The world was silent.
No wind, no sound — just endless whiteness surrounding Aryan as he stood in the ruins of the mansion's great hall. The walls were gone. The ceiling was gone. The only thing that remained was the mirror — floating midair, shards suspended around it like frozen tears of glass.
Aryan's heartbeat echoed in the emptiness. "Where… am I?"
A faint voice answered, soft and distant:
"You never left, Aryan."
He turned. Aryan, Rhea, and Kabir stood at the edge of the void, their figures flickering like ghosts. They looked older — or maybe just tired, worn by fear.
Aryan took a step forward. "We found you. But this place… it's falling apart. The town's gone."
Rhea's eyes were filled with tears. "We're fading. Everyone is. You have to wake up."
"Wake up?" Aryan frowned. "What are you talking about?"
The fog thickened. The fragments of the mirror began to spin slowly, reflecting flashes of memories — a hospital bed, a car crash, a screaming mother, a boy lying still.
Aryan staggered back. "No… no, that's not me…"
Kabir's voice trembled. "It is. This isn't real, Aryan. You've been asleep… for years."
He looked at them, confusion turning to anger. "Then what are you? Huh? You're telling me none of this—none of YOU—is real?"
Rhea stepped closer. "We were real once. We were there… the day of the accident. The trip never ended, Aryan. The bus crashed before we ever reached Windale."
The words hit like lightning.
His mind reeled — flashes returned in fragments. The bus… the rain… the hill road… screams.
And then darkness.
Aryan fell to his knees. The floor beneath him rippled like water.
"No… it can't be…"
Aryan crouched beside him. "It's time to go back. You have to let us go."
But then, a voice — not human — whispered from the spinning shards of glass:
"If he wakes… you disappear."
The reflection reformed, grinning wider than before. Its eyes burned with blue fire.
"Stay, Aryan. Here, you're in control. Here, no one leaves you. Not again."
The mirror's glow intensified, forming ghostly versions of everyone he had lost — laughing, talking, reaching for him.
His parents. His friends. His childhood.
All there. All waiting.
Tears streamed down his face. "I… I don't want to lose them."
Rhea shook her head. "You're not losing us. You're freeing us."
The reflection screamed, its voice splitting into hundreds of echoes:
"They lied to you! This is your world, your truth! Stay and you'll never feel pain again!"
The walls of light trembled. The ground began to crack open, revealing an abyss of swirling shadows beneath. Aryan grabbed Aryan's arm.
"Aryan, listen to me. If you don't wake up now — you'll forget who you really are!"
The mirror's voice grew frantic:
"If you leave, you'll be alone!"
Aryan closed his eyes. The sound of the piano returned — the same melody from before — slow, fragile, but now filled with peace.
He remembered his mother playing it when he was little, before everything changed.
He whispered softly,
"I'm already alone… if I stay here."
And then — he smashed the mirror with his fist.
Light exploded everywhere. The mansion, the fog, the town — everything shattered like glass breaking in slow motion.
The faces of his friends faded into smiles, peaceful at last.
Aryan's voice echoed faintly as the world dissolved into brightness:
"We'll meet again… when you open your eyes."
Aryan gasped.
For the first time in years, he breathed.
The sound of a heartbeat monitor filled his ears. White walls. Beeping machines.
He was lying in a hospital bed. A nurse shouted, "He's waking up!"
And just before his vision went clear, he saw a reflection in the room's glass door — his own — smiling faintly… and whispering something he couldn't hear.