Everfound s-3

by Neal Shusterman

As a skinjacker, he had the privilege of staying in the parlor car, so he and Jill were never too distant from each other, and when Jill got tired of pretending to ignore him, she would ask questions.

  “How long have you been at this? Furjacking, I mean?”

  But the real question was hidden beneath her words. She was more interested in knowing how much time he had left.

  “The time will come that my slumbering body dies, and I can no longer furjack, just as that time will come for you.”

  “So you know about that…”

  Jix nodded. His Excellency had explained to him right away about how his body was in a coma-and how his gift of skinjacking was only a temporary one. “When I can no longer do it-when I become a normal Afterlight, I will find a coin, and pay my passage into the light.”

  “You mean you don’t have your coin now?”

  “No.” The truth was, His Excellency had his own special use for Evercoins, but Jix wasn’t about to tell Jill that. “Why is your hair like that?” he asked her.

  “Tornado,” she answered, and shook her nasty, nettled hair. “You hate my hair, don’t you? Everyone hates it. I don’t care.”

  “It’s wild,” he told her. “I like wild.”

  She squirmed at that. “How about you?” she asked. “How did you wind up in Everlost?”

  “I was attacked in my sleep,” he told her. What he didn’t tell her was that he was attacked by a jaguar that had wandered into the village. He liked to think that maybe he had furjacked that same cat once or twice in his travels.

  When the train reached Austin, Jill had asked Jix to join them when they went out reaping. “You can jack a circus tiger,” she suggested, “and eat some really obnoxious kid in the crowd.” Jix couldn’t tell whether or not she was kidding, so he made up an answer that was equally unnerving.

  “Humans don’t taste good to a cat,” he told her. “I only eat them when there’s nothing better.”

  He did not join them, because he was not convinced the gods would approve of reaping. True, the Mayan gods were fairly bloodthirsty-particularly the jaguar gods-but there was a proper sense of nobility to those ancient stories of carnage. There was nothing noble about reaping.

  When they reached Austin, there was finally a dead westbound track, heading toward San Antonio. Southwest, more accurately, but there was a very good chance that once they reached San Antonio, it would become a northwest track, heading toward the western states. Then, right around sunset the next day, as they neared San Antonio, the train came screeching to an abrupt halt.

  All of Jix’s senses peaked to high alert, and he instinctively knew there was going to be trouble.

  Milos left the parlor car, furious at Speedo for bringing the train to such a jarring stop-but even before he reached the engine, he saw the reason.

  “Problem!” shouted Allie from the front of the train. “We’ve got a problem here!”

  “I can see that!” Milos shouted back.

  Once again, there was a building on the tracks. Speedo had managed to stop the train about a quarter mile away from it this time-but seeing it from this distance was almost worse. It wasn’t something so small and quaint as a clapboard church. You couldn’t even call it a house. This thing was a mansion.

  Speedo leaned out of the engine compartment, looking like he was dripping sweat instead of pool water. “H-H-How many Afterlights do you think it took to move that onto the tracks?” asked Speedo, nervously. Milos did not want to consider the answer.

  “We’ll send a team to investigate,” Milos said.

  The skinjackers now peered out of the parlor car at Milos for an explanation.

  “What gives, what gives?” asked Squirrel. “Did you find out why we stopped so hard?”

  Then Jix, leaning out of the entrance to the parlor car, pointed over Milos’s shoulder, to the south. “There! Do you see that?”

  Milos looked to where he was pointing. Night was falling quickly; the sky was already dark… and yet there was light coming from behind a nearby hill.

  “Is that a city?” suggested Jill, probably hoping she could go reaping again.

  “I don’t think so,” Milos said, his worry building. It looked like headlights in a haze, but the source of the light was still hidden by the hill. “It’s getting brighter.”

  Jix released a growl that sounded much more like the real thing than any of his previous attempts. “We can’t stop here!” he told them. “We have to leave. Now!”

  “We can’t leave!” Milos told him, pointing to the building in their path.

  “Then go backward!” Jix shouted.

  “Backwardsh?” said Moose. “Back to where?”

  “Anywhere!”

