Prologue
The Mirror That Waited
Time is the one thing we trust blindly.
It ticks forward, second by second, with no mercy, no pause. We measure our lives by it—birthdays, deadlines, prayers, funerals. When time moves, life moves. When it stops, something is wrong.
But what if time doesn't stop for you—what if it stops for everything else?
What if a child's laughter suddenly fades mid-sound, fans freeze mid-spin, and birds in the sky hang motionless—and only you can move through it?
You'd think it's a dream. You'd hope it's a glitch.
It's not.
There are things in this world that don't belong here.
Some slip in quietly—through shadows, through thoughts, through gifts.
And some wait.
Like the mirror.
It waited in silence, with painted flowers and an innocent curve. It watched. It listened.
And when the moment was right, it called.
This is the story of what came through.
Of what tried to stay.
And of the one man who stood between our world and something unspeakable.
No rituals.
No temples.
No gods.
Just Sarkar.
And me.
The one who saw everything from just close enough to never forget.
Part 1
---
Most people wouldn't believe me if I told them what I've seen. But that's the nature of truth—it hides in plain sight, waiting for someone foolish enough to notice.
I live with my best friend. I call him Sarkar. That's the only name anyone knows. Where he came from, who he really is—no one knows. No one wants to know either.
We share a dusty first-floor flat above an old tailoring shop in the backstreets of Chunar, a small town that pretends to sleep but never really does. The walls are tired, the fans squeak, and the power goes out so often that we've learned to navigate in the dark.
But none of that is what makes our life unusual.
It's what Sarkar does.
No one has a proper title for him. Some call him a spiritualist. Others whisper words like occultist, or worse. A few call him a conman. But those who really need him—they just call.
There's no signboard, no online profile, no business hours. Only a knock on the door, a hesitant voice, and eyes that have seen something they wish they hadn't.
I've watched them arrive: trembling, exhausted, looking over their shoulders. People claiming things that don't fit the real world—mirrors that breathe, walls that hum, shadows that move when no one does.
And Sarkar listens. Calm. Unblinking. Sometimes he asks for an object they brought. Sometimes he doesn't. He never writes anything down. Never interrupts.
Then, he stands up, slips on his plain cotton kurta, picks up nothing but his handkerchief, and says,
"Let's go, Arvind."
I always go with him. Because I need to see.
Yesterday was no different.
A woman named Meera came. Early thirties, schoolteacher from Bhadohi. Said her five-year-old son, Rishu, had begun speaking in a language she couldn't identify. Said her ceiling fan spins in reverse—even when it's off. Said that, just before she hears her dead husband's voice from the bathroom, there's a sudden, sharp smell—like burnt turmeric.
Sarkar listened. At the end, he asked her just one question:
"Has anyone gifted you a mirror recently?"
Her expression changed instantly.
We reached her house by evening. A low-rise flat inside a silent government colony. Neighbors watched us without blinking.
Inside, Sarkar moved like he always does. Quiet. Focused. He touched the corners of each room, paused at the base of the bathroom door, stood silently near the child's bed. Finally, he spent several minutes just looking at a mirror on the drawing room wall—an oval, old-fashioned one with red and green floral dots painted along the edge.
He said nothing. We left.
Back home, I expected him to open his old wooden box or maybe write in that stained black diary he sometimes uses. But this time, he just lay on the floor mat, staring at the ceiling. After a while, he said,
"Two days."
That's what he told Meera as well, when we called her later. "You'll need to wait two days. Keep this powder with you at all times. Don't open it. Don't let your son touch it."
She asked, "Will it stop?"
He said,
"No. But it won't touch you until then."
And now we wait. I don't know what he saw, or what he's planning. I don't even know what's in that powder.
But I've learned not to ask. Because Sarkar's answers always come on their own.
And with Sarkar—answers are never free.
---
After Meera left, Sarkar didn't speak.
He simply placed the packet of powder beside the window, moved the rug in the center of the room aside, and sat down cross-legged on the cool cement floor—facing the east wall.
That wall is strange.
