Gary began the long walk. Midnight in this neighborhood was not a good time to be out walking, but even in a high crime area the chance of being a victim on any particular night wasn't very high. An hour and a half later, however, he saw a shadowed figure standing a block in front of him.
He would have run if he hadn't recognized it as being his father. Gary ran towards him.
"It's all gone," he told Jack. "My life here is destroyed. I just got thrown out. Where am I going to---"
Jack cut him off. "The reality bending of wishes is confined to a limited "area. You're still a lawyer. You still have a home. It just isn't here.
"You're right," said Gary. "I wasn't thinking. It's just that that's how I would be thinking--how I am thinking, with all that happened here. I suppose you want me to tell you all the information I have, right? You're welcome to hear it. I couldn't ever talk to anyone in my life here, about my life here. Here, Linda cheated on me, I went on a bender, and I've been at it for over five years. I... Wait, that's not right. I'm confusing two different things.
Gary tried to straighten out the history in his head. "In the real world, I left Linda after Mike was born. That's thirteen years ago. Now I left after Zoe was born. That's eighteen years ago. If I'd been on a bender since then I'd be dead by now."
"It can be confusing," said Jack. "Anyway, what do you know about Linda, Jon, and Mike?"
"I haven't visited them that much. I do know that Mike has never been in trouble with the law. Or rather, he brags about petty crimes yet somehow has never been stopped by the police. Now that you've told me about the stone, that all makes sense."
"I tried some research of my own," said Gary. "Jon became a girl named Jo. I was surprised but really, I already knew that--after all Jon did send me that text message. I managed to scry and see a couple of wishes that Mike had made. One wish was that no teacher would ever give Jon a higher grade than he gave Mikey. Jon was caught shoplifting once but I don't think that was a wish; I think Jon was just under a lot of stress from this. I checked Mike's Facebook page. He's at college. Her's also playing football there. He hangs around with Karyn whenever he's here, but he doesn't see her as much since he's been at college. This may mean he's getting tired of her since he could teleport back to see her any time he wants. Most of his new social circle is at college and I've seen nothing suspicious, like mysteriously appearing new cars. Mike got one of those, though."
"Karyn?"
"Jon's old friend. Except he's called her Sharon a couple of times. That's Karyn's younger sister, so I suspect he did a swap of some kind."
They reached the old house and entered. Soon they were back in the secret room, except Gary was dirtier, smellier, and more disheveled. Gary poured out his five years of troubles about the wish-created life in the city and Jack showed Gary all the research he had managed to do.
"Basically," explained Jack, "what we need to do depends on what protections Mike has. If he has no protections at all, I just zap the stone here. If he kept other people from taking it, but not from using it, we go in at night and take it. If only he can use it, then we have to force him to use it against his interests, except he probably has protections against that, too. Of course, even if we get the stone, reversing wishes isn't easy."
Jo tried to think of a way to get a message to Sharon, to figure out if Mike had swapped her with her sister. Unfortunately, Sharon didn't have a phone or email. She did seem to have a Facebook page which was itself a little suspicious, given her age. Of course, she couldn't write where Mike could see it, so the best she would be able to do--if it was her--would be to write something that looked innocent but which Jo might recognize. Jo searched through old posts and found something that looked a little off. It was a year old but written too well for an 11 year old. It also described a local amusement park--which she used to go to when she was younger.
Jo did the math. The amusement park had closed 12 years ago, when Jo was 9 for real. Jon had been there with Karyn, but Sharon couldn't have been there. So it was a clue--but what could Jo do about it?
