Hearing its name being called, the clone smiled faintly with a quiet familiarity. Its molten-amber eyes gleamed as though it had been waiting for this moment to speak again.
Seeing this, Ash's breath caught, and he looked down at his hands, flexing them as if trying to grasp the weight of what he was seeing.
For a moment he said nothing, his chest tight, before his voice slipped out in a whisper, "So it really was you… the reason that clone felt so alive."
'Hello again, Ash,' he spoke.
Ash exhaled slowly, tension dragging down his shoulders as his assumptions were confirmed, 'How?'
Riven's voice sharp but steady, echoed in Ash's head as if it had always belonged there, 'I never left… I told you that.'
'Yes… but how?' Ash's claws flexed, 'You're no longer just in my head.'
