That night, I had a dream.
Not the "floating through clouds while naked" kind. This one was... strange. It didn't feel like a dream. It felt edited. Like someone had cut out the beginning, skipped the plot, and left me inside the final scene of a then he spoke. A voice that sounded like it'd been dubbed over a thousand times by different actors; male,female, robotic, angry. seductive. Every line overlapped like he couldn't decide who he wanted to be.
"They cut me out. But you? They wrote you in."So I turned but nothing. Just more empty chairs and that faint projector hum. I tried to walk away, but every step looped me back to where I started. Like a scratched DVD."The stories always loved you. I know what you are. And I know who I am."I was zapped in a horror film I never agreed to star in.I was standing in an old theater. Dust swirled through a projector's glow, casting flickering images on a torn screen. Empty seats stretched into the darkness. But behind me… breathing, not loud but just enough to remind me I wasn't alone.
"The stories always loved you. I know what you are. And I know who I am." He repeated.
A flash, one frame, just one revealed a man's face, glitched and grainy, stitched from a thousand roles that never made it past auditions. His mouth moved out of sync with the sound."Remember me." Huh? Like bruh who the fuck is this dude.
I woke up sweating, my TV hissing static even though it wasn't plugged in.
REALITY, LATER THAT DAY
Emma greeted me like always, towel wrapped around her hair, sitting on my couch like she'd always lived there. I had stashed her safely in my world; my domain. No movie could reach her here. Or so I thought.That's when I noticed it.
A VHS tape; black,unlabeled just sitting on the floor like it had always been there.
I didn't put it there.Emma hadn't either.
When I touched it, cold rushed through me. Not like "AC-on-full-blast" cold. The kind of chill you get when you realize someone's been watching you too long. I didn't insert the tape. I threw it out the window.It came back.
INTRODUCING THE VILLAIN
He was born from forgotten scripts, a graveyard of deleted dreams. Now, he drags the worst of every genre behind him like a cloak ;romance turned sour, comedy turned cruel, drama twisted into horror. His name?
Director's Cut.
He was the main character once. Now he's the editor of pain. He doesn't just change stories , he rewrites them around you.
He'll appear as a background extra in one movie. Then a minor role. Then someone whispers his name on set and suddenly, that movie starts playing by his rules.
Skill : "Script Override."
Once per movie, he can rewrite one event, permanently.
He's coming for Emma. He's coming for my affection skills. And he wants to turn my movie-hopping power into a one-way trip… into his masterpiece of vengeance.