Alaric sat by the window of the classroom, eyes unfocused, watching the clouds drift like slow-moving ghosts across the sky. The murmur of the teacher’s voice was a distant hum, merging with the steady tap of chalk against the board and the occasional cough from a student. The world spun around him in rhythms he could no longer feel part of.
His fingers traced the cracked wood of the desk, worn by years of use, as if hoping to find meaning in its grooves. He used to love this seat—front row, far right—close enough to the window to pretend he was somewhere else but not too close to be noticed. Now it just felt like a cage with a view.
“Alaric, could you repeat what I just said?”
The question snapped him from his thoughts. The class turned. Eyes. Always watching. He blinked.
“I… sorry.”
The teacher sighed. “Stay after class.”
He gave a small nod, more out of habit than guilt.
As the day continued, everything felt heavy. His bag, his limbs, his thoughts. Each step down the hallway echoed with a dull weight, like walking through water. He passed lockers, conversations, laughter. None of it seemed to reach him.
During lunch, he sat alone under the tree in the back corner of the schoolyard. A familiar place—hidden, shadowed, safe. He opened his lunchbox and stared at it blankly before closing it again. Hunger had become a concept rather than a sensation.
His phone buzzed.
"Mom: Don't forget your therapy session today. 6PM. We love you."
He turned the screen off.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
Therapy. It had helped once. But lately, even words had started to betray him. How do you explain to someone that your dreams feel more real than your waking life? That your chest feels hollow even when you're surrounded by people?
That you feel like something inside you is… breaking?
That night, sleep came reluctantly. When it did, it came in flashes—dreams soaked in symbolism and color.
He stood in a desert of stars. Above, a bleeding moon. Below, an ocean of mirrors reflecting faces not his own. A figure stood at the edge of the horizon—a silhouette with eyes like constellations.
“You’re not ready,” the voice echoed. “But you must choose.”
He reached out.
The mirrors shattered.
He woke with a gasp, heart pounding, clothes clinging to sweat.
The room was dark. But something pulsed beneath his skin. A hum. Ancient. Alive.
At school the next day, he walked through the corridors like a ghost. People passed him. None saw him.
He reached his locker and stared at it for a long moment. There was a sticky note stuck to the front.
“Smile more. You look like death.”
No name. Just a cruel joke in cursive handwriting.
He crumpled it in silence.
In class, the whispers came again. The stares. He felt like a cracked vase held together by willpower alone. The counselor’s voice echoed from the past.
"You don’t have to carry it all alone, Alaric."
But what if he was meant to?
That afternoon, the sky turned grey. Clouds rolled in like bruises across the horizon. A storm threatened.
After the final bell, he didn’t go home.
He climbed.
The stairs to the rooftop were old, rarely used, covered in dust and silence. Each step felt heavier than the last. At the top, the door creaked open with a groan.
The wind greeted him.
The city stretched beneath—a sea of lights and movement, unaware of the storm above and the storm within.
He stepped to the edge.
The wind tugged at his shirt, playful and cruel. The silence up here was total. No voices. No messages. Just the sound of his heartbeat and the pull of the void.
His mind wandered—not to fear, but to peace. A strange serenity.
But just as his foot shifted—
A whisper. A voice.
Familiar. Ancient.
"You were not meant to fall."
He turned. No one there.
But the sky… it shimmered. Like fabric pulled apart.
And from that shimmering tear… light poured out. Symbols danced in the air—complex, living runes that pulsed with something divine.
Before he could breathe, the world folded.
And everything changed.
