The boarding school corridors smelled of chalk and sweat, just as he remembered. But the air felt too exact, like the memory of a smell rather than the thing itself.
He had begun to notice these fractures — how the world folded back on itself, how days bled together like badly looped tape. The faces of his classmates blurred if he stared too long, like smudged paint.
And then, there were the moments.
The moments he knew too well.
---
The staircase.
The heavy footsteps behind him.
The three boys.
He knew this scene — not because he lived it once, but because he had lived it over and over in his mind, long after the bruises had faded.
Second week of term.
The first time he was truly broken.
---
> "Oi, writer boy."
"Got your little notebook today?"
"Bet he cries if we tear it again."
Their laughter echoed off the stone walls, sharp and cruel.
He knew what came next. The shove. The fall. The curled silence.
In the real memory, he hadn't fought back. He had stayed on the ground, clutching the scraps of his torn notebook, while their kicks landed again and again.
That had been the script of his life. To endure. To swallow. To stay silent.
But now, something inside him clenched.
> "Not this time," he whispered.
---
👊 The Fight
The shove came — but he caught the railing, pulled himself upright, and slammed his shoulder into the nearest boy.
Surprise cracked their rhythm. One stumbled back, nearly tripping on the stairs.
The second boy swung, fist smashing into his cheek. Pain exploded across his face — but instead of collapsing, he swung back. His knuckles split against bone. A grunt, a curse.
They piled on him, three against one. Hands dragged at his collar, fists pounded his ribs. He clawed, bit, slammed his elbow into someone's stomach. One toppled with him down a step.
It wasn't graceful. It wasn't heroic.
It was chaos — ugly, raw, desperate.
Every nerve screamed, every bruise bloomed. But he didn't stop. Even when blood filled his mouth. Even when his vision swam.
Because the fight wasn't about winning.
It was about breaking the pattern.
---
When it was done, he lay on the floor, chest heaving, battered and shaking. The boys spat curses, bloodied themselves, before retreating.
But the stairwell wasn't the same anymore.
The paint on the walls peeled, flickered, glitching to white nothingness before snapping back. The light buzzed overhead, stuttering like an old film reel.
The memory had cracked.
---
That night, back in the dorm, the pain in his ribs throbbed with every breath. But beneath it was something else — a strange exhilaration.
Across from him, the Silent One sat in his bed, eyes dark and unblinking. Watching. Like he had witnessed something forbidden.
The MC managed a broken smile, tasting blood.
> "This time… I didn't just take it."
And somewhere deep inside the walls, the world shuddered.