Morning came too slowly.
Manraj hadn't slept after the "38" burned itself into his chest. Not really. He'd drifted in and out of those sharp, restless half-dreams where your body believes it's awake but your mind is somewhere else entirely.
Shadows. Water. A voice he refused to answer.
He sat at the small table in Zoya's apartment, fingers wrapped around a cup of tea that had stopped steaming twenty minutes ago.
He didn't drink it.
He just held it.
The heat grounded him.
Zoya emerged from the hallway with her hair tied up in a rough knot and her hoodie halfway zipped. She looked like she'd barely slept too—but she moved with the jittery determination of someone who refused to acknowledge exhaustion.
"Morning," she said, rubbing her eyes.
"Is it?" Manraj muttered.
She glanced at his untouched tea.
"That bad?"
He tapped his chest once, just above the symbols.
"Thirty-eight," he said.
Zoya whistled low. "It really dropped at midnight."
He nodded. "Like it was waiting."
Zoya grabbed her notebook from the counter and flipped to the page titled:
DAY TWO — COUNTDOWN OBSERVATIONS
She scribbled:
00:00 — SHIFT to 38. Root aware of Manraj's state. Unknown trigger.
"Okay," she said. "Rule one still applies. You tell me everything. No heroic stupidity."
Manraj gave her a half-smile.
"Zoya, if I was trying to be heroic, I wouldn't be drinking bad tea in your kitchen."
"Fair."
She sat across from him, pulling her legs up onto the chair, and leaned forward.
"Did you feel anything else? Pressure? Pull? Weird phantom voices telling you to join a cult?"
He hesitated.
"…not voices."
Zoya raised a brow. "Define 'not voices.'"
"Like…" He rubbed his temple. "Like the world inhaled. Once. Deep