Dane returned from the dark, stepping back under the canopy.
“I guess we got it,” she told him.
He smiled at her. “I could feel it.”
Fourteen days to Mandy’s premiere …
Emile DeRondeau handed Dane a pair of safety glasses, a requirement for being on the main shop floor. “You should know, Seamus Downey’s already here. He likes to keep his nose in everything.”
“Oh. Oh, that’s good,” Dane replied, putting on the glasses. “The closer he’s watching the better.”
“Exactly.”
Emile DeRondeau’s company, EDR Theatrical Design and Effect, occupied an expansive building that used to be a major grocery store and was one of the backstage wonders of the showbiz world. Some of the most memorable and impressive set designs, stage effects, and convention displays originated in this place, conceived and constructed by Emile and his team of eight semi-eccentric dream builders. The place sounded like a factory, with the incessant whirring of drills, whining of saws, and growling of grinders and sanders.
Emile led the way through the main shop to Room C, tucked away in a corner of the building and placarded against casual visitors. In the center of the room, the pod hung like a plumb bob from a ceiling hoist, suspended a foot off the floor. It was functional but still in the bare plywood stage until all the gimmicks and safety features were tested.
Standing next to it, getting a thorough briefing from one of Emile’s builders, was Seamus Downey.
“Mr. Downey!” Dane called out, walking right up to him.
Mr. Downey’s face tightened a moment, but he immediately put on a smile. “Well. This is a surprise.”
Dane extended his hand.
Downey shook it and asked, “What are you doing here?”
Emile piped in, “It was my request, actually. Eloise needs a safety coach, Dane was the first one I thought of. Turns out they already knew each other!”
“Yeah,” said Seamus, his smile crooked. “Small world.”
Dane looked the pod over, allowing himself to come close to Seamus for a lowered-voice conversation. “Just so you know, you are her manager, Mr. Downey, and I respect that. I’m only here to assure her safety. It’s a technical role.”
“Looks to me like you couldn’t stay away.”
Dane smiled. “Well, we have our friendship, but we’d make a pretty odd-looking couple, don’t you think?” He poked his head through the escape hatch, inspecting the pod’s interior. “Just give her some time. As near as I can tell, you’re definitely in the game. As for me, when the stunt’s over, my job’s over and I’m going home. But it’s a privilege being here and I want to thank you.”
Seamus eased a bit. “Okay. You’re welcome. We all want Eloise to be perfectly safe.”
Emile called, “Eloise, you ready?”
Mandy was perched on a chair against the wall, watching the little encounter between Dane and Seamus and reminding herself not to show any feelings about it. She was wearing navy sweats and a body harness and wrapping each ankle with a sport bandage to protect her from the shackles. One final wrap around her left ankle and she was ready.
Dane greeted her and talked only about the stunt. “Now, I know heights don’t bother you much, but you’re going to be upside down and hanging by your ankles a hundred and fifty feet off the ground, so we’re going to do a little fear inoculation and step through this slowly.”
Emile signaled the hoist operator. He raised the pod to where it aligned with an escape platform fifteen feet above the floor. With a quiet whirring, the six panels composing the bottom of the pod opened like a flower, and a second cable passing through the pod dropped back down.
A nasty-looking pair of leg shackles were laid out on a tumbling mat immediately below the pod. Mandy stepped up and a crewman clamped them around her ankles as Dane explained, “These shackles are safety-wired so they won’t fall off and hit you on the chin and embarrass you in front of all those people. Make sure the safeties are in place before they hoist you up. Now, this cable hooks to your body harness …”
Dane kept explaining, she kept rehearsing and testing. With her ankles shackled and her hands cuffed to a chain about her waist, she lay down on the mat and the hoist took her up, feet first, until she was hanging upside down with her face even with Dane’s.
“How you feeling?” Dane asked.
“Like a bat,” she answered.
“Your weight should be on the harness, not your ankles.”
Her ankles felt fine. “Good to go.”
“Okay.” Dane almost touched her. She couldn’t touch him, she was handcuffed. He renewed his business-only face. “We’ll see you upstairs.” He said to the hoist man, “Up slowly.”
The cable raised her. With her chin to her chest she could look up past her feet and see the pod about to swallow her like a man-eating plant. To one side she could see Dane hurrying up the scaffold stairs to meet her at the top.
An invisible guide wire kept her turned toward the rear of the pod and the escape hatch. Feet first, she slipped inside until her feet rested on the pod’s ceiling. She hung the chain that bound her ankles on a hook in the ceiling, and a quick outward roll of her feet tripped the shackles open. “Legs are free,” she said, then pressed a button with her toe to close the six petal doors. They whirred shut below her, a soft cradle came up against each of her shoulders, and she was sealed inside, in the dark.
She heard Dane’s voice right outside.
“Okay, cuff release.”
Bending her elbows triggered the cuffs—they slipped off.
“Hands on the grips,” he told her. “Cable release when you’re ready.”
On either side of her, at shoulder level, was a short handgrip. She grabbed on. The grip on the right included a small lever she compressed with her hand. Click! “Cable free.”
“Now drop your knees toward your chest …”
Her knees pressed against the panel in front of her but nothing happened. “Uh, am I doing this right?”
“Your knees should be pressing against the panel.”
“They are.”
“Oh, brother!” Dane yanked a packing bolt from the escape hatch locking mechanism. “Attention, everybody!” All the techs and observers on the floor looked up at him. He held up the bolt for them to see. “This packing bolt should only be in place during transport of the pod. Be sure to flag it and remove it before the stunt. Got it?”
They were embarrassed. Good thing. Seamus looked disgusted, but with good reason.
“Okay,” he called to her, “knees against the panel.”
She kneed the panel and it popped open. She pushed against the grips, lifting her body, and with one quick tumble, she was out on the platform. High fives.
“Is she out?” came Seamus’s voice from below.
Mandy peered around the mirror system that would hide her escape and gave him a thumbs up. He looked astounded, then delighted.
Okay, so more than just the illusion was working.
Twelve days before Mandy’s premiere …
Dane met with Preston Gabriel, Emile DeRondeau, and Keisha Ellerman in a tree-shaded picnic area behind an elementary school near Preston’s house.
“Mandy’s checked out in the pod,” Dane reported. “All systems are go.”
Emile asked, “Go? Going?”
Keisha told him, “ ‘All systems are go.’ It’s old astronaut talk.”
“Ohhh.”
Dane asked Preston, “Comfortable with the big room show?”
“It’s coming together on schedule. Emile’s building the sets and I’ll bring up some effects from LA. We’ll be ready for the premiere.”
“So Keisha, what’ve you got?” Dane asked.
Keisha opened her sketchbook. “The Grand Illusion involves these two designs …” She flipped to the pages. “This one, in black leather with silver tunic, is in keeping with the macabre, medieval aspect of the stunt’s opening. The cuff release is integrated into the waistband, and I’ll include some extra banding around her ankles as she requested. It’s cut with a little extra room to fit over this one …” The flowing, angelic costume in glimmering white got an immediate reaction. “This was her idea, something totally opposite the black outfit to express a metamorphosis from death to life, escaping this world and soaring to heaven. The train and the streamers fold up against her back inside the leather suit, and the quick change deploys in less than a second.” Keisha loved the thought of it. “Like a butterfly from a cocoon.”