Summer break, day 11, 19:40
"And now, to something a little more extraordinary, a phenomenon people all over the world have been waiting for."
The screen flickers briefly as the camera cuts to the studio. A man and a woman sat behind a news desk, both smiling with perfect smiles.
The woman leaned slightly toward the camera. "Tonight marks the peak of what astronomers are calling a once-in-a-million-years meteor event," she said in a calm, practiced tone. "Under clear skies, thousands of meteors are expected to be visible across large parts of the world. According to scientists, a display like this will not occur again on this scale for an unimaginably long time."
Her co-host nodded. "Cities worldwide are preparing for the occasion. Many public viewings are planned in parks, on rooftops, and along waterfronts, with people gathering to watch together."
"Exactly," she continued. "If the weather cooperates, tonight offers a rare chance to witness something truly unique. So wherever you are, it might be worth taking a moment to look up."
He smiled at her. "Sounds like a good way to end a long day."
She glanced at him briefly. "Are you suggesting we watch it together after the broadcast?"
He laughed softly. "I am suggesting a meteor report off camera."
She smiled back. "We will see. Either way, enjoy the night."
The segment ended with a slow zoom of sparkling simulation footage, stars sweeping over a model of Earth as a gentle piano track faded into commercials.
I blinked at the TV for a few seconds.
It is the 11th day of summer break, and so far I have not left the house even once. Yesterday, Mum and Dad argued about it again, about me staying in my room, about me never going out, about whether I even have friends. I do not want them to worry about me. So today is the day I leave, even if it is only for a bit.
My phone rested in my hand, unlocked. I'd been scrolling through nothing, just swiping out of habit, not even looking. Some meme. An ad. A blurred selfie someone had posted with the caption "ready for tonight". I had no idea who they were.
The phone screen dimmed and shut off. I didn't bother turning it back on.
Suddenly, like a lightning flash, a memory of my mother shot through my head, how she had cried last night. My father had stood beside her, comforting her, but said nothing. I had hidden behind the wall, unnoticed, and listened. "Aleks hasn't left his room for days." "What is wrong with my son?" "Why doesn't he go out with his friends?" "Doesn't he feel lonely?"
I shook my head, tried to think of something else to forget it quickly. Aleks. Pull yourself together. Mum and Dad were the only people here who maybe still thought about you at all, so at least try not to disappoint them too.
I finally stood up and looked around. My room was a complete mess, tissues and dirty clothes scattered all over the floor. It was pitch black inside, the only light coming from the TV mounted on the wall across from my bed. Right next to it stood my gaming setup. If I was not wasting time on my phone in bed, I was probably sitting there.
The setup was pretty basic: a desk, two monitors, a PC, and a worn-out gaming chair that had definitely seen better days.
I usually kept my saved-up cash on the top shelf on the right side of the desk. So I walked over and opened it.
"Weird," I muttered to myself. For some reason, my wallet was not on the shelf. Maybe it was lying somewhere on the desk, but it was hard to tell with all the dishes and empty plastic bottles cluttering the surface.
I couldn't be bothered to dig through that mess. So I just grabbed my debit card and made my way down the hallway toward the bathroom.
The mirror lit up as I stepped in front of it. As much as I didn't want to, I glanced at myself.
I hate myself.
A small, fragile boy stood in front of me. I was 16 but didn't look older than 12. I was short and skinny, but my face was chubby and my cheeks thick. Back then I had gone to the gym regularly for a proud six months, five times a week, never skipping once. It had been nice until I spotted a few of them there. From that moment on, I never went back.
My hair was dark blond and my eyes gray. I had never seen anyone with eye color like mine. Maybe it was because I never looked people in the eyes, but they were the only thing I liked about myself. And I didn't want to ruin even that.
I brushed my teeth without thinking much, rinsed my face, patted it dry. Fixed my hair a little.
Done.
I walked back to grab my keys and wallet. The hallway lights were off, but a faint yellow glow came from the kitchen.
"Where are you going?" my dad's voice called out.
I leaned around the corner just enough for him to see me.
"Out. Meteor thing."
He glanced up from his chair, one hand on a mug, the other holding his phone.
"With a friend?"
"Yeah."
I lied.
He didn't question it.
Just nodded once.
"Aleks, don't come back late."
"Got it."
Before I opened the front door, I took a deep breath.
Aleks, you can do it.
