayne picked you somehow, and don’t ask me to explain it, because I can’t. None of this makes any sense out there in what everyone calls the ‘real world,’ but this world is just as real, believe me. And it’s the world we’re in right now, so you’ve got to trust me.”

“It’s just so…different,” Jess said, looking at her own hand glowing.

“I know what that’s like. I remember what it was like the first few times. I thought it was some kind of dream. If it wasn’t for the others, I’d still think it’s a dream. But it isn’t. We’re here and we’ve got stuff to do, and I need you to trust me. Willa’s going to be okay, and if she isn’t we’ll help her. It’s just the way it is.”

Jess nodded, still mesmerized by her illuminated hand. “I’ll bet you’re a good cheerleader.”

“Sit tight and wait for my signal.”

Charlene sprang into action. Up and over and past the bench, looking this way and that, stitching her way through the tall, mature trees along the embankment. She faced the Tuileries Gardens as she crossed and found a hiding place tucked into a storefront.

She waved and Jess followed, repeating her steps nearly exactly, amazed how it suddenly felt as if they’d crossed the Atlantic and stepped into a foreign country. The Parisian buildings were realistic and lovely, with tall windows and curving copper roofs. There were shops and cafés with little tables outside, incredible fountains, bright awnings, gas lamps, and street signs. The flowers and landscaping were all neatly manicured and perfect, the air heavy with perfume.

“It’s…amazing.”

“Yes,” Charlene said. “But hold the applause. We need to find the Notre Dame exhibit.”

“The Impressions movie.”

“Yes.”

“The main pavilion would be the next street over, wouldn’t it?” Jess asked.

“Must be.”

The girls kept to the front of the buildings and worked their way around to the entrance to a second, more elaborate courtyard. This, too, had gardens and gas lamps, shops and fountains. The plaza ended at a formidable structure behind which rose the needle of the top of the Eiffel Tower.

Just then, Jess heard the scuff of footsteps and pulled Charlene down with her, behind a large trash can and some potted plants.

A pair of court jesters appeared, clownlike in their colorful costumes and facepaint. They danced and leaped up on benches beneath a row of trees, with comical movements.

But Charlene recognized them for what they were. “Overtakers,” she whispered into Jess’s ear. She motioned for Jess to stay still. The two jesters were unpredictable, turning this way one moment and that way the next. Suddenly one of them, with powdered sugar all over his lips, approached the trash can behind which they were hiding. He crunched up a piece of paper and threw it away. If Charlene had reached out, she could have touched him.

“Pardon!” he called out to the other in French.

“Oui!” answered the other.

“T’entends un ronronnement?”

Charlene looked at Jess with a puzzled face. Jess leaned in so close that her lips touched Charlene’s ear. “‘Do you hear a hum?’” she translated.

“Non!”

“Viens ici.”

“‘Come here,’” Jess whispered.

The other jester bounded over, still playful and childlike in his movement.

Charlene held her breath and tried to calm herself, knowing the closer she got to all-clear, the less of a hum her DHI would emit.

The second jester, unable to leave his character, held his hand to his ear in a silly way, overemphasizing the effort.

“Aha! Je l’entends!”

“‘I hear it!’”

“Qu’est-ce que t’en penses?”

“‘What do you think it is?’”

“Je pense qu’il y a quelque chose qui ronronne!”

“‘I think there’s something humming!’”

“Mais qu’est-ce qu’il y a qui pourrait ronronner ici? Je ne l’ai jamais entendu avant. Et toi?”

“‘But what could be humming here? I’ve never heard it before. Have you?’”

“Moi non plus. C’est un des fluos, peut-être? Comment pourrais-je savoir?”

“‘Me neither. Maybe it’s one of the fluorescent lights? How should I know?’”

Charlene nodded, appreciating the translation. Then she shook her head and made her fingers walk, indicating they had to move.

The jesters, only a few yards away, were going to find them. She felt certain of it. At the same time, she felt her hands and feet tingle, and the same odd sensation pass all the way through her until warming the center of her chest, just below her ribs.

