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You could always make new memories right? Emotions though, you couldn't get those back. Lorena decided it would be best if she retrieved her emotions rather than her memories. Better Legacy keep those.

[EMOTIONS]

[emotions]

Memories.

They were the fuel to the fire, the seed of their own demise. Charlie could feel himself fading. His existence as a plant creature was a short one... and yet, part of him was not ready to let go. Part of him felt as if he should, just let himself fade into the abyss he once came from. A small spark inside cried out no, no he wanted to live! It was the same feeling he had when given the choice of a life as a single mind versus a life as a shrubbery.

It seemed either way the choice was moot, it had been made for him.

Images shift, he watched them as if watching a home move specifically for him. He saw buildings, places, people... He saw the University as it was before things went to hell. Corey, Caroline... all of their little 'ducklings' going about their merry way. It wasn't the best existence, but it worked. They had survived, formed a family and a structure built on mutual trust and friendship.

One last memory, one last picture. He saw himself curling on the streets, succumbing to the infection he was doomed with from the start.

'You understand now', it whispers, and then you are heavily aware that you have been separated and how oddly alone it makes you feel. 'I am a legacy that cannot be used to destroy. As all memories are harvested, they are also given creation'.

Before he could even respond, he was tossed into a room with a single door. The door was red, and even he could feel the anger from within. As he thought about it a memory flashed, the first zone. The fighting, the gang.

Before he could dwell on that, a new door shimmers to stand next to the first. The gold door. Gold meaning wealth and riches, he thought about the Casino. How much fear and dread that one place could cause in one person.

That was when he knew, each of these 'doors' were an event that happened this past week.

The white door was next, the feeling of regret almost too strong to push past. He saw what he had become, what he did.

Then came blue, the door reminding him of the one person who came through for him. The young man who had helped, despite all cards stacked against them. This 'whitecoat' was the same he had saved prior, an eye for an eye.

The violet door brought back things, things too close to home. He shivered as he remembered, himself and others as made in vines.

The sixth door when joined with the others, he saw nothing and...something told him he would be glad for it. His minds eye a censor, he felt different with this door.

Finally came the last door, and he foudn himself met with a mirror of himself. "Emotions are.... complicated." Charlie answered in truth, wondering how exactly to explain. "They can be wonderful things, or they can be your worst enemy. often times they balance on a thin line, sometimes mingling and mixing."

They do not understand. 'Do these emotions dictate your choices'?

"Yes."

Then it was his turn to be Memories, defending himself against emotions. Why did it feel so strange, sitting here knowing the answers without any bit of feeling behind them?

He did not understand, why was this existance so hard? Once the pairing had combined, allowing themselves to mingle together, was when he truly understood. Creation was giving them a choice, allowing them to decide for themselves. They can either keep their self, or their memories. There was no going back, no middle ground where the two could mix. There was a toll to be paid, and to be no progression past until that single decision was made.

He really wished Corey or Caroline were here. There was a reason he always considered himself their third, the one standing behind the pair of them. Truth be told, while he could lead he wasnt a natural leader... and err'd towards their judgements more than his own. He wished they were here, wished he wasn't so alone. How much would they take, emotionally? Memories?

He was scared, he didn't want to forget but on the same token he felt a life without emotions would turn to be some half life, no life. If he forgot, he could make new memories. If he lost his emotions, he could never regain them.

There was no choice in the end, not really.

[[Dr. Harvard Falls chooses emotions]]

He remembered how it was before the infection, and before he was forced to live in a falling-apart dorm with 40 some-odd students and a handful of professors. Harvard remembered and he thought that maybe it wasn't such a bad fate, after all. They held hope in each of their hands, the light of it searing their palms; they held each other. In this way, it was better than the time before, he'd been forced to shed the sort of aloofness he'd worn around himself like a cloak, and he ached with the need to continue. This life was what he could make of it, and it wasn't bad. Harvard held onto the promises he'd made, none of which were made lightly (instead they settled, heavy on his heart, a somehow comforting weight), and he looked forward to fulfilling them each day. He would live for this. He would live and -

--------------------

There was sunshine and warmth: a feeling of inevitability and rightness and vines tangling. This too, he thought, was not bad. He could be here, he could find them all in the green green green that could devour them. But, too soon, it all was gone and he was cold. It was a kind of cold crueler than a winter's chill, the kind that seeped into a person's bones and stayed there, unmoving, threatening to freeze him from the inside out. He was alone and not alone, but it wasn't the right kind of not alone. And then the Harvard that would become a a part of creation didn't care anymore. Perhaps this was all a dream and he'd wake up in a warm bed, sheets tangled around his legs, sheets tangled around them. Perhaps this was -

------------------------

Harvard fell into the whole of it, seeing purpose swirl around him, them - the eddies and whorls of many lifetimes coalescing into patterns both familiar and not. Creation whispered into him and he understood the whys of what had to pass but he did not like them. Yet, he did not dislike them, either. Things simply were. He watched from above, and it was like looking down from a skyscraper and seeing the cars, the people, as so many ants (they looked inconsequential but they were not; they never were) and the seventh day approached and... he was gone. There was a lifetime's worth of promises unmade in that moment. If he had been given time, Harvard might have mourned for that loss. But he was not, and so the only thing he felt was a faint sense of regret, of fragments that could never be made whole again. Creation moved, and the doors passed by in a whirl of color and emotion and memories. It was beautiful, Harvard thought, a kaleidoscope of everything he'd come to be.