The streets still held the warmth of the day. Shadows stretched long across the sidewalk as the sun slid lower behind the rooftops. Streetlamps hadn't flickered on yet, but the sky had already started shifting, colors bleeding from blue to purple, soft hints of gold melting into the clouds.
I passed by people heading toward parks, carrying foldable chairs and bags of snacks. A couple laughed as they juggled a rolled-up picnic blanket between them. Kids ran ahead, yelling about the event. A group of teenagers in matching hoodies was taking selfies near a fountain.
The whole city was preparing to look up.
I kept walking.
The corner shop was open. I normally went there to buy something to drink, so I pushed the door open, the little bell above it giving a tired jingle. Inside, the air smelled faintly of old candy and cleaning spray. Shelves lined with snacks, energy drinks, and a fridge humming quietly in the back.
I made my way straight to it and opened the cooler. The cold air hit me in the face, crisp and sharp. My hand hesitated for a moment before I grabbed the familiar glass bottle, dark red, a faint cherry-vanilla tint swirling behind the label.
I closed the door, bottle in hand, and made my way to the counter.
That's when I heard the little bell above the door ring behind me, and then I saw him.
Brad. He was one of them. He was leaning casually against the wall next to the exit, like the store belonged to him. Tall, athletic, the kind of face you'd see on an ad. Everyone at school talked about him, especially the girls. Standing next to him was Carmen. Her dark, straight hair fell over one shoulder, brown eyes shining in the fridge's neon light. Her skin held the warm brown of her homeland, she'd moved here from Spain a few years ago. Back in middle school, she was my best friend. Ever since then, I've had the dumbest, most hopeless crush on her. And now she was standing beside Brad.
Brad looked at me and grinned, not in a nice way. More like a cat spotting a toy. He raised his voice so everyone could hear.
"Hey Carmen, look. One of the weirdos I told you about."
His words hit like cold water. My mouth went dry. I knew what came next: mockery, maybe even a shove later behind the school building. For years, he'd humiliated me, treated me like garbage. Like I wasn't even human. Carmen tugged on his sleeve gently. "Brad, stop. That's not funny." Her voice was soft, almost apologetic. But she didn't move away. Her eyes met mine, recognized me, and then slid away like I was nothing.
I wanted to say something. Something clever or angry. Anything. But I just stood there, frozen. My legs didn't feel like mine. The debit card in my hand trembled.
Moments like this are why I won't leave the house for the next few days. My fingers tightened around the soda bottle in my hands. I turned to the cashier, placed the bottle on the counter, stared at the card reader. The numbers blurred.
Just pay. Just get out. Just breathe.
Beep. Payment approved.
"Have fun tonight," the cashier mumbled without even looking at me.
I grabbed the bottle and headed for the door. In the reflection of the glass, I saw it: Brad wrapping his arm around Carmen, kissing her.
The door slid open. Cool air hit my face.
It wasn't until I was outside that I noticed how badly my knees were shaking. Brad was still laughing inside; Carmen's voice was just a faint echo. I looked up at the sky as it started to darken. A tear slid softly down my cheek. That was too much; I wanted to go back home. To my room.
I walked on, the cool glass bottle sweating slightly in my hand.
A few minutes later, I turned onto the quieter path. The sounds of chatter, music, and cars faded behind me, replaced by the crunch of gravel under my shoes and the soft rustle of wind through trees.
The path wound gently uphill, flanked by overgrown hedges and an old metal fence on one side. Faint outlines of distant apartment windows blinked in the growing dusk like lazy fireflies.
My spot came into view, a half-buried bench sitting slightly crooked under a lone streetlight in a mostly forgotten corner of the park. The light flickered once, then held steady, casting pale gold across the worn wood and cracked pavement. I always go there when I tell my parents that I'm going out. I sat.
The bench creaked beneath me, like it always did.
I popped the cap off the bottle and let it fall to the ground. Took a sip. Perfect.
The sky above had darkened just enough to show the first stars, tiny white dots blinking into existence one by one. The clouds were still pulling apart slowly, streaks of purple and orange slicing across the horizon.
I leaned back.
Maybe in another universe, my situation looked different. Maybe the Aleks from there was somebody. Went out with friends to eat, to shop, to swim, to the movies. Maybe he sat on this bench right here with them, waiting for the meteor show to start. Maybe, unlike me, he lived.
