High up in the sky above Lake Buena Vista, the first helicopter tour of the morning gave a couple of tourists a bird's eye view of the Walt Disney World property. If the occupants had looked down at the highway below, rather than at the large patches of dark green trees or the drab gray buildings, they might have noticed a brown blur speeding down the road. A closer look would have revealed two dots, one blond and the other red, bopping in time to blaring music. Had they been within hearing range, they would have heard it was No Doubt's song "Tragic Kingdom" that was playing. And had they really cared about any of this, they would have noticed too very important people indeed...
"I get to pick the CD on the way back."
Liberty just smirked at Jake and turned up the volume. The wind whipped her mane of orange-red hair as the Jeep sped towards the employee parking lot. With only a clear, plastic roof and no doors, the light tan vehicle looked like a prime target for hijacking. Its only line of defense was the fact it was possibly the most ugly car ever made. It spat out more exhaust than the Indy Speedway clunkers in Tomorrowland. Plus it looked like it would go up in flame quicker than in a Pinto on a bumper car course.
"Ready for the day?" the khaki clad Jungle Cruise skipper asked, parking his ATV.
Lib shot back, "Am I ever?"
Jake grinned at the redhead. "You're just jealous 'cause you know I have the better job."
Lib shoved him, making him cackle. The friends got out of the car and fell into step with one another. "The sad thing is," she said, "you might be right. But I work at the funnier attraction."
"Oh, ouch!" he feigned an emotional lash, hand across his heart. The closer they got to their lockers, the greater the excitement in his eyes. Jake Livingston genuinely loved his job. And he honestly thought the jokes were funny! Every day he strode in, bright eyed and bushy tailed, with an arsenal of pathetic puns in mind. Sandy haired, loyal, and hyper, Jake always reminded everyone of a golden retriever.
He got his uniform, grinning from ear to ear. It looked just like the outfit he was wearing. Lib shook her head and rolled her emerald eyes. It took a special breed to be a Skipper: a blend of stand up comedian, sadist, and masochist all rolled into one.
Picking up her pale pink blouse, white cap, and long skirt, Lib wondered if it took a certain type to do her job as well.
An unseen fiddle played cheerfully, its sweet tones carried on the breeze as it wafted through Liberty Square, drifting around colonial style buildings. Ducks in the Rivers of America quacked and scrambled for fresh, hurled popcorn. The Liberty Bell steamboat sailed past the Haunted Mansion. Every couple of hours, the captain would tug on the whistle, making several guests in the spook house's queue jump. Across the river, kids and parents climbed and ran across Tom Sawyer's Island.
Whistling along with the patriotic tune of an invisible fife, Liberty Madison stood in front of the Hall of Presidents. Perhaps it had been fate, having a name like that and having the love of American history that she did. When she was a young child, the Hall of Presidents had been her favorite attraction. Little swinging legs unable to touch the floor, she had sat in rapt attention, eyes glued to the giant screen as the narration and projections gave a brief, engrossing history of the U. S. The best part came after the film, though. She had squealed in delight as the red, velvet curtain had been squeakily raised, revealing what looked like the living, breathing presidents, the formers and the current. Hearing the inspiring words of Abraham Lincoln had started her love for history. How she had wished those were the real men so she could talk with each and every one and find out how things had really gone down.
About twelve years would pass before she would set foot in Disney again. At nineteen, she had moved from her native Philadelphia to Lake Buena Vista, Florida, to be in the Disney College Program. Of course she requested if she could work in the Hall of Presidents. To her surprise, they let her. On her first day, after ushering small groups in and out of the show, she decided to give up most of her lunch break to watch it.
Eagerly, she had anticipated the narration she only had flickers of a child's memory of. However, when the voice started, it was different. She brushed that aside though, and kept enjoying the show. But to her horror, the attraction was changed!
It was almost impossible to stay quiet as she gritted her teeth and gripped the arm rests of her cushioned chair, listening to some random voice cry out during the Constitutional Convention debate segment, "What about the slaves?" When the Whisky Rebellion part was completely taken out, her eye twitched. Gone was the positive note on inventors like Thomas Edison and the Wright Brothers after the lesson on the Civil War. That had been replaced with a mini speech about continuing prejudice. The whole thing had been revamped to be historically inaccurate for the sake of being politically correct! Or rather, making the nation seem politically correct in its early years.