All-clear, she realized, having heard Finn describe it so many times. She motioned for Jess to stay down, as close to the trash can as possible.

Then she stood up, looked right at the two jesters and said, “Looking for me?” There was no sense reciting DHI lines as she might have had they been Security guards or Cast Members; these two were Overtakers, patrolling for only one reason: to find and capture Kingdom Keepers.

As she moved toward them, the jesters lunged for her—and ran right through her. They fell to the path and turned their faces back toward her, clearly jolted by the experience.

Charlene, glowing more brightly with the thrill of having achieved all-clear, ran off, leading the two away from Jess’s hiding place, where she was crouched behind the trash can. She vaulted over a bench, just as she ran hurdles for the track team, and heard one of the jesters crash into the bench behind her. She leaped up onto the edge of the fountain and across the water, landing a foot on the retaining wall, springing off it, and ducking under a tree.

She heard a splash—the second jester had gone down in the fountain.

Charlene cut left and vaulted over a second wall through a narrow gap between young trees. She was in a courtyard, blocked to her left by the same line of trees. She ran right and then sharply left as she reached a street between two French buildings. She never looked back, having learned from her coaches that to do so cost precious time in a footrace. The jesters were no match for her agility and speed. If she had looked back she would have seen the two a good twenty yards behind, and slowing as she continued to develop more speed.

She faced more gardens and trees—knew she could lose them for good here and circle back around, with any luck, in time to meet up with Jess.

But just as important, she needed to keep the jesters busy, to give Jess time to enter the pavilion and look for any clues. She fought the urge to be rid of these two. For the moment, she needed them to follow her. She slowed just long enough for them to see her enter the landscaping, just long enough for them to think they had a chance in following her.

Back in the courtyard, Jess stood and watched the footrace under way. She ran toward the pavilion, remembering the importance of getting inside. She entered and stopped abruptly, overcome by the magnificence of the exhibition hall. Ahead of her was the empty waiting line for the film Impressions de France. There was a model of Notre Dame in Paris, and a huge gargoyle crouched on a pedestal. She felt paralyzed, wondering what she was supposed to do. She wasn’t about to go in and sit down and watch a movie. What clue had Wayne intended for them?

She closed her eyes, wondering if she could make herself see one of her visions. She heard a cracking sound and chunks of something, like rock, striking the floor.

She opened her eyes to see the gargoyle breaking apart from his recoiled pose. Small cracks appeared in his neck, widening as his head moved and swiveled toward her. Pieces of concrete and particles of dust fell away from him. His eyelids cracked and began to open.

She felt light-headed. She stepped back and knocked over a stanchion.

The gargoyle’s ugly monkey eyes ringed with spikes locked onto hers, hypnotizing her. The small wings on his back began to flutter, sending more dust into the air. He wrenched his unseen legs up and out of the pedestal to stand four feet high, crouching and craning toward her as he blinked his dusty eyes in an effort to clear them.

“Over here!” came a girl’s voice.

Jess, spooked with the surprise, let out a short cry, and glanced over to see Willa, drenched head to toe.

The gargoyle pivoted toward Willa.

“Over here, monkey-man!” Willa said.

“Or here!” Jess said.

The gargoyle jerked his head in Jess’s direction, unable to decide which way to go. More dust flew, and Jess could see more cracks appearing in his body.

The beast’s wings beat more furiously, and he lifted into the air, flying toward Willa. She dove to the floor and slid. The gargoyle landed heavily, shaking the entire building, but missed her. Willa came to her feet, grabbing onto the waiting-line rope.

“Help me!” she said.

Jess grabbed the other end of the rope. The girls dragged the stanchions with them as they charged the gargoyle. It struggled to turn around, moving slowly, like someone trying to get out of a chair.

The waiting-line rope caught the beast on his side and wrapped his wings tight against his body as the girls continued around him and met on the other side. They tangled the rope clumsily as the gargoyle fought off being captured. But his wings were caught and ineffective.

