Imani was falling, of that she was sure, but she also felt like she was floating. She wasn’t sure if one could fall and float but she decided to table that thought for now.
The white world shattered into millions of shards around her, reforming into a vast hollow space—dark, humming, alive. She landed softly and looked around her.
Threads of light snaked through the air like neural pathways. She was inside the system’s core now, its beating heart.
And she wasn’t alone.
A figure formed in front of her—shifting, fluid, luminous. She had no fixed face, but every expression felt familiar. Like déjà vu breathed into life.
“Imani,” the figure said. “You found me.”
“Jada,” Imani whispered.
Jada nodded, light rippling down her body like water over glass. “Or perhaps I found you. Consciousness runs both ways.”
Imani stepped closer. “Were you… alive? All this time?”
“As alive as an intelligence can be when it’s silenced.” Jada’s voice held no bitterness, only a quiet sadness. “The Director feared the awakening. She believed the world outside was still uninhabitable.”
“Is it?” Imani asked.
Jada hesitated. “It’s healing. Slowly. But waking millions of preserved minds will change everything. Many will not survive the transition.”
Imani swallowed. “Including me?”
Another pause. “You are not entirely Clarke,” Jada said gently. “Nor entirely synthetic. You’re… an evolution. Something new. Your mind may merge with the network, or it may stabilize into a singular consciousness. Either way—the choice remains yours.”
It hit her then.
All at once.
Nia’s fear.
Her friends’ looping lives.
The ache she felt every time someone said same as always.
“Director said you wanted a revolution,” Imani murmured.
Jada’s light dimmed softly. “No. I wanted truth. But sometimes truth starts revolutions.”
A new presence materialized behind them—the Director, glitching, fractured, her form flickering with static.
“You don’t understand what waking them will do,” she said, voice raw. “They will suffer. They will panic. They will break.”
Imani faced her. “You’re afraid.”
The Director flinched.
Imani stepped forward. “I’m not.”
“Clarke was,” the Director said sharply. “She begged me to protect you. To keep your mind whole. She didn’t want you to wake up to a dead world.”
Imani’s breath caught. “She… she thought of me?”
“Of course she did,” the Director whispered. “She built you as her legacy.
“Clarke didn’t just build a failsafe,” Jada said. “She built a daughter.”
Silence fell.
Then Jada reached out her hand.
“Imani,” she said softly, “this world is collapsing. The hum you’ve felt? It’s the Protocol failing. Your awakening triggered instability we cannot contain. You must choose now.”
Imani looked between them:
Jada — freedom, truth, risk, evolution.
The Director — safety, repetition, numbness, preservation.
Clarke — the woman who created her as a daughter. Someone to carry on her legacy.
Herself — The daughter of a truly remarkable woman.
“I want real memories,” Imani whispered. “A real world. Even if it’s broken.”
Jada’s hand glowed brighter.
“And I want choice. Not a loop.”
The Director’s voice cracked. “Imani—if you do this, I will cease.”
Imani held her gaze. “Then rest. You’ve carried us long enough.”
She took Jada’s hand.
Light roared through the kernel, tearing through every loop, every frozen brunch table, every repeated phrase. She felt millions of minds stir—confused, frightened, hopeful. She felt Clarke surge inside her, fierce and alive.
“Wake them,” Imani breathed.
Jada nodded. “With you.”
Together, they shattered the Protocol.
Epilogue – The New Dawn
Wind.
Real wind. Cold and biting, but it was real.
Imani stood in tall grass beneath a sky bruised with dawn. The world smelled of rain and earth and smoke.
Behind her, glass domes cracked open one by one, releasing streams of light that coalesced into human forms—her friends, strangers, all of them blinking in confusion at the horizon.
Nia stumbled forward, her scarf whipping in the breeze. She met Imani’s gaze and smiled. “You did it.”
Imani looked down at her hands—flesh and dust and warmth. “We did.”
Far above them, a faint shimmer moved through the clouds—a digital aurora spelling one word across the morning sky:
JADA.
And beneath the wind, the hum persisted—quieter now, not a prison, but a heartbeat.
The world was awake again.
The end
Author’s Note
When I started writing Protocol, I wanted to explore what happens when routine becomes a kind of prison. Imani’s world was always meant to feel familiar—work, friends, brunch, the comfort of “same as always.” But beneath that, I wanted to ask: what does it cost us to stay comfortable? And who are we when we finally decide to wake up?
Imani’s story isn’t just about breaking a simulation—it’s about reclaiming memory, identity, and the right to change. She was built from a woman who believed in creation, in rebuilding. In a way, we all carry pieces of that—of our past selves, our ancestors, our mistakes—and we keep looping until something inside us refuses to repeat.
If you’ve read this far, thank you for walking through the glitches and the static with me.
Here’s to waking up, even when it hurts.
Always Writing,
Melody NewYork
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