Tark and Zyra awoke in their basement. Everything was back in place. There was no sign of the damage done by Vera.
Tark sat up on his mouldy, lumpy mattress, and looked across the basement at Zyra who was sitting up on her mattress.
‘I guess it's done,’ he whispered.
Zyra nodded, then a smile spread across her face. ‘We beats the Fat Man.’
‘Yeah.’ Tark smiled in return. ‘We dids.’
‘We saved everything!’
‘Yeah,’ Tark agreed. ‘We dids.’
‘Unless,’ said Zyra quietly. ‘Unless all that wuz a game, too.’
They climbed slowly to their feet and walked around the basement, looking at everything, examining ordinary things, running hands and fingers across walls, over chairs, through the dust and dirt. It was all familiar, it was all the same, and yet it was so different. Zyra looked down at herself. She was wearing her leather coat.
‘A game,’ whispered Tark. ‘We is in a game.’
‘Maybe,’ said Zyra.
‘So do we play?’ asked Tark. ‘Does we goes on likes before?’
‘Wot else is there?’
‘Us,’ said Tark, walking over to Zyra and reaching out a hand to touch her arm.
‘But it's against the rules.’
‘Yeah, it is,’ agreed Tark. ‘But the Designers is gone. And I don'ts care.’
He took Zyra's hand in his and leaned forward, bringing his face close to hers. ‘Alls I cares about … is …’
He leaned closer.
‘… you.’
And as their lips met, everything changed.