Today I,book Three: Endless Cycles Chapter One 7:30 AM Friday, September 21, 2039 Justin I haven't seen Mayzie since she went to Victoria's two years ago. She went and never came back. I can't eat or even look at pancakes anymore, because they were her favorite. I made them the day she went to Victoria's, because it was her birthday. She'd be sixteen now. The work I do as a chef keeps the grief of Mayzie's situation at bay. She had a dream to be a photographer when she was little, and would pretend she took pictures of me for TIME magazine. That was before the fanalettes came. When they came four years ago, we had our weapons because we were hunting that day. They ambushed us, killing our parents. Then, it was all Mayzie and me could do to survive.We set up a camp after wandering in the forest for a week. It got lost after we strayed too far from it. Then we found the safe compound and then she got...well, I don't know what happened to her. Chapter Two 7:46AM Friday, September 21,2039 Mayzie It's the fall equinox. Victoria told me so. Anyway, two years ago, I got kidnapped by Victoria and taken to the woods, where she chained me to a tree and has interrogated me for months, years, actually. She gives me food every morning and evening. So, right now, she's poking me, trying to get me to talk. I have been so silent for two years, I am not sure my voice still works. "What do the fanalettes do?" Her voice is raspy. "Maizelle, answer me!" I see a fanalette behind her and realize it's going after me. Chapter Three 80 AM Friday, September 21, 2039 Justin I go to the restaurant down at the lobby of the safe apartments. The first order, a woman, asks for a short stack. I tell her that we no longer serve it at this restaurant and she yells at me about how this is a breakfast place without pancakes and I do something I can't explain. I grab a chair and fling it across the room. It nearly hits Mayzie and I stop short, Mayzie? She isn't here. But she flings herself at me and I react the way any rational human being would. I hug her and lift her up, my vision getting wobbly from happy, joyful tears. "Mayzie! Where've you been?" She tugs me along to the woods. "Mayzie. Stop. Come on." I see Victoria, sprawled on the ground. She points to a tree branch, stuck through Victoria's eye, slanted up into her scull. "Mayzie. No way. You did that?" I say, pointing at the stick. And then, Mayzie speaks. Two years ago I heard her voice, once filled with #life and laughter and happiness, is now worn to a thick rasp, one of an old man." Yeah, I did. To come home. To you." I fiddle my fingers and she looks at me with her bright, charismatic eyes. Suddenly, I get so angry I do something I can't explain. I pin her against a tree and ask her, " Why? Why did you leave me? All alone?Mayzie, you left me." She looks at me, and my anger melts like butter. She is crying and I can't leave her like this."Justin, I didn't want to. I was kidnapped,okay? Get it through your thick scull." Then she was gone. Chapter Four 8:40 AM Friday, September 21, 2039 Mayzie "Got it through your scull yet?" I say as Justin chases after me. I see the guards. They are the same from the first day we got here. Their names are Damian and Alicia, and they are brother and sister. "Got what through my scull?" Damian asks. I answer,"Justin here needs to get it through his scull that I was kidnapped and didn't run off for two years willingly. Okay?" I snap the last word at Justin. He asks,"Who are we? Why are we here?" Damian stares at Alicia." Fine. You- " He points at me- are Roxie and Jacob Luciata's daughter. You-" He points at Justin- "Are not her brother. You are her cousin, Sallie and Clutch Ramirez's son. You are both 15 except he" Damian motions to Justin- "is one month older. You were placed together as a brother-sister pair when Sallie, Clutch, Roxie, and Jacob were killed by Victoria. Both of you got that wiped from your memory. They made you believe that fanalettes killed them. Obviously Victoria is dead now or she-" He motions to me again-"Would not be here. Now, you don't know anything. Scram!" He shoos us off and a guy named Mr. Phillips, obviously Damian's boss- shows up. I walk to our apartment and sit down. Chapter Five 9:56AM Friday,September 21,2039 Justin Mayzie flops on her bed and I begin making pancakes for her because I'd guess she hasn't had anything good to eat in years and besides, who knows if she doesn't like them still? She gets off her bed and grabs a pair of tan hiking shorts and a pale green tank top. She walks into our small bathroom and shuts the door. I continue cooking until they are done. Then Mayzie comes out with her tank top and hiking shorts on and completely clean. She'd washed the twigs and leaves out of her hair and brushed it into a ponytail reaching her mid-back, the dirt is off her face, her legs,and her arms. She has obviously been coughing and hacking up stuff like she's doing now. I hear her talk again, her voice mostly back to normal. "I smell pancakes!" She says in a singsong voice. I smile and set the pancakes down. "How did Damian know who we were?" She asks, her voice showing a hint of seriousness, her face with a ghost of a smile. "Me. He