Somewhere between sleep and wakefulness, the world stutters.And if you listen carefully... you can hear reality rebooting.
Two days after the tunnel.
Aaryan hadn't spoken much.
Not because he didn't want to.
But because... every time he opened his mouth, the air around him would pause, glitch, and sometimes crack. Words came out like echoes — sometimes too loud, sometimes completely silent.
Even silence had stopped behaving like silence.
The Observer, Kavi, had warned him — "Reality bends to the glitch. Don't get too comfortable."
But comfort was impossible now. Food lost its taste. Time moved differently. Every reflection felt like it was studying him back.
He was slipping.
And then she appeared.
🌃 The Encounter
It was late evening. Aaryan had wandered toward an abandoned clocktower at the edge of Old Delhi — drawn by a strange pull. The place had been burned in the riots five years ago. Now it stood silent, broken, swallowed by overgrowth.
But the moment he stepped into the entrance… the world muted.
No sound. No wind. Not even his own breath.
And she stood there.
On the second level of the tower.
Wearing a long, tattered black hoodie. Hair tied in two tight braids. Barefoot. Eyes glowing faint blue. And on her throat — a stitched 'X' mark.
She raised her hand.
And with it, the entire tower vibrated.
Not physically. Digitally.Aaryan could see fragments of light breaking across the walls, code symbols glowing faintly — like someone was hacking the space around them.
He stepped forward. "Who are you?"
She didn't speak.
Instead, she drew in the air.
A square. Then an eye. Then a slash.
And then… he heard a voice. But inside his head.
"You've been heard. Now be silent."
👤 Name: Nyra
The girl's name was Nyra.
Not her real name — just what the code had assigned her.
She was like him. Marked. Indexed. Glitched.
Only… worse.
Nyra couldn't speak. Not because she was mute — but because every sound she made could destroy parts of the physical world. Her glitch was sonic — destructive, irreversible. She had silenced entire streets before being hidden away in this reality pocket.
Aaryan could feel the vibrations of her pain.
"You're the first new signature I've felt in months."
"That means the system is activating Phase 2."
🌀 Phase 2?
Aaryan's voice trembled: "What's Phase 2?"
She looked at him — sadness in her glowing eyes.
Then she touched his chest gently, and in a flash — visions exploded in his mind.
A map made of glitch nodes spread across the city
Dozens of people like him — indexed, hidden, some dead
A core signal buried under Delhi, coded as IN.VI.SYS
And in the final image — a colossal tower, stretching into the sky, made of pure shifting code, surrounded by dark sentinels called the Protocol Priors
He stumbled back, breathless.
"Where is that place? That tower?"
Nyra drew three letters mid-air.
D-C-C(Delhi Control Core)
And then she stepped back. Her eyes now worried.
"You're triggering something. The silence here won't hold you long."
⚡ Attack
Before Aaryan could react, the tower walls cracked.
The air hissed. The symbols that had floated around them shattered.
And a new glitch storm burst through the walls.
Two figures entered. Protocol agents — tall, blade-armed, their bodies made of reflective code armor.
Aaryan shouted, "Run!"
But Nyra didn't move.
She stepped forward.
And screamed.
Except… the scream was invisible.
A pulse burst from her throat — not heard, but felt. The entire tower bent inward. The Protocol agents staggered, their armor fracturing.
But it wasn't enough.
One of them lunged forward, slicing air — Nyra flew back, slammed against the wall, unconscious.
Aaryan's body responded.
Not with rage.
But with code.
His mark expanded, forming lines across his chest, up to his jaw. His hands turned transparent — not invisible, but non-existent.
And for the first time, he didn't glitch by accident.
He glitched on purpose.
Time folded. Space split.
He moved — between the seconds.
One moment here. The next — behind the agent.
He touched its neck — and whispered, "No more."
The Protocol shattered.
💔 Aftermath
Nyra lay bleeding — a faint red glow escaping her body.
Aaryan lifted her. "Don't die. Please."
She touched his cheek. Her fingers flickered.
"You're the key... Find the core... Don't let them..."
And then she vanished.
Not dead.
Just… derezzed. Like code deleted from the system.
He was alone again.
But now he had a location.
DCC.
And a mission.
📱 Final Scene
That night, Aaryan found his phone glowing faintly.
One message had appeared.
[Signal Detected: Core Unlocking in 3 days][Welcome, Aaryan. The City is Waking.]
He looked out the window.
The sky shimmered again.
But this time, it wasn't a glitch.
It was a beacon.