Lunch ended before I even registered it. One moment we were seated, the conversation dragging somewhere I didn't want to follow, and the next the bell rang and everything snapped back into motion. Chairs scraped, voices rose, and students flooded the hallways. I stood up quietly and moved with the crowd, not bothering to say anything. Somehow, we ended up walking together again. Theo was talking as usual, something about the school feeling like a military base. I tuned him out almost immediately. I didn't like his type. Too loud. Too impulsive. The kind of person who acted first and thought later. Shenji responded occasionally, calm and measured, but I stayed silent, eyes forward, just wanting the next class to come and go. I didn't know why I had decided to be with them today. Maybe it was because Shenji had a part of my past with him, and I clung to that. I smiled. Maybe high school wasn't going to be so bad.
Then something felt wrong.
It wasn't a sound. It was pressure. A shift in the air that made my chest tighten. My steps slowed without me thinking, my eyes scanning ahead. And then I saw it. At the far end of the corridor, where the hallway curved, something moved wrong. Its form twisted, unstable, like it couldn't fully exist. And in its grip was a student, struggling, legs kicking weakly against nothing.
My breath caught.
But no one else reacted.
Students walked past it. Through it. Around it. Laughing. Talking. Completely unaware.
Like it wasn't even there.
My stomach dropped.
I had seen something like this before.
On August 27th.
"Theo?" Shenji was looking straight at the monster.
Theo saw it.
I knew the exact moment he did because he stopped talking mid sentence. His entire body went still, eyes locked forward, expression shifting from confusion to something sharper.
"Wait… you guys see that too?" he said, voice low but urgent, glancing between me and Shenji. "That thing… it's holding someone."
Before I could answer, before I could even process it fully, he moved.
He ran.
Straight toward it.
"What are you doing?!" I snapped, reaching for him, but he had already pushed past a group of students who didn't even flinch. One of them stumbled from the impact and cursed at him, completely unaware of what he was running toward.
"Something's wrong!" Theo shouted back without slowing. "You're seeing this, right?!"
Panic surged through me.
The creature shifted, reacting to his movement, tightening its hold on the struggling student, and started to flee. And still, no one else noticed.
For a second, I froze.
The same feeling. The same moment.
Sanchi….
No. Not again.
I clenched my fists hard enough to hurt.
Not this time.
"Stop!" I shouted, even though I knew he wouldn't.
He didn't.
And I wasn't standing there again.
I ran.
Straight after him, pushing through the crowd, ignoring the fear clawing its way up my throat. Every step felt too familiar, like I had lived this already and knew exactly how it could end. Behind me, I heard footsteps keeping pace.
Shenji.
Of course.
Theo was already near the end of the corridor, closing in like he actually thought he could fight it. I pushed harder, trying to catch up, my chest tight, my mind racing.
"Theo, don't!"
He didn't slow down.
And neither did I.