Disney in Shadow (4 page)

“So you want me to leave?” he said.

“No,” Jess answered, stealing the moment from Amanda. “She wants to pretend she isn’t thrilled that you took a very big chance by coming here to protect us, and she wants to make it seem like it’s no big deal when we all know that it is a big deal. I, for one, want to thank you. I like it that there are three of us. I feel better that you’re here, and so does Amanda, though she’ll never admit it.”

“I don’t have to admit what isn’t true,” Amanda said.

“There’s a lot of park to cover,” Jess said. “Three people are better than two.”

“It may be more complicated than that,” Finn said. He took each girl by the arm and led them behind a stand selling all kinds of merchandise. They quickly picked up on the fact that he was using the stand as a screen, and that made them both curious to try to look around it and see who or what they were hiding from.

“It’s a woman,” he said. “I’m pretty sure I saw her in front of school this morning.”

“Seriously?” Amanda asked.

“And Maybeck said some woman was lurking around Crazy Glaze. Window-shopping, but less interested in the pottery than the people inside.”

“And she’s
here
?” Jess said.

Finn nodded. “I saw her enter just before you two. If she is following you, she’s good at it, because she never looked back toward the gates, never gave any indication…and I don’t see how she could have followed me, but I’m not ruling that out either.”

“So what do we do about it?” Jess asked.

Amanda lifted onto her toes to see over the stand, but Finn pulled her back down.

“I think I take the woman, while you two search for a temperature drop.”

“We don’t have phones,” Amanda reminded him. “So what good does your following the woman do?”

“If I keep my distance, I can see if she eventually tries to follow you two. If she does then we know she’s trouble—probably an Overtaker—and maybe by me following her she leads us to Wayne.”

“You’re dreaming,” Amanda said.

“That’s genius!” Jess said.

“And if she’s following
you
,” Amanda said, “which makes sense if she was watching you from in front of the school, then by following her you could be led right into a trap. Then, instead of looking for Wayne, we’d be looking for you and Wayne. That’s helpful.”

Amanda was typically gentle and good-natured. Yet it seemed that the closer they grew as friends, the more sarcastic she became. Or maybe it was the foster-home situation and the threat of her and Jess being sent back to Maryland that was making her this way. Whatever it was, he didn’t like her like this and wanted to say so, but Jess interrupted.

“I say we call for a vote,” Jess proposed. “All in favor of Finn following the woman?”

Jess and Finn sheepishly raised their hands.

“Whatever,” Amanda said. “But listen up, Alex Rider: if anything happens, you’d better leave us some clues. This park is gigantic and we’re leaving here together—the three of us—you got that?”

She sounded concerned—deeply concerned.

Finn bit back a smile. “Sounds good to me.”

“And me,” Jess said, chiming in.

Finn spotted a bright green balloon for sale on the cart. It was the only green balloon.

“Keep a lookout,” Finn said, “for that green balloon. I’m going to carry it low unless there’s trouble. If you see a green balloon following you, it’s probably me, and it means something’s wrong—like maybe the woman is following you, or I’ve been spotted, or something like that. If that happens, you split up. No matter what, we all meet back here in two hours so I can get home by dinner, and you guys can get to your place before curfew. Sooner than that if there’s trouble. Agreed?”

“I suppose,” Amanda said.

“You’re good at this,” Jess said.

“I’ve had a little practice,” Finn said.

He bought the balloon, and hurried off to catch up with the mystery woman.

“Y
OU WERE A LITTLE HARD ON HIM
, don’t you think?” Jess asked as she and Amanda headed toward The Land. Not only was Soarin’ their favorite attraction in Epcot, but The Land offered a controlled environment—a cooler environment—and because of that, it seemed a good place to start in their search for signs of Maleficent or Chernabog.

“I was only messing with him,” Amanda said, answering her. “He shouldn’t be here. That’s the whole point of our being here, right? So what’s with that?”

“He’s worried about us.”

“Yeah, right. And who’s the one always getting in trouble?”

