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  But, she realizes that all she has to protect herself with is Lucky, the stuffed bear, and, after a bizarre whirling sound exudes from the wall to her left, she feels so much apprehension and fear welling up inside her that she can no longer tolerate sitting there.

  She thinks, What if Mason was right? What if Clyde…. Stop it, Amy, get a hold of yourself.

  Regardless, she can stay put no longer. After wrangling herself from behind the iron bar, Amy steps out into the room. It is remarkably still.

  Amy looks at the train and sees Lucky in the second cart. She heads toward the large bear and lifts him from the seat. “So you're stuck in here, too? Mason is such a jerk for leaving us here. Scotty was simply doing what he thought Mason would like, and Jack…well…what was Jack thinking? Boys. Don't worry, Lucky, they'll be here in a second…. Won't they?”

  Amy strolls over to the campfire. A collection of sticks are stacked up against each other to form the structure. One stick in particular appears loose, and it grabs her attention.

  “Good idea, Lucky. It wouldn't hurt to have that, just in case. She lifts the object from its rest and holds it firmly with her right hand. The stick is solid wood and roughly three feet long, similar to a softball bat.

  In fourth grade, Amy's dad had made her go out for softball. She absolutely hated it at first. The practices were pure drudgery. But this changed after she played in her first real game. The crowd, the competition—they fueled her. Ever since that first game, she was hooked.

  Amy cradles the stick and squeezes her hands around the solid wood exterior, thinking, Like to see someone try and get us now.

  From the wall to her left, sudden music startles Amy. She wonders, What's that? Is the power coming back on?

  After rushing back to the train, she pauses. The train doesn't stir. The green tinted lights don't flicker to life. But the music continues. It's calliope music. Amy ponders, I didn't think we were that close to the carousel.

  Amy is now filled with confusion but also curiosity. Where is that music coming from? she wonders and takes cautious steps toward the wall, scanning for the point of origin. Above her head, a neon green sign glows to life. It reads, “Enter.” The outline of a door is now apparent on the wall. Amy thinks, Is this a way out? Could I walk out the doors and back into the park? No. Then it would be labeled “Exit,” not “Enter.” She notices a crash bar at her waist protruding from the door.

  “What do you think, Lucky? Wait for the boys? Right, let's go back and wait in the cart.”

  Turning back to the vehicle, she gives another glance at the door. The music grows louder.

  Chapter 24

  A barrage of activity, lights, sounds, and motion comes all at once. The three boys wheel around, but it's too late to catch Amy. As a result of their foolishness, they turn just in time to see her carried through the large doors.

  Jack arrives at the doors first. Desperately, he flings himself at the door, expecting it to give way, but a dull thud is heard as his shoulder strikes the barrier.

  “They won't budge.”

  “You serious? Back off, let me try,” offers Mason.

  Relenting to let the “macho man” try, Jack watches as Mason grunts with his shoulder pressed on the door.

  “Oh, man, you're right. Come on, help me here.”

  Jack takes a position directly beside Mason.

  “Okay, we push on three,” states Mason.

  Scotty, willing to help, looks up at the other two boys and asks, “Hey, where do you guys want me?”

  Dismissing the offer, Mason growls, “You'll just get in the way, Scotty. We'll take it from here.”

  Scotty, however, ignores the rebuff and finds a place to push beside Mason, who looks at Jack and says, “One, two, three.”

  The door does not give, but Scotty's footing does. He slides face first towards the floor, and his hands search for a steadying hold. They find Mason's shirt, which rips at the collar and results in the larger boy falling down on top of Scotty.

  In the ensuing confusion, Mason ambles to his feet and yells, “Scotty, you klutz! I told you to stand back. You almost strangled me. Now get back and let us handle this.”

  Reproached, Scotty wanders a few feet back while rubbing a bright red spot on his forehead. Still wanting to help, he offers, “But if we just wait for the next train to come through, we can catch up.”

  “He's right, Mason, another train should be here any minute.”

  On cue, the hum of the sound system throttles off and dim lights flash bright and then go out, leaving only the emergency lights that lazily give off their glow. The power has died again.

