Rain began to fall—but upward.
Droplets rose from the pavement,
spiraling skyward like ash returning to fire.
Amelia stood on the rooftop, staring into the distance.
Below her, the city was no longer dying.
It was transforming.
Roots had erupted through the asphalt,
some glowing faintly, others whispering as they grew.
And in the center of the city, where Room 303 had once been,
now stood a monolith: obsidian-black, spiraled with veins of light.
Alexis joined her, breathless.
> "The building's gone," she said. "But that… thing… it's alive."
Amelia didn't turn.
> "It's the memory of Room 303.
Not the place—
the idea of it."
The sky darkened.
Birds flew in geometric patterns, then disappeared midair.
Reality was collapsing into metaphor.
From her coat pocket, Amelia drew the small glass vial—the one they recovered from the buried forest.
Inside, a fragment of the spiral still pulsed.
> "I remember something," she whispered.
"But it's not mine."
> "Whose?" Alexis asked.
> "The garden's."
Below them, a wave of sound rose from the roots.
Not a scream—
but a song.
Low, ancient, melodic.
The spiral wasn't just spreading.
It was calling.
> "We have one chapter left," Alexis said, half smiling.
"And I think it's already written."
Amelia looked to the sky, where stars began to rearrange.
Into a spiral.