The Key To the Kingdom (38 page)
Read The Key To the Kingdom Online
Authors: Jeff Dixon
Instantly breaking into a sprint, Hawk ran toward Fantasyland. Kiran ran alongside him but couldn’t match his speed. Reginald was fifty yards away when they spotted him. Their quick retreat bought them a few additional yards, but they were running blind.
“This way!” Kiran tugged his arm from behind.
Hawk turned back to his left as Kiran headed for an unmarked door. Swinging the door open he followed her into an undecorated hallway. Still in a dead sprint she surged ahead with Hawk right behind her. Yanking another door open they both stepped into a stairwell and began a steep descent. Somewhere behind them Hawk was certain he heard the door they had stepped out of Fantasyland through open as well. Reginald was right behind them. Feet dancing lightly over each step, they twisted around a landing and continued their downward race. The steps came to an end. Never breaking pace Kiran hit the next doorway and shoved it open. Together they ran through it.
K
IRAN AND
H
AWK CHARGED
into one of the best-known and least seen legends in the Magic Kingdom: the utilidor. Most guests of the Magic Kingdom don’t realize they are actually walking on the second floor of the theme park. Underneath the streets, the flowers, the trees, and the water is the underground portion of the Magic Kingdom known as the utilidor. This massive infrastructure, a network of offices, massive storage areas, and administrative space, woven together by a one-and-a-half-mile color-coded tunnel system, expands out over nine acres. The unique construction allows the Magic Kingdom to create an extra sense of magic with cast members and characters traveling from one place to another unseen by guests.
Beyond the convenience of moving cast members from place to place, the utilidor serves as the control and command center for the park. Rooms off each side of the tunnels lead to employee areas containing video games, locker rooms, dressing areas, and places to watch television and relax. Cast members can find a cafeteria, barber shop, wardrobe headquarters, paycheck center, utility hubs, and the controls that run the entire theme park. This windowless creation is one of the most creative portions of the Magic Kingdom, which, although extremely functional and practical, helps create the onstage magical world that all of the guests experience.
Kiran ran to her left through a tunnel that began to wind away off to their right. Hawk followed her closely, glancing behind him to see if Reginald was in pursuit. In a full sprint, their footfalls reverberated in the utilidor.
The pair wildly ran along the concrete corridor. In a full-bore sprint Hawk could feel the fatigue of the last few days sapping the spring out of his step. Realizing his current pace would momentarily exhaust him, he willed his conscience to create some kind of plan. The utilidor formed a complete circle below the Magic Kingdom. A long corridor down the middle of the oval ran below Main Street USA and stretched back below Fantasyland. Hawk was trying to get his bearings, but it was assumed that if you were in the utilidor you knew where you were going. The assumption did not always hold true and he’d heard many new cast members, confident they could navigate the passages and find the correct stairwell, would easily get lost in the loop of the tunnel. The corridor Kiran and Hawk were in came to an intersection and they both hesitated.
“Hawk! Let’s go left and we’ll end up back near the main entrance of the park.”
“No, let’s go right.” Away from the entrance. And somewhere down here, if he could find what he was looking for, was his way out. “Reginald might not expect that.”
“Do you know where you are?” Kiran whispered.
“Where I am exactly . . . I have no idea,” he admitted. “But I don’t have time to ask for directions.”
“I’m giving you directions. Follow me and let’s get out of here.”
“I think we should go this way,” Hawk gestured in the opposite direction.
“Go where?”
Hawk settled the conversation as he grabbed Kiran’s hand and tugged her in the direction his instincts had chosen. They ran again and in short order the utilidor veered sharply to the left. Making the turn they came to yet another intersection. This was the corridor Hawk had been looking for. They stood at the opening of the main hallway that divided the underground oval of the utilidoors. The pipes streaming sideways along the walls and roofline mixed with the shadows created by the fluorescent tube lighting made the corridor look like it stretched toward infinity. Still holding hands they paused and looked down the utilidor.
“We go that way.” Hawk sighed and got ready to run once more.
“No!” Kiran pulled back against him, causing him to turn toward her.
“It’s deserted this time of the morning, let’s go!”
“No, we can still get back to the main entrance of the tunnel.” Kiran strongly leaned in the other direction. “At the end of the main utilidor is the wardrobe area, dining room, DACS, and where any traffic would be this time of night.”
“I have an idea,” Hawk urged her. “Trust me.”