The more he struggled, the more cracks appeared in his body. Dust was everywhere, like a thick cloud. The girls ran for the exit.

“He’s coming apart!” Jess said.

“Out of the way!” shouted Charlene.

The girls turned in the doorway to see the gargoyle in silhouette. They reacted instinctively. Charlene charged like a sprinter, left the ground, flying at the strange creature, feet first. She hit hard, driving the beast over onto his back. He smacked the floor and, as he did, broke into a hundred pieces.

The cloud of dust settled. Charlene scrambled to her feet.

“Everyone okay?” she asked.

“Where did you come from?” Jess asked.

“What was that?” Willa said.

“Gymnastics,” Charlene answered. “A vault without the follow-through.” She smiled widely. “I always wondered if I’d get a chance to use any of it.”

Willa said, “We’d better get out of here.”

“And fast,” Charlene said, agreeing. “I left the jesters halfway to Morocco. At some point they’ll figure out I circled back.”

“We just leave?” Jess asked.

“Not enough excitement for one night?” Charlene teased.

“We find the others,” Willa said. “The Overtakers know we’re here now. There isn’t much time.”

“We’ve got to warn them,” Charlene added.

“If we can,” Willa said.

* * *

“What’s going on?” Amanda asked. She and Finn had been on their way around the east side of Epcot—past the Universe of Energy pavilion, Mission Space, and the abandoned Wonders of Life—when Finn had grabbed her by the wrist and jerked her down behind a gift cart.

“Look low to the ground.”

She gasped.

“Our friend the python.”

“Where’s it going?”

“Away from Wonders toward the east side of the park.”

“Jess!”

“Yes…France is over there.”

“But then—”

“They’re in trouble.” Finn took out his phone and texted Charlene.

snake comin ur way

They stayed hidden, awaiting Charlene’s reply.

ovrtkrs evrywehr need help tell me when da snake croses da bridge…

“We need to follow him.”

“I was afraid you were going to say something like that.”

“At a distance. It’ll be all right.”

“Why don’t I believe you?”

“I can leave you off at the arrival point, if you want.”

“Alone? Hello? I don’t think so!”

“Okay. Stay low.”

Finn and Amanda followed the snake for the next several minutes, staying well behind him. Finn kept licking his finger and holding it up when they paused.

“Wind direction,” he explained. “He’s going to smell us before he hears or sees us. But with the wind coming off the lake as it is, we’re fine.”

They reached the central fountain, and tucked behind its low wall.

“He’s just so disgusting,” she said of Gigabyte.

“He’s a twenty-foot snake. What’d you expect?”

He hurried out across the plaza and Amanda followed. They turned right toward Canada, from where Finn had a good view of the bridge to France.

Gigabyte slithered along, moving with astonishing speed.

snakes crosin da bridge…

tell me wen hes ovr

“Finn…to the left…” Amanda said.

Finn looked across the water, where he saw the pair of Segways at Showcase Plaza coming toward them.

uhoh more ovrtakrs…dont move

He hoped he’d sent the text in time.

But suddenly Charlene appeared from under the bridge. Then Jess. Then Willa.

“I don’t believe it!” Amanda said. “Where’d they come from?”

“They aren’t going to make it!”

At that moment, the two dummies on the Segways changed course, spotting the girls.

“They’re going to get caught!” Finn said, standing up. He looked around trying to think what to do.

Amanda stepped out alongside of him. She closed her eyes, raised her hand, palm up.

The Segways briefly lifted off the asphalt as if they hit a speed bump, but then continued to scoot along normally.

“Not the same,” Amanda mumbled. Finn could feel her concentrating. Being a DHI had lessened her powers. She was trembling as she squinted her eyes and lifted her outstretched hand for a second try. This time the Segways rose and floated, went off-balance and fell to the asphalt. The two dummies went flying and broke into pieces as they landed. One lost a leg and an arm. The other, both arms.

