Love in the time of chaos

: Where Mem

woke t

not destruction. The kind where birds return to sing ag

the Archive was released into the world, since the signal-Ewa's frequency-chan

that day t

a hero. He felt like a vessel t

mming trunk. A memory surfaced-him as a boy, no more than six, list

he'd said. "That's why we plant

e unde

of memory. But some seeds,

morning patrol with a

he said, sitting beside him on

ed up. "G

but unmarked. Moving like th

. "The fre

said. "Or what

Resonance. Her voice, once a thunderous echo in Tari's bo

y're trying to

bloomed here, it threa

esponded to collective mood now-Tari had no idea how or why, only that people seemed gentler, m

d to go back

brow furrowed.

e. The part I

moment. Then: "You said

ers told me-beneath the living memory is the

harpened. "The

nod

m that starte

returned to the sacred chamber where Kémi, the last Living Archive, now sl

older than nine, with circuitry etched int

e?" Tari

Mama Sade said. "One of many. But thi

s eyes and looked

ing under?

nod

out a hand. "T

y, but Mama Sade raised a hand. "

only briefly before c

the world

nto darkness,

n into circuitry. A place that felt like sta

the erasure of dialects from educational systems, the weaponization of borders, the sterilization of women in clinics with European funding, th

beside him, s

reached

ass, flickering in colors Tari could not name. A voice

memory, but you will a

hands t

ere far away: "Don't let it scare you

ed at t

and said: "It's only strong

e in dialects recovered from the Archive, laughter from the Lagos protests of 2020, data from indigenous clima

ng images of war, famine, e

it c

en col

fragments, and the

ing. Around them, the walls vibrate

Lagos changed again-not i

ers rose. Not museums, but living spaces wher

dren learned history not by rote, but through empathy simulations-touching objects that

agos was

arguments. Disa

ening. And listening, a

stood before a c

art of a council-a rotating body of memory stewa

d. "It lives in all of us. You do

felt less like adoration and more like affirm

a real leader

ad. "I'm just a

mmered blue, then violet, then a rich

ed by, playing a recording of a g

"Do you think

said. "She left so we co

y, Tari wrote in a notebook made from reclai

s not what

choose to c

carry it

never forget

in the wind-branches glowing faintly, roots