Bristol – England, 7:12 PM
The world outside Ishaan's window was dimming. Not just from the sunset — but from something else. Something quieter. He watched shadows lengthen over the rooftops as if the city were holding its breath.
He'd stopped checking his phone. No more alerts, no more news. The numbers didn't matter now.
The only countdown that mattered was inside him.
He could feel it like a tide rising just beneath his skin — not painful, but constant. The closer it came, the more real the wrongness became. He wasn't sick. He wasn't scared. Not exactly.
But there was a hollow space inside him where fear should have been.
Instead, there was resolve.
He stood in front of the mirror in his small dorm bathroom. Looked himself in the eyes. And for a moment — a flicker — the glass distorted. Not cracked, not fogged. Just wrong.
He's coming undone.
The warping wasn't just out there — it was him.
His fingers gripped the edge of the sink. Not to steady himself, but to remember the weight of things. The feel of mass, of friction. Of here.
He inhaled.
Exhaled.
The pressure behind his eyes spiked — no pain. Just a shift. A reminder.
He stepped back from the mirror. Turned to the center of his room.
And the air around him bent.
Not with light, but with geometry.
Angles that shouldn't exist began to form — sharp, silent curves folding in on themselves. The walls twisted outward and back, as if the room were exhaling through a tear in its own skin.
A pulse.
Not sound. Not vibration. A feeling — like the rules of the room were being rewritten.
His knees weakened for half a second.
Then he whispered — not to the room. Not to the presence. To himself.
"Ishaan Ren Vale."
Not a name.
A reminder.
Not of where he was, but of who.
The warping narrowed. The fold of space tightened. His feet felt loose against the ground. Gravity still held, but not like it used to.
The moment was seconds away.
He had slipped the photo into his jacket earlier — close to his heart.
Now, he reached down, tucked his phone deep into his pants pocket, and shouldered his backpack. The straps bit into him — grounding, familiar.
Would they come with him?
He didn't know.
But it felt like they would.
Like the pull would take everything bound to him closely enough.
Outside, the last rays of sunlight died behind the horizon.
And Ishaan Ren Vale vanished.
The room was empty.
The distortion sealed.
And the world turned, as if nothing had changed.