The one that still had its legs stood back up, turned its head back around a hundred and eighty degrees to face the front again and went off in search of its missing arms.

The girls took off at a sprint, joining Finn and Amanda, who were already running away. Finn glanced back to see the two dummies piecing themselves back together. It would be a few minutes before they were able to ride the Segways again.

“Was that you?” Jess asked Amanda.

“Sorry. It was a little bit strong,” Amanda said.

“It did the trick,” Finn said.

Charlene was well out in front of the others, since she was a much faster runner.

“Where to?” she called out.

“Norway!” Finn shouted, suddenly concerned that he hadn’t heard from either Maybeck or Philby.

* * *

“Those who seek the spirit of Norway face peril and adventure,” a Norwegian man’s voice cautioned from inside a dark tunnel.

“I don’t like the sound of that,” Maybeck said.

“Me, neither,” Philby agreed. “Especially since it was Wayne who sent us here.”

The boat worked up a long incline, then leveled off, facing an Audio-Animatronic figure of a woman standing at the door of a cabin. She said something, but Philby missed it. Two men were working by a burning log.

“There!” Maybeck said.

Leaning against a rock were two axes with a sword in the middle.

Philby hadn’t been expecting it so soon.

Maybeck stood.

“No!” Philby cautioned. “The alarms!” He’d studied Maelstrom. It had dozens of autostop features to keep guests from the danger of leaving the boats.

But Maybeck jumped anyway. It was a brilliant jump, nearly straight up. He came down four feet into the display. By jumping so far, he avoided tripping the light beam that would have caused an autostop—if the autostop was even in effect after hours, which Philby wasn’t sure of.

Maybeck grabbed for the sword and pulled, but it didn’t come free. Philby and the boat continued moving, now pulling even with the two men by the log. Maybeck would soon be left behind.

“It’s wired to the rock!” Maybeck struggled to free it, pulling the sword and then untwisting the wire.

Philby heard the ring of metal, like the sound of a sword coming out of its sheath. Maybeck, sword in hand, came running around the two male figures, vaulted over a pile of logs, and landed on a large boulder. He timed it perfectly, sliding down the rock and back into the boat, onto the same bench where Philby sat.

“Ta-da!” he declared, making the sound of a brass fanfare.

They passed more rocks, and some guy with a cape holding a horn. The horn sounded.

“That isn’t supposed to happen,” Maybeck said. “That’s not part of the ride.”

Philby looked worried.

They approached another gateway into the next scene.

“That was way too easy,” Philby mumbled, half expecting the next Audio-Animatronic mannequin to spin around and challenge them.

“Agreed,” Maybeck said. He passed the sword to Philby, who took a quick look at it, then passed it back.

“We’ll deal with that once we’re out of here,” he said.

As the bow of the boat passed the gateway a creepy voice called out.

“What’s this?” came the voice from a white-bearded old man in white clothes. He didn’t look like any robot; he looked real. “How dare you come here! Stop! This is Troll Country. Begone! I cast a spell…”

At mention of “a spell” Maybeck snapped his head around to check with Philby.

“I heard it,” said Philby.

The scene’s events were happening quickly now—too quickly.

An incredibly ugly troll appeared at the old man’s side.

“Yes, yes. You’ll disappear. Disappear! Bye-bye!”

“It’s them,” Philby said, for it seemed to him the script had to have been written by the Overtakers themselves. Spells. Disappearance. Everything the Overtakers wanted for the Kingdom Keepers.

“‘Bye-bye,’” Maybeck quoted the man. “That can’t be good.”

The boat suddenly spun around to face backward. They fell away fast, falling down a surging waterfall.

“I hate going backward!” Philby announced.

“Makes two of us,” Maybeck said.

“GURR-OWLLL!” roared an animal from behind and above their left shoulders. Maybeck instinctively ducked. “I am not seeing this!” Philby declared as a live polar bear slashed his huge paw through the air—right where Maybeck’s head would have been.