It's entirely bare. No calendar, no cobwebs, not even the slightest shade from passing light. Just flat, faded plaster. I've seen it a hundred times. Still, every time Sarkar stares at it like it's showing him something—something only he can read.
And when he does this, no one is allowed to speak. Not even shift in place. Not even cough.
That's the rule.
He sat there today too. Silent. Focused.
Sometimes his eyes narrowed. Sometimes his lips twitched into a smile, then vanished into a frown.
For thirty minutes straight, he didn't blink more than twice.
I've learned not to interrupt. I've learned it the hard way.
Then suddenly, he stood up, walked to the kitchen, and prepared his food.
Boiled bottle gourd, half a boiled potato, a single pinch of salt. No oil, no turmeric, no spices. No milk. Never milk.
He ate in complete silence.
After washing his steel plate and drying his hands, he poured water into his glass—his own glass, no one else is allowed to touch it. Slowly, he rotated the glass clockwise, three full circles. His eyes followed the swirling water as if watching for something invisible.
Then he paused. Held the glass in mid-air. Looked into it once more.
And quietly kept it aside. Didn't drink.
After that, he walked to his old jute bag, checked inside, and slung it over his shoulder.
"I'm going," he said without looking at me.
"Where?" I asked.
"Stay here. Don't leave the house," he replied, already halfway down the stairs.
He was gone.
Hours passed. Evening turned into night. The wind grew sharp, and the city settled into its usual winter silence—barking dogs, distant train horns, temple bells dying slowly into the air.
And then the door creaked open.
Sarkar entered.
He was soaked in sweat. His kurta clung to him. His hair stuck to his forehead. And yet… it was a cold night. Bone cold.
He didn't say anything. Didn't look at me. He put down his bag, washed his face, and sat on the floor again—facing that wall.
Only after five minutes of silence did I speak.
"What happened?"
He didn't move. Didn't blink.
Then he said, in a voice lower than usual—almost whispering:
"This is not simple."
And that was all.
---
Sarkar barely slept that night. At dawn, before the street dogs had stopped barking and before the vendors began their morning cries, he was already tying his bag strap and heading out.
"Where are you going?" I asked, still half-asleep.
"To Meera's house," he said without turning.
I followed him. Something in his voice told me to.
We reached her housing block just as the milkman was leaving. Sarkar rang the bell. A moment later, Meera opened the door, still in her night clothes, surprised but calm.
"How was the night?" Sarkar asked immediately.
"Normal," she said. "Completely normal. I slept well."
Sarkar nodded once. "And Rishu?"
"He's still asleep," she said, stepping aside.
Sarkar rushed to the boy's bedroom without waiting.
Rishu lay under a thin blanket, turned toward the window. But something was… wrong.
Sarkar froze. I did too.
Rishu was sleeping with his head at the foot of the bed—the opposite direction from what Meera had described earlier. Sarkar stared at it for a second, then gently placed his hand on the boy's forehead.
He jolted back.
"His eyes," Sarkar whispered.
I moved closer. Rishu's eyes had opened slightly—just a sliver. And what we saw inside wasn't white. It was deep wine red.
We rushed him to a local doctor.
105 degrees Fahrenheit. Severe fever. But no cough, no infection, no visible illness.
The doctor wrote down some paracetamol and antibiotics. "Looks viral. Take care of him. Monitor closely," he told Meera.
Back outside, Meera turned to Sarkar.
"How did you know something was wrong?"
Sarkar looked at her with that flat, unreadable gaze.
"It's not just strange," he said. "It's far more dangerous than you think."
We returned to her house after noon. Sarkar didn't enter. He began walking—slowly—around the building. Clockwise. One full circle. Then another. Then a third.
With each step, he murmured something under his breath. Not Sanskrit. Not anything I recognized. Just… sounds. Sounds that didn't feel right in daylight.
At the main doorway, he pulled out a thin, dull-brown thread and tied it above the threshold. Tight. Deliberate.
He didn't explain. He never does.
