Haruka fell asleep while studying, more like overthinking. He woke up at 4:17 am for no reason. He rubbed his eyes and took a step towards his bed... He lies on his bed.
He couldn't sleep... his back itched. He opened his eyes to reach out for his back. He noticed he wasn't feeling his bed. He felt grass... He felt sunlight on his face... a field?
His eyes were wide... in his heart and mind he was wishing that..."Not again...not again of this bullshit..."
He shakes, seeing that it was not so sunny but windy weather. The sky was grey, but the sunlight was bright.
Haruka stares in front... sees a guy with a white coat and a circle on his back, which is even whiter. He saw that he was wearing a plague doctor mask, but white, and his hat was white too... Wasn't it black last time?--- He thought.
The guy in white takes a sip of coffee and speaks.
"Patience... have it, and you will win a lot of things... but even patience have it's limits, you know... I know, and I can feel how you are feeling...scared... annoyed... and maybe also a bit traumatized?"
He stops drinking coffee and looks at Haruka.
"Hello there, little boy... My name is Atience P... Not the one you saw before..."
Haruka stares at him... his voice sounded so kind... so nice and so calming that it removed his fear and let him talk properly.
"So... who are you and why are you here?... why am I here?... why does it happen to me? yesterday's feeling about that...I bet you saw it..."
Atience P. replies,
"Hmm... Let me think... well, you will figure it out soon... just wait a bit... consider it as a test to wield me..."
Haruka stares without understanding anything, "Wield you?"
Atience P. replies,
"Well... the guy you saw last time...is Pr-...Hmm... Nevermind... You will get it soon... trust me... for now... You are away from your home... far away... Your body is there... sleeping, but your soul is here..."
Atience P. waves his hand, and suddenly a portal opens. He got up from his chair and started to go towards the portal.
"Haruka... Come in..."
Haruka goes inside that portal, even if he was scared, he was kind of less scared than before because... Atience P. has a real, kind, and soft voice. A strange, nostalgic, and soothing voice. He remembers that this calming tone was similar to his sister's tone.
He enters the portal with Atience P.
Suddenly, everything was weird.
The world... wasn't the same. He saw things differently.
He sees himself.
Not a clone.
Not a reflection.
He sees multiple versions of himself stretched forward and backward like frames in a film strip.
Past Haruka.
Present Haruka.
Future Haruka.
He can't see width, length, and height, but he can see the whole itself. It was hurting his head. His nose bleed but after a few seconds he...kept seeing it...
"Dangerously beautiful... So...that is how I die?"
Atience P. replied with a chuckle.
"No... That is another timeline...I made sure you don't get spoilers of this timeline..."
They went back to the weird field by that portal.
"Who are you guys?"-- Haruka asked.
Atience P. replies with, "Well... You will find it out soon, as I said before. Plus, you're seeing the shape of your existence, not timelines only."
He opens another portal.
Haruka, by now, was shaking... sound, gravity, and 3d objects didn't make sense. He was losing it. He forces himself not to go insane.
He takes a deep breath and goes in, thinking that Atience P. won't kill him... He was kind.
He goes in...
That line splits.
Every decision.
Every hesitation.
Every "what if."
And he sees all of them.
At once.
It was far superior to what he saw before.
Atience P. speaks, "It is the 5th dimension...I know you can adapt, Haruka..."
Haruka couldn't take this much...his nose bleeds
That line splits.
Every decision.
Every hesitation.
Every "what if."
And he sees all of them.
At once.
He doesn't just see branches.
He can feel them tugging.
Like gravity from other possibilities.
A different version of him is screaming.
Another is begging him not to continue.
One is warning him about Atience P.
But he never found the line that he is living... Atience P. hid that too.
They went back to the field by that portal. He lay on the land...the field.
Atience P. flicks his eyes... Haruka opens his eyes and sees himself waking up from the bed...he looks out of the window because of the weird noises.
People look like cutouts.
Voices sound delayed.
He knows there are branches behind every movement now.
But he can't see them anymore.
Imagine going from seeing a forest to being locked in one tree.
That's suffocating.
He hears someone answer before they speak.
He instinctively dodges something that hasn't happened yet.
He almost calls someone by a name they don't have in this timeline.
Because his brain still remembers the other branches.
But he can't access them.
It's like phantom limb syndrome.... but for realities.
Migraine behind the eyes.
Nosebleed.
Slight tremor in his hand.
He feels like gravity is slightly misaligned.
His head was spinning, he couldn't focus... He was having a headache... he can't stand... He collapses on the bed.
He closes his eyes.
And still sees the room.
Not imagination.
Not memory.
He can see behind his eyelids.
Because part of him is still "observing" from outside the timeline.
He's lying in bed.
But he also sees himself lying in bed.
Like he's both the body and the witness.
He hears a whisper.
Not a voice.
Just a sentence in his own tone:
"You chose this one."
No source.
No direction.
Just inside his skull.
And he doesn't know what "this one" means.
As he drifts to sleep, he feels something.
Not touching him.
Not visible.
Just…
Observing.
And he realizes something cold:
When he was in 5D…
He wasn't just looking at other branches.
Something in the branches looked back.