It was 2:17 A.M.
Every light in the town went out at the exact same moment.
Streetlights. Houses. Hospitals.
As if someone had pulled the plug on reality itself.
Silence swallowed everything.
Then Aarav's phone vibrated.
Unknown Number.
"You are already dead."
Aarav scoffed and tossed the phone onto the bed.
"Some stupid prank," he muttered.
But then he looked up.
At the mirror.
And his breath froze.
Someone was standing there.
Someone who looked exactly like him.
Same face.
Same height.
Same black hoodie.
One difference.
Blood was slowly dripping from that version's eyes.
The reflection smiled and whispered:
"Run. You have seven days."
Six Hours Earlier – 8:10 P.M.
Riverside Colony had one rule everyone knew since childhood:
Never go near the playground after midnight.
That's why Aarav, Riya, Kabir, and Sameer felt a strange mix of excitement and fear as they stopped their bicycles near the rusted gate.
Kabir laughed nervously.
"If something happens, the ghost won't kill me—my mom will."
Riya stared at the playground.
"Don't you ever feel like… this place is watching us?"
At the center of the playground stood an old abandoned well.
Its cover had been broken for years.
Aarav switched on his torch and pointed it inside.
Darkness.
Not normal darkness.
Deep. Endless.
"Let's go back," Sameer said. "This is enough."
Kabir picked up a stone.
"One second. Let's test physics."
He dropped it into the well.
No sound.
No echo.
Nothing.
As if the stone had never existed.
Then—
A voice rose from inside the well.
"Aarav…"
Everyone froze.
Not because the well spoke.
But because the voice sounded exactly like Aarav's.
Present – 2:19 A.M.
Aarav stood alone in his room.
The mirror was normal now.
No blood.
No reflection.
Hallucination, he told himself.
His phone buzzed again.
Rule #1:
Never trust someone who looks like you.
His throat went dry.
Suddenly—
The bedroom door began to open on its own.
Creeeeak.
Bare footsteps echoed from the corridor.
One.
Two.
Three.
Aarav stepped back.
The problem wasn't that someone was coming.
The problem was—
The footsteps sounded exactly like his own.
Then a voice whispered from outside the door:
"Aarav… did you forget me?"
It was his voice.
END – CLIFFHANGER
His phone lit up one last time.
"Rule #2 will be revealed tomorrow…
if you survive till morning."
At that exact moment,
the lights in the room turned on.
The mirror reflected him again.
This time, the reflection wasn't smiling.
It had written something on the glass—
with blood.
"GAME STARTED."