“We’ve had our share,” Jess said.

Neither of them could forget the nightmare of Jess’s being captured by the Overtakers, her escape that had led to her being trapped, and the resulting ordeal inside Animal Kingdom. Finn had been the one to find her, and Jess nearly reminded Amanda of that, but knew she didn’t need to.

“He’s handy to have around at times like this,” Jess said.

“I suppose. But it’s risky for him—for all of them. I think it’s stupid of him to come.”

“You’re
worried
about him! Do you have a crush on him?” Jess said.

“As if! You’re the one he can’t keep his eyes off of. Him and every other boy.”

“That is
so
not true!”

“We both know it is,” Amanda said. “Hey, I’m good with it, so don’t fight it.” She lowered her voice. “Why do you keep checking your watch? We’ve got plenty of time before we have to be back.”

“It isn’t that,” Jess said. “My watch shows the temperature. Elevation. A bunch of stuff. It’s like for rock climbers or something.”

Amanda moved closer trying to see the watch face. “And?” she asked.

“No change so far. Eighty-two degrees.”

“As in, boiling.”

“Yeah, but my watch may pick up on a change before we do. You realize we’re lucky it’s so hot out?”

“Because?”

“Because it’ll be more obvious if the temperature drops all of a sudden, like Finn says it will. And because any kind of sudden chill will need some kind of explanation. It’s not as if anything’s getting colder out here, you know?”

It was true. Everything around them was concrete or stone, storing or reflecting the intense afternoon heat. Any drop in temperature could only be explained by something man-made or
unnatural
.

The Land was housed in an inelegant glass-and-concrete structure with a huge sign bearing its name. As the girls approached it, they walked slowly, trying to sense a change in temperature. Jess monitored her watch carefully.

“Nothing but hot,” Jess said.

“Personally, I think this is hopeless,” Amanda said. “I mean I know Finn and those guys have felt a chill before, but you’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Any other ideas?”

“No. That’s the thing, I guess. Finn is super-close to Wayne. His being missing is eating him up. We’ve got to do something, but I’m not sure there’s any point to—” Amanda turned because Jess had stopped walking. “Sis?” she said, using a favorite nickname.

Jessica stood there staring into space. She looked as if she was studying the sign on the building, but Amanda knew something was wrong. She hurried back to her.

“Sis?”

“I don’t want to lose it,” Jess said.

Amanda was about to say something when she thought better of it. Her “sister” was a rare and unusual creature herself; her gift of “sight” made her different in the same way that Amanda’s own gifts separated her from others. In this way neither of them felt that she belonged, which only solidified their friendship and their bond. Amanda knew better than to speak. She knew it intuitively without needing to be told. She took Jess gently by the arm and steered her toward a concrete bench. At the same time, her concern for their safety told her to search for any security cameras in the area; in the Magic Kingdom, Finn had believed some of the security people worked in concert with the Overtakers.

Again, she was about to speak; again, she controlled herself.

“Pencil,” Jess said. She sounded sleepy. “Something to write on.”

Amanda dug through her purse. No pen, no paper, but she found some mascara. She slipped Jess’s purse off her shoulder and rifled through it as well. She came up with a Winn-Dixie receipt. She put the mascara brush into Jess’s right hand and the receipt onto her leg and steered Jess’s hand to the receipt.

“Okay.” She spoke softly.

Jess had that faraway look going. But her hand began to move, and the mascara brush smeared black onto the receipt. It was no good: her effort was illegible. Amanda frantically dug through Jess’s purse. In a zippered pocket she found a stumpy wooden pencil. She replaced the mascara with the pencil. Jess’s hand began to scribble again.

She shaded and crosshatched, making the receipt darker. Then she pressed hard and wrote several letters, making them fat and black.

