Aaryan hadn't slept.
Not really.
His body had been still, lying on the bed, but his mind had been trapped in a limbo — a glitch-space that hummed with a strange frequency. There was no sound. No time. Only echoes. Echoes of himself, repeating, fading, merging.
And one voice.
"You're not supposed to be seen yet."
The words looped like a curse.
He sat up as the first rays of the morning cut through the window. The light didn't warm him like it used to. It bounced off his skin as if he wasn't quite there. Like the world acknowledged his presence, but only halfway.
⚙️ Something was changing.
He noticed it when he brushed his teeth. His reflection was missing again — not completely, but fractured. His face appeared in slivers, like broken glass rearranged in the wrong order.
When he spoke aloud, "I'm fine," the mirror responded an instant before his lips even moved.
Time was lagging for him. Or maybe he was lagging for time.
Downstairs, his mother looked up from the newspaper and paused mid-sentence when she saw him.
"Aaryan... are you alright? You look... pale."
"I'm fine," he lied.
She blinked — and for a full five seconds, she didn't move. Like someone had hit pause on her.
Then she exhaled suddenly, stood up, and continued talking as if nothing had happened.
That's when he realized it wasn't just him glitching anymore.
Reality around him was beginning to buckle.
🏫 In School…
The classroom was unusually quiet.
Aaryan sat near the back, pretending to listen as Mrs. Fernandes droned on about entropy and molecular chaos. Ironic, he thought — chaos theory while the universe around him was literally distorting.
He tapped his pen. Once. Twice.On the third tap, the sound reverberated, stretching unnaturally like a ripple in space.
The girl sitting in front of him turned around sharply, frowning. "Did you hear that?"
He froze.
"Like… the air cracked or something," she whispered.
It wasn't just in his head anymore.
Someone else heard the glitch.
⚠️ But then something worse happened.
During lunch, as Aaryan walked across the field, trying to ground himself in the normal — sunlight, footsteps, voices — the world blinked.
Literally.
For a single moment, everything vanished. No sound. No color. No people.
And in that void stood a figure.
The same hooded man from yesterday.
Only this time, he was not alone.
There were three of them — tall, faceless, robes stitched with strange glowing patterns that pulsed like circuitry.
And they were moving toward him.
Aaryan tried to run.
But the space around him folded like paper. Each step he took brought him closer to them, not away.
Then—BZZZTTT.
The sound of the bell exploded around him.
Time snapped back. Color returned. Noise surged like a tidal wave.
He was standing alone again. No one around him seemed to notice.
But on the side of his neck, something burned.
A symbol had been branded into his skin — faint, glowing softly.
Like a countdown.
📁 That Evening…
Aaryan avoided home.
Instead, he took the long way, cutting through alleys and abandoned roads, until he reached the edge of the city — an old junkyard. Here, he could think.
He sat atop a rusted car, heart pounding.
He took out his phone, opened the forum again.
Thread Title: "The Code that Sees You"
This time, a new message had appeared.
"If the mark has appeared, you've already been 'indexed'. Do not attempt to resist visibility.But above all… don't trust anyone who can still see you clearly."
Aaryan read it thrice.
What the hell did that even mean?
He looked up — and almost dropped the phone.
A man stood at the edge of the junkyard.
Not moving. Not blinking.
Just staring.
⚔️ And Then…
Everything around Aaryan froze again.
Time fracture.
But this time, he wasn't the only one unfrozen.
The man stepped forward and spoke without speaking — lips didn't move.
"You have accessed forbidden visibility. You must be contained."
"No—wait, I don't even know what's happening—!"
"Irrelevant. The Code must remain invisible."
The man raised his hand.
Energy shimmered — like static electricity made of light and smoke.
And then Aaryan… vanished.
He didn't teleport.He didn't run.He glitched.
One moment he was standing, the next — his body broke into fragments of light, dissolving into the air like shattered pixels.
The man stumbled, disoriented. He looked around.
Aaryan was invisible — truly, absolutely.
And for the first time…
He felt power.
🌌 A Strange Space
Aaryan found himself in a void. Not empty — but layered.
It was like being between the cracks of existence. Everything was grayscale and suspended in time.
Here, the air hummed with secrets.
He could see faint trails — shadows of moments that had happened, or were about to happen.
Memories. Timelines. Secrets.
In the distance, he saw a version of himself as a child, playing alone. Then another — older, covered in symbols, surrounded by chaos.
Future versions?
Before he could process more, the space began to crack.The void wasn't stable.
A whisper echoed through the gray:
"The Code awakens. But visibility is a curse."
He fell—back into reality.
🌃 Back in the real world…
He reappeared in the middle of the junkyard.
Collapsed. Gasping. His body steaming with cold.
And now — something had changed.
He looked at his hands.They were normal.
But inside… he felt different.
Like he was plugged into something bigger.
The invisible code had accepted him.
But what had he lost in return?
🕶️ Last Scene…
Later that night, as he lay in bed, a final notification popped up on his phone.
[New Message: Unknown Sender]"Welcome, Aaryan. The veil has thinned. You are no longer hidden. They are coming."
He clicked to reply.
But the message deleted itself.
And his screen —turned black.