How Disney had managed to keep it out of the press was anybody’s guess. Finn attributed the privacy to both the stringent contracts Cast Members signed and the loyalty of Disney employees.
Terry “Donnie” Maybeck and Charlene Turner patrolled the area outside the Base and staged sorties into the shadows. Maybeck, a high school freshman like the other Keepers, was easily mistaken for a senior. He didn’t mind that so much. What he did mind was that because he was African American and fit, nearly everyone assumed he was an athlete. He was in fact an artist. Charlene, on the other hand, was dainty and blond and blue-eyed, easily mistaken for a glam girl, yet she was an incredible athlete. As a freshman she had already been asked to try out for the varsity gymnastics team; she was currently on the football cheerleading squad. She was a climber, a runner, an anything-goes girl. Courageous and confident in action, while often quiet and unopinionated in the company of her fellow Keepers, she was a good balance to Maybeck’s arrogance and self-proclaimed superiority. He thought he was God’s gift to everything—especially girls, who indeed threw themselves at him, though Charlene could not understand why. She could see in the mirror why boys liked her, but Maybeck’s popularity with the girls baffled her. Philby had teamed the two as partners. They served Monday and Thursday nights together.
DHI 2.0 gave them the advantage over the Overtakers, but wouldn’t help much if they faced Overtaker holograms. The ability of the OTs to cross over had made strategizing against them trickier.
Maybeck and Charlene were currently squatting on the far side of a Pargo—a Disney golf cart used to move Cast Members around backstage. The Pargo was parked next to the bland, boxy building that housed the Base on the second floor. The hour was closing in on 2:30, a time of night both kids, even as holograms, grew overly tired.
“Quiet tonight,” Charlene said.
“Yeah. Bothers me.”
“I know what you mean.
“It’s like they’re planning something,” Charlene said.
“Count on it.”
“Or they’re busy somewhere else.”
Maybeck shifted uneasily. “That’s a disturbing thought.”
“I’m just saying.”
“I kinda wish you wouldn’t,” he said.
“Going on two weeks,” she reminded. “So what if the plan is to tire us out? What if the purpose of the Siege is not to conquer the Base but to wear us down trying to protect it?”
“See what I mean? You’re thinking too much.”
“Or you aren’t thinking enough. What makes more sense, them trying to get control of the mechanical side of the parks, or to defeat us?”
“Or both, you mean?”
“That’s exactly what I mean! Yes. Wear us down with this siege. Spring some kind of attack or trap—on us, not the Base. And then, with us out of the way, take the Base, and the parks with it.”
“You know the problem with you? You get really negative when you’re tired. Thanks for the chill pill, Charlie. Just what the doctor ordered.”
“I’m just being pragmatic.”
“Don’t do that. Don’t use words like that. Don’t be like Philby and start showing off how smart you are.”
“Philby doesn’t do that. Philby is just Philby.”
“Well, you’re not Philby. Am I right? You’re Charlie. So don’t go doing that.”
“Okay,” she said. “I’m just being…realistic. How’s that?”
“Don’t patronize me,” Maybeck said.
“Don’t use words like that,” she complained, imitating his voice.
They both laughed.
The movement came from their right. A pair of blurs, definitely coming toward the building.
“I counted two,” Maybeck said.
“Yes,” Charlene said.
“Could be decoys,” he said.
“Absolutely.”
“I’ll take this way. You take that.”
“Way ahead of you.” Charlene rotated to her left, ready to circle the building counterclockwise.
“Watch for a counterattack.”
“You think?” she asked sarcastically. “Meet you on the other side. I’ll be the girl in all black.”
“Eyes open,” he cautioned.
“On three,” she said, and began counting.
* * *
Charlene appreciated that DHI 2.0 had significantly reduced the glow of her hologram. There had been a time when walking around in the dark was like wearing Day-Glo. But with the upgrade, she could sneak along the building’s exterior wall like a shadow.
As she came around the opposite side, she saw them: two brooms-and-buckets climbing a drainpipe. There had been a time—years ago now—when such a sight would have stopped her cold. But she did not question what she saw for even a millisecond. Brooms, pirates, witches, fairies—there was nothing unexpected anymore. The Overtakers had recruited from nearly every group of Disney characters. All presented an equal threat, though each with specific skills.