He smiled back. “I couldn’t have done it without you either. Just do me a favor,” he said, stretching as he yawned. “If you find another Cocoon, just wait until tomorrow to show me. Okay?”

I laughed. “No problem. Good night, Elliot.”

“Good night, Regan,” Elliot said with a grin, and he turned and disappeared into his dorm. I stood there a moment longer before turning back to my own door and creeping into the dorm. The other girls were all there, snoring softly in their bunks, and I had to stifle the urge to give them all hugs. That could wait until tomorrow.

I was still smiling at Elliot’s joke as I climbed into my bunk. I lay down, tucking myself into the covers as a bone-tired weariness washed over me. Saving the Academy, and possibly history as we knew it, was exhausting. Rolling to the side, I tucked my arm under my head and was just nodding off to sleep when my fingertips brushed against a thick piece of paper someone had tucked under my pillow. I froze, not really believing it. No way. This couldn’t be what I thought it was. It just couldn’t. I lay there for a few seconds, wrestling with my exhaustion and my need to know if my suspicions were correct. Although, after everything that had happened, there was really only one choice. Whatever it is, I told myself, Elliot and I can handle it. With that I gave in and reached under my pillow. The envelope was thick, the paper eerily familiar as I took in Elliot’s name hastily written across the front in his own handwriting. Well, I thought as I opened the Cocoon, at least this time Elliot couldn’t be mad about how the letter was written.

Author’s Note

Dear Reader,

The more I write, the more I realize that the majority of my stories came from my time teaching seventh-grade language arts. It was a very different time in my life. I had free time, for one thing, but I was also testing out my wings as a teacher while simultaneously chasing this crazy publishing dream. One of the research projects I taught involved a book put out by LIFE magazine entitled 100 Photographs that Changed the World. It was beautiful, stuffed with full-page glossy pictures, and I promptly took a box cutter to it for my bulletin board. Teachers are allowed to commit book sins like this . . . at least that’s the story I’m sticking to.