Kingdom Keepers V(61)

“We have to be asleep by midnight in order to cross over,” Kenny said.

“Are you down with this?” Bart asked.

“If you’re asking if I’m comfortable being a hologram, no, I’m not. I don’t suppose it’s something you can get comfortable doing without a lot of experience, and we’ve done it, what, four times?”

“It is seriously random,” Bart said. “I’m totally into it.”

“We’re here as support, don’t forget. Our job is to be there only when we’re needed.”

“Why so secret, exactly? I mean, we’re legit, right?”

“The OTs can’t know about us. The Keepers know a couple of us are here, but not our names. That the rest of us are guarding the Base. But the whole idea is that we operate in the background. The OTs will not expect crew members to be DHIs. That gives us a jump on them, but only once.”

“So we’re like the Navy SEALs. We rescue them if something goes wrong.”

“We keep an eye on them. Don’t get all full of yourself.”

Bart huffed. “It’s the only way I roll,” he said.

“Yeah? Well, roll a different direction. We’re on orders here. You get it? Orders.”

“Yeah, I know. We mess this up, and they’ll replace us.”

“No. We mess this up,” Kenny said, “and they’ll be replacing a Keeper.”





Finn’s last conscious thought involved a train’s headlight heading at him. Thankfully, he wasn’t flattened. Instead, he fell deeply asleep, the relaxation technique having quelled his anxieties. First he pictured absolute darkness; then a pinprick of light; finally, as the circle of light spread outward, it consumed him.

He opened his eyes. No matter how often he crossed over he always found his heart racing as he contemplated, dream or reality? For his dreams could feel so real, and reality could prove so dreamlike.

He was in a room with white, shiny walls and a gray, shiny floor. He turned…a table bolted to the floor. Six plastic chairs. He relaxed and waved his arm at the leg of the table: it passed through. He’d crossed over.

Sitting up, he recognized the room from a few hours earlier: it was the break room used by Cast Members—two refrigerators, a sink, and a coffee machine, all glistening new like the rest of the ship. While Philby could control when the Keepers crossed over, he could not control where they “landed”: the software’s most recent default settings were impossible to hack. At the Magic Kingdom it was in front of Cinderella Castle; in Animal Kingdom, the Tree of Life; in Epcot, the fountains.

Interesting, he thought, that in the parks it was a public space, while on the ship, a Cast Member area. He explained this to himself by the fact that the parks closed to the public at night, whereas a ship never did. They couldn’t very well cross over into the lobby atrium without risking being seen. Wayne and the Imagineers, it would seem, had carefully thought this through. No surprise there.

He waited, playing a game with himself. Willa, he thought. Five minutes later, Willa was indeed the first to appear. He expected Maybeck and Charlene next, both of whom had a harder time getting to sleep. He wasn’t disappointed. Seven minutes after the arrival of Willa’s hologram came the remaining two Keepers. All four of them had gone to sleep wearing Cast Member uniforms supplied by Laundry at Wayne’s direction: a blue golf shirt, khaki shorts, white canvas deck shoes. They too took a few moments to comprehend their situation—testing their transparency. It was better to leave them alone for this process. Finn and Willa sat back. Charlene appeared jarred by the realization of crossing over, suggesting she had fallen more deeply asleep than Maybeck. Soon, all four were sitting up in a circle on the floor of the break room.

“New assignment,” Finn said. “Searching for the server needs to wait because Philby doesn’t have confirmation it’s on board yet. There’s an unexpected test of some lifeboats. That’s our assignment.” He talked them through what he’d learned from Storey Ming without revealing her identity—only that a crew member was being used as a go-between by Wayne and the Imagineers. A brief discussion ensued. The Keepers were a democracy, not a dictatorship, and while Finn accepted his role as leader, he interpreted the role as that of a filter; he was first a listener. Decisions came later.

“Do we trust her?” Maybeck asked.

“I do,” Finn answered.

“Because?”

Finn shrugged. Because she can really kiss.

“First,” Willa said, “because she’s right about testing the lifeboats. Tests are typically conducted in major ports. Sometimes at night, yes. But rarely. And Castaway Cay is not the place for it. There’s very little protected water. Lots of hazards. No shore patrols to assist if something goes wrong. Second, if the OTs are after us, which we can only assume they are, it makes almost no sense for them to come after us as DHIs where we present the biggest threat to them.”