“I’m telling you, Hawk, if we go back we can get out of the tunnels and sneak back down Main Street to the castle.”
“Reginald is right behind us,” Hawk said. “Don’t you think he will be expecting us to do what you just said?”
“I—” Her eyes danced back and forth as though she expected, as he did, Reginald would come racing around the corner at any minute.
“Follow me.” Hawk began moving down the long passageway.
Hesitantly Kiran followed as she glanced back over her shoulder to see if they were being followed. The preacher’s greatest fear now was that in this long, straight corridor they would lose their ability to stay hidden. Running around the oval had allowed the bend in the hallways to constantly break the line of sight between them and their pursuer. Now that luxury was gone and an all-out sprint through the utilidor risked exposing them. Hawk had a destination in mind, he just didn’t know if they had time to get there.
Cambridge thundered to a stop as the corridor abruptly came to an intersection. He looked to his right as the sweat soaked through his shirt and ran down his temples. Turning his head to the right he knew this direction would take him past a large cast member break room, then to a series of tunnels that would all provide access back into the theme park. Hawkes and Roberts had been moving through the theme park all night and he was confident they would go back there. Reflexively he reached toward his waistband for his radio. The cameras in the utilidor were monitored in a security station. In a moment he might have known where the two were, but in his haste to get back into the park, his radio was still in his office. He would have to trust his instincts. He headed to his left to find a stairwell back into the theme park.
Halfway down the never-ending utilidor Hawk and Kiran were still alone.
“He isn’t behind us,” Kiran panted.
“Where is he?” Hawk broke down and slowed his pace. “Where did he go?”
“I don’t know, maybe he went the other way.”
Following Hawk’s lead Kiran began to slow and they both settled into a brisk jog. Three people rounded the corner from the direction they were heading. The cast members had been talking but quit as they saw the unexpected sight of two people running toward them. Silently staring as the pair trotted in their direction the three men took their places in a golf cart that was sitting along the wall in the tunnel. The tires squealed on the concrete as the black rubber gripped and jolted the cart forward. Kiran and Hawk drifted to the right side of the corridor giving the cart room to meet them. Just as the cart was in front of them the driver broke into a broad smile.
“It would have been easier to have grabbed a cart!” Jovially he waved and the other two men smiled.
“Now you tell us!” Hawk returned the wave as the cart headed past them.
“Obviously they weren’t looking for us,” Kiran commented.
“But we did look a little odd running down the corridor.”
“You think?”
“Just keep jogging, we’re almost there.” Hawk moved back into the center of the utilidor.
“Almost where?”
“Almost here.” Hawk stopped at a doorway.
“What are you doing?”
“We’re going in.” Hawk pulled his employee ID card out of his pocket and swiped the magnetic stripe through the lock on the door. The time had come to reveal the discovery he hadn’t shown her after his climb through Expedition Everest.
“Where did you get that?” Kiran asked as she saw the card for the first time.
“A yeti gave it to me,” Hawk responded and placed it back in his pocket not giving her a chance to take a closer look.
The door opened and Hawk smiled as they entered the Character Zoo.
T
HE CHARACTER
Z
OO
is the place where many dreams begin to come alive for kids although they never realize it. Below the streets and attractions of the Magic Kingdom is the place where “friends” of all the famous Walt Disney characters gather to pick up wardrobe, make minor repairs to outfits, and transform themselves into the famous celebrities created by Disney through the years. Mortal everyday people walk into the zoo and exit as a legendary character designed to bring delight and smiles to people of all ages.
In many ways this is the one place many dream of seeing but deep inside don’t really want to. There is something magical about suspending belief and imagining you are meeting the one and only Goofy or Pluto. Inside the Character Zoo a little of the magic unravels. Unlike many other areas of the Magic Kingdom, this large area is wildly disheveled.
Hawk thought that describing it as a zoo was appropriate. There were large oversized heads of the characters given birth in animated dreams of artists through the years. Hanging in row after untidy row were the various pieces of each outfit and costume necessary to bring the famous cartoon celebrities to life. Hawk and Kiran moved deeper into the zoo, twisting through the maze of crowded clothes racks.
“Hawk, we shouldn’t be in here!”
“Why not?”
“Because night is when they have a crew in to do costume repair. Someone will see us.”
“I don’t see anyone here.” He gestured toward the oversized head of Minnie Mouse resting on a shelf above a clothes rack and lowered his voice. “I don’t hear a creature stirring, not even a mouse.”