Everfound (Skinjacker 3)

Mikey shook his head, not wanting to believe it. There was a stirring in his soul now, building toward pain—the kind of pain the living felt. “No trick, Clarence.”

“So, where did he go?”

“Nowhere,” Mikey sadly told him. “He went nowhere.”

CHAPTER 28

The Tears of Eternity

The very fabric of the universe mourns the extinguishing of a soul—both in Everlost and the living world. If Squirrel had still been there to see it, he would have been proud, maybe even a bit embarrassed, to see the tribute paid to his memory by all of creation.

In Nevada, an unprecedented thunderstorm formed where none should have been, pouring forth a deluge of water, salty as tears, on the parched earth below.

In Africa, a seven-point-five earthquake rumbled like a heaving sob through the vast Serengeti, a place where no fault line existed before.

In Brazil, a furious tornado cut a path from one edge of the nation to the other, with not a single storm cloud anywhere in the sky.

ook, and all the Afterlights scattered in terror, abandoning their mission, but that didn’t do a thing for the living children still trapped in the playground—and no matter how hard Clarence hit that lock, it wouldn’t break. So instead he used the crowbar to pry the gate from its hinges. . . .

“What’s wrong with you?”

The sky-crane control booth had flown open and Moose was faced with a furious construction foreman.

“I . . . I . . .”

“Why haven’t you dropped them?”

Moose quickly realized that it was Milos, but he was no more relieved. “Maybe we shouldn’t do it, Milosh. I mean, itch jusht a bunsh of little kidsh.”

“We need all ages, you idiot! Mary would expect no less.” And when Moose made no move toward the control panel, Milos said, “Either you do it, or I will.”

“Okay,” said Moose. “Then you do it.”

Milos glared at him. Then, without the slightest hesitation, he reached out, pushed the button, and released the entire load.

Mikey, still in beastly form, frightened the last of the Afterlights away, then turned to see Clarence pry the gate off its hinges, just as the girders above them began a thirty-story drop. A flood of living children escaped from the playground as the girders fell, and just then Mikey heard a voice behind him.

“Mikey, is that you?”

It was Allie! The sound of her voice chased the beast back to the depths of Mikey’s mind in an instant and he became himself once more. She ran toward him, but before they could embrace, a crash exploded in the living world violent enough to feel in Everlost.

No matter how strong the climbing starship was, it could not hold off a crushing onslaught of tempered steel. The load of falling girders didn’t just destroy the jungle gym, it shattered it. Fragments of plastic exploded in all directions, and even the ground beneath it fractured from the weight. The principal and teachers, who were the last out of the gate, were hit by plastic and asphalt shrapnel, and although those wounds were painful, they were not deadly—and their larger bodies shielded the escaping children.

The playground was destroyed but the children were saved.

Then as Allie and Mikey looked to the spot where the climbing starship had been, they saw something amazing. The space-age jungle gym was gone from the living world, but in Everlost a strange swirl of ectoplasmic smoke, almost alive with purpose and design, began to condense and change color resolving from green to shades of blue and gray. It took shape as if the cosmos itself had breathed into a huge invisible mold the exact size and shape as the jungle gym. For a moment it shimmered like a mirage, and then became solid. The entire playground, lost to the living world, was now a part of Everlost.

“Wow” was all that Mikey could say. In all his years in Everlost he had seen many things but had never witnessed a place cross into Everlost. Finally he turned to Allie, ready for that long-overdue reunion, but Allie’s eyes were still locked on the jungle gym, because she saw something he had not yet seen. Not all the children were saved . . . because crawling out of the newly crossed jungle gym was a little boy who Allie recognized. It was the blond boy Milos had skinjacked. Milos must have put him to sleep so soundly that when Milos left his body, the boy remained unconscious within the starship tunnels and was still there when the steel came crashing down.

“There’s always one,” said a man’s voice Allie didn’t recognize. “No matter how many you save, there’s always one.” There, standing just a few yards away from Mikey, Allie saw a man who seemed half in Everlost and half out—but before she could process what she saw, something else stole her attention. A brand-new tunnel now opened before the boy, much different from the climbing tunnels he had just crawled out of . . . and the light at the end of this tunnel was blinding.

That’s when Milos barged furiously past her. “I will not leave this place empty-handed!” He ran, determined to tackle the boy out of the tunnel, and trap him in Everlost—but out of nowhere a brown blur launched itself at Milos, knocking him to the ground before he could get to the boy.

“This ends here,” said Nick with such fury that his chocolate ran as dark as tar. “Let the boy go!” Even as he said it, the blond boy’s eyes lit up and a smile filled his face. He reached a hand toward the tunnel, it drew him in, and the tunnel vanished. Whatever his destination, he got there without any further interference.

Everyone was speechless. The only sounds now were from the living world; the creak of settling steel, the cries of all the kids who survived, the soothing voices of adults trying to comfort them, and the distant sound of approaching sirens.

Milos, now smeared with tar-dark chocolate, pulled himself away from Nick and looked hatefully at everyone around him. In his mind he was the only one wronged here. He was the only victim. Even Moose had betrayed him, and was still up in the sky crane bawling his eyes out like a baby, just because Milos dropped the load of steel. Well, at least he still had Squirrel, who now came up beside him. Then he saw Clarence, and froze.