Jon soon made it to his homeroom class, for the first class of the day. He had plenty of time to get some supplies out of his backpack before class began.
As he pulled out his school notebook, he saw a strange envelope, addressed to him. He opened it it, revealing two sheets of paper and a strange looking coin. The coin did not resemble any currency Jon was familiar with. Instead it was marked 'Good for ten wishes'.
Jon then took a look at the sheets of paper, and gasped. It was a letter from his grandfather.
"Dear Jon,
If you are reading this, it means that my wish has worked and you should now be in possession of not only this letter but one of the Wishing Coins. I am sorry I had to mislead you in my previous letter, but rest assured I had good reasons for doing so.
As you have probably guessed, it is very easy for one to fake their own death through use of some carefully-worded wishes. One can easily create a stand-in for one's corpse that can be convincing to even the best medical examiners in the world. It is also easy for one to become another person entirely. With the right wishes, it is easy to become one of a different race, gender, age, or ethnicity, and to create a full set of legal records to go with the new identity.
I cannot tell you where I am now, nor who I am now, nor why I had to go into hiding in this manner. The reasons why are a long story that I do not believe it is safe to tell at this time. For now, it is far more important that I clear up a few matters regarding the stone, and to tell you what you need to know about the Wishing Coins.
First off, everything I told you about the stone in my previous letter was mostly the truth, but I may have omitted a few details. You may recall that I said (and I quote) 'Changes made will be as if it has always been so, apart from for those within earshot of the wish or out of the range of influence of the stone. This range I estimate at several miles, but I fear I have not been able to determine an exact figure'. You may have wondered why I just didn't wish to know the stone's range, and then tell you what it was.
The fact of the matter is, the stone's range depends on how much magical energy it has within it. While the stone may very well have ties to the ancient Incan civilization, I am far from the first person to have found it since the Incan civilization collapsed. It has had several users since then. Some made wishes that drained the stone of its power, causing its range to decrease. Its most recent owner before I discovered it returned the stone to South America over sixty years ago, to recharge it.
Apparently, the ruined temple where I discovered it is one of several mystical places of power on Earth, where magical items such as the stone can be recharged. As such, its range limitation depends on how much power is within the stone. A century ago, it had enough power to have a range limit of 1000 miles. However, huge changes in reality (such as averting catastrophic disasters such as floods, hurricanes, earthquakes, or wars) can cause a greater drain on the stone's power than your average wish.
And that is not getting into what happens when someone just goes crazy with the stone and just wishes hundreds of people into ducks or whole cities into lollipops, and someone else has to find a way to clean things up without flatly contradicting the previous wishes. So the stone's range limit has decreased a great deal during the past century. My best guess is that the stone's current range limit is somewhere between 80 and 90 miles at the most.
I trust, however, that you will use the stone carefully. However, I did not intend this stone for you alone. I know it is only a matter of time before your sister Zoe finds out about the stone, and shares it with her friend Athena DeVries. Athena DeVries is well-versed on the subject of magical artifacts, given her interest in magic and the supernatural, and her family and ours go back a ways.
If you need further advice on what to do with an object of power such as the stone, Athena DeVries and her contacts within the mystical community might be worth speaking with, but exercise extreme caution when doing so. Not all of her acquaintances can be entirely trusted.
_Now, on to the matter of the Wishing Coins. _
The Wishing Coins were created in a manner designed to emulate the stone's power. How long ago they were created, I do not know, but entire stashes of them were discovered in South America and in the English county of Somerset not far from Glastonbury Tor. When you made your accidental wish that 'something interesting would happen', someone within the 80 to 90 mile range of the stone was seized with an idea. They had at least one of the Wishing Coins already, and used it to wish that Wishing Coins would scatter all over the world so that lots of people would be able to have the opportunity to have their wishes granted. A noble idea, wanting to share wishes with many people, but one that comes with a great many problems.
Before you ask how I know about your wish, let me explain it now. Before I left the stone to you, I made a wish so that I would know just what wishes you or anyone else made on the stone, and what the immediate results were. So I know all about the wishes you and your friend Karyn made. Back to the Wishing Coins.
The Wishing Coins work similar to the wishing stone in the sense that wishes alter reality, and that those who do not hear the wishes believe the altered reality is how things have always been. However, there are some critical differences.
The first is that they do not share the stone's range limitation. Wishes made on them can affect the entire Earth. This can lead to some serious confusion, as with enough people making certain kinds of wishes, schools, corporations, and whole countries could have different leaders every day and no one would notice unless they'd wished to notice any changes in reality.
Second, each coin has a limit to how many wishes one can make with them. The most common Wishing Coin is one I call the Wishing Penny. It is good for one wish, and after that, its magic is spent and it vanishes. Then there is the Wishing Nickel, good for five wishes, and the Wishing Dime, good for ten wishes. Somewhat more rare is the Wishing Quarter, good for 25 wishes, and even rarer than that is the Wishing Halfdollar, good for 50 wishes.
Now, Jon, before I go I must tell you about the further wish I made for you using the Wishing Coins I have in my possession. I have wished not only for you to remember the changes in reality, but for you to share that ability with anyone you choose. All you have to do to make someone else remember how things were before wishes changed reality is to say "(name of person) remembers". For example, if you were to say "Karyn Black remembers", Karyn would remember everything and know just what has changed by magical wishes. You must say both their first and last names while picturing their faces in your mind for this to work, so that people sharing the same name will not be affected.
Make good use of the Wishing Coin I sent you, but as it is a Wishing Dime, it is only good for ten wishes. I advise you only use it in cases where the wishing stone's range limitation would get in the way of countering a bad wish someone else made with a Wishing Coin.
I must go. We may or may not ever see each other in person again, as even with magical wishes, it is impossible to truly know the future. But use the stone and the wishing coin wisely, and think of me often.
Your friend, always
Grandpa.
Jon paused to take in what he had just read. He couldn't believe it. How many Wishing Coins were there, scattered throughout the world? And how many people could be using them even now?
Jon guessed right away that Starla Stanfield was likely not the only person in the town of Lake Point to have found a wishing coin. At least hers was a Wishing Penny that had already been spent on something beneficial to lots of people. A Performing Arts Center was a nice place to have around the neighborhood, and there were several people who could benefit from it. But who knows what other people who found wishing coins would wish for?
"Jon Gibson..." said the teacher.
"Uh, present." Jon said.
Jon folded up the letter, put it back in the envelope, and put the envelope back in his pack. He needed to try to focus on his first class. Granted, given what he now knew about Wishing Coins, that might not be possible, but he had to at least try, and to put his concerns about what others might be wishing aside for now.
He could only hope that if anyone was making a wish right now, it would be a good one.
