Ethan Cole had always thought of reality as something firm, something that stayed put no matter how hard you pushed. Yet tonight, with the sleek, glass-black visor trembling in his hands, he felt the edge of his world flex and blur. Outside his apartment window, the city glowed with the same muted neon he'd seen every night for years. inside, his heart beat again his ribs like a fist.
The visor, officially called a "RealmLink", had arrived only that afternoon, courier delivered with a discreet note from a company he didn't remember signing up with. Enter the realm. Meet the one who waits. The words had been printed in silver ink. nothing else. It should have felt like a scam. Instead, it felt like a dare.
He ran a thumb along the edge of the device. Lightweight. Cool to the touch. It was absurd to think that slipping it over his eye could take him anywhere. Absurd, and yet he couldn't stop imagining who might be waiting on the other side. Someone who understood. Someone who could fill the hollow that Sofia's absence had carved into him.
Across the city, Elara Dawn sat on the edge of her own bed, staring at an identical visor glowing faintly in her lap. Her hands were steady, but her chest was a storm. After Rowan, she had sworn she would never open herself to anyone again. But the RealmLink had whispered to her too, promising a place where she could escape her scars. A place where she might... heal. Or break all over again.
Ethan sat back against the headboard, the visor heavy now in his hands. Sofia's last message still glowed on his phone, a simple "I'm sorry , I'll be busy again tonight." She was always busy, and he kept telling himself it was temporary. But the silence between her texts had started to feel like a canyon. The RealmLink in his lap seemed to hum, a strange promise of company he couldn't quite ignore.
He pressed the power symbol. A soft tone filled the room and blue light crawled along the visor's edges like liquid neon. The instructions were simple: place it over your eyes, lie back, breathe. He hesitated only a heartbeat before slipping it on.
For a moment there was nothing but black. Then his vision cracked open into light.
He was standing in a plain glassy water reflecting a sky of swirling violet and gold. Towers rose in the distance, made of shapes he didn't recognize, bending like ribbons. Each sound was a whisper, as if the realm itself was breathing around him. His clothes had changed too; his reflection showed a leaner, almost streaked with silver.
"Welcome, Seeker," a voice said softly. It was neither male nor female, more like a thought placed gently inside his head. "You have entered the Threshold."
Ethan spun, but there was no one behind him. Only the endless plain and the towers that pulsed like living things.
Across the city, Elara slid her own visor into place. Her apartment faded and the realm blossomed around her. She found herself in the same water-mirror plain, but her reflection shimmered differently: long hair braided with silver threads, eyes brighter than she had ever seen them in the mirror. She felt lighter, but the ache of her past still clung to her like shadow.
She turned slowly, searching. The realm was beautiful, but it was empty.
And then, across the shimmering water, she saw someone.
Ethan noticed movement at the edge of the mirrored plain. A figure was walking toward him, her reflection rippling across the glass-like water. She wasn't a glitch, he realized; she was another person. His pulse jumped.
Elara moved carefully, her bare feet making no sound. The closer she came, the clearer he could see her: a young woman in a flowing coat of soft blue and silver, her eyes bright yet cautious. She stopped a few pace away, as if unsure whether she was allowed to speak.
"You're... real? Ethan asked, his voice echoing strangely in the vastness.
"I think so," Elara said. Her tone held a soft laugh, but her finger were knotted together. "I didn't expect to see anyone else here."
Neither of them moved for a heartbeat. The realm hummed around them, as if listening.
"Hi... I'm Ethan," he offered at last.
"Elara," she said quietly. "Elara Dawn."
Her name felt like a key turning in a lock. He smiled despite himself.
"I don't even know what this place is," he admitted. "I just... got this visor today. Thought I'd try it."
"Me too," she said. "It feels like a dream."
A small breeze lifted across the plain. In the distance, the towers shifted, their spires pointing toward the two of them like compass needles. The water at their feet rippled outward in circles.
"I think we're meant to go there," Ethan said, nodding at the towers.
Elara hesitated. Trusting someone here felt dangerous, but she was tired of being alone. "Then let's go together," she said finally.
Side by side, they started walking. Each step felt lighter than the last, as though the realm itself was drawing them forward. Neither of them saw the faint symbols glowing on their wrists, marks they hadn't notice yet, or the flicker of another presence watching from the towers.
The towers in the distance grew taller with every step, curling upward like ribbons of light. The mirrored water beneath their feet had no ripples except where they walked, yet strange symbols flared in their footprints, quick silver runes that faded as soon as they looked back. Neither of them spoke; the silence between them felt delicate, like a spell they might break if they said too much too soon.
A low hum began to build under the surface. At first Ethan thought it was his own heartbeat, but then the water trembled and a pulse of blue light spread outward from the towers, rolling toward them like a silent wave.
"What is that?" Elara whispered. Her reflection flickered in the water, two version of her overlapping for a second.
"I don't know," Ethan said, and reached instinctively for her hand. The moment their fingers brushed the wave hit. The mirrored plain turned into a mosaic of moving pictures, hundreds of shades showing glimpses of other places: a forest of crystal tress, a sea of floating islands, a dark hall lined with masks. The image shifted faster and faster until they blurred back into silver.
When the light faded, a figure stood where there had been nothing before.
It was tall, cloaked in white, its face hidden behind a mask of hammered gold. It did not walk toward them so much as glide, the water parting in circle around its feet.
"Seekers," It said, the voice low and echoing. "You have crossed the Threshold. Few arrive without invitation."
Ethan's throat felt dry. "What is this place?"
"The Realm Between," the figure replied. "Where truth and desire take form. Where choices are marked." Its masked gaze titled toward their wrists. Ethan followed the gesture and saw, for the first time, the faint sigil glowing on his skin, a circle with a single wing etched inside. Elara had one too, though hers glowed with different color, a crescent with three star.
"What do these mean?" Elara asked.
"They are the paths you have yet to walk," the figure said. "But paths have a price."
Before either could speak again, the figure dissolved into light. In its place floated two shards of crystal, each the size of a coin. They spun slowly, casting soft beams onto the water.
"I guess... these are for us?" Ethan said.
Elara reached out. The moment her fingers touched her shard the towers in the distance shifted: a bridge of luminous stone extended from their base toward the plain.
A breeze lifted around them again, stronger this time, carrying a faint whisper in a language neither of them knew.
Elara glanced at Ethan, her eyes a mix of caution and excitement. "Looks like we're supposed to go," she said.
Ethan nodded, still staring at the mark on his wrist. Sofia's name flickered across his thoughts like a guilt echo, but he pushed it away and stepped onto the new bridge.
Together they walked toward the towers, unaware of the shadow that peeled itself from the mirrored water behind them and began to follow.
The crossing had begun, and something in the dark was crossing with them.