- The red door showed him anger. Fear was mixed in - the undying, the infected, the invasion into their safe space. But there was also a room number written on her arm, a boy's smile, another's grumble, roll call. It was not all anger.

- For gold, he knew what was coming. There was wealth, luxury, a pack of cigarettes, two, slipped into his pocket. Harvard lost himself in the feel of shuffling cards, in the smirk that crossed his face as he bought someone, in the metal gleam of collars. The games he had played had been less for the money and more for the experience. It had been easy to forget they were in danger.

- The next door was white, and he touched it before it opened, hoping somehow he could imprint the memory of it into his fingertips. But it opened, nevertheless, and the hospital loomed up, forbidding and isolated. Despite the anxiety, the paranoia that curled and bubbled in his lungs, Harvard remembered this fondly. It had been perhaps the most frightening and yet most exhilarating. He had thought he would lose her, would lose them all in the thick fog that curled up like reaching arms. But also here were memories of stolen moments on half-broken cots, of chasing. He remembered bandages, and nines, and the bright light of candles.

- Blue colored the next door. This door was disorienting - he was both him and a little girl. She had taken him, saved him, in her own selfish way. He knew the feeling of both blood dripping down his arm and that same blood rubbed on pale skin, the way it flaked off when dry. Harvard should be grateful. He had been protected and maybe that meant he was worth protecting.

- Harvard knew an end was coming, and he wanted to resist it, but the violet door opened anyway, drawing him inside. He could see both of his selves and it was strangely satisfying to know that some things had stayed the same. He watched his arms, his vines and where they moved. Harvard was in tandem with himself, even as he changed. Two sets of the same person - so different, and yet...

- Inside the black door was nothing he remembered. His fingertips tingled and smelled of silver, his mouth felt full of a bitter taste he did not know. Harvard moved onward, facing the final door, the green door.

-----------------

It should feel like completion, he thinks, staring at the two halves of himself. Harvard is them both, and he is himself. Instead, it feels like betrayal. It feels like a choice he never wanted to make. It feels lonely.

First, he is emotion. And the memories pierce through him, trying to find and fit against him like puzzle pieces. "You don't understand," he says. "How can you have memory without emotion? It means nothing."

"It mean everything," the other him says precisely. Harvard shakes his head. "It is not. Memories can fade, time can turn them false, but feeling... it..." He cuts himself off and blinks as though the sun is shining in his eyes. And maybe it is.

"I don't understand," whispers memory and Harvard is him, his mouth forming the words, lips sounding out each syllable as though he's learning a language for the first time. Here, he remembers each day, every moment in stark, clear relief. It's a clinical kind of feeling, as if someone had distilled the person he used to be into a collection of meetings, of findings, of brushes with danger. He is himself, he supposes, and he knows he is useful. It's as natural as a sequence of numbers.

"1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9," Harvard says, no longer understanding what a nine feels like. "I am useful. I can save people, watch empires rise and fall and-"

"I am myself," whispers emotion, hushed desperation threading through his voice. He knows that it feels like a pattern, that it feels like fate, somehow. This Harvard feels in the way a child does, loudly, intensely, until he is eaten up by them.

"And so am I," he says, head tilting. "Do you not understand? Let me show you." And he reaches out to touch himself on the cheek.

They are one, for a moment. He is himself, complete with memories and emotions to match. It feels good to have this instance, to be. But it still feels lonely. Slowly, he replays things over in his head - touches, the way she gasped just so, the blood on his back, the hysterical laugh that was almost crying. Memory without emotion, emotion without memory. There's a choice to be made and he hugs the bits of himself together like he's leaving an old friend. Holds the bits of himself together like a badly-stitched suture over a too-deep wound. He cannot hold it forever; he knows. And, unbidden, his mouth, mouths open.

"I cannot," he whispers. And so he doesn't. Memory bleeds out of him, pooling at his feet, sticky and as red as blood. He presses his palms to it, tries to save it, but it drips away. Eventually, Harvard gives up. Harvard forgets, but he feels.

[Mason 'Sling' Shaw - Emotions]

He wasn't sure what the hell any of this meant, and this sure as s**t wasn't the adventure he'd meant to set out on. Bandit hideouts, some weird kind of murder poker, creepy-a** hospital where the fog called his name, a nice little dog fella coming to fetch him. None of this made a lick of sense, not one bit of it - not until that green door, where half of him was the self he'd always known, and the other just as spooky as any of the rest of it.

If he had to choose, Sling was pretty sure he'd seen this in enough movies to know better than to pick the one that's obviously a clone. Or whatever this was. For listening to something that talked so much about how he understood, he had a hard time believing that he did.