  “No use in waiting for another train now,” says Jack. A dark thought clouds his mind: Did the ride respond to our plans? No, that's ridiculous. Scotty remarks, “It's like the ride heard you, Jack.”

  “Shut up, Scotty,” says Mason, who's assessing the damage to his shirt.

  “Well, at least this buys us some time. Amy's train won't be going anywhere ‘til the power cuts back on. Come on, Jack. We need to hurry. The power might cut back on soon.” Mason says.

  After another three-count followed by straining and groaning, a slight budge gives way. However, it's not enough for any of them to squeeze through.

  “Oh man, we're in for it now, Mason. Clyde is going to know that we got out of the ride. He's going to know we were up to something, and Amy—she's….”

  Jack stops mid-sentence before revealing a deeper level of concern for the girl.

  “Calm down, Jack,” assures Mason. “We're going to get through that door.”

  Still, Jack's mind races,“What was I thinking? Everything had been so perfect. She's out there all alone, and I left her.

  Mason instructs, “Jack look around. We need something to pry them open.”

  Every second wasted in the room, causes more stress to envelop Jack. He realizes that Amy's cart could be two rooms ahead now.

  Thankfully, Mason is keeping his cool. He says, “There—against the wall—that stack of bones,” and saunters to the pile. Examining the collection, he pulls a leg bone from the stack. “This will do.”

  Scotty starts, “You want me to—?”

  “Can it, Scotty, you've helped enough.”

  The mood is tense, and even Jack pays little attention to the harsh treatment of Scotty.

  “We're gonna push one more time. Give it all you've got, and when we get a gap, I'll do the rest. One, two, three.”

  Jack slams his shoulder hard into his door with desperation fueling his effort. As the others exert their will as well, the doors open slightly. While Mason grinds his left shoulder on the left door, he extends his right hand and lodges the bone into the crevice. Then, using the bone as a wedge, Mason forces the small opening to extend. A loud cracking sound occurs as the bone snaps in two and Mason spills back onto his posterior. Nonetheless, the left-side door flings open due to the hinge giving way against the strain.

  “It worked! Let's go! Hurry!” Jack implores.

  Mason flings a piece of the broken bone to the side and clambers to his feet, joining the other boys in making a break through the open door, which leads into the Rumpelstiltskin Room.

  Chapter 25

  Scotty is the last one into the room. He is hurt. Mason has rarely been so critical of him before, and it stings. He is not sure what is more painful, the lump forming just below his hairline or the insults Mason threw his way.

  Sulking and feeling useless, the boy decides to let the other two be the heroes by rescuing the damsel in distress. Instead of following the other boys to the center of the room, he slumps away from them to explore the room. After all, he, too, had never been able to walk around the ride like this. He examines the tent set up in the room as well as the spinning wheel and the fake bonfire. Although the sticks were toppled over, this didn't faze Scotty as being all that unusual, but out of the corner of his eye, he spies something shinning and wonders, What's this?It turns out to be a shiny pair of large
silver scissors at the base of the spinning wheel. His eyes are transfixed on the sheers. Marveling at the imagination of the creators of the ride for their realism, he stands before them as an idea flashes in his mind: My prop! I bet Mason thinks I was going to chicken out. Well, I'll show him. He'll have to be impressed. Maybe he will forget about my fall back there.

  Glowing with pride, he scoops up the scissors, thinking, Now we all have what we came for. Mission complete! He calls out, “Guys, look what…. Guys? What are you looking at?”

  Then, looking down, he gasps at what the other two are staring at: an empty train with no sign of Amy.

  Chapter 26

  “This is way too creepy deepy. So, Lucky, do we go through the door or stay in here? We could wait for the boys.”

  After further consideration, Amy says, “No, it serves them right. We should leave them. I bet this door will lead us right out of here. The power is off again, and that music has to be coming from outside the ride. Come on, let's go. Oh, this is ludicrous: I'm talking to a stuffed bear. What? Don't look at me like that.”

  Amy thinks about waiting for Jack but then tells herself, “He left me sitting there on the ride, too. He's no better than the others.”

