Mal considered it for a moment, thinking. Finally she nodded. “Okay. Jay’s right. We need to lie low,” she said. “We’ll leave Saturday after the game since everyone gets off-campus privileges on the weekend. Come back Sunday night like everyone else, be back here in time for class on Monday.”
“Now you’re talking.” Jay smiled.
“Wait, hold on,” said Evie. “If Jay and Carlos get to play tourney, what about the dance? I’m part of the royal committee, and I have to make sure everything’s set up correctly. Otherwise, what if it looks like Wonderland threw up on everything? Plus, it’s right after the game, and people will notice if we’re not there, especially you, Mal. Even if Ben’s not there, people will be expecting you.”
“So we go to the dance too,” agreed Jay. “Why not?”
Carlos made a few calculations in his head. “The game ends by five, and the dance starts at six, we stay for an hour, maybe, to make sure everyone notices that we were there. That doesn’t leave us a whole lot of time to get out of here and to the Isle by midnight, but it’s doable.”
“And this way you guys won’t let down your team,” said Evie.
“And Evie gets to set up with her committee,” added Jay.
“And Mal gets to…dance?” said Carlos.
“We all get to dance,” said Evie, whose eyes were sparkling now.
Mal threw up her hands. “Okay,” she said. “We won’t leave till after the game and the dance so we don’t arouse suspicion, and I guess it’s good to live up to our responsibilities.”
They discussed the logistics of their plan for sneaking out of Auradon: Evie would come up with disguises while Jay would figure out transportation.
“Did we miss anything?” Mal asked.
“Yes, I think so,” said Carlos after a moment. “So far the plan can get us out of here, but wouldn’t people notice that we’re gone on Sunday? That would raise some alarms, don’t you think? Even though we’re allowed to be off campus for the weekend, people might think it’s strange since we never go anywhere.”
“Oh, right,” said Jay with a sheepish smile. “What are we going to do about that?”
Mal grimaced, thinking hard. “We’re going to be gone for less than twenty-four hours. How about we all pretend to catch some sort of bug that keeps us in our rooms, and we can post things online about how sick we are, when in reality we’re actually running around the island. Isn’t that what our online feeds are for? To convince people you’re doing something that you’re not?”
“I don’t think that’s what they’re for, actually,” said Carlos.
“No, it’s perfect,” said Jay. “We all get the flu. No one will want to be near us, then. Everyone will leave us alone.”
“Evie, can you set up our accounts so that the posts show up automatically? We won’t be able to update them ourselves from the Isle,” Mal pointed out.
“Of course,” said Evie. “I feel like I’ve been training my whole life for this.” She batted her eyelashes jokingly before looking serious again. “So we’re taking off on Saturday night for sure?”
“For sure,” said Carlos, who had turned a bit green. “What are you smiling about?” he snapped at Jay, who was leaning back, arms behind his head, looking like he hadn’t a care in the world. “Aren’t you scared?”
“Totally, but I sort of expected something like this would happen,” Jay replied.
“What do you mean you expected something like this to happen?” demanded Carlos, who was practically pulling out his black-and-white hair at the roots at the thought of returning home so soon.
“I just did,” Jay said, and stopped to consider why he felt that way. He had grown up on the Isle of the Lost, scrounged for food in the garbage, survived goblin-made coffee, and his favorite snack was still stale popcorn. Even after living in Auradon, he would always be a bit skeptical of happily-ever-after. And honestly, he’d been waiting for the other shoe to drop ever since the Coronation.
“I don’t know, because it can’t be this easy, right? We win one battle against Maleficent and it’s over?” he told them. “No way; haven’t we learned by now that there are always mons
ters hiding under beds, or in the closet, or, um, escaping from island prisons? Monsters who are related to us even.”
“You think our parents are monsters?” Evie asked, her voice faint.
“Well, we all know mine certainly is,” said Mal. “Fire-breathing dragon and everything.”
They all laughed. But Jay was still thinking of what he’d said about their parents. Was Jafar a monster? Jafar might take things to the extreme, but he was also just Jay’s slightly overweight, pajama-wearing dad, who dreamt of gold and riches beyond his wildest imagination. A man driven by greed who thought only of himself wasn’t much of a monster on an island without magic. But what would happen if Jafar was able to get his magic back? Like Maleficent, Jafar had a powerful magical staff, a cobra that could hypnotize and manipulate those who came under its thrall. Who knew what he would be capable of doing then? But Jay already knew that answer. It’s what had landed his father in the Isle of the Lost in the first place.
So no, Jay wasn’t surprised that their parents were up to something new, and while he was frightened, he also knew that it didn’t matter if all of them were scared. If it was true that this Anti-Heroes movement was growing on the Isle of the Lost, and that their errant parents—Jafar, Evil Queen, and Cruella de Vil—were behind it, he and his friends were the only ones who could stop them. “As Mal said herself, Maleficent is definitely a monster, but we took care of Maleficent, didn’t we?” he said. “So we can handle this, whatever it is.”
“But what if Maleficent is part of it too?” said Evie worriedly. “What if she’s not completely harmless like we think she is?”