Everwild

She lingered at the neighbor's door a moment more, then left, taking the package with her to the front door of her own home. Then she stood at her own front door, frozen, just as she had been frozen at the city sign. This was the moment she had waited for. All she had to do was ring the bell. All she had to do was lift her finger--his finger--and do it. Never had a living hand felt so heavy.

Then, to her surprise, the door opened without her ever ringing the bell.

"Hi, is that package for us?"

The woman who opened the door was not her mother. She was a total stranger. She was in her twenties, and had a baby on her hip, who was very excited by the prospect of a large box.

"Just bring it in, and put it by the stairs," the woman said. "Do I have to sign for it?"

"Uh ... uh ... It's not for you." Allie cleared her throat, startled by the way she sounded. She could never get used to the masculine timbre of her voice when she cross-jacked. It was one of several troubling things that came with being temporarily male.

"Well, if it's not for us, then who is it for?"

"The Johnson family."

"Who?" she asked, then realized. "Oh, right. We got things for them every once in a while, once the forwarding order expired."

They had moved--but that could just be her mother and sister, who weren't in the car. She still had no way of knowing if her father had survived.

"Any idea where they went?"

"No," the woman said.

"Wasn't there an accident?" Allie asked. "I heard about it--they lost a daughter."

"I wouldn't know about that. Sorry."

And then Allie asked the big question. "How long have you been living here?"

"Almost three years now."

Allie closed her eyes, and tried to take that in. She had been in Everlost for three years. Unchanged, never aging. Still fourteen. How could so much time have passed?

"Wait a second," the woman said. "Of course, I can't be sure, but I seem to recall something about Memphis. I think that's where they went."

It made sense--her mother had family there ... but did that mean her father had died in the crash, and her mother had sold the house? There were so many questions still unanswered.

The woman shifted the baby to her other hip, getting impatient. "The neighbors might know more, but then a lot of them are just summer renters."

"Thank you. Sorry to have bothered you."

Then the woman closed the door, to the protests of the baby, who began to wail over the fact that the box was not for him. Allie went to other homes on the street, but few neighbors were home, and the ones who did come to the door were clueless.

Allie returned to the UPS truck, took one last breath of the flavorful June air, then pulled herself out of the delivery man. Ending a skinjacking was as unpleasant as begi

"What happened?" Mikey asked, coming up to her. "Were they there? Did you talk to them?"

"They moved to Memphis," she told him, still a bit dazed by it all.

Mikey sighed. "So ... I suppose that means we're going to Te

She offered him an apologetic grin that wasn't all that apologetic. It was disheartening to know that her home was no longer hers, and troubling to have so far to go until she could find out the truth. Yet there was relief in it as well ... because Memphis was far, far away, and that meant she wouldn't be losing Mikey so quickly! Looking at him now, he seemed taller. Majestic. There was a reason for that.

"You're sinking," Mikey said.

Laughing, Allie reached out to him. He took her hand gently but firmly, and eased her out of the ground.

They left, but as they did, Allie couldn't help but look back toward the deliveryman, who was now heading back to his truck. She couldn't deny how much she enjoyed the lingering sensation of flesh. Each time she skinjacked, it felt more and more seductive. In her book Caution, This Means You, Mary Hightower has this to say about the Everwild:

"Finders who survive excursions into the untamed corners of Everlost tell stories of things strange, mystical, and dangerous. Whether or not these stories of the Everwild are true do not matter to the sensible Afterlight, for all sensible Afterlights know that it's best to leave the wild wild, and the Unknown unknown. Venturing beyond one's personal zone of safety is always ill-advised, and can only end in profound unpleasantness."

It is important to note that Mary wrote this before she, herself, took to the skies.

CHAPTER 5 Southern Discomfort

Nick had never seen a city with so many deadspots. They were so numerous that they could hardly be called deadspots at all. The city of Atlanta belonged as much to Everlost as it did to the living world. The streets were part cobblestone, part asphalt, part dirt. The night was lit by just as many gas lamps as modern street-lights. Buildings from multiple time periods seemed to occupy the same space, fighting to claim "dominant reality." It made it very clear to Nick that as much as he thought he knew and understood Everlost, he barely knew anything at all.

Their train slowly, cautiously rolled forward on tracks that once carried the Civil War dead. Then, as the train neared the center of Atlanta, the living world road began to fill the train like an asphalt river.

"We're sinking!" shouted Joh

"I don't think that's it," said Charlie. "It's more like the street's rising. We're still riding on tracks."

"I have a feeling we're in for a few more surprises," said Nick. * * *

Long ago, when the battle between locomotive and automobile came to Atlanta, the city was caught in a dilemma. Atlanta, being the chief railroad city of the south, had so many trains, there was simply no room for cars. Then the city pla

Why not build roads above the train tracks?

And so by building automobile viaducts above the central railroad gulch, the city of Atlanta was effectively raised almost twenty feet. The first floor of every building was now underground--and second floors became the new ground floors. Then, as cars took over, and rail lines closed down, those old subterranean storefronts were forgotten. Thus was born underground Atlanta--and although modern business interests have turned parts of it into a mall, the real Atlanta underground belongs to Everlost.

The train rolled down the underground street in near darkness, but then the faint, pale blue glow of Afterlights began to fill the street around them. Afterlights were quite literally coming out of the woodwork--not dozens, but hundreds, and, like the buildings around them, these kids were from every era in history. Some held bricks, others metal pipes or bats--but one thing was clear--every single one of them was armed and prepared for a fight.