That evening, as the winter shadows crept longer across our floor back at the flat, I finally asked:
"What is going on?"
Sarkar didn't look away from the wall. His expression was hard now. Focused.
"It's not simple," he said. "It's too dangerous."
He paused.
"Whatever this is—it's not just haunting them. It's trying to kill them."
I felt a chill crawl into my spine.
"And tomorrow," he continued, "is a moonless night. Amavasya. Its strength will be at its peak."
I waited for more.
Sarkar closed his eyes.
"Whatever happens… tomorrow, we'll know. Till then—I cannot say anything."
---
Some things aren't what they seem.
Like a wall that's just a wall—until you stare at it long enough.
Like a mirror that only shows reflections—until it shows something else.
Like a clock.
The strange thing about this world is the clock.
Most of the time, it moves. Predictable. Familiar.
When it stops, and the world moves on, we blame the battery.
But when the clock stops... and everything else does too—except you?
That's not technical failure. That's intrusion. Something slipping through.
And I felt that.
I woke up that morning with a tightness in my chest. Not fear, not yet. Just… weight. Heavy, crawling, alive. Something was creeping toward me. I couldn't see it, but I felt it—like hot breath behind the spine.
And Sarkar was gone from his mat. Already moving.
He was on the floor, surrounded by dry twigs, wilted neem leaves, and tiny black seeds shaped like teardrops. In the center, a plain steel glass of water.
He was whispering again—those strange syllables that didn't belong to any language I knew.
At first, everything was still. But halfway through the chant, the water in the glass began to spin. No wind. No hand movement. Just spinning. Then it slowly turned pale red—like blood diluted in river water.
And Sarkar smiled.
Not a full smile. Just enough to show he had found something he'd been expecting.
Without a word, he carried that water to Meera's house. We followed.
He didn't speak, didn't knock. He walked straight to the mirror—the oval one with painted red and green dots—and splashed the red water across its surface.
For a second, silence.
Then: Crack!
The glass split down the center. A jagged fracture, sharp and unnatural.
And a sound escaped it. Not human. Not animal. Just raw wrongness.
One burst of it—like something had been slapped mid-scream.
Then a sudden burnt smell—metallic, bitter.
Rishu cried once from his room, then quieted. The fever broke.
His breathing slowed. His body relaxed.
Sarkar didn't say a word through the entire process.
Meera, stunned and still shaking, tried to offer him a small bundle of cash wrapped in cloth.
He didn't even touch it.
Not because he didn't value money—Sarkar understood its place.
But because he didn't charge anyone. Money found him anyway, like rivers finding the sea.
---
That evening, when we returned to our flat, I sat with him as he wiped sweat from his forehead and finally exhaled.
I told him about my dream. The crawling feeling. The clock. The weight. The shape I couldn't see.
He chuckled softly. Not mocking. More like someone hearing a child describe thunder.
"You felt it because it noticed you," he said.
"What was it?" I asked.
"A threshold," he replied. "A being not of this world—but very close to entering."
"A spirit?"
"No. Worse."
He stared at the blank wall. His voice dropped.
"Most hauntings are echoes. This wasn't an echo. This was a breach."
I didn't speak.
"The mirror was a receiver. Someone gave it to her last week, right? A gift?"
I nodded.
"That mirror was prepared. Not by accident. Someone wanted something to enter her house. Maybe to hurt her. Maybe to use the child as a host. But whatever it was... today was its last chance."
"Why today?"
"Because tomorrow is a new moon. If it had survived till then—it would've anchored. Stayed. No ritual would have undone it."
"But why did it stop?" I asked. "Why the glass of water? Why the seeds and leaves?"
He looked at me.
"Because the rules of that world aren't like ours. You don't fight it with muscle. You break its pattern. Disrupt its connection. That water wasn't holy. It was balanced. Everything used was gathered under exact conditions—sunlight, wind direction, silence. That balance cracked its chaos."
I stared at the now-empty glass.
"And that smile of yours?" I asked.
He finally laughed.
"That was relief. Not everything ends with fire. Some ends with precision."
---