I take a step back, looking at the hologram screen in front of me and take a deep breath. My heart starts racing and my hands shake. I've never been so afraid in my life, which is saying a lot. Suddenly, Aaron appears before me.

"Is it completed now?" He asks with his hands together behind his back. "I think you have had quite enough time."

"I--I think I am," I stutter in amazement. "After all these years I just wanted to be back with them and now I might be able to and..."

"I know this is overwhelming for you Rowan. You're always welcome to stay...you remember the deal, don't you?"

"I do," I sigh. "But I never truly thought this day would come. I never thought I could do it." I recall the day about twelve years ago when Aaron reluctantly agreed to my deal so long ago. I realized that I couldn't be the EcoPan, but I couldn't let humanity down either, so I came up with an idea. I will still become the EcoPan when I am old and content in my life, but in the meantime, I can be a normal, happy person. Or as normal as I get. I would temporarily be relieved of my duties as the EcoPan and then live my normal life if I can make the EcoPans procedures. If I can give the EcoPan a functioning database to run off of for the rest of my life, however long it may be, I can go home to my friends. It's been a long twelve years, yet also a short twelve years as I made these careful calculations as the other half the EcoPan. And now, I think I succeeded. I think I might have a running database that I can leave Aaron with for the next sixty or seventy years. Now, I might be able to go home. I might hold my family again. Like I explained to Lachlan, I feel time differently than them. I don't feel time, I observe it. I feel like I saw them just this morning but I also have an understanding that I've been waiting on them for forever and I want them back.

Well, you succeeded Rowan. Truly I didn't think you were going to succeed either, but here we are.

"I can go back home?" I ask with a gulp. Aaron nods.

You are the EcoPan as much as I. I don't control you, you don't control me. Although, I do believe you have persuaded me in much. I can no longer stop you from leaving, Aaron says and I feel frozen. I can leave. Now. It won't be the same, I know that, but I don't feel like it's been twelve years. I feel like when I wake up I can throw my arms around them and kiss them and they'll love me again, but it's been so long for them. I guess you could assume I would keep connections with Ash, mom, and Lark, and I would have but I couldn't. To preserve energy and direct it towards my calculation, Aaron cut off any non-vital ability of the EcoPan. And talking to humans in a non-critical situation isn't vital to him. It must feel like they haven't spoken to me in forever. Well, now I'll be with them again...am I ready for that?

"So...I'm allowed to leave now?" I ask. I can hardly believe it.

I'm afraid you are, He says and I can tell he's observing me. It's a strange thing. We're still one as the EcoPan but we still have moments, like now, where I need to speak to know, not as him and Yarrow allows us to be separate. I can't blame him for being curious about what I'm about to do next, quite honestly I'm curious too. What do I do next?

Do what you truly want. What we both have always truly wanted, Yarrow pleads. I know you have had no awareness of time, but I have. All this time I've been wanting to go home. I have feelings too Rowan and I miss our family. I miss our home. Let's go back.

I have moments hesitance. I don't know what anything will be like when I get home or who anyone would be. Quite honestly, I don't know if it's the right thing to do, but I'm doing it. I'm going home. Aaron, who is still reading my thoughts after all these years, nods his head.

Very well, He says. Are you ready?

"No," I confess. "But I have to be. It's my time. You can let me go now."

"Goodbye Rowan. I'll see you soon," He replies and for a second I become suspicious. He grins and corrects himself. "It'll be soon for me. A long time for you. Now, I think it's time for our departure." Without another word, I feel a consuming bright light, then the light leaves me just as quickly as it came. I feel a detachment like Aaron is leaving me and its the best relief I've ever felt in all my life considering I've lived as one with him for the past twelve years, not that I've felt those twelve years. My eyes open and it feels like such a foreign feeling by now. As I wake up I see the grey roof above me and know I'm back. I'm back in the world! I'm in such a hurry to sit up, to move my limbs, to feel something that when I sit up I hit my head on the clear glass. I hear Aaron chuckle inside me and the glass slides open.

