[Excerpt from Thomas J. Silas's First Entry – Do Not Read This (Seriously, Don't)]
Ahem.
Okay. Hhuh-huh. Sorry. That was me trying to clear my throat, not dying—though depending on how this goes, that might be next on the agenda.
Anyway—hi. Or don't hi. Honestly, I didn't plan on talking to anyone. I talk when I'm nervous, okay? Like, a lot. Like, if anxiety had a Spotify playlist, my voice would be every track.
But that's not why I started this.
If you're holding this book, journal, dead tree diary, whatever you call it in your time—stop reading. Right now. Like, at the next full stop. I mean it.
.
...You didn't stop, did you? Ugh. Of course not. Curious cat, meet electrocution-level consequences.
Fine. Just know this: what you're about to read is the kind of insane that makes conspiracy theories look like bedtime stories. I'm talking magic, multi-world shenanigans, things with way too many eyes, and one kid (me) who did not sign up for any of it. But it's true. All of it. Believe me or don't—I'm way past trying to convince people.
Wait—manners. Right.
Name's Thomas. J. Silas. I'm fifteen. Well, I was fifteen before all of this started. Now? I have no idea how old I am. Like, I've aged in trauma years. Emotionally? Probably pushing eighty. But biologically? Somewhere between caffeinated raccoon and mildly haunted doll.
Something's happening. Like, to everything. Reality's cracking at the seams like your grandma's wallpaper. I don't have time to explain it all right now because—surprise!—I'm technically on the run from what I think might be interdimensional space rabbits. Yes, I know how that sounds. Yes, they bite.
But listen—if you make it to the end of this book, if the pages don't disappear or catch fire (no promises), and you actually understand what I'm saying? You're in danger.
I mean it. Lock your door. Bolt it. Stack furniture in front of it. Hide under a blanket if that helps (it doesn't, but I respect the effort).
Then… open this book again. Slowly. Look for the key words. They're hidden between lines, dropped like breadcrumbs. If you find them, you might—might—get out. There's a pattern. There's always a pattern. And if you can't find them before they find you?
Too late.
I'm sorry.
I wish I could explain more, but I have to go. There's another world falling apart and—lucky me—I'm the idiot with the duct-taped fate of existence on his shoulders. And yes, I am wearing one sock and a mustard-stained hoodie. No, that's not relevant. But you try doing multiverse jumps with laundry access.
I'll write again if I can. No promises. Time's weird out there. Sometimes it runs backward. Sometimes it hums. Sometimes it just… stares.
Anyway.
Remember: they're coming.
And you won't even know it until it's way, way too late.
So yeah.
Good luck, reader-who-doesn't-listen.
Hope you're better at surviving than I was at staying quiet.
— Thomas J. Silas
(Possibly fifteen. Possibly dead. Definitely tired.)
*********
This wasn't the first time someone had screamed at me like I'd just set a building on fire. And no, I hadn't. Not this time, anyway.
Look—I know I'm not exactly a model student. I've been called a "brat," a "handful," a "menace to structured learning environments," and once—my personal favorite—"a walking academic hazard." But did I deserve to get expelled?
Okay… maybe. Kinda. But not really.
This was school number three in, what, three years? I'd barely even unpacked my books from the last one, and now Royal North Boys Academy had yeeted me straight into the history bin. Expelled. Again. I swear, at this point, I should just start collecting schools like Pokémon.
Anyway, Royal North was weird. Like, try-hard elite weird. They had this thing for uniforms—navy blue blazers with shiny gold buttons and shorts. Shorts. Who the heck wears shorts with a blazer? I looked like a confused traffic warden on his way to a yacht club meeting.
So no, I didn't like the place. Not that I ever like any school, but this one? This one had Mr. Brandwaters. Ugh.
Mr. Brandwaters was the kind of literature teacher who smelled like cold coffee and lemon cough drops and thought "fun" meant reading Shakespeare in a tone that could murder joy. And listen, I like books. I do. But the way this dude butchered Macbeth? I wanted to yeet the whole desk out the window.