  She pushes the bar, and the door under the “Enter” sign gives way. A small black tunnel is revealed behind the door.

  “Jackpot, Lucky! This is a service exit.”

  Another single door illuminated by two glowing emergency lights appears at the end of the tunnel.

  Slowly and cautiously, Amy takes one step at a time. The lights at the end of the hall provide little comfort for the shaken girl and her bear.

  “When we get to that door and find Clyde, we are not covering for them, you know,” Amy says aloud, and then

  thinks, The faster I get out of here, the better.

  As Amy quickens her pace, the calliope music grows louder. Maybe the carousel is just on the other side? she considers. But when she pushes against this second door, the music stops as the door opens to reveal another room. Amy realizes she is still in the ride and thinks, Oh, just great.

  She sees a gingerbread house positioned in the center of the large room. The house stands there made entirely of candy. It is a life-sized version of one of those gingerbread houses she used to make with her grandmother during Christmas break. Trying to make sense of the situation, Amy thinks, I just took a cut through to another part of the ride.

  From somewhere up above, a speaker cracks and buzzes. Amy looks in the direction of the sound and is startled to see a narrator mannequin with a large book in hand. Amy, reassuring herself that the figure is not real, waits for the rhyme.

  “Little Red all alone had made a wrong turn.

  A poor choice, she made the boys to spurn.

  If she had some wisdom on this ominous night,

  She would realize her peril and at once take flight.”

  Amy thinks, “Little Red, wrong turn, boys? What peril? Wait a minute, is he talking about me? This can't be happening. It has to be a coincidence. Just then another ominous fact makes her dizzy. She says, “Wait a second, isn't the power off? How is that speaker…?”

  Talking to the bear is absurd, she knows, but it helps calm her a little.

  “Okay, Lucky, that's enough. Let's go find the boys.”

  Amy turns around to reach for the door and exclaims, “What in the world!?”

  The handle and the door are both missing. She scratches and pries along the wall trying to find the door, but it's no use. The entrance has completely disappeared.

  Panic takes hold of Amy, and she yells, “Jack! Scotty! Help! Somebody!”

  Chapter 27

  The fact that Amy is not in the room confuses Jack. Where is she? he wonders.

  “Okay, this is not good,” Scotty informs the others.

  “Understatement of the year,” Mason sourly snaps.

  “She's not here?” Scotty continues.

  “That's enough, Captain Obvious. We can see that. We know this is not good, we know Amy is not here, we know we're in deep trouble, we know something—”

  “Okay, Mason, I think he's had enough. You're not helping.”

  “All right, Jack, since you're the one who knows everything about this ride, where did she go?”

  “I don't know,” Jack answers disturbed. “Well…she had to leave this room. Probably when the power shut off.”

  “Why didn't she wait for us?” Scotty wonders aloud.

  “I don't know,” Jack answers again.

  “You don't know much, do you?”

  Cross at Mason's attitude, Jack snaps back, “None of us know what happened in here! All we know is that Amy is gone.”

  He tells himself to remain calm and says, “Look, she probably just walked over to the next room.” Jack takes long strides to the door to the next room and tries to open it. “This door won't give just like the last one.”

  Jack thinks, Amy where are you?Mason starts, “Maybe she got out before the doors were—”

  “You guys hear that?” asks Jack.

  “Yeah. Music,” says Scotty who looks in the air for the source.

  Pointing above Mason's head, Jack asks, “Where did that come from?

  “The music?” Mason cocks his head listening.

  “No. That.”

  Scotty and Mason look up to see an illuminated “Enter” sign glowing above a door. C

  alliope music floats through the room.

  “That's where she went, come on,” commands Jack. He pushes on the crash bar, and the three boys enter the tunnel and amble down the dim hallway to the far door.

  “I bet she walked down this hallway,” Scotty suggests. “That door probably is an exit.”

  Jack nods in hopeful agreement to Scotty's observation. He opens the door, and the boys are stunned by the sudden appearance of a new room.

  “I have never seen this one before,” says Jack, who looks around, marveling.