She would admit that the Hall of Presidents had been a much more positive outlook on history, skirting some of the more negative issues, but at least it got most of its facts straight. Now it was full of falsities and depressing. The attraction that she had loved so dearly she now hated. But she was stuck there for the time being. Maybe after her semester was over, she could work part time and request to move to EPCOT's American Adventure.
She would ask about Splash Mountain, but she had a feeling word of her petition to get Song of the South released on DVD had reached someone higher up and she'd never be allowed to work near that ride. They probably thought she'd stage a protest. It wasn't like she'd really given them reason to assume she'd do something like that. Well, okay, maybe she had. And maybe she had been out of line telling everyone in the waiting room for Hall of Presidents each and every inaccurate little detail of the show. And maybe she shouldn't have handed out pamphlets and told people to complain at City Hall. Honestly, she was amazed she wasn't let go.
Lib sighed and looked around the empty waiting area. Perhaps she needed to quit being so anal-retentive. It was meant to be entertainment, after all. Actually, for most people, the Hall meant a quick nap in air conditioning. She should, she thought, just be thankful it hadn't been torn down and replaced with a playground and meet and greet, like poor 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.
Glancing down at her Donald Duck watch, she noted it was time for her lunch break. Another cast member was there, so she need not worry…Who was she kidding? Like there was going to be a crowd! It had been practically deserted all day. But it was early November, and a weekday at that. With Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party finished, they wouldn't be seeing heavy crowds until December. Even if some families came here during the kids' Thanksgiving break, it wasn't too bad. (Compared to Christmas and New Year's, nothing was "too bad.")
So she slipped away and headed for the employee cafeteria.
Stuffing a ketchup covered chicken finger into his mouth, Jake boasted, "I got a kid to laugh! At one of my jokes!" He chugged down a swallow of soda and then continued. "It was the bathroom one, with all the natives dancing in a circle. You know, 'You may think you're witnessing some great, tribal ritual, but the chief really lost the key to the men's room.'" Beaming, he stole one of Lib's fries.
She playfully stabbed at his hand with a plastic fork. "Are you sure he was laughing with you and not at you?" Moving too quick for him to catch her, she took some macaroni and cheese from his plate.
"Careful with that joke. It's an antique." He pilfered another French fry.
"Oh, and you would know about tired old jokes, Skipper Jake."
"Exactly. I'm the leading expert." Looking up, he noticed a friend of theirs walking towards them. "Oh!" he cried in a mock, Shakespearean accent. "What ho! Tis the fair princess, come to grace us with her presence! To what do we owe the extreme pleasure, O graceful maiden of the Middle East?"
Francine Torres blushed and pushed her black hair over her shoulder as she took a seat at their table. Underneath the purple robe she wore was her Jasmine costume. "Hey guys."
Soft spoken, Francine's voice was hardly above a whisper when she wasn't out posing for photos or signing autographs. Her big, brown eyes always seemed to divert shyly away when she wasn't in character. She was actually a Latina, but, as she pointed out, when you were in a good enough costume and had the right wig, kids didn't see race. All they saw was their hero (or heroine). And really, their grinning faces when they saw the characters they loved were all that mattered.
"How's your day been, Frankie?" Lib asked.
The other girl stared down into her salad, poking at it with a fork. "Oh, it's been all right. I'm just really tired. My step-dad and I got in another fight last night."
Lib and Jake exchanged arched eyebrow looks, and then they both gave Frankie an once-over glance while she was still distracted by her food. No bruises they could see. That didn't mean anything, though.
"Uh, you know," Lib began, knowing she was treading on thin ice, "when that happens, you can call me. I can come get you and you can spend the night at my place."
Frankie shook her head. "I wouldn't impose. And, I mean, it's not like anything happened. Just words." The eighteen year old sighed and pushed her food around. Unlike Lib and Jake, she didn't live on property, and she wasn't in the college program. Working part time, she would graduate from high school that May. The role of princess had always suited Frankie. It seemed like she was just waiting for her prince charming to show up and whisk her away for a fairy tale, happy ending.
Lib couldn't decide whether she felt pity or frustration. But she held back any lectures this time.
Instead, she said, "Since we've got tomorrow off, Jake and I were going to have a 'Swept Under the Rug' Disney film fest at my apartment tonight. You're welcome to join us. I've got plenty of popcorn." She gave her most encouraging expression.
Lifting her head, the younger girl grinned. But then the smile faded. "Oh, I can't. I've got to be home tonight to watch my stepbrothers and sisters."