Suddenly, a broad light appeared in the night sky. The meteor show had begun.
I looked up. The first meteor began to glide across the night sky. It flew slowly; behind it was its trail, which grew longer with every second. It was majestic in different colors; at the very front it was a bright yellow, almost white; farther back it turned turquoise, then pink, and at the end violet. Shortly afterward, the trail took up almost the entire night sky. It gave the dark night light again.
I stood up from the bench to see as much of it as possible, to experience the moment before it turned into a memory. I got goosebumps, and I hadn't seen something so beautiful in a very, very long time.
Aleks, the world out there was so beautiful and there was still so much to discover. I didn't want to live like this anymore. I didn't want my world to be only my room. I didn't want to lie in my bed and rot while those who destroyed me, who ruined me, had the time of their lives.
I shouted out: I want to finally live!
After I said that, a strong wind came; birds flew away, and dogs far away started barking out of nowhere.
I looked up at the night sky. Strange, the meteor trail still didn't disappear.
I looked more closely and felt a shock. No, that couldn't be real. What was happening right now? The meteor trail was spreading slowly from left to right. It looked as if the meteor had just sliced through the night sky, and now the true sky was revealing itself inside the expanding strip.
Inside it was darkness itself. It was the blackest black I had ever seen; it was so dark it consumed the light, no star could salvage that blackness.
The trail spread further until it stopped. From a distance it looked like a huge, glowing oval in the sky, almost like the shape of an eye. The edge glowed in the meteor's colors, while in the middle that deep darkness spread. Everything around this oval went still. No wind, no sound, only that shining shape in the sky.
After a few seconds, a small bright point began to appear in the darkness. It grew slowly, became rounder, stronger, and brighter, until it became a large circular point of light. It looked like a pupil, as if the sky itself had opened an eye. The light inside it moved slightly, as if it were blinking or watching the earth.
I stood there and didn't know what to do. Was that God? I mean, three weeks ago I remembered seeing a crazy guy at the station on my way to school. He yelled that the end was near and to turn back to God before it was too late. But they all said that, didn't they?
To be honest, I wasn't even ready to talk to Him now. He would definitely have been angry with me for not getting my life together with the life He had given me.
Suddenly, red, glowing particles appeared around the eye. They looked like tears that were slowly falling. With every tear, the light began to flicker. They looked liquid, almost like glowing drops of blood. They drifted slowly downward, as if the sky were crying. The red drops flowed like rain, but much slower, and each of them left a fine, luminous trail in the air.
I just stood there and stared up. The drops drew closer, more and more of them, until one fell right in front of me. I watched it glow in the air and then hit the ground.
In the next moment, the drop began to move. The red liquid crept across the ground, drew together, and grew darker, from bright red to deep black. Then, suddenly, a shape rose out of it.
I stepped back. In front of me stood something that had just been a drop, now it looked like a living, dark creature. It slowly lifted its head, and I had the feeling it was looking at me.
Suddenly, this creature let out a scream so loud I thought my eardrum was about to burst.
"The fuck?" I took a step back and started running.
Faster than I ever had before. Down the street, past shuttered shops, past the corner bakery with its glass already shattered. My feet hit the pavement like drumbeats. My chest burned. My legs screamed. I didn't stop.
I couldn't.
Screams erupted behind me. People were dying. Buildings collapsed. A man sprinted past me with blood on his hands, shouting something about his daughter. I didn't stop to ask. Another blur dashed across the sidewalk, chasing him.
No. Not chasing.
Hunting.
And then it saw me.
Shit. I had to run. I didn't want to die yet. I didn't want to die as a nobody. I had just promised myself to change. Please God, if you could hear me, give me one more chance.
I turned down the alley behind the gym. Narrow, tight, steep. Dumb move. Halfway through, I realized.
Dead end.
"Shit." "Shitshitshit."
This demonic creature ran behind me until it stopped. Its steps grew slower and slower, as if it took pleasure in seeing me terrified.
I raised my hands like that would help. My voice barely came out.
"Please don't."
The creature lunged.
Suddenly.
A blinding light.
Something pierced the air with a sharp crack, and a golden spear slammed into the creature's torso, pinning it to the wall beside me. It didn't bleed. It just convulsed, glitching even harder, then disintegrated into smoke and sparks.
I dropped to the ground, gasping.
