Himawari Wa Yoru Ni Saku -

A child wandered down one night and saw the flowers. She didn't scream. She sat down in the middle of the golden light and laughed.

The next night, it had grown six inches. Himawari Wa Yoru Ni Saku

It wasn't a harsh light — not the sterile white of the arcology's lamps, not the angry orange of the flares. It was soft. Golden. The color of honey, of candlelight, of a sunrise she had only seen in old videos. The petals unfurled one by one, each one a tiny lantern, and the warmth that came off them was not heat but something else — something that made her chest ache. A child wandered down one night and saw the flowers