MKPFP IFP

Amanda looked up. Later, she wouldn’t be sure exactly why she did this. Had something instinctive told her to do so, or had it been only coincidence? These kinds of questions pestered her lately, the reasons behind events, the power of intuition and thought and what role fate played in her life and the lives of others. She didn’t mention any of this to anyone—not even Jess. It was “heavy,” deep stuff—and she was afraid she’d be teased for thinking about such things—but she lay awake at night considering the connection of her life to the lives of others, what her life might have been like had she not been orphaned, what it would mean for her and Jess to be sent back to the Fairlies, whether Finn liked her as more than a friend, where she was going to be in another three years when she turned eighteen and the foster-care system released her.

She spotted a green balloon coming toward her. Carried high above the heads of the guests pouring in to The Land, it bounced with the movement of the person carrying it.

Finn?
If so, they had no time to hang out on a bench.

“We’ve got to get going,” she said to Jess, whose hand suddenly went rigid as she stopped writing. She blinked.

“Jess!” Amanda continued. “The balloon. Finn. The woman. We can’t stay here.”

Jess looked over at Amanda, then took in her surroundings. “Whoa,” she gasped. She looked down at the receipt as if seeing it for the first time. “What’s going—?”

“Now!” Amanda said, grabbing the pencil and receipt and stuffing them into her purse.

The green balloon wasn’t traveling at the speed of the other guests, but much faster. She knew it was Finn. She knew it meant trouble was coming toward them as quickly as the balloon.

She pulled Jess to her feet. “You okay?”

“Yes. Fine.”

They started toward The Land.

“It was like…one of my dreams,” Jess explained.

“You know? Like when you get in the zone. In a daydream? Like that.”

“You were totally gone,” Amanda said. “Like sleepwalking.”

“Exactly! That’s exactly it. That’s never happened to me before. Nothing like that. I mean, when I’m asleep, sure. In my dreams. But never like that. Never awake.”

Amanda glanced back. Her eyes fell briefly on a woman coming toward them, a woman more put together than ninety percent of the other park guests. She had her hair up in a fancy way, and wore a nice necklace, a pressed white shirt. Amanda knew immediately it was
the woman
, though she spent no time considering how that might be possible.

“It’s her,” she told Jess. “Follow me.”

She picked up the pace, leading Jess into the enormous, circular pavilion. There was an escalator and stairs ahead. A balcony running around the perimeter looked down into the lower plaza. Miniature hot-air balloons were suspended from the peak of the tent with colorful streamers cascading down on all sides.

She avoided the pileup at the escalator and took the stairs, careful not to run and draw further attention to them.

Below them was a sea of tables, most with colorful umbrellas overhead. The umbrellas did not exactly hide whoever was sitting beneath them. So she plotted a course away from the stairs.

“This way!” she whispered as they reached the plaza. She glanced quickly up. There was the green balloon, now only a few feet behind the woman. Finn was taking a huge risk getting so close to the woman.

Amanda cut quickly to the right and dodged a few tables, now in a location screened from the stairs. For the time being, they’d ditched the woman. She wanted to keep it that way.

“How are we supposed to hide in this place?” she asked Jess. But there was no answer: Jess seemed dazed, like she’d just woken up.

Amanda considered the girls’ room, but they’d only trap themselves.

“Can’t see the forest for the trees,” Jess said. She was pointing at the waiting line for Living with the Land.

Amanda tried to make sense of what Jess had just said.
Trees?
There were fruit trees inside Living with the Land, but if they tried to jump out of the boat they’d be busted.

“It’s a basketball team, right?” Jess interrupted, sounding much more awake. “Or volleyball, maybe. Come on!”

Jess reversed their roles, taking Amanda by the hand and steering her toward the line.

“I don’t think this is such a good idea,” Amanda said. She spotted a group of tall girls all wearing a team uniform.
The forest for the trees
, she realized. “We don’t want to get stuck on a ride.”

But Jess ignored her.

“Excuse me,” Jess said, maneuvering the two of them between the team and the far wall, as if keenly interested in the wall’s photographic mural. The athletes continued talking among themselves, not the least bit interested in the two girls.