  Then there came a sound like the mechanical groaning of some infernal engine.

  … Grr-ah-Grr-ah-Grr-ah-Grr-cha! Grr-ah-Grr-ah-Grr-ah-Grr-cha. ..

  By now kids were looking out of the train windows, pointing at the light, murmuring to one another, while the sound coming over the hill got louder and more menacing by the second.

  … Grr-ah-Grr-ah-Grr-ah-Grr-cha! Grr-ah-Grr-ah-Grr-ah-Grr-cha. ..

  “What is that?” asked Jill. “Some kind of machine?”

  “No,” said Jix, just as the source of the light finally crested the hill. “It’s a war cry.”

  Now it was clear what that light had been. It was the combined glow of countless Afterlights coming over the hill toward the train. This was an invading force.

  “ Bozhe moi! ” It didn’t take a Russian translator to get the gist of what Milos had said.

  As wave after wave of Afterlights came over the hill toward them, the awful sound resolved into the voices of a mob shouting their singular war cry:

  … Oogah-oogah-oogah-cha-ka! Oogah-oogah-oogah-cha-ka!

  Mary’s kids were not prepared for this.

  Months ago, when she had gathered her army of children, she had readied them for battle against the Chocolate Ogre-but back then, they knew exactly what they were up against, and had the advantage of being the attackers. This, however, was an ambush, and no one knew what to do, so everyone panicked.

  Kids ran from the train, then ran back to the train, then ran out again. Kids screamed, they cried, and they fought with one another, as if that was somehow going to help.

  “Stop it!” Milos demanded “Everyone stay calm!” But of course no one did.

  … Oogah-oogah-oogah-cha-ka! Oogah-oogah-oogah-cha-ka!

  The approaching marauders had faces painted with neon-bright war paint-green, yellow, and red-that glowed even more brightly than their bodies did, and many of them held what appeared to be weapons.

  Milos ran up to the engine cab, where Speedo looked at him, wide-eyed and frozen like a rabbit before the radial. “What do we do?” warbled Speedo as Milos climbed in.

  Milos looked toward the mansion, still a quarter mile ahead of them. “We ram it!” Milos said.

  “Ram it? But…”

  … OOGAH-OOGAH-OOGAH-CHA-KA! OOGAH-OOGAH-OOGAH-CHA-KA!

  “I said RAM IT!”

  Milos didn’t wait for Speedo. He grabbed the control stick and pushed it all the way forward.

  The couplers shuddered, the wheels moaned, and the train began to move, picking up speed, with the first of the invaders just fifty yards away.

  “I don’t like this!” Speedo complained, bracing himself against the bulkhead. “I don’t like this at all!”

  But Milos knew what he was doing. The mansion, just like the church, was resting on the tracks. The attackers had put it there-which meant that the train could knock it off of the tracks and barrel right on past, escaping the mob. All it took was enough momentum.

  Jix, who still hung out of the door of the parlor car, was nearly thrown off by the sudden momentum, and Allie, who, as always, had the best view of the rapidly approaching mansion, screamed, calling Milos every foul name devised in the English language, but her voice was drowned out by the roar of the engine as they accelerated toward the mansion. Sh
e had no idea what would happen to her once she hit. The impact couldn’t hurt or kill her, but what if the crash tore her soul to bits, and every bit, still alive and kicking, sunk down to the center of the earth? Whatever was coming, she knew it wouldn’t be pleasant. She shut her eyes, and gritted her teeth as she, and the train, connected with the building at sixty miles per hour.

  CHAPTER 14

  The Neon Nightmares

  I n the early 1900s, a man who had made a fortune in oil decided to build a ranch in the middle of nowhere, complete with a thirty-room mansion: a showplace of a home fit for balls and galas and all those kinds of high society events that the rich attend. It was built on the right-of-way of an old rail line, but as that line no longer existed, no one thought it was much of a problem.