  “Neither have I,” adds Mason.

  “You think this is like some cast aside part of the ride they don't use anymore?” Scotty asks.

  “It has to be,” Jack says.

  Suddenly, the narrator mannequin speaks.

  “The shaken boys have made a quite a blunder

  In their haste for items to plunder.

  The mistake had been made for personal glory

  Now they must make amends to finish the story.

  But they cannot go back: the girl is lost.

  Must find her at once, but at what cost?”

  For a few seconds, none of the boys speak. There is an uncomfortable silence.

  Breaking the tension, Jack offers, “Okay, that's bizarre.”

  “It was talking about us,” Scotty, eyes wide open, suggests.

  “Oh, Scotty, that's garbage,” Mason counters, dismissing the rhyme.

  Jack ponders the meaning of the words. “No, Scotty is right. How did it know about us—and our props and Amy?”

  “He, or, uh, it doesn't. It's just a coincidence. Has to be,” declares Mason, who appears to be trying to convince himself of the truth of his own words.

  Jack walks up to the narrator slowly. He's apprehensive that the mannequin might actually be real. Glaring over the shoulder of the fake man, he, for the first time, examines the large book. Jack has always wondered whether the creators of the ride had taken the time write words in the large books, but there it is on the paper—the exact rhyme that had blared over the cracking speakers.

  “What's with the house?” Mason quips.

  “Oh,” answers Scotty, “I imagine it's a scene from Hansel and Gretel. You know, the German fairy tale recorded first by the Brothers Grimm. It was—”

  “Okay, Scotty, I get the point. What do we do now, fearless leader?” asks Mason while staring at Jack.

  This situation surprises Jack more than a little. He knows the ride well, but this is new territory, and Mason is actually ready to take orders.

  “She can't be far. There ar
e a set of doors over this way. She must have gone through here.”

  A munching sound catches Jack's attention. He asks, “Scotty, what are you doing?”

  “It's candy, real candy.”

  Disgusted, Mason mocks a puking lurch, then says, “Oh, you're sick. You have no idea how long it's been sitting here.”

  “No, it's good! It tastes fresh. Here, take a bite.”

  Scotty pulls a peppermint stick from the frame of a tiny door.

  “No thanks, I'm good. What's gotten into you? I can't believe you're just going to eat that.” But Mason actually finds the whole affair not surprising. Scotty is pretty well-known for his cast iron stomach.

  “I'm nervous. I get hungry when I'm nervous. Plus, I was curious.”

  “I don't care how curious I am, I am not going to go munching on some house in a creepy dark ride,” Mason chides. Then, he remembers something and asks, “Hey, what happened to Hansel and Gretel when they ate off the house?”

  Between bites of candy, Scotty says, “A witch came and imprisoned them in a cage to fatten them up so she could cook them in—”

  Scotty stops chewing for a moment when he realizes how similar his situation is to Hansel and Gretel. He looks around. Jack and Mason, too, are scanning the room, but the coast is clear.

  Scotty says, “I don't see any witches,” and he continues chowing down.

  Still, Jack is growing nervous about the whole situation. “Guys, something about this room seems different. It's ‘off,’ you know?”

  “What do you mean, Jack?” grumbles Scotty while munching on a piece of red licorice from the window sill.

  “I don't know, it just feels…odd.” And after another pause, he says, “We need to find Amy, and then we should get outta here.”

  Chapter 28

  The troubles in the Dark Ride have caused Clyde headaches for three days. He wondered why he had not simply closed the Enchanted Forrest down, but the answer to that question is obvious. In spite of the trouble, it is a popular attraction, and he hated the thought of shutting her down before fans had an opportunity for a farewell ride. In fact, he was willing to fight the ride all night if he had to just to let kids like Jack have one more moment. This perseverance had resulted in at least fifteen trips to the large breaker box located in the rear of the Jack and Jill Room. There, he would simply jiggle a few wires and flip a couple of switches, and the ride would groan back to life. However, Clyde was beginning to think that what he was doing at the box had nothing to do with the power coming back on at all.