I liked a story by Mikel so much that I did some edits and sent them to him last week. I haven't heard back. Is he answering e-mails to his aol address? Can you ping him and ask him to respond?
Also, I've written a first sequel to his story. The board FAQ say I can post it if I credit him with the prior story and characters, but is that right? Because he copyrighted his first story, I think I need his consent for a derivative work like a sequel.
I don't have any other address for Mikel than the aol.com one, so if they're not answering you I doubt they'll answer me either! But less than a week later is rather a short period of time to expect a response, especially if you're expecting them to look over work, so I would advise simply waiting.
I would typically want to get confirmation from the original author before publishing a derivative work, yeah; I'm not 100% sure on what the legal requirements are on that front in regards to copyrighted work, but I tend to err on the side of caution.