  For a dozen years or so, the mansion was the talk of Texas; however, lightning strikes the rich and poor alike, and on one unfortunate night, a sizable lightning bolt set the place aflame. It burned to the ground in just a few hours. Now in the living world there’s nothing but a hint of a clearing where the mansion once stood-but such a home, built with the blood, cash, and tears of a man who loved every inch of it, could not vanish from existence. The mansion crossed into Everlost in exactly the same spot where it was erected…

  … which was right smack in the middle of the ghost train’s path.

  ***

  When the train struck the mansion, the building did not slide off the tracks, because, unlike the little church, it was exactly where it was supposed to be-and although the building was shaken down to its foundation by the locomotive strike, it did not yield. In the end, the mansion wanted to remain where it was more than the train wanted to barrel through-and so the train derailed.

  The train cars uncoupled, folding together like an accordion, riding over one another, or just flying off the tracks like model trains running over a toy car-because every child with a train set eventually creates a massive derailing as part of the fun-and like toy trains, these train cars could not be damaged by the crash. They were simply thrown every which way.

  Everyone experienced the crash differently.

  Jix, who hadn’t been able to decide whether to stay on the train or jump, had clung to the hand rail of the parlor car, and was sent flying by the impact. He could only hope he had enough cat in him to land on his feet.

  Allie got the worst of it. She was shredded by the impact, but the shredding only lasted for an instant; then even before the engine stopped tumbling, her body was stitching itself back together. It felt like worms weaving through her insides. Meanwhile, the world spun as the engine tumbled before finally coming to rest. Allie thought the crash would loosen her bonds, but they didn’t. She was still tied to the nose of the train. She was right side up now, which meant that the engine was upside down-but even though it had settled, it was still shifting, and she was tilting slowly backward. She quickly realized what was happening; the engine was sinking tail-first into the living world. In a minute-maybe less-it would sink all the way down and she would be submerged in the earth.

  In the engine cab, Speedo was thrown against the control panel and dazed as the engine launched off the tracks, and when it finally stopped tumbling, Milos was no longer in the engine cab with him-he had been ejected out of the open door upon impact.

  “Ooooh, this is bad,” Speedo wailed. “It’s worse than just bad, it’s really really bad.” The door of the engine cab was now almost entirely submerged in the earth as it sunk into the living world. With no time to lose, Speedo squeezed himself through the gap at the last possible moment. The fact that he was wet, for once, was helpful, because it made it easier to slip out. Then Speedo ran off into the night, and didn’t look back.

  Mary, as well as all the Interlights in the sleeping car, remained asleep through the whole thing, and the kids in the prison car had grown so uninterested in the outside world, they were barely aware of the crash. They felt the jolt as the prison car rode over the car in front of it and toppled to the side, but they had no idea what had caused it. “Earthquake?” one of the kids inside said, and since no one was quite sure, they just went on with their conversations.

  Everywhere kids were scrambling to get out of the train cars before they sank. How successful they were depended on how their car had landed. There were only two cars that were not sinking-the parlor car, which had been launched clear over the engine, and had landed on the roof of the mansion, and the sleeping car, which had landed sideways across the tracks.

  “What a mesh,” said Moose as he climbed out of the parlor car and surveyed the situation below, happy that the parlor car was on the mansion roof, away from the worst of it.

  “Nice one, Milos,” said Jill, shouting down to wherever he might be. “Maybe next time you can just hurl us all into the Grand Canyon.”

  Milos heard her, but at the moment was too preoccupied to respond. He was now beneath the sleeping car, pinned to the rails, and struggle as he might, he could not free himself. What made it worse was that none of the kids running past him were willing to lift a finger for him.

  “You!” he would command. “Come over here and help me!”

  But they just glanced at him and hurried off without even answering.

  Then, like thunder after the lightning strike, the invaders arrived-and they were so excited by this turn of events that their war cry degraded into random whoops and shouts of triumph. They had strange makeshift weapons. A skeletal umbrella at the end of a spear gun. A boomerang attached to long strips of flypaper-all items meant for snagging and catching Afterlights-and their bright war paint brought terror to all of Mary’s kids.

  “Get their coins!” one of them screamed. “Get their coins and send them downtown!” Little did they know that these Afterlights had already surrendered their coins to Mary. Not even the ones who slept had coins, because those never appeared until after one awoke in Everlost. If coins were what these invaders wanted, they would come up empty-handed, and be very, very angry about it.

