Ahaan stood frozen in the dark hallway. The walls were breathing… slowly, like lungs. Every step he took echoed like a whisper through the abandoned orphanage. Behind him, the door had disappeared.
There was no way back now.
He held his father's journal tightly. The pages had begun to glow with a strange light, and on the latest page, a message was scribbled in a shaky hand:
"The floor disappears where the truth hides."
Ahaan walked slowly, turning a corner, and came face to face with a strange door. It looked old and rotten — wooden with deep cracks, rusted metal symbols carved across it. His hand reached for the handle.
The moment he touched it, the air turned ice cold.
He pushed.
Creeeaaaak…
The door opened to something impossible — a room with no floor.
There was nothing below. Just endless blackness, like a giant hole that went on forever. Floating above that darkness was a broken metal bed, and sitting on that bed was a girl.
She had pale skin, long black hair covering her face. Her legs hung from the side of the bed, not touching anything.
Ahaan's voice shook. "H-Hello?"
The girl didn't move. But her voice came — from all around him.
"You shouldn't have come here, Ahaan."
His eyes widened. "Who… are you?"
Slowly, the girl lifted her head. Her eyes were white. Lifeless. But her mouth stretched into a smile.
"I'm Saira. And I've been waiting for you."
A chill ran through his spine.
He had seen that name before. In his father's journal. A sketch of this same girl — with that same smile. Underneath it, his father had written:
"Saira – the last child who vanished from the orphanage. Found only in dreams."
"What do you mean... waiting?" Ahaan whispered.
Saira floated off the bed and drifted closer. She didn't walk — she glided.
"Because you carry the key. Your father left it… inside your blood. The Watcher needs it now."
Suddenly, Ahaan's wrist began to glow. A strange symbol appeared under his skin — twisting like it was alive. It matched one of the drawings in the journal.
His heart pounded. "What did my father do?"
Saira tilted her head.
"He thought he could trap the darkness in stories. But some stories… bite back."
The journal in his hand grew hot. A page flipped by itself.
There was a new drawing — a door made of bones, and behind it… a black eye, staring.
Ahaan breathed, "The Watcher…"
The walls started shaking. The floating bed fell into the dark pit. Saira screamed — her voice turned into a hundred broken voices all screaming together.
Then — a giant hand shot up from the darkness.
It had long claws, thin bones, and no skin. It reached for Ahaan.
He turned and ran.
But the door was gone.
Just more walls. More black liquid oozing from cracks. More whispers in his head.
"Come deeper, Ahaan. The story is not finished. You are the ending."
He fell to the ground, covering his ears. His vision spun. The journal burned in his hand.
Then—
Everything went dark.
When Ahaan opened his eyes, he was lying outside the orphanage again. The night was cold. The building behind him stood broken and quiet.
He sat up, confused, shaking. In his lap lay a new page — torn from the journal.
It was a drawing of Saira, her eyes now black instead of white. A sentence was written in red ink:
"You saw her. That means she saw you too. She's not done."
Ahaan's hands trembled. The Watcher wasn't just a myth. And now, a ghost girl from his father's past had found him.
He looked up at the forest ahead. It was darker than before. Silent. Waiting.
He knew what came next.
Find the bone door.
Open the truth.
Or be lost in the story forever.
Then....