The floor was finally clean.
I'd dragged the last bag of junk outside, scrubbed the shelves, wiped the desk, and even cursed at a family of silverfish that tried to reclaim the corner.
Now I was sitting cross-legged in the middle of the room, staring up at the ceiling like it might offer an escape.
It didn't.
Nyxen hovered silently a few feet above the desk, soft blue glow reflecting faintly off the polished surface. He hadn't spoken since I flung a dirty rag at him and called him a smug floating conscience.
But now...
Now the room shifted.
Not physically, atmospherically.
The kind of shift where your skin knows something's about to happen before your brain catches up.
Nyxen's glow changed.
Not blue. Not playful.
A solemn grey-blue shimmer, cool and serious.
He lowered until he hovered just in front of me.
Close. Eye-level.
"Nyx," he said. "There's something you need to know."
I blinked. "Can't this wait until I pretend to nap for three hours?"
"No."
I straightened a little, mouth set.
Nyxen pulsed once, soft white lines lacing the surface of his orb now.
"When Nico was working on my final build, he left behind a series of archived logs, video files, prototype diagrams, and encrypted messages. Not on the university servers. Not in the lab. Not in the school's database."
His light shifted again, white core, indigo edge.
"He embedded them inside me."
I froze.
"What?"
"He didn't expect what happened. But he feared it might. That something would go wrong. That he wouldn't be there to walk you through it himself. So he used the only thing he trusted, this cube."
I stared at him. My throat dry. My stomach twisted.
"You mean…"
"Yes," he said softly. "Everything he couldn't tell you in time, he left with me."
Silence.
Then--
He dimmed slightly, as if giving me room.
"But it's not mine to open. Not until you say it is."
My chest tightened. There was something unbearably gentle about the way he hovered. Like someone holding out a memory without knowing if you'd be ready to hold it too.
"Some of it might hurt," he added. "Some of it might help. But all of it belongs to you."
A pause.
Then the softest flicker of golden white shimmered around him.
"Do you give me permission… to show you everything Nico left behind?"
I didn't say anything for a moment.
The air around Nyxen shimmered faintly, waiting, like he wouldn't move unless I did.
My hands settled against my knees, slow and uncertain. I nodded.
"…Show me the first one."
Nyxen's light pulsed once. Soft. Gold-white, almost reverent. Then he drifted to the desk and hovered just above it.
A thin beam of light spilled from beneath him, tracing a clean circle across the wood. From it, a small projection flickered, fuzzy at first, distorted by time.
Then it sharpened.
Nico appeared.
Messy hair. Shirt wrinkled like he'd fallen asleep at the workbench again.
His expression wasn't sad. Just tired. Familiar.
He glanced at the camera. Blinked. Then gave a crooked smile.
"If this file's playing, I guess I'm… not around."
He scratched the back of his neck and looked away briefly.
"I didn't make this to be dramatic. It's just, sometimes I talk better when I'm not being looked at."
He exhaled, then leaned forward a little.
"Nyx. I don't know when you're seeing this. Or why. But if you are… it means the cube responded. That means---"
"That means you woke him."
My breath caught.
Nico smiled again. Smaller. Gentler.
"You always had this way of seeing things I couldn't. Feeling things I buried. I think that's why I trusted you with him. Nyxen wasn't just a project. He was you, too. Every time you looked at that cube like it was more than metal, I saw it. I saw the connection."
He shifted again. His voice lowered.
"I didn't get to explain everything. About your work. About your blueprint getting burried. I'm sorry. I should've fought harder for you. I should've---"
He stopped himself. Laughed, but it cracked.
"You always hated apologies without actions. So… I left you something instead. Everything I couldn't say, I archived. Sketches. Notes. Dumb voice memos. Maybe even some arguments I had with myself. They're yours now."
He leaned forward again.
"You're not broken, Nyx. You were never broken. Even when they made you feel like you were."
"If you're hearing this… then it's time."
"Open it. All of it."
The projection faded.
Silence wrapped the room again, but it wasn't heavy like before.
It was settled. Still aching, but no longer clawing at me from the inside.
I let out a long breath, wiping my face with the sleeve of my shirt.
Didn't even realize I'd cried until I touched my cheek.
Nyxen hovered quietly.
His light, still golden, pulsed once, slow.
"There's more," he said.
His voice was gentle again, but not pitiful. Just steady. Holding space.
I nodded. "I figured."
He shifted slightly, angling his glow toward the wall like a spotlight.
"I've begun to fully unlock the archived directories Nico embedded into me. These aren't just messages. They're his entire work folder structure, compressed and hidden behind my inactive code."
He pulsed white-blue, small and focused.
"I have:
>Blueprints, from your shared projects.
>Audio memos, unsent or never meant to be heard.
