Thomas's eyes bulged in shock the mont he saw the won standing before him.
Ti seed to freeze. His breath caught in his throat, and for a second, the world fell utterly silent. They were stunning—radiant, even—with warm smiles and eyes full of life.
But that wasn't what shook him. It was the fact that he knew them. Intimately. Painfully.
The last ti he had seen them, they had been charred and mangled beyond recognition, their bodies little more than scorched lumps of flesh pulled from the twisted wreckage of a burning car.
The image had haunted his nightmares ever since. Yet here they were now—whole, alive, and impossibly beautiful.
They were the two most important won in his life.
"Mom?" he choked out, his voice trembling.
"Colleen!" he cried, louder this ti, taking a step forward before freezing again.
His mother stood there, just as he rembered her—soft features, kind eyes.
And Colleen, his girlfriend, looked exactly like she had the day he told her he loved her for the first ti.
But they were dead. They had died in a car bombing almost a year ago, an explosion ant for him. He had buried them. He had cried over their coffins.
So how could this be real?
A surge of hope slamd into his chest like a tidal wave. His knees nearly buckled under the weight of it.
Could they have survived? Was it all a lie? So governnt cover-up? So miracle?
But just as quickly as the hope rose, a cold, biting voice in the back of his mind cut through the haze.
No. This isn't real. This can't be real.
Thomas shook his head violently and took a shaky step back.
"No… this isn't happening," he whispered, his voice cracking.
He shut his eyes tight, as if hoping that when he opened them again, either they would still be there—or, more likely, they'd vanish like a cruel mirage.
"This has to be one of Ross's tricks," he muttered bitterly. "Another one of his damn illusions."
He had seen what Ross was capable of—he had sorcery that bent reality like paper.
This—this had to be so high-tech simulation or another one of Ross's reality-bending gas.
Or at least that was what he assud.
But part of him, the broken part that still carried grief like a wound that wouldn't close, wanted to believe.
God, he wanted to believe.
He opened his eyes slowly, dreading what he'd see.
The two won stared at him with the sa stunned expression that twisted his own features.
Their eyes—wide, brimming with confusion and fear—locked onto his, as if they too were grappling with the impossibility of the mont.
Their lips moved, trying to form words, but no sound escaped. Just breathless attempts—silent gasps from throats that had once known death.
They looked exactly as they had on the last day he saw them alive.
His mother—her features unmistakably familiar, like a gentler, older mirror of his own—stood tall in a light blue, midi-length sundress.
The soft fabric clung to her fra, delicate as mory. The dress, sleeveless with thin straps, held a square neckline that frad her graceful collarbones.
The material was lightweight, almost translucent in places, with a subtle floral pattern scattered across its surface, like faded petals on an old gravestone.
It drifted around her legs in a soft A-line shape, flowing as though caught in a breeze that wasn't there.
On her feet were silver Mary Jane flats, worn at the edges—an oddly mundane, grounding detail in a scene that felt pulled from a dream or a nightmare.
Beside her stood Colleen—young, vibrant, heartbreakingly beautiful.
She was dressed in a pink sports bra and tight-fitting gray athletic shorts, an outfit chosen for comfort and movent, for sun and water.
The ensemble clung to her like a second skin, highlighting every curve, every line that Thomas rembered all too well.
She had been glowing that day, ready for a swim, laughing and full of life.
He rembered teasing her about forgetting sunscreen, and how she'd stuck her tongue out at him in response.
That had been the last mont of peace before the blast.
And now, here they were again—alive.
A sick twist of emotions knotted in his chest: disbelief, horror, hope, and an aching, desperate longing.
He wanted to run to them, to hold them, to make sure they were real—but fear rooted him to the spot. He didn't trust it. He couldn't.
The air around them shimred faintly, as though the universe itself was struggling to keep the illusion stable.
No, Thomas thought, his jaw clenching. This isn't right.
He took a shaky breath of air.
It had to be Ross.
With Ross's power—his immortality, his arcane science, his twisted gas—resurrecting the dead was no more difficult than breathing.
"Thomas?"
His mother's voice broke through the silence like sunlight piercing a stormcloud—soft, gentle, achingly familiar.
The sound of it hit him like a punch to the chest. For a heartbeat, the world stopped.
And then everything inside him shattered.
The fragile wall of doubt he had built around his heart crumbled in an instant.
The fear that this was an illusion, a cruel imitation, dissolved under the weight of that single word.
He knew that voice. Not in the way soone recognizes a sound—but in the way the soul recognizes a part of itself.
He had heard that voice lull him to sleep as a child. He had heard it scold him, laugh with him, comfort him after nightmares.
No sorcery could mimic the warmth in it. No spell could recreate the way it made his heart swell and ache all at once.
It was her.
His mind reeled, but his heart surged forward, racing ahead of logic. His body responded on instinct, stepping toward her even as his legs trembled.
This is real.
He could feel it in his bones, in the blood rushing through his veins, in the breath that caught in his throat. His entire being—mind, body, soul—scread the truth in perfect, undeniable harmony:
That was his mother.
She had co back.
Tears welled in his eyes, blurring her face, but he didn't need to see her clearly. That voice—just that one word—was enough to undo him completely.
He had mourned her. He had buried her. He had whispered goodbye to a gravestone that would never speak back.
And yet here she stood, calling his na in that voice that had once been silenced forever.
"How about this, Thomas? Do you like my gifts? I gave two of them back. Aren't I generous?" Ross laughed on the side which broke the tearful reunion.
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