knew because of me. He once said my pancakes had an ingredient like no other-grief and love. Both were for you, Mayzie. He already knew we weren't brother and sister, though, and he said grief like that came only from family. So he figured out who our parents were. Then he told us." Her face fell into a serious tone. "I wish I could've come back earlier. Every day, I tried. I really did. But I'm okay now so it's cool." Chapter Six 10:38 AM Friday, September 21,2039 Mayzie I love the pancakes and the chef who made them. He says,"Lets play Imagine." Imagine is a game we would play when Mama and Papa were out. In Imagine, we would make things from the four elements to use to achieve a goal. Say, build a house of wood from Earth, a well from Water and Earth, or a fireplace from Earth and Fire. "Okay, we'll play Imagine. You start." I say. He decides we'll build a bed of Earth. "Mayzie, you build a headboard and frame. I'll build a mattress, pillow, and blanket. You start." I begin by asking,"Oh, Mother of Earth, may we use your resources to create a bed so we may peacefully sleep through the night?" She "replies","Yes, Child, you may." I step up to the "Forge" and "craft"wooden framing and a headboard. I step back and Justin "creates" a woolen blanket, pillow, and mattress. We "fit them together" and study our "product." "Perfect!" Justin exclaims. "Now we can sleep peacefully through the night. It is beautifully crafted." "The blanket is beautiful with the designs. I love it. And its designer." I give him a half smile. He smiles, a grin as big as the moon. And as white. He holds me up and I touch the ceiling. He sets me down. Then a quiet knock drifts from the door. A girl from the compound named Paige is there. "Hello, Mayzie. Justin." She says in a quiet voice. Her white hair glistens. "What's up?" He says. She smiles, a small, shy smile. "May I come in?" I say,"Of course." She pulls a blade out and before my body knows what my brain is doing, my bow is loaded and pointed at her chest. She smiles. The knife nearly hits my arm. The arrow flies, hitting Paige square in the chest. She collapses, dead. I retrieve the arrow and clean it in the sink. He glances at me and says,"Mayzie, how'd you do that?" I shoot back,"Do what?" He responds,"Pull out your bow, load it, and aim it so fast?" I frown."I don't know. My brain responded to the threat faster than my body did." Chapter Seven 9:37 PM Sunday, November 23,2057 Twelve years later Justin Me and Mayzie both had children who were stubborn and quick witted. We live in the plains of Nevada, where we have small orchards and dairy ranches. Actually, I found the cure for a fanalette to turn human again.One egg, completely raw, a tablespoon of nutmeg, and a tablespoon of pure vanilla extract, mixed together completely and put in a syringe. Shoot it in any part of them,then they become human again. They don't lose any memories of who they are. We- meaning me and Mayzie- have little cabins outside of our own. Each has one bed, a rug, a fireplace with a poker, and a table and chair. Everything can be moved- except the fireplace. We each built 8 and are building more. They are for humans with no place to live. Most have a place. Anyway, our children- Mayzie's son, J.R, standing for Jonathan Ryan,and daughter, Ally, and my son, Sam- are hunting for game. Lots runs free around here. Mayzie is shooting a tree for fun. I am watching the kids trot back with arms and game bags full and laughing happily. "Hi,Papa." Says Sam. "Hey, half-pint." Mayzie retrieves her arrows and turns to the twins. "Hey,Momma! We got a deer!" I hear a female- meaning Ally's- voice say excitedly. J.R chimes in, "It was easy. She was laying by the stream. We got her and now we can have stew." These three children are the world to me. Mayzie, too. When Piper left, I was devastated. When Jake left Mayzie with twins to take care of, she trained her children to be independent, to deal with tragedy not with anger, but with peace. They were 7. My child learned from her children to be peaceful and look on the bright side of things, to see the cup as half full, not half empty. Love and happiness are branded like a scar into them all. They go out to milk the cows and I see Mayzie heading to the orchard with her pail labeled Apples and another labeled Oranges. She sees me following and sets the Oranges pail down for me since she knows I like the orange side of the orchard better. The tangy smell and the spongy dirt on my bare feet are why I like it. I pick it up and pick the fruit on the bottom first. Then I see J.R and Ally with their own pails and Sam coming after. They all pick a tree and climb. I go to the tree next to J.R and climb, picking every piece of fruit on the tree all the way to the top. Then I walk to my house and peel two, eating them. Then I make a gallon of juice and put it in our ice-tub. Then I go back out, pail empty. The sunset causes streaks across the sky and the children to walk home, pails full. Sam comes in, going to a counter top and squeezing juice into glass jars with lids on them. The top goes on and I tell him to go wash up for bed so he does. I do too then tuck him in. I go to sleep myself. THE END