Always

Chapter Three

John's POV

I've been in the Himalayas for a whole year. Ella invited herself to join me a few months ago when she showed up randomly. It was just a week ago that I left my solitude to seek out all of the Garde and our main allies to give them a Lorialite pendant that would teleport them straight to the cave in the center of this mountain when they held the pendant and visualized the place. Marina is already here, and has been with me for the past week, I can tell she was lonely, still fried over the war. I knew she needed to come here, see the progress I've made with the cave. I've created a large, customized table for all of us to sit at in the cave, scraped away all the artwork on the wall of the cave, and over all, made a nice sanctuary for us here. So this is where I brought her.

"Good morning," I say as I approach Marina. Who is already cooking some fish for breakfast. Courtesy of her underwater breathing.

"Morning," Marina says. She looks up and smiles at me, flinging her long brown hair over her shoulder.

"Ella still asleep?" I ask.

"As always," Marina says, chuckling and still, smiling. She looks so much better since she came here.

"Nope, I'm up," a younger voice says. Marina and I turn to see Ella wander out of her room.

I made this little house/shack when I first came here, before it was just a two-room, sloppy put together shack I had for shelter. Marina and Ella both helped me add on some more rooms, and we decorated the house. It looks a lot more like a home now, even though it's still technically made out of wood, mud, and some salvaged boulders for support. Each of the now five rooms has a queen sized mattress that is off the ground from makeshift bed frames I put together. The kitchen area features two fire pits for cooking, an ice box, which contains ice Marina and I froze from river water. And a small table for eating at. Marina has been helping me make a larger table since she forced me to help her make the "dining area" part of the kitchen larger.

"Hungry?" Marina asks.

"I could eat," Ella says through a yawn.

"Good, because I already made enough for all of us," Marina says. She pulls three fish out of the boiling pot and sets them on the rack over the cooking fire. I get some fruit juice I bought at my latest trip to town out of the ice box. And set that on the table along with the few wooden plates I made. I also made wooden utensils and so on.

We eat breakfast with our usual conversation, what we are doing today and eventually it turns to when others will be coming.

"I honestly have no idea," I say.

"Nobody does," Marina says.

"I could if I wanted to, but I'm too lazy to try a long range thing," Ella says.

I finish my breakfast and get up.

"Need a ride to school Ella?" I ask.

"Please!" Ella says. She loves it every morning when I fly her to her school.

"I'll be back in a bit, Marina," I say.

"Got it."

Ella climbs on my back and we take off, waving at Marina. I drop Ella off a half mile from her school, out of sight.