"Oh, really," said Sarah McMillan. "Looks like some kind of valuable antique. I wonder if I can clean it off and take it."
Some people might think she'd never want to be seen with dirty hands. It was true, of course, but it wouldn't stop her from getting them dirty anyway and cleaning up. Sarah pushed some dirt aside and tried to lift up one end of the pole. It barely budged.
But suddenly, she saw appear out of thin air a girl. "Wha--?" said Sarah.
"Well, maybe you should get rid of it," said Karyn.
"That's easy," said Jon. "I wish that that pole's magic will finally expire right now, and that this means it stops working but not that anything in the past is undone. There you go."
"Nothing in the past is undone?"
"I can't kill Lola just because I zapped her into existence."
"But," said Karyn, "if someone else touched the pole before the wish, their girl would still be around too."
"What are the odds of that?" wondered Jon. "The pole was around for hundreds of years and nobody found it.
"I suppose..."
Sarah blinked. She tried to lift the pole again. It still barely moved, but nothing new happened.
"Let me help," said the strange girl. Sarah as yet didn't recognize the attraction in the girl's eyes....