"Maybe next weekend then."
"Hey-hey!" a caffeine enriched, cracking voice spastically called out, startling all of them out of their somber mood. A lanky teenager in a Space Mountain CM suit flung himself down next to Jake. "Oh my god! You'll never guess what I found out!" he quickly blurted, his head whipping from side to side. He was shaking, hair and glasses askew.
"What's up, Isaac?" asked Jake. "Besides Astro Orbitor," he chuckled.
"No time for jokes!" Isaac spat, his eyes big and bloodshot behind his thick lenses. Body trembling with the after effects of having two Red Bulls for lunch, he lowered his head down close to the table and waited for the others to do the same. "I've got news," he hissed. He jerked his head above the others just for a second, shooting nervous glares in every direction. Lowering his head again, he whispered, "You know that ever since ExtraTERRORestial Alien Encounter was taken out, I've been keeping tabs on what's on slate to be removed, right?"
Actually they didn't. Truthfully, they knew less about Isaac than they knew about, say, how to build an audio animatronic from the ground up. (And since neither Jake nor Lib could even build an erector set tower with written instruction, color coding, and half of it already put together, that was saying something.) The only reason they could remember the kid's name was because he wore it on a tag!
"Uh, yeah," they lied.
Conspiratorially, Isaac darted his gaze around and slowly reached into his pocket and took out a folded note. He pushed it towards Lib. "You didn't get it from me," he ordered, tapping the side of his nose. His eye twitched.
Opening the white printer paper, Lib's eyes dashed across the font, her face showing more and more disbelief with each paragraph. Jake and Frankie, sitting across from her, could only wait to hear.
"But…but…" Lib babbled, too upset to make a coherent sentence. "I thought…I thought this would be, I don't know, protected!"
Jake snatched the parchment from her limp hands and read it out loud. "'Go ahead has been given on demolition of Carousel of Progress. Dismantle can be done eleven, twelve…" He looked up. "Are they talking about tomorrow? It's the twelfth."
Isaac bobbed his head. "It's been closed all day. 'Refurbs' they say. Ha! They're trying to do this without anyone knowin'. It's a conspiracy!" Shaking, he ducked back down, whimpering.
Lib frowned thoughtfully. "How did you get this?"
"Hacked into the system. Don't know who it's from though. Just one board to another," he explained breathlessly. " I was just able to snag the e-mail. Then it shut me out. Ha! But the point is, I got it!"
After being quiet for so long, Frankie finally spoke up. "Are we…are we going to, you know, do anything?" she asked timidly. "I really like that ride. The song always makes me happy."
Lib looked thoughtful. "But this is pure Walt. How could they get rid of it? His name is in the title. And it's Americana! It's all about looking forward to the future while paying tribute to the past! Not everything has to be a thrill ride! You need time to relax and just take in some charm and wit after walking in the heat all day. They think everything needs to be able to sell toys," she sneered. "There's always at least half a theater full when I watch it. It certainly does better than HoP."
"You know, you never hear anything about small world getting the ax," Jake quipped. "I thought everyone hated that."
"I like it," Frankie mumbled into her bowl.
"What can we do?" asked Lib. "Even if you," she looked at Isaac, "were to send that out to everyone and post it on every message board, nothing would be done. Remember Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea?"
"Mr. Toad's Wild Ride," Jake sighed, remembering how he and his older brothers had shown up in brown shirts that read "SAVE TOAD!"
"Alien Encounter," grumbled Isaac.
"Dreamfinder in EPCOT," Frankie mumbled. "And Dreamflight here."
Horizons… World of Motion… Mission to Mars… The list could go on. Many attractions had come and gone from the parks. If something had worn out its popularity or there was an idea for something "better" that could go in its place, or a ride got too many complaints, out it went. It was something fans got used to, even if they didn't like it. But Lib couldn't think of any reasons to remove Carousel of Progress. Maybe it was considered too "slow" and "boring" by today's standards, but it always seemed to have a crowd. It was classic, sweet, funny, and above all, uplifting.
Something about this felt wrong. She wished she could do something. But when management made a decision, not even chaining yourself to a ride car could get them to change their minds.
Glancing down at her watch, she decided to break the somber silence. "Lunch will be over in just a minute. We have to start heading out." As they left to throw away their trash and put up their trays, she couldn't help but feel they were being watched.