There was no sound.
No alarm.
No glitch.
No corrupted Kira screaming fire through the walls of a broken memory matrix.
Just…
Softness.
Anne opened her eyes.
She was lying on real grass.
Real sky above. No binary. No crackling distortion. Just endless blue, the kind that had no business being this peaceful after a metaphysical apocalypse.
She sat up slowly, her fingers brushing over clovers and dirt.
Her breath caught.
> She was back in the garden.
Not a simulation.
The garden.
The one from her childhood.
The one with the broken fountain, the twisted tree, and the overturned flower pots her sister always swore she'd replant and never did.
Anne stood up, wobbly, like someone waking from a coma of too many realities. She looked around.
"Javier?" she called.
From behind the tree, a voice replied, "If this is the afterlife, it's got great landscaping."
He stepped out, brushing dirt off his hoodie. "Also, not to be dramatic, but I think I peed a little during that collapse sequence. Like, just a micro amount."
Anne gave a weak laugh. "Still romantic as ever."
"Runs in the family," he deadpanned, then paused. "Too soon?"
She looked at him for a long moment, eyes brimming with something between gratitude and the weight of memory. "You really remembered all of it."
Javier nodded. "Every bit you didn't know you left behind in me."
Silence settled again. And in that silence, the sound of a soft crunch reached their ears.
They looked down.
> The ant was still walking.
Same path.
Same little black body.
Same tireless journey toward a flowerpot it would never reach.
Anne whispered, "It's real. It's really here."
"Or," Javier said, crouching next to her, "we're both still in a simulation and the ant is actually a hyper-advanced AI trying to warn us of the upcoming toaster uprising."
She smacked his arm. "Could you not with the Black Mirror jokes while I'm processing trauma?"
Javier smiled but his eyes softened. "You brought us back."
Anne's voice cracked. "She brought us back."
They stood in silence again. The breeze rustled the flowers—deep, dark, gloomy ones this time. The kind her sister used to draw. Almost like the garden had grown in grief, and bloomed anyway.
Javier spoke quietly. "What happens now?"
Anne looked up, as if the answer was somewhere beyond the clouds.
"I think…" she said slowly, "this garden is real. The memories were real. But maybe… they weren't supposed to stay locked away forever."
Javier tilted his head. "You mean like, they were meant to come back?"
"No," she said. "They were meant to be shared."
He stared at her. "You mean you want to—"
"Write it. Draw it. Tell it. Everything. Kira. The project. The garden. The collapse. Even the ant."
He raised a brow. "But won't people think you're crazy?"
She shrugged. "I'll just tell them the truth."
"That your dead sister built a secret memory-mirroring system and stashed pieces of your trauma in the brain of a sarcastic, emotionally avoidant boy you'd later fall in love with?"
"Exactly."
Javier smirked. "Yeah okay, sounds like a Netflix limited series."
She laughed, full and real. Then her expression softened.
"Thank you, Javier. For remembering when I didn't."
He took her hand, more serious now.
"You remembered the ant. That's the hard part."
And from behind them, just faintly, they heard Kira's voice again.
> "Don't forget me this time."
Anne closed her eyes.
"I won't."