The house was burning.
Not in flames, but in consequence.
Media vans swarmed outside the remote orphanage-turned-laboratory, their headlights slicing through the forest mist like accusations. Paramedics moved like ghosts, wrapping trembling children in thermal blankets. Authorities cuffed Reva and Dr. Varma, dragging them into armored vans under heavy guard. Their expressions were blank—like statues of the damned.
But inside the compound, in the shadowed halls where it all happened, silence still screamed.
Veer stood in the corridor, watching the cages being dismantled.
They were tiny—too tiny—not meant for living beings. Inside one of them, there were small claw marks on the walls. Scratches. Numbers. A girl had carved each passing day into the wall until it broke her.
Zayan joined him, silent. In his arms was a small boy with bruised wrists and wide, broken eyes. The boy flinched at every sound.
"He doesn't speak," Zayan whispered. "Probably hasn't for years."
"They all stopped being children here," Veer muttered, voice low. "They became experiments."
"They survived," Zayan replied, but even he didn't believe it.
Rudra was in the makeshift medic bay, shoulder bandaged, IV hooked to his arm. He'd regained consciousness an hour ago but hadn't spoken much. His eyes had a haunted, faraway look. Karan sat beside him, wiping blood from his jaw, hands trembling just slightly.
"I keep smelling that drug," Karan murmured. "Even now. I can't shake the images she made me see."
Veer didn't answer.
Because his own mind was still bleeding.
He'd seen Avni. Her laughter. Her touch. And then—her eyes filled with tears, calling out for help. That illusion had felt more real than anything in his life. He could still feel her fingertips brush his cheek.
And yet—she wasn't there.
She was never there.
It was a lie.
A scientific manipulation, mixed with cruel precision. Varma's drug, according to the lab's notes, was a synthetic hallucinogen designed to intensify emotion and tie hallucinations to subconscious desires or trauma.
Veer's trauma had a name.
And it echoed through his skull.
Avni.
---
Later, as night swallowed the sky and authorities tried to piece together statements, Veer stood before Reva one last time. She was handcuffed to a stretcher, but her face held no remorse. Only a kind of chilling calm.
"You're going to jail for a long time," he told her.
"I gave them dreams," she said flatly. "You think you're a savior? You'll see. The real monsters aren't in cages. They wear uniforms. They shake your hand."
"Kids died because of you."
Her lips curled. "Kids die every day, Mr. Veer. At least here, they dreamed before they broke."
He didn't hit her.
Didn't yell.
He simply walked away.
Because monsters like her—they fed off attention.
---
Outside, the air was sharp. Cold.
Veer leaned against a tree, lighting a cigarette, though he rarely smoked. The flame of the lighter flickered once—then died.
Karan joined him.
"Press is going to tear this open," Karan said.
"Good. Let them."
"You think there are more places like this?"
Veer exhaled smoke into the night. "I'm sure of it."
And then—he felt it.
That tug in his chest again.
Avni's memory. Not the illusion.
The real one. Her voice, real and unfiltered, echoed in his head:
"You don't have to fix the world, Veer. Just don't become the thing you're fighting."
He crushed the cigarette underfoot.
"We bring the kids out," Veer said. "We give them names again. Not numbers."
Zayan's voice came through from the side. "And Reva… she's not the head. She was just the lab rat who went too far. There's a bigger force behind this. Funding, connections, global. This is only the face of the operation."
Veer turned.
His eyes were cold now.
Deadly.
"Then we rip off the mask."
---
Somewhere far away…
A man in a pristine grey suit stared at the news broadcast on his tablet. The compound was crawling with law enforcement. The screen showed Reva's arrest.
He tapped the screen twice.
"She cracked too soon," he muttered.
Beside him, a woman in a velvet scarf lit a cigar.
"She always was too sentimental," she said, exhaling smoke. "But don't worry. The boys don't know who we are. Not yet."
The man smiled thinly. "Then let's keep it that way. But monitor them closely. Especially the one with the scar."
He touched the photo of Veer.
And smirked.
"Let's give him something new to remember."
---------------------------
The room was silent. Too silent.
The kind that pressed into your ears until even your own heartbeat sounded like a war drum.
Veer poured another glass.
His hand trembled only slightly now.
The liquor burned down his throat, but it did nothing to burn away the ache. His head leaned against the wall behind him, eyes half-closed, shirtless sculpted body with a tattoo of her near his heart. The moonlight filtered in weakly through the sheer white curtains, making the shadows dance like phantoms. Like her.
Like Avni
She stood near the window. Barefoot. Dressed in white. Her hair loose, falling like dark silk down her back.
he felt her.
A shift in the air.
His eyes fluttered open.
And she was there.
Not a memory. Not a figment from the past.
She was standing before him.
Dressed in soft white. Hair loose around her shoulders. Her eyes wide, filled with something between fear and longing.
"Avni…"
His voice cracked.
She didn't speak—only watched him, a step away.
He stood up slowly, the alcohol weighing down his limbs, each breath heavier than the last. His gaze locked with hers, and the world around them seemed to melt into grayscale. The curtains floated around like whispers, and the only color left was her.
"You're not real," he murmured.
But his feet still moved.
She stepped back.
Another step.
He followed.
One step. Two.
Until she hit the wall behind her.
She gasped lightly, and the sound intoxicated him more than the drink ever could.
He came closer, eyes dark and wild, until his face lowered to the crook of her neck. He breathed her in.
Slowly. Deeply.
Like this was the last scent he'd ever remember.
The stubble on his jaw scraped lightly against her skin as he whispered, voice low and reverent,
"You make me surrender like no one else ever has… and yet you vanish like smoke."
Her eyes flickered shut.
His lips brushed the corner of her mouth. Soft. Tortured.
"Do you know what it costs me… not to drag you into the chaos of my world? And still… you haunt every step I take."
His hands found her waist, gripping it with need—his desperation tightening around her like chains.
She melted into him, and he walked her backward, step by step, until they stumbled onto the bed. Her weight pressed gently on top of him, his hands never letting her go.
She was warm.
His voice broke, soft but ragged:
"Stay… please stay."
He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear with a tenderness that cracked something inside him.
The moonlight kissed her cheek.
And he stared into her eyes—those goddamn eyes that haunted him more than nightmares ever could.
His lips parted.
But the words didn't come.
His vision blurred.
His breath slowed.
He closed his eyes, arms wrapping around her like a child clinging to the last thread of peace in a crumbling world.
In the haze of liquor and loneliness, she stayed.
Breathing with him. Existing only for him.
The only peace left in his madness.
Still.
Silent.
Just like always.
Only in his arms.
Only in this room.
Only in the darkness.