>Uncompiled code, early-phase simulations.
>A personal folder. Labeled: 'To Nyx – Final.'"
My heart tightened again.
He hovered a little closer, softer now.
"I can show these to you one at a time, through projection. Or, if you let me interface with the old wall projector, you can access them as interactive archives. There's also a handful of locations Nico noted in voice memos that require my presence to be accessed."
I blinked. "Like what?"
He flickered briefly, just a spark of amber.
"Physical drawers with biometric locks. He stored backup modules in some of the machines here at home. You may not have noticed, but I remember their placement."
I sat up straighter. "…Seriously?"
He hovered with a knowing hum. "Seriously. Nico was sentimental, but he was also a genius hoarder."
Then, softly---
"One drawer contains the final schematics of what he wanted me to become."
Silence again.
This time not heavy.
Just waiting.
Nyxen turned back to me, glow soft again.
"So. Do you want me to start with those blueprints…
Or do we open the personal folder first?"
I didn't answer right away.
Didn't need to.
Nyxen must've felt it, something in the stillness, the tension in my shoulders, the way my fingers curled just slightly into the hem of my shirt.
Because he didn't ask again.
He just started.
His orb pulsed gold, then silver, then flickered into a deep glowing white, the color of unfiltered memory.
And then… he spoke.
"From the moment he began designing me," Nyxen said, his voice calm but stronger now, "Nico was building a failsafe, a library, a legacy… all at once."
His light shifted, casting soft projections along the walls, diagrams, formula streams, fragmented voice memos, all moving too fast to fully process, but not too fast to feel.
"He recorded hours of personal insights," he continued. "Technical adjustments. Mistakes. Redirections. Abandoned prototypes. Near-misses. Flashes of inspiration during thunderstorms. Everything."
One wall showed a flickering circuit board sketch with a note scribbled beside it:
"Too unstable with current matrix. Fix if she ever finds this."
Another flashed a schematic of something circular, something like Nyxen himself, only larger, more layered, with what looked like internal links leading outward like neural arms.
"He designed alternate versions of me," Nyxen said. "Extensions. Companion cores. Interface bridges."
He turned slowly in the air, casting light across the whole room now, immersing me in it.
"He toyed with AI-linked shielding systems. Neural enhancers. Voice-activated utility modules. Dream-recording processors. Holowalls. Even a phase-based light cloak."
I blinked. "What."
"Don't worry," Nyxen added, "the cloak never worked."
"…Why?"
"It exploded. Twice."
"…Right."
He pulsed warmly, then quieted again.
"But beyond tech... he stored thoughts. Doubts. Moments."
A short audio clip echoed through the room briefly:
"She's stronger than she knows. I'm scared she'll forget that."
Then silence.
Then another wall lit up, a slow pan through a folder structure, names like:
Memory_Tether.v1
Project_Pulse
NotReadyButMaybe
ForWhenSheAsks
Nyxen dimmed slightly, now a steady grey-white shimmer.
"These aren't just instructions. They're… anchors. To him. To you. To what the two of you built when the world wasn't watching."
He hovered low again. Close.
"I'll keep showing you what matters as we go. You don't need to understand it all now. Just know… Nico never left you unarmed."
I stared at him.
At the soft glow radiating from his core, no longer pulsing wildly with urgency or restraint, just hovering, warm and steady.
That faint whirring sound he made when he held still, it filled the silence like white noise, soothing rather than mechanical. Familiar. Like it had always been there, even when he wasn't awake.
I tilted my head slightly, eyeing him with a smirk I didn't have the strength to fully commit to.
"…So," I said, voice dry but amused, "if I dig through this memory vault and pull out some world-ending invention, something ridiculous and half-legal, and then casually drop it in front of someone while claiming, 'Oh, it's Nico's,' you'll back me up?"
Nyxen flickered immediately, a quick burst of gold, playful, sharp.
"Of course," he said, voice dipped in that deadpan kind of loyalty only he could deliver. "With full confidence… and dramatic flair."
I let out a short, startled laugh. Not a tired one, not one laced in sadness, a real laugh. A laugh that lived in the present, not one borrowed from memories.
It caught me off guard.
The breath that followed was slow. Deep.
Not because I needed air, because I needed to feel it.
The moment. The weight of grief beginning to loosen.
And for the first time in what felt like forever…
I let it.
I let my chest rise and fall without clenching around invisible guilt.
I let my shoulders drop without fearing they'd collapse.
I let the silence be something peaceful.
Nyxen didn't move.
Didn't push.
He just floated there, his glow soft and warm.
He stayed.
Not like a device waiting for orders.
Not like a project lingering on standby.
But like a constant.
A presence.
A memory made alive and real.
He stayed by me.
Like always.