All I said—all I said—was that Shakespeare might've been dramatic, but not everything he wrote was deep, and maybe Lady Macbeth had a point about stabbing people who waste your time. Which, okay, maybe not the best argument to make during class. Especially when I was already on probation for "misusing school lab frogs." (Don't ask.)
Mr. Brandwaters just didn't get it. Like, at all. He kept interrupting me, telling me to "respect the text" and "watch my tone," and I—I just snapped. I called him a bum. Not proud of that. It kind of just fell out of my mouth like a rogue jellybean. Then, and I admit this probably tipped the scale, I may have... sorta... slipped a small nail onto his chair before class.
Just for good measure.
It wasn't even sharp! Okay, it was slightly sharp. But come on, it wasn't like I taped a landmine to the seat. He barely even sat before he jumped up yelping like someone had poured soup in his trousers, and then all hell broke loose. The principal got called, I got hauled out like a war criminal, and the whole time I was thinking, I just wanted to talk about Shakespeare. Is that a crime now?
Also, side note: the chair squeaked like it was protesting too. Like, even the furniture had had enough of Mr. Brandwaters.
So yeah. Expelled.
Again.
My mom hasn't even called me yet. That's the scary part. She's probably just sitting at home in scary silence, sharpening her "I'm disappointed in you" tone to a fine edge. I'd rather be yelled at, honestly. The silence is worse. It's like… she's waiting to see if I'll say something first. Which I won't. Because I'm too proud. And also because she's terrifying when she's quiet.
Anyway. That's how my Tuesday went.
How was yours?
Sitting at the train station like some kind of abandoned Victorian orphan. All I needed was a violin case and a tragic backstory about a chimney fire. Instead, I had a plastic backpack with one busted strap, a school report that might as well have been soaked in red ink, and the slow, creeping realization that my mom was definitely late. Again.
The headteacher—Mr. McGloomy-McTightshirt or whatever—had driven me here himself in his weirdly clean Toyota and used the office telephone (yes, a real corded phone like we were in a spy movie from 1982) to call my mom. He said, and I quote, "She's on her way." Which, in my life, roughly translates to: "You'll be here long enough to memorize every gum stain on this platform."
And look, I wasn't surprised. I wouldn't come rushing to pick me up either. Not after the summer I'd had. Expelled. Again. Like it was a new seasonal sport and I was going pro. All she probably heard on the phone was "Your son has been naughty" and she rolled her eyes so hard she temporarily forgot I existed.
So yeah. I sat there. Just… existing. Trying to pretend the cold metal bench wasn't sneakily sucking the warmth out of my butt and that the air didn't smell like rust and warm fries I wasn't allowed to eat.
My knees were bouncing. Not because I was nervous (okay maybe a little)—but because it was either that or start crying like a toddler in a Batman T-shirt. I hate waiting. Especially for a lecture. Especially when I know I deserve it, but I'm still gonna argue about it anyway. It's a gift.
But—books. That was the one thing that almost made sitting in public humiliation slightly bearable.
Not textbooks. Ew. Biology smells like formaldehyde and regret. Math is just legalized torture disguised as numbers. No, I mean real books. Stories. Wild ones. Talking lions, flying horses, kids with swords and destinies and questionable decision-making. Dragons that aren't metaphors for capitalism. Stuff that takes your brain and launches it somewhere way cooler than your own dumb life.
I'd been reading so much this summer, my eyes basically threw a strike and gave up. Like—"We're out. You're on your own." Now I was stuck with these round glasses that made me look like an anxious owl with trust issues. And they didn't even help much. Half the time they fogged up when I breathed wrong or got too close to a hot dog stand. The other half, they just sat there, mocking me.
Also? They kept slipping down my nose in this tragic, slow-motion way, like even they didn't want to be associated with my face. Traitors.
There were people on the platform with me—normal people, doing normal things. Business guy yelling into his earpiece like he was arguing with an invisible ex-wife. Teen couple doing the hand-holding thing that made me want to simultaneously gag and take notes. Old woman feeding pigeons popcorn, which I'm pretty sure is illegal, but try telling her that.
And me? The expelled kid. The disappointment. The weirdo with dragon books and glasses and a backpack full of nothing but bad choices.