The bear came back the other way just as Maybeck found the wherewithal to lift the sword. He sliced the bear’s left arm nearly in half. Smoke rose as sparks zapped from it. A bunch of wires dangled from the stump.

“But I could have sworn it was real…” Philby said, realizing the bear was no longer alive, but just an Audio-Animatronic.

Another roar, ten times as loud as the first. Philby dove into the bottom of the boat. Maybeck leaned away.

A second polar bear, standing eight feet tall on its rear legs, bent over and shoved its teeth right into Maybeck’s face and snapped, trying to get a bite of him. Maybeck screamed and dropped the sword. It rattled around in the bottom of the boat, and Philby grabbed hold of it.

The bear’s mouth bit into the side of the boat and stopped. The bear’s left paw grabbed the boat as its right clawed for Maybeck, and caught his shoulder.

Maybeck screamed horribly and reached for the wound. Philby reacted instinctively, doing the one thing he’d always been told not to do: he stood up in a moving boat. In part, he was trying to save Maybeck. In part, he was trying to be Maybeck.

He jabbed the sword at the bear. The beast saw it coming and reared back, taking a swipe at Philby. Only then did Philby realize that the bear’s rear legs were fixed to the display—it couldn’t come after them. But the bear hit the sword. Philby clutched his left hand around the grip to hold onto it and was spun like a turnstile.

He flew out of the boat.

But instead of thunking down onto the opposite display, Philby landed softly—too softly.

He lifted his head to see Maybeck’s eyes go impossibly wide. Maybeck grabbed Philby’s feet and pulled.

“Get out of there!” he said.

Philby tried, but he couldn’t move. Something was holding him. He rocked his head, not really wanting to see…

Gnomes!

There had to be a dozen of them. Tiny things, no taller than a ruler—alive!—with old-man faces and warts, and long, disgusting noses and weird ears. They supported Philby—they had caught him. But now they held onto him, claiming him as a prisoner, while Maybeck fought to keep in the boat.

Gulliver’s Travels, Philby thought.

The boat continued moving, leaving Philby behind.

Philby was wrenched at an inhuman angle, his shoulders held by the intrepid gnomes, his feet by Maybeck.

He swatted at the gnomes. One of them stabbed his hand with a miniature gnome knife—it was like getting poked by a knitting needle. Thankfully the Imagineers hadn’t armed the gnomes with sharpened weapons. Philby banged the sword over to his right, where it connected with a clank. He knew he must have hit a gnome when he felt his right shoulder jolt free. Philby next slapped the blade over his left shoulder, and now he was clear. But Maybeck had not let go; he’d moved to the back of the boat as it had moved forward and now had nowhere left to go.

All at once, Philby was being dragged half in, half out of the boat, with six angry gnomes racing on their miniature feet in a flurry to catch up to him.

The polar bear grew smaller and smaller, framed by the tunnel as the boat continued moving.

Maybeck finally hauled Philby into the boat just before they entered through the next scene’s gate—where Philby would have been knocked free and left behind.

There were trees. It was a rocky cave. The narrator said something that Philby couldn’t make out. He was trembling from head to toe.

“Thanks,” he said.

“You saved us, not me!” said Maybeck, in a rare display of humility.

Just as Philby thought he’d regained his balance, the boat dropped away, out from under them. It raced down an incline and into yet another scene. It was night. They were on the ocean under the northern lights, with an oil rig to their left.

“Cold!” Philby said, warning Maybeck, who understood what a drop in temperature meant.

Maleficent.

Darkness.

“We’re almost through,” Maybeck said.

Thankfully, a sea village appeared, not the green witch. Not this time.

Standing onshore were Willa, Charlene, Finn, Jess, and Amanda. A ship’s horn sounded.

“You guys get all the fun!” Willa complained.

“Yeah, fun!” Maybeck said, pulling his bloody hand away from his wounded shoulder.

Finn reached out and helped the two to shore.