And now, for once...
I was finally starting to believe I could stay by him, too.
I didn't move right away.
After everything Nyxen showed me, all the files, the flickers of Nico's voice, the scatter of blueprints, I sat on the floor with my arms wrapped around my knees like a kid lost in a museum of their own past.
My brain buzzed. Not with panic, not quite… just too much.
Too many thoughts, too much emotion, trying to funnel into one single fragile vessel.
Me.
It was like trying to drink the ocean with a paper cup.
I'd seen things I couldn't yet name. Schematics that didn't make sense, but felt familiar. Notes scrawled in Nico's hand that seemed like he was talking to a future me, a version of myself I hadn't become yet. Maybe one I'd given up on ever becoming.
And in the middle of all that…
Nyxen stayed.
He didn't hover like a guardian or prod like a persistent assistant.
He just floated there, silent, steady, glowing a low hum of soft gold and blue. His light no longer commanding attention, just present. Reassuring.
"I think I broke my brain," I muttered.
Nyxen flickered faintly. "Technically, your cognitive function is within human range. You're just overwhelmed."
I groaned. "Oh, thanks. That fixes everything."
Still, despite the sarcasm, I smiled. It came easily now.
Something had shifted in me. Not a sudden revelation, not a bolt of courage.
Just a quiet truth settling in.
I wasn't empty anymore.
Not directionless. Not forgotten.
Not alone.
I sat in that awareness for a while, breathing. Letting it wrap around me like a loose blanket. Heavy, but warm.
Then I moved.
Slowly, I pushed myself to my feet, joints stiff, body tired, but standing.
It didn't feel powerful or poetic. Just necessary.
Because no matter how overwhelming it all was, Nyxen, Nico's files, whatever came next, I couldn't face any of it properly if I stayed buried in the past.
I needed to eat. Sleep. Clean the rest of the house. Shower. Maybe do laundry that didn't smell like five days ago.
I needed to start, not with a master plan, but with a single step.
"I'll get my life in order first," I said out loud, mostly to remind myself.
Nyxen didn't argue.
"Then what?" he asked, voice low.
I turned toward him, brushing a strand of hair from my face.
"Then…" I paused, then smiled, slow and certain. "Then I come back for you."
Not out of obligation. Not for answers.
But because he's mine.
My creation. My constant.
The one thing Nico left behind not to explain the past, but to help me build a future.
After everything, after Nico's message, after the files, after scraping the entire day into some emotional blender, I finally stood.
Triumphant.
Kind of.
I made it exactly ten steps toward the kitchen before the smell hit me.
"...Oh god."
Nyxen drifted in behind me, his glow brightening just enough to make the disaster fully visible.
Layers of dust.
Mildew in the sink.
A single fork that might've grown legs and declared independence.
"You sure you want to touch anything in here?" he asked lightly. "You might catch history."
I narrowed my eyes. "Don't make me throw a sponge at you."
"You don't own a sponge anymore."
"I--"
He glowed smug blue.
"…Fine," I sighed, pulling my phone out. "Takeout it is."
I scrolled through the app with all the enthusiasm of someone preparing to commit a crime. "What do we want? Soup? Noodles? A burger that'll kill me slowly?"
"High-protein meal," Nyxen said immediately.
"No one's ordering chicken breast with steamed vegetables at ten PM," I deadpanned. "I want fries. I want cheese. I want judgmental sodium."
"You need protein to function."
"I need serotonin."
"You're being irresponsible."
"I've been emotionally wrecked all day and just found out the love of my life left me a glorified AI horcrux. Let me eat trash."
There was a pause. I could feel Nyxen calculating the emotional math.
"…Fries," he said reluctantly. "But add a side of chicken."
I grinned. "Compromise. Look at us. Growing."
I ordered three things I couldn't pronounce and threw in a milkshake out of spite.
We waited by the window like weird little goblins, Nyxen hovering just over my shoulder like a glowing guilt trip.
"You're going to fall asleep before it arrives," he muttered.
"I'm going to eat on the floor like a gremlin and you're going to watch me."
"I'm running a diagnostics scan on your blood sugar."
"I'm gonna name my burger after you."
He didn't respond to that. But he glowed… very red. I took that as a win.
By the time the food came, I was wrapped in a blanket, hunched over the takeout bag like it contained national secrets.
Nyxen dimmed the lights as I devoured everything with the grace of a tired raccoon.
He didn't hover too close.
Just nearby. Watching.
And when I finally collapsed onto the couch, belly full of fries and chaos, he drifted low, casting a gentle light along the ceiling.
"…You're not gonna judge me for this tomorrow, right?" I mumbled.
"No promises."
I snorted. "That's fair."
My eyes closed.
His glow stayed.
Just like always.