ECHO OF THE VOID : THE AWAKENED
Chapter 2: The Garden of Dreams
Asher’s first days in the waking world were hard.
He had been asleep for four hundred years. The world he woke to was not the world he had left. Earth was gone. The Odyssey was a wreck. The colony was small and fragile and full of strangers.
He was disoriented. He was frightened. He was lonely.
Aris stayed with him.
She brought him food. She brought him water. She brought him clothes that fit. She sat with him in the garden, among the lilies, and talked to him about nothing and everything.
He did not speak much.
But he listened.
And slowly, gradually, he began to heal.
“You were a botanist,” Aris said, on the third day.
Asher nodded.
“I studied plants. Their genetics. Their adaptations. Their dreams.”
“Plants dream?”
“Everything dreams. Plants. Animals. People. Even the earth itself. Dreams are not just for the sleeping. They’re for the living.”
“What do plants dream about?”
Asher looked at the garden.
At the lilies.
At the light.
“They dream of sunlight. Of water. Of soil. They dream of growing. Of reaching. Of becoming.”
“And people?”
Asher met her eyes.
“People dream of the same things. They just use different words.”
On the fifth day, he asked her about the echo.
“You killed it,” he said. “How?”
“I didn’t kill it. I contained it. I became the lock.”
“Then where is it now?”
Aris was silent for a long moment.
“I don’t know. Sleeping, I hope. Dreaming, maybe. Waiting.”
“Waiting for what?”
“For someone to wake it. For someone to feed it. For someone to set it free.”
Asher’s face paled.
“Can it be set free?”
“Anything can be set free. If the lock is broken. If the cage is opened. If the dreamer is willing.”
“Are you willing?”
Aris looked at the sky.
At the sun.
At the light.
“No,” she said. “I’m not.”
On the seventh day, he walked through the city for the first time.
The streets were crowded, the market busy, the children laughing. People stared at him as he passed—a stranger, a sleeper, a ghost from the past.
He did not flinch.
He did not hide.
He walked with his head high, his shoulders back, his eyes forward.
Aris walked beside him.
“They’re staring,” he said.
“They’re curious.”
“About what?”
“About you. About who you are. About where you’ve been.”
“Should I tell them?”
Aris looked at him.
“Do you want to?”
He was silent for a long moment.
“No,” he said. “Not yet.”
“Then don’t.”
They stopped at the edge of the city.
The wilderness stretched before them—forests and rivers and mountains, untouched by human hands.
“What’s out there?” Asher asked.
“Another world,” Aris said. “A new world. A world we haven’t explored yet.”
“Will we ever explore it?”
“Someday. When we’re ready.”
“When will that be?”
Aris smiled.
It was a sad smile, small and tired and full of years.
“I don’t know. But I hope soon.”
That night, Aris dreamed.
She was standing in a garden.
Not the garden of Asher’s dream. Not the field of her own dream. A different garden. Dark and twisted, the trees like grasping hands, the flowers like bleeding wounds.
And in the center of the garden, a figure.
A woman.
She was young—younger than Aris, younger than Sera. Her dark hair was long and straight, her white dress was torn and stained, her bare feet were pressed against the dead grass.
Her eyes were closed.
She was sleeping.
But she was not at peace.
“Aris,” the woman said. “Help me.”
Aris walked toward her.
“Who are you?”
The woman opened her eyes.
They were black.
Not the black of the echo. A different black. Softer. Sadder.
“I am the first,” she said. “The first to dream. The first to wake. The first to be forgotten.”
“What do you want?”
The woman reached out.
Her hand was cold.
“I want you to remember me.”
Aris woke with a gasp.
Sera was beside her.
“What happened?” Sera asked.
“A dream. A woman. She asked me to remember her.”
“Who was she?”
Aris looked at the window.
At the darkness.
At the stars.
“I don’t know. But I think she’s a sleeper. I think she’s been waiting for a very long time.”
“Do you want to find her?”
Aris was silent for a long moment.
“Yes,” she said. “I do.”
The next morning, Aris went to the medical bay.
Elara was there, tending to a row of sleepers—their bodies still, their faces peaceful, their dreams unknown.
“I need to find someone,” Aris said.
“Who?”
“I don’t know her name. But I saw her in a dream. Dark hair. White dress. Black eyes.”
Elara’s face went pale.
“That’s not possible.”
“Why not?”
Elara walked to a pod at the end of the row.
The glass was frosted, the readouts dark, the labels faded.
“This sleeper has been under for four hundred years,” Elara said. “Her vitals are stable. Her brain activity is normal. But she’s never dreamed. Not once. Not in all that time.”
“Then who did I see?”
Elara looked at the pod.
At the glass.
At the darkness.
“I don’t know,” she said. “But I think you need to find out.”