So far, he seemed to be in control of his hologram, but he knew from previous attempts that his hologram quickly deteriorated. A few minutes was all he had, until Finn, the fourteen-year-old boy, came back to replace the DHI.
He stepped out of the way as he heard footsteps approaching. The man arrived at the platform. Finn hid behind him. The man was big, with thick, heavy legs and broad shoulders. He looked a little foolish in his red-and-white-striped jacket and straw hat. He studied the checkerboard floor like a person trying to remember the code, bringing his thick hand to his scrabbly chin in contemplation.
“White or black? Odds or evens?” Finn said, startling the man.
The man spun around, his face a knot of anger. “You’re not allowed here,” he said in a deep, dry voice. Incredibly quickly for his size, he jumped toward Finn and swiped at him, his hands passing right through the DHI, at which point he stood up in astonishment, looking at his own hands as if they’d betrayed him.
“One wrong step, and you fall,” Finn said, darting past the man and out onto the checkerboard floor. He concentrated on the idea of light—pure light. A DHI weighed nothing, and only weight triggered the tiles in the floor. But he knew he couldn’t maintain this pure state for very long. He had to lure the man out onto the floor quickly. There wasn’t much time.
He tried another tack. “I’m a Cast Member,” Finn said, “like you.”
“I don’t care. You’re not allowed up there,” he said. By saying this he confirmed he knew about the penthouse—Walt Disney’s former apartment—the secret room Wayne had offered the DHIs as a place to hide.
An Overtaker? Finn wondered. The group loyal to Maleficent, dedicated to changing the balance of power in the Parks.
“I said you’re not allowed up there,” the man said.
“White or black?” Finn said, his DHI standing on one of each.
The pleasant warmth of the DHI gave way to a slight chill, and Finn knew the internal light was giving way to flesh and blood. He wished he understood how to control this transformation better, but that was for another time. He took advantage of his brief weightlessness and crossed the checkerboard floor to a platform that presented another three ascending staircases. He had one last trick left.
The man stepped out onto the checkerboard, keeping his eyes on the squares. It was a long fall below—thirty feet or more, though the floor had been painted in perspective, which made it appear more like three hundred: a bottomless, rocky cavern. He took that in, and then, as he looked across at Finn, his face turned scarlet with anger.
“You won’t talk your way out of this, son.” He stepped onto a black tile. Then another. He knew the pattern! Making sure he avoided any two black squares in the same horizontal line, he progressed cautiously but quickly across the floor.
Finn felt the DHI fading. He’d managed to maintain it for a minute or more, but he suspected he weighed something now. Would he trip the sensors that opened the floor, or could he make it across?
His plan was to run right through the man. He believed if he concentrated, he could summon his pure DHI for the fraction of a second it would take to pass through him. In doing so, he was certain to cause the intruder to misstep, which would send him plummeting. But Finn would have to move quickly to avoid being on the floor when it fell out and gave way.
He stepped out onto two black squares. He could feel his weight on his feet. He was about equal parts boy and DHI. How much longer?
The Dapper Dan stopped halfway, his face a scowl. Then something occurred to him, and he belched out a laugh. “Going to wrestle me, are you?” He grinned mischievously. “I’ll save you the trouble.” His right foot reached out for a white square.
Finn had not considered that the fastest way for the man to catch Finn was to make Finn fall with him.
Finn ran forward on the black tiles, simultaneously letting go of all fear. He felt the warmth return like a blast from a furnace. But well before he reached the other side—in fact, before he even reached his adversary—the floor went out from under him.
The man fell, letting out a short scream as he was funneled into a red plastic chute.
Finn was floating. The trapdoor had opened beneath him, but his DHI simply hovered. He was suspended ten feet above the evacuation chute, with only air beneath him.
He felt the chill returning. He managed three steps toward the edge of the open pit and then fell. His fingers caught the lip of the hinged flooring, and his body smacked into the hanging trapdoor. Normally not good at pull-ups, he must have been partially DHI, because he managed to lift himself, hook a leg, and pull himself up. Seconds later, the trapdoor snapped back into position. He stayed on the black squares and recrossed.
Middle staircase. Red door. He remembered this section well.
He heard the Dapper Dan hit bottom and, seconds later, the sound of him climbing stairs again. Faster now. Ever more determined to apprehend Finn.
Finn stepped forward into total darkness, a matter of extreme trust. The first time he’d followed Wayne in here, he’d nearly puked from fear. The black hole.
He ran smack into Philby.
“There’s no elevator,” Philby said.
“What?”
“No elevator. It’s not here.”
“It has to be here,” Finn said.
“No such luck, Sherlock.”
“But that means—”
“Somebody’s up there,” Philby said. “Already in the apartment. And what do you want to bet it’s not Wayne?”
“There’s got to be another way up,” Finn said. “Fire stairs. Something for an emergency.”
“In case you hadn’t noticed, it’s pitch black. You don’t happen to have a flashlight on you, I suppose?”
“Turn your back to me,” Finn said. He mustered his strength. Transforming into his DHI sapped his energy. He felt exhausted from having challenged the man just now, but knew he had to do this. He closed his eyes. He felt the warmth return. He couldn’t hold it for more than a few seconds. He came out of it, his legs weak, his head swooning.
“Oh, man! How cool is that?” Philby said excitedly. “Hold on to my shirt, lightning bug. I saw some stairs over here.”
Finn reached out and held on, as much to keep his balance as to stay with Philby. They reached a set of metal stairs, the handrail cool to the touch.
“Going up,” said Philby.
They started climbing the spiral stairs. Higher and higher.
From below them came the heavy breathing of the man pursuing them.
He’d already caught back up. He sounded incredibly close.
7
MAYBECK PROVED HIMSELF the faster runner, arriving next to Amanda at nearly the same instant as Charlene and Willa despite having come the long way around. The rain was falling in punishing waves, and thunder was cracking menacingly overhead.
Amanda, soaking wet, was on her knees, crying. Jez just stood there, the rain passing through her. It took Maybeck and the girls a few seconds to realize what Amanda already knew.
“Oh, man,” said Maybeck. “How long ago did this happen?”
Willa and Charlene helped Amanda to her feet. Everyone but Jez was now drenched. Charlene held her hands over her hair, as if that would do any good.
“She didn’t keep up,” Amanda said. “I thought she was probably fiddling with her iPod—trying to protect it from the rain. She won’t stop messing with that thing. So I looked back, and …she was there.” She pointed to the DHI of her sister.