  Allie heard the battle, but couldn’t see it. The engine had tilted straight up as the back end sank into the earth, so now her only view was of the stars and the moon.

  “Someone out there had better untie me!” she yelled. She did not want to spend eternity like this. Going down to the center of the earth was bad enough. She would not go down tied to a stupid train!

  Sure enough, someone climbed up to her-but it wasn’t one of the invaders. It was Jix, his nose and fledgling whiskers twitching.

  “So are you going to free me this time?” she asked. “Or are you just here to chat?”

  He immediately began to pull at the bonds that held her there, but they were too tight to undo. He paused, but only for a moment. “You’re a skinjacker,” Jix said. “So skinjack. That’s how you can get out of this.”

  “There aren’t any living people here,” Allie reminded him. “We’re in the middle of nowhere.”

  “I don’t mean people.”

  It took her a moment, but Allie finally got it. Still it made no difference. “Oh, so do you think a longhorn or an antelope will come bounding out of the bush on cue, and stand where I can skinjack it?”

  “I see your point,” said Jix, and then he leaped from the engine, leaving Allie to struggle with her bonds on her own. Around her the shouts of the invaders and the cries of Mary’s kids filled the night. Allie could see them now when she turned her head. It was horrible. Kids wrapped in flypaper and dragged off by the marauders; kids tangled in nets sinking into the ground. And then she saw the caboose. It lay on its side, and around it a mob of Mary’s kids struggled to keep it above ground, but their efforts were failing. If nothing else, Allie would have the satisfaction of knowing that Mary was going down too.

  In a few moments Allie could see the dry brush around her, which meant that the train had sunk all the way down and was only a foot or so above the earth.

  Just then, in the living world, something came bursting out of the chaparral. A coyote ran toward A
llie and stopped only a few inches from her… as if on cue. Allie couldn’t believe her luck, but it wasn’t luck at all. Jix peeled out of the coyote. He had furjacked it and brought it right to her!

  “Hurry! Before it runs away,” Jix said. The coyote, perhaps confused at having been possessed by a human spirit, howled and took off-but Allie bent her hand up from her bonds, reaching toward it, and her fingertips touched the creature’s leg as it passed.

  There came a familiar rush and sudden dizziness. She felt the unmistakable heaviness of flesh, and – run run run, food food food, scratch scratch scratch -

  Suddenly she was no longer tied to the train-she was no longer in Everlost at all! Her spirit had been drawn into the body of the coyote!

  It felt- run- strange. Perhaps Jix enjoyed being in something nonhuman, but Allie knew she could never- food food- be a furjacker. The smells, the strange taste in her elongated mouth, and the feel of fleas on mangy fur- scratch scratch -were all just nasty-not to mention the maddening lack of opposable thumbs.

  The living world around her was- howl- peaceful and still. Only the simple sound of chirping crickets- howl at the moon! Do it do it!filled the chilly night air. How strange- sniff sniff- that so much madness could be going on in this exact spot in Everlost, but to a living creature it was all invisible.

  There was something- run run- very wrong, however. She could tell within an instant of furjacking the coyote. It wasn’t just that she didn’t like it-somehow her spirit was at odds with the animal. As if she were- pant, pant- somehow allergic. Could that be possible?

  She wanted to- run!- stay, to make sure that Mary had sunk, but the coyote’s instincts grated so coarsely against her ownsniff-scratch-sniff- she couldn’t think clearly. The smells were sosniff sniff- powerful it confused her thoughts. Why was she here? Who was she? She found herself darting back and forth, turning in circles, disgusted by her own dog breath. Her ability to- run-howl-run- think clearly had been- food-food- smashed by the scents and sounds assaulting the- sniff-listen-sniff- coyote’s senses, then a rabbitchase!- scurried through- chase!- the underbrush- go!- and she found herself- food!- racing after it- catch!- in pursuit- chase!- unable to control herself- food!- and she knew- catch!- that she- food!- was in serious- eat! -serious- eat!- trouble…