Everwild

"Wake up ..."

A moment passed. Then a moment more. And then two eyelids rose, revealing a pair of eyes that were the same shade of brown. The golem blinked, then blinked again.

"Am I?" said the golem. "Am I?"

"Are you what?"

"Am I ... here?"

"Yes," said Mikey, "you are. Do you know your name?"

The golem looked at him blankly. "Do I have a name?"

"Yes. Your name is Nick."

"My name is ... Nick."

"Say it again," urged Mikey.

"My name is Nick!"

The holes on the side of the golem's head grew into actual ears. The slit that was its mouth became a pair of lips.

"My name is Nick!" the golem said again, and sat itself up. "Is your name Nick?"

"No. I'm Mikey."

"Mikey McGill!" said the golem, pleased with itself. Its shapeless body took on human curves. Its lump of a nose spread with two nostrils.

"What do you remember?"

"I don't know," said the golem. He looked around, then said. "Allie!" And suddenly his mittenlike hand divided into fingers and a thumb. He looked at them curiously.

"Yes! Yes, Allie!" said Mikey.

"But ... but what's an Allie?" asked the golem.

Mikey sighed. This wasn't going to be easy, this wasn't going to be quick, but in Everlost, time was a plentiful thing.

"Allie's a friend," Mikey told him, "and you and I have to help her."

The golem stood, then walked, and when Mikey felt confident that the golem was sure-footed enough, he led them both west, toward the Mississippi, until they could no longer fight the wind.

There was no way they could cross the bridge, there was no way they could forge the river... .

... But there was another way to get to the other side.

Now, as they stood in place, they both began to sink into the living world. The golem looked down, to see his brown ankles had already disappeared into the earth. "We sink if we don't keep moving!" he said. "I remember now!"

"Good," said Mikey. "Keep on remembering."

They were up to their knees now, but Mikey made no move to pull himself out, and so neither did the chocolate golem.

"Hold on to me," Mikey told him. "Hold on to me tight, and whatever you do, don't let go."

The golem did as he was told, but as they sunk to their waists, he said, "I don't think this is a good idea." "It's all right," said Mikey. "We're just taking a trip."

"Where are we going?"

"We're going under the river, coming up on the other side. And then we're heading west to find Allie." Mikey forced his feet and his hands to grow into long, jagged claws, just perfect for moving through the earth. He had once clawed his way back from the center of the earth, he had to believe he could do this!

The wind still blew strong and relentless, but it did not penetrate the earth. Soon they had sunk to their chests.

"I'm scared," said the golem.

"So am I, Nick." But then Mikey thought about Allie, and came to understand that there was another feeling in him far more powerful than fear. A feeling that made his afterglow turn lavender. He held on to that feeling as he sank to his shoulders, and kept on going. Then, in spite of everything, he began to smile. So much of his existence in Everlost had been full of despair. Despair, and a fear of losing what he had. But Allie was not lost, she was just there across the river, waiting for him to find her. Nick was not lost either--not entirely.

It was then that Mikey McGill realized something. It must have been his sister who first called this place Everlost, because by naming it so, it stripped away all hope except for a faith in her, and the "safety" she could provide. Well, Mary was wrong on all counts, because nothing in Everlost was lost forever, if one had the courage to search for it.

Mikey held tightly on to this shining truth as he and the golem sunk into the earth. Then with all the force of his heart, his mind, and his soul, Mikey McGill began to dig. EpilogueEPILOGUE Requiem for the Living

On a bench in a train station in the city of Little Rock, Arkansas, sat a girl who made the ticket agent nervous.

She had arrived early in the morning, presumably to wait for someone to arrive on the train, but few passenger trains came through Little Rock's Union Station--in fact it was more of an office building now than anything else. The ticket agent called security, and the two security guards on duty eyed her from a distance.

"A nut job," concluded the older man, but the younger guard was not so jaded. He had just turned twenty, and was new to the job. He still saw the best in people. "Maybe she's just waiting for the Texas Eagle."

"That train's not due for hours," said the older guard. "I'm tellin' ya--she's a wacko. Sooner or later there'll be a 'tell' that gives it away--you watch!"

The girl did not have the look of the various and sundry crazies that frequented the nation's train stations. She was well-dressed--in fact, overdressed in a emerald-green satin gown. True, her red hair looked a bit disheveled, but she was neither talking to herself or engaging in questionable activities--although sitting for hours in a train station was, in and of itself, questionable.

She was hard not to notice. What with that shimmering gown, she was the only bright spot in the dreary station, and it drew the younger guard's attention all morning long, until he finally approached her. She was as beautiful up close as she was from a distance, although some discoloration around one eye attested to some sort of trouble.

"Are you all right, Miss?" he asked. "Can I help you with anything?"

"No," she said cheerily. "I'm just waiting for a friend."

"The train isn't due to arrive for another six hours-- and with that bridge down in Memphis, everything's been rerouted, so it's bound to be late. Wouldn't you rather come back later?"

"My friend is not necessarily arriving by train," she informed him.

"Oh." Since he didn't quite know how to respond to that, he just let her be, convincing the other guard not to evict her for loitering. It occurred to him that this girl fit the description of a woman wanted for questioning in the bridge disaster, but there was no way it could have been her. This girl was far too young and i

She was still there at noon, and was begi

"On the house," he said. "Why, thank you!"

"Are you sure I can't help you?" he asked. "Maybe we could call your friend."

"I'm afraid he has no telephone." And clearly neither did she.

She ate her bagel slowly, with a grace rarely seen in these days of fast food and stuffed faces. If she was still here when his shift ended, he thought he might offer to buy her di

As the day wore on, she became more and more unsettled, and her behavior became such that the older guard crossed his arms and said, "See, I told you so!" But again, the younger guard convinced him to leave the poor girl alone. "She's all yours," the older man said as he left at the end of his shift.

At about four in the afternoon, the girl began to walk around the station with increasing impatience, zeroing in on anyone who lingered alone for too long, and the guard began to truly feel for her.