Disney after Dark

“Excuse me, Mr. Hotshot, but I do not want to hear you talking that way, and you know it. If this is going to go to your head, we are not doing this.”

Actually, Fi

“Okay. I’ll do it,” he said.

She beamed. He loved to see her like that—bright-eyed and childlike.

A month after Fi

The size of a jet aircraft hangar, the soundstage was rigged with hundreds of film lights, a green screen that filled one entire wall, trampolines, cameras, boom microphones, and dozens of scruffily dressed crew members. He’d never seen anything like it, except in movies, though he did his best to pretend otherwise. A college-age girl dressed in black and gray wore a headset with a microphone mouthpiece, a fuzzy black ball by her lips. She called herself a “PA.” It took Fi

Brad made Fi

There were five kids in all. One very pretty girl, Charlene, had sandy blond hair and blue eyes, with pale skin. The other girl, Willa, struck him as a little geeky, but extremely smart. She was sweet, but not knockout gorgeous like Charlene. Not many girls looked like Charlene. Willa struck him as moody. With her hooded brown eyes and dark, braided hair, she might have been Asian or Native American. Maybeck, an African American kid, was taller than Fi

On a break, Fi

Philby looked older than all of them, but was in fact the same age. He had a British accent or something close to it—Australia or New Zealand, Fi

“Quite the motley group,” Philby said.

“We’re the Orlando assortment pack,” Maybeck quipped. “One of every flavor.”

Fi

“Control,” Maybeck answered. “These kinds of guys…with them it’s all about control. That guy, Brad? I don’t trust him. He’s keeping stuff from us. Count on it.”

Fi

“We’d better be able to trust him,” Fi

“I don’t know about you,” Maybeck answered, “but I never trust anyone but myself.” He added a little late, “No offense.”

Fi

Philby said, “Did you know that DHI—Disney Host Interactive—also stands for Daylight Hologram Imaging?”

“Seriously?” Fi

“Totally.”

“See?” Maybeck said. “That’s what I’m talking about—right there. First I’ve heard of it.”

Philby continued, “This has never been done before. DHIs. Not like this. We’re going to be turned into absolutely perfect three-dimensional images. Duplicates of ourselves. We’ll look real, but we’ll be made of nothing but light. It’s pretty cool technology, actually.”

“But if it’s never been done before,” Fi

The boys glanced back and forth between themselves. Philby said, “It’s like taking pictures, that’s all. How can it not be safe?”

“It pays,” Maybeck said harshly. “That’s all I care about. My aunt could use the extra money.”

“Your aunt?” Fi

“Yeah,” Maybeck said. “I live with my aunt. My parents…They aren’t around.”

Fi

“Sorry,” Fi

“Not your problem,” Maybeck said in a softer voice. “My aunt’s cool. She tried to get me in a toothpaste ad, but I lost out. Then this thing came up. Brad told me that if I’d gotten that ad I’d never have been asked to be a host. They want nothing but fresh faces.”

“So you got lucky,” Fi

“We all got lucky,” Maybeck agreed. “A DHI in the Magic Kingdom? We’re going to be famous.”

“We’re going to be ghosts,” Philby corrected. “Electronic ghosts, provided that this technology actually works.”

“Don’t say stuff like that,” Maybeck pleaded. “Of course it works.”

“Of course,” Philby said. “My bad.” But he sounded less than convinced.

3

“I don’t get it,” Dilard said as he gripped Fi

“The other DHIs,” Fi

“You know how stupid that sounds?”

“Yeah, but I don’t care. No matter what, I’ve got to find out if they’ve had similar…dreams.”

Dillard glanced up and immediately let go of Fi

Dillard clasped his ankles again. Fi

He squeezed out a couple more sit-ups. “It’s experimental,” he explained. “The DHI technology. Not exactly photography, not exactly computer graphics.”

“You’re going psycho on me,” Dillard complained.

Fi

“I’m sorry to have to tell you this,” Dillard said, “but I think they fried your brain.”

“I don’t know any of their full names. Willa, Charlene, Maybeck, and Philby. Maybeck and Philby will be easier to find than the girls, because those are their last names, unusual names at that. There was this guy at MGM who ran things. He would know who everyone is, though I’m not sure he’d tell me.”

Dillard gave Fi