Jess had effectively put a human screen between herself and Amanda and the mystery woman. There was no way the woman would see them unless she, too, joined the line and pushed forward; but that would be nearly impossible: several families had filed in behind the team. The woman would have to cut the line to have any chance of seeing the girls, and that would only draw attention to her.

The hardest thing for Amanda was not looking. She kept an eye for the green balloon but made no effort to see through the tall girls, for fear of her being seen.

“Good call,” she said to Jess.

“Finn had better be careful,” Jess said.

“Yeah, I know.”

The line surged forward. The sisters stayed with the team, keeping up against the wall and out of sight of the vast hall.

“Oh, no,” Amanda said. The green balloon appeared and stopped about five yards behind them.

Finn was in their line. He had not lowered the balloon, which meant only one thing.

“No more looking,” Jess instructed. “We keep our backs to her. We’ll be on the ride—in the boat—in less than a minute. What’s she going to do then?”

“No idea,” Amanda answered, “but I don’t think I want to find out.”

“We’ve just got to hope—” Jess cut herself off. It was too late: the volleyball team filled up the back of a boat. This forced the two girls into the front of the next set of boats. Behind them, other park visitors took their seats.

Amanda stole one look in that direction. The balloon, still aloft, had moved farther back in line. Finn had stopped, allowing those in line to pass him.

In that fleeting glimpse, Amanda spotted the woman as well. She was boarding the ride on the same set of boats as Amanda and Jess, only a few behind.

“She’s right behind us. Like three rows. What do we do now?” Amanda whispered into Jess’s left ear.

Jess stared ahead.

“You got us into this,” Amanda complained.

“First we calm down,” Jess said without any trace of tension in her voice. “I’m coming up with a plan.”

“Now? Now you’re coming up with one?”

“I am,” said Jess. “If you’ll allow me to think, that is.”

The guide was saying, “Please remain seated. Please keep your legs and hands inside the boat at all times…”

“That’s it!” Jess said.

Amanda looked quickly around, expecting to see something.

“Where?” she said. “What?”

“Do exactly as I say,” Jess instructed.

“Oh yeah, that’s worked real well so far,” Amanda snapped sarcastically.

“There’s no room for hesitation,” Jess explained. “As in
none
. We either do this together, or it’s your turn to come up with a plan.”

“Okay. I get it.”

A recorded female voice took over from the guide. The narrator warned of a storm, then identified the rain forest, and the desert. There was a brief explanation of the diversity and importance of each to the earth’s ecosystems.

“The American prairie once appeared as desolate as the desert,”
the voice continued.

“Get ready,” Jess hissed.

“
Psst!
Girls?”

Jess and Amanda froze. It was a woman’s voice coming from directly behind them. They didn’t have to guess which woman it was.

“
Psst!
You, two! I need to talk to you. It’s about—”

“If you’d please keep your voice down,” said the guide, cutting her off.

The boats had moved into a dark tunnel where movie screens showed working farms, ladybugs, and beetles.

“Now!” Jess said. She stepped off the boat and onto a walkway, ducking down into the dark to hide. Amanda was right behind her.

An alarm sounded. The boats stopped immediately. Several guests were talking at once.

“They got off!…I saw that!…You can’t do that!”

They had tripped some kind of emergency stop.

“Come on! Let’s go!” Jess said.

Together the girls headed for the light ahead and reached the greenhouse where banana and other fruit trees rose from a beachlike floor of sand.

Two men in coveralls appeared.

“You can’t leave the boat!” one of them hollered.

“My sister can’t hold it in another minute,” Jess said. “Mexican food, you know?”

A twitter of laughter carried to them from down the tunnel. The guests on the ride had heard her.

“Oh…thanks,” Amanda said through clenched teeth. “
This
was your plan?”

“You can’t leave the boat!” the greenhouse worker repeated. “Mister, if you don’t get my sister to the girls’ room,
you’re
going to need a boat. Or at least some rain boots.” The alarm stopped. The boat started moving again. “Your tickets will be pulled for this,” the worker said.