Always so hasty, He says with a sigh and I roll my freshly opened eyes. As I sit up every bone in my body seems to creek and crack, every piece of me urns to move again. I want to run, I want to hug, I want to kiss. They're all so close, aren't they? My thoughts seem to go to Lark. How much I crave your smile, then my thoughts turn to Lachlan. How is he? How are both of them? It's been twelve years to them without me. Is there any chance that either of them waited for me? Is there any chance that they're still somebody I could love? I pray that there is because they're the only two people I can love. I won't move on if they leave me here to be alone.

I push the low odds of actually being happy from my mind and stay positive. As my feet hit the ground my knees buckle beneath me and I fall to the ground sending a sharp pain running up from my knee caps. Most people I assume would curse or stand with a disgruntled look. I don't, instead, I find that I let out a soft chuckle and marvel at the simple fact that I have feeling again. I know that I keep saying that I don't feel time, and I don't, but this is still all so old to me. I haven't felt anything physically for years, or even simply had a body. I look around in wide-eyed amazement as I shakily use my feet. I let out a bursting laugh as I realize I have quite literally forgotten how to use my limbs and body. As a tall girl I had a hard time controlling my limbs and learning how to be graceful, but it's a whole new kind of awkward as a shuttle across the ground. I use the coffins as railing and walk to the staircase. I find everything in this old familiar world hilarious and laugh until I cry as I have to use my hands and knees to crawl up the staircase without a railing. When I get to the top Aaron opens the door for me and I can't help but feel like he finds this comical. I crawl out into the light and shield my eyes against the glaring sun with a moan. I reach out and my fingertips find something cold and hard that is only about two feet tall, it's a gravestone. Still, I'm able to use it to rise to my feet. I look around and everything looks like a shadow against the bright light.

"Are you okay?" I hear a voice say and I look to my left. It takes a few more moments for my eyes to adjust to the light but I can make out a young girl who looks about ten or eleven to my left "Wait...I know you."

"Do you?" I asked and my throat is so dry that it comes out as a horrid whisper. She nods.

"Everyone does. Here, let me help you. I know the way back home and...I know who you should avoid," she says as an afterthought and takes my hand as she leads me. The girl has a gentle touch and she seems mature for her age. She has stunning wide eyes and dark raven hair like mine.

"What do you mean? Who are my enemies?" I croak.

"Don't try to talk Rowan. And you don't really have enemies, but you do have people you should avoid. Everybody loves you but that's just the problem. Some people love you too much, and you left them behind." She glances at me and I don't think she's judging me but I do think she's skeptical. "People like my uncle."

"Who's your uncle?" I ask. "I probably don't know him but I would like to."

She looks down and her plump lips part slightly, then she presses them into a line again. "We can talk about who I am later. Right now I want to get you to safety. Here, are you thirsty?"

I nod and she hands me a canteen she had strapped to her bag. I gulp the warm water gratefully. I take a look around at my surroundings and by surprise, I see Mira's garden. It's as beautiful as ever. The gorgeous white, red, pink, and dozens of other colored flowers are just as lively as I remember. They have tangled and claimed dozens of headstones as their homes and somehow the headstones of the dead make the garden more beautiful, but there is one difference that really stands out to me. The statute. The statute of Aaron that hid the EcoPans heart has been destroyed and remade as me. I look at the wise young girl for an explanation and she plays with one of her braids. Her dark hair is flowing and she has small braids at the front of her face. She's so young.

"What's your name?" I ask her. She looks up at me and smiles.

"The same as yours. Rowan." Without another word, she helps me to the entrance of the garden and I have an instinct to look up. I look up and see the sign. It's just how I had imagined it! I gasp as I look at the beautiful print that reads "Mira and Rowan's Garden." The sign looks more like a painting as the painted flowers wrap and coil around the letters. It depicts a bird sitting on top of the R in Rowan and it has a familiar look in its eyes. Hope. The way all of the animals looked at me in Lachlan's painting. I let out a content sigh and gaze at it. "Isn't it beautiful?"

"My Lachlan made it. Of course, it's beautiful," I whisper in amazement.

"Oh. Do you remember him?" She asks.

"Of course I remember him," I laugh. "He's one of the most important people to me. Do you know him?"

"I do," she says and the mixed emotions in her voice gives me pause. "He's..."

"What?" I asked. She takes a deep breath like she's unsure if she should tell me.

"He's my uncle," she explains. I gasp. "You might know who my parents are. Fern and Rook?"

~~~~~~