I tried to focus on the book in my lap. It was a worn-out paperback with a cracked spine and a cover that looked like it had been through battle. I'd read it six times already, but I kept it with me like armor. Like, if I'm holding a fantasy novel, you legally can't yell at me. Right?
Pages don't judge. They just keep turning.
Still no mom.
I sighed, leaned back, and stared up at the ceiling of the station. It was covered in these weird gray tiles, and I started counting them just to keep from panicking. One. Two. Twenty. Seventy-six. One hundred and... wait, was that mold?
Great.
Train doors opened somewhere in the distance with that tired sssssshh-click noise, like even the trains were sick of my drama.
I rubbed my eyes behind my glasses, muttered something about wanting to teleport into a different timeline, and waited.
And waited.
And waited some more.
If this was how heroes started their stories, then honestly? It sucked.
*********
*********
"Thomas!"
My name hit the air like a flying sandal. Sharp. Angry. Echoing across the train station like the opening line of a horror movie I definitely wasn't surviving.
I looked up from my book—or, okay, the book I was pretending to read to avoid reality—and spotted her. My mom. Storming toward me like a tiny, angry warship in discount heels.
"Ah. The Queen arrives," I mumbled to no one. Then louder, "Well hello, Mother." I slapped on the fakest, shiniest smile I could manage. "I was starting to think you'd abandoned me. I was minutes away from being adopted by pigeons."
"Don't patronize me, boy."
And then—ow. Her hand shot out like a cobra with perfect aim and pinched my ear. Not gently. Not like moms in movies do. No, this was full-on tactical warfare. My skull lit up with pain so bright, I swear I saw next week flash before my eyes.
"OW—MOM—SERIOUSLY—WE'RE IN PUBLIC," I yelped, twisting like a fish on a hook.
"You are in so much trouble, lad," she snapped, her grip tightening like she was trying to detach my ear from the rest of my body. "Your father will not let you see daylight for a month."
Which, okay, sounded dramatic. But based on prior experience, also not entirely false. My dad had this thing where he treated grounding like a competitive sport. Last time I got suspended, I was banned from Wi-Fi, door locks, and my socks for two straight weeks. ("You won't be needing socks if you're not going anywhere," he'd said, like a Bond villain.)
"I know, Mother. I know, alright?" I hissed through clenched teeth, trying not to trip over my own feet while being led like an angry donkey by the ear. My backpack bumped against my leg with every step, like it was trying to beat me up too. "Can we just—ow—go inside like normal people? You're scarring me for life."
"Good," she muttered, finally letting go of my ear after what felt like twelve years. "Maybe you'll learn something from the scars."
I muttered something that could've been "Yes ma'am" but definitely came out more like "bless ham." She didn't seem to care.
The train station doors hissed open and let in a gust of AC and the smell of burnt rubber, tired commuters, and—oddly enough—fried fish. I blinked at the fluorescent lights, trying to shake off the dazed feeling in my head. Part pain, part shame, part "how-the-heck-did-I-become-this-level-of-disaster."
I grabbed my bags, which felt heavier now for no reason other than guilt probably has mass. Or maybe it was all the books. I tend to panic-pack fantasy novels when things go bad. Because if you're gonna get yelled at for wrecking your education, you might as well have a few dragons on hand.
I trailed after her, trying to walk like a free man and not like a recently punished puppy.
People stared. Because of course they did. Some old guy in a beige coat raised his eyebrows at me like I was a delinquent he recognized from the news. A toddler clutched his juice box tighter. Someone whispered something that sounded suspiciously like "troublemaker."
And maybe I was. A little. But that didn't mean I didn't feel like garbage about it. Deep down—like, way past the sarcasm and book quotes and fake-smiling—I hated this part. The part where she looked tired. Not just "been working all day" tired, but disappointed tired. That quiet kind of tired that hits you harder than any punishment.
But whatever. I'd deal with that later. Maybe apologize. Maybe pretend to apologize, then actually mean it three days later when I couldn't sleep.
For now, I just kept walking. Kept my head down. Let her lead.
Because whether I deserved it or not, the storm had already hit.
And I was still standing in the rain.