Before me stood a shape, glowing so bright I had to shield my eyes. As it came near, I saw two big wings on its back.
Is that a fucking angel?
The shape came closer.
"Endure a little longer, Aleksander. You're nearly safe."
I froze. "You, how do you know my name?"
It didn't answer.
Then he vanished. No flash, no noise. Nothing.
Had God heard my plea? Had He given me a chance to live?
I sat there for a second, heart pounding.
My hands were shaking. My legs barely worked. But somehow, I stood up.
Everything hurt. I walked. Through the empty streets. Through the smoke. Through the shattered remains of my town.
The buildings were hollow. The air was thick with ash. Somewhere, a phone kept ringing. No one answered.
A woman lay motionless under a broken streetlight. Her eyes were open. Her mouth, too. No sound came out.
I stepped over her.
One block later, a car burned in silence. Another creature crawled across the ruins like a drunk centipede made of glass and teeth. It didn't see me.
I kept walking.
My mind had stopped trying to make sense of anything. I was just... moving. Waiting for it to end.
Then I looked down.
A glowing circle spread beneath my feet. It looked like something people in movies would draw at rituals. In it were symbols I didn't recognize, lit up one by one.
"Holy shi..."
The ground vanished and I couldn't see anything. I just felt like I was falling somewhere infinite.
I couldn't feel my body. My thoughts scattered. Was I dying?
No. I hope not.
If this was death, it should've been darker. Quieter. I should've seen something. My parents. A memory. Anything.
Then, impact.
Hard stone beneath my back. Cold air in my lungs. I gasped, twisted onto my side, and coughed like I hadn't breathed in years.
What the hell just happened?
I opened my eyes.
Blue.
The sky was blue.
Not unzipped like before. It was blue, bright and peaceful.
I blinked.
I sat up slowly, my whole body trembling. My shirt clung to my chest, damp with sweat and dust. I wasn't dead.
I was somewhere else.
And I wasn't alone.
Voices surrounded me, hundreds of them, maybe thousands. At first, I just listened, like my brain was trying to decide if this was real or if I had finally snapped. The voices did not sound like my street, my city, my country. Too many accents. Too many screams at once.
I turned my head and froze.
"Damn."
A massive crowd.
People packed shoulder to shoulder across a wide, grass field.
Some people were crying. Others were screaming. Most were just... frozen.
Everyone looked just as lost as I felt.
Men in office suits. Women in hospital gowns. Teenagers with school bags. Toddlers. Seniors. Everyone.
My chest tightened. I scanned the horizon, searching for something familiar. A road sign. A building. A skyline. Anything.
Nothing.
Just endless field, distant treelines, and a sky that looked too clean. Too bright. The air smelled different too, sharp and cold, like a morning that did not belong to my world. Even the light felt wrong, like the sun sat at an angle my body did not recognize.
My stomach dropped.
"This is not Earth."
The words came out before I could stop them, quiet and stupid, like saying it out loud would make it untrue. I had been in my town. I had been running. I had been falling. And now I was here.
How the hell do you even teleport?
And mixed in with them…
"What the hell am I looking at?"
Elves. Fucking elves.
You know these creatures from fantasy movies and games. Tall, elegant people with long ears, glowing eyes, and clothes that shimmered like magic had barfed all over them.
My brain tried to reject it. My brain tried to label it as cosplay, a prank, a hallucination, some mass psychosis triggered by shock.
Then one of them turned, and the movement was too natural. No fake ears. No costume seams. The shape of the skull itself was different, the cartilage perfect. The eyes caught the light in a way that made my skin crawl.
And then I saw the shorter ones.
Stocky. Broad. Thick arms, heavy shoulders, beards like steel wire. They did not look like short humans. They looked like someone carved a person out of rock and then dared them to be real.
Dwarves.
My throat went dry.
My legs wanted to collapse.
"This isn't Earth," I whispered again, like repeating it could anchor me. "This isn't Earth."
"Is this a dream?" My voice cracked. "Did I finally go crazy?"
No one answered.
The ground beneath us pulsed.
A voice echoed through the sky. Not from speakers. Not from anywhere physical. "You have been spared."
I froze.
"The creatures which destroyed your worlds will also come for this one."
My stomach twisted.
"You have six months."
Murmurs rippled through the crowd. Someone shouted, "Six months for what?!"
The voice ignored him.
"Unite. Learn. Survive. Or perish, like your world did."