Ridley Pearson - Power Play

“Where is it?” Finn said, spinning around.

“There!” Amanda and Charlene said at the exact same moment, both pointing.

“Okay. But let’s not advertise,” Finn said.

The girls lowered their arms.

Once at the tree behind the café, Finn pushed OK .

The tree began speaking. Or at least it seemed so real that Charlene jumped back. Finn felt shivers run up his arms as an old man’s voice-a voice he knew to be Wayne’s-spoke to them from a speaker in the shrubs designed to look like a rock.

“We all need a waiter now and then,” said the voice. “Some can get a waiter’s attention faster than others. This can have disappointing results.”

As Finn slapped his pockets hoping to find a pen, he noticed Jess already scribbling on a piece of paper. Jess carried a pencil and paper whenever she was inside the Parks. She had previously had daytime “dreams” or visions of the future here while awake. She came prepared. Her uncanny ability to dream about future events had earned her a place as a Fairlie alongside “sister” Amanda. That power was corrupted and nearly harnessed by Maleficent, who’d put Jess under the effects of a horrible spell, which brought her together with Finn and the Keepers when Amanda had sought their help to free Jess of the spell. Now, the Keepers benefited from her unique ability; on more than one occasion the Keepers had used a Jess diary page to “see” an event before it happened. They’d learned to pay strict attention to anything she sketched.

The phone’s screen said to press BACK to hear the message a second time. Finn pressed the button. Jess continued writing.

“Got it,” she said.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Charlene asked.

“We keep going. You know what he’s like,” Finn said.

The screen on the phone changed. An animated Kim Possible said, “Find a friend around front. Push OK and watch what he does.”

Again, a photo appeared. It showed two garden gnomes and some shrubs. They located the identical setting just inside the Norway plaza, past the Stave Church.

Finn pressed OK .

The gnome spun around, his backside facing them. Finn pressed OK and the garden sculpture pivoted to face them again. He triggered the phone to repeat the effect.

“Whoa!” Charlene exclaimed. “Way cool.”

“Please write it down,” Finn said to Jess.

Charlene leaned against him from one side; Amanda the other. A Finn sandwich.

A cartoon of a dorky kid appeared on-screen. He said that Kim Possible had identified a signal post and that she needed their help in locating it. If the enemy saw that signal, they were told, bad things might happen.

“Is that supposed to be some kind of code?” Charlene asked.

“Don’t know,” Finn said. But he was thinking, So many questions from her.

The camera offered another photograph. The four of them returned to behind the bakery. Jess, with her keen artistic eye, found the scenery that matched. She positioned them all with their backs to the bakery patio and pointed to their right where the building ended at a knot of rocks and foliage.

“Go ahead,” Charlene said. “Try it.”

Finn pressed OK .

Nothing happened.

“Try again,” she said.

“Up high,” Amanda said. She knew better than to point and attract attention. One by one the other kids saw it: a red, triangular flag popping up from behind a wrought iron lamppost each time Finn pushed BACK . The flag reappeared and sank.

“Better write it down,” he said, but Jess was already on it.

The Kim Possible character reappeared on the phone and told them how well they were doing and that they had one last clue to find.

Another picture.

Charlene spotted the location immediately: it was a rock face on the way back to the Kim Possible cart where they’d started.

The screen read: Push “OK” to have your picture taken.

“I don’t know about having your picture taken,” Amanda said.

“It’s telling us to do it,” Charlene pointed out. “We’ve done everything so far.”

Finn said softly, “Maybe it’s a way for Wayne to see that it’s really us. That we’re the ones on the adventure.”

“That makes sense,” Jess said. “It should probably be just you and Charlene in the picture.”

“Agreed,” Finn said. “You and Amanda keep an eye out, while Charlene and I do this.” His personal phone vibrated in his pocket. He read the text. It was from Maybeck.

CTDs on Segways headed this way.

“Crash-test dummies,” Finn said. “We need to hurry.” Finn texted back:

Diversion needed.

His phone buzzed back.

No prob

He and Charlene hurried out in front of the rocks and Finn pressed OK .

The cartoon character’s thin voice told him to face the lake and press OK again when he was ready to have his picture taken.

He had no idea what might happen. A trap door? A net falling from the trees? With everyone’s attention now focused on the lake, anything could happen to them and it would go unnoticed. If it was a trap, it had been cleverly planned. He and the others had walked right into it, eyes open.

His thumb hovered over the phone’s OK button.

He pushed OK .

A bright light flashed quickly from within the bushes.

Finn believed this to be part of the trick-to blind them while someone attempted to capture them. He bumped his shoulder against Charlene and reached down and grabbed her hand.

But no one came charging toward them. Finn spotted Amanda looking back at them, and immediately released Charlene’s hand.

Return the phone to get your photos.

Press “OK”

Finn pressed OK and was told what a great job he’d done for the Kim Possible team. How they couldn’t have done it without him.

Jess and Amanda joined them.

Amanda said, “Did you see Maybeck? He was running through the crowd, a pair of crash-test dummies after him.”

“Did they catch him?” Finn asked, anxiously.

She pointed. The CTDs stood well above the crowd on their Segways. But they were barely moving because of all the people. Maybeck had led them past Norway and had to be way ahead of them by now-a good job of creating a diversion.

Finn and the girls reached the Kim Possible cart.

The Cast Member greeted them. “Have a good quest?”

“I guess,” said Finn, returning the phone.

“Here’s your picture,” the man said, pointing out the snapshot pinned to a corkboard.

As all three girls stepped up to see it, the Cast Member blocked Finn from joining them and slipped something into Finn’s right hand. Slippery paper. Photos-Finn could tell by the texture. He stole a glance at the first of the photos but slid them into the only pocket in his absurd gym pants as the Cast Member shook his head, suggesting Finn wasn’t to share these.

The image on the photo hit him hard: the Evil Queen somewhere in DisneyQuest. She was standing in front of four students: two girls, Greg Luowski, and a boy wearing a striped T-shirt, whose face couldn’t be seen because of the Queen.

He’d only seen it for an instant, but there was no question in his mind of what he’d seen. The Queen was talking to the four kids and, more importantly, they were listening .

It hit him like a slap in the face. He had to show it to the others. He simply had to. But the Cast Member had warned him not to. Worse, he still didn’t know what was on the second photo. He needed a minute by himself.

“I gotta go to the bathroom,” he told the girls, as they turned from the posted photo.

“I don’t get it,” Charlene said. “So what if our picture was taken? What’s it mean?”