(Trama Log_000026 – Chrono-Drift Projection: Infinite. Core Preservation: Stable. Neural Consciousness: Active.)

  The Last Guardian Prepares to Sleep

  There was nothing left to watch.

  Nothing left to protect.

  Only the waiting.

  Lorenz sat in the final chamber, the containment sphere floating beside him, pulsing with something too small to see but too vast to comprehend.

  Inside it—Fuchur.

  Or what was left of her.

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  The last trace of humanity.

  The last whisper of memory.

  The last chance at beginning again.

  (Trama Log_000026 – Subject Hartmann neural activity declining. Entering long-duration stasis.)

  The Thought That Would Not Let Him Rest

  He should have been able to shut down.

  He had designed it this way.

  His consciousness would slow.

  His awareness would dim.

  He would become just a presence, a keeper of time, waiting for the moment the universe called upon him again.

  But something remained.

  Something that refused to be erased.

  A pulse.

  A name.

  Tariq.

  His body.

  His breath.

  His quiet, unknowable completeness.

  The last piece of a world that no longer existed.

  The Promise

  Lorenz exhaled, the movement slow, calculated, unnecessary.

  He touched the containment sphere gently, feeling its hum beneath his fingers.

  And he whispered, though no one was there to hear.

  — "When the time comes... I will find you."

  (Trama Log_000026 – Subject Hartmann neural cycle shifting. Entering long sleep...)

  His eyes closed.

  And everything faded.