Drifting in memories, details of others lives, some in an era unfamiliar while others it could recognize, the mall, the apartments even the school that it had maybe once called home. There were faces, names attached to them with a purpose, even words that composed or gave definition to feelings. She was there, her body, the familiar smiling face moving, struggling to keep some existence only to succumb to the virus in the end. It was a fruitless struggle but it was hers.

It was hers.

Aware, it was strange almost awkward as the realization of its self was connected to something once tangible. It once had ambition, goals, love, things that were once words now had some form of meaning, emotion. Creation. The voice spoke, and then, as it has always done, sent it forward.

It, no she, passed through the red door, the feeling of anger overwhelming like a fire that had ignited an explosion. Battle, no skirmish had been a better word, had erupted between two groups as supplies had grown slim. She was there with the rest of the fraction, the feeling of dislike, maybe more so hate and resentment building up. They need to survive, they needed to do what they could to survive, they would not give up.  The undying, the loss, the reminder of what had and would happen continued to feed rage.

She was not aware of how long, but the memories of anger faded away as she stepped through a gold door. Casino, the sound of chips hitting metal, the smell of smoke and alcohol lingered in the air as glittered filled the sight. It was easy to sink into luxury, they had missed such opulence for so long that they had almost forgotten in. Even with the struggle to all survive, the red led lit around their necks, she had been able to drink, share in the pride and wealth. They had all managed to buy themselves or others, they would all escape, they had won this feeling of pride.

White, it gave the feeling of something wrong, it bothered her to look at it, to go near it, even more to step through it. Fog curled around as the darkness of shadows limbered, passing, their arms stretching out reaching. Voices ran amok as the decaying building rose in the center as a beacon of some false hope. There she had seen the other’s, she had seen her, both accusing and destructive threatening to tear them apart. Maybe it had been love, but there was fear that lurked as the feeling of regret for of abandoning, the anxiety of being hated and blamed. She had fear of losing her.

Blue, it was almost too welcoming as she stepped through it eager to escape the white. It stranger than the others, not in the sense of obtrusive but in a sense that something was more or less amiss. She was there but so was another, a face that was somewhat familiar but not one that belonged before in the memories or doors. It protected her, it had tried to save her to escape somewhere away from it all. He had given her hope, hope that the struggle was finally over.

Hope nested as she stepped through the violet door, the existence of two her. One that was there, among the vines reaching out as it tried to gain some form while the other seemed as if it had returned to the world before as if unaware of the other half. It was strange, the fleeting moments of clarity to help, to return a favor to him, to love her, and to hold others. It was overwhelming feeling to give in and to fight at once.

The black door remained silent.

Green. Memories flooded, washing her reminding her that they were hers and that it was theirs, they had always been hers and theirs even when shared with others. It was strange to think that that it had forgotten what had once been so important, it had been so easy to lose herself in the rest.

Memories and emotions greeted one another, each a perfect half of the other, both understanding their own purpose but lacking the reason for the other. Perfect in one way yet very incomplete.
What was like it feel? To never forget how one felt. The compulsive nature to respond on whim, the overwhelming feeling of being what it was to be alive, knowing freedom. Love, fear, disappointment, resentment, regret, and hope they were all important, all needed to forge its way.

What was it like to remember? To never forget what had happened, to see it objectively and to recall and to give knowledge of what has been. There is no need for impulse, no fear, no worry or concern, no love, and no mistrust, it was simple and clear and it everlasting.

To remain, or to leave.

What is Creation to you?

Emotion. Even if she would forget the time they had shared, the encounters, the important moments, she was sure as long as she felt the same, if she kept the same emotions she had before,  it would happen again, differently, but again. Harper chose with no regret.

She felt herself unravel and unwind, and in the end, Dani never quite knew what her purpose was. All the events that had transpired... it was all a blur.
In the end, she chose something she had neglected, or perhaps, something she hadn't allowed herself to embrace.
In the end, Dani decided emotions were something important to rely on.

[Emotions]

It had been an emotional ride so far. Seeing her body succumb to the infection, walking through all those door, relieving the memories and emotions she thought she had forgotten. And her she was, forced to make a decision that would change her life forever. If what she had at the moment could be called a life at all.

Alice was looking at the other part of herself. Well, not looking looking more like feeling. The other her, her memories looked as confused as she felt. Was she ready to do it? Forget all she had been through, every person she had met,everything she had seen? Despite the difficulty she knew she only had one choice, for what would life be, what would those memories be without the emotions behind them. Despite not wanting to lose them, she argued with herself that the best course of action would be to forget.

"I'm not me without my emotions. I can make new memories. No, I will make new memories and I will continue to fight for the right to be myself."

The memory version of herself contemplated her answer and as clarity come to its mind it slowly started disappearing.

[ EMOTIONS ]

It was a hard choice for Durza, he'd made close friends during the fall of the world and forfeiting his memories would wipe his knowledge of them, wouldn't it? But, he could run into them again, and he would become friends with them again if he had his emotions. So in the end, that was what he chose. He put his head in his hands as his memories fled him and slipped away on the wind. All but the month he had lived with the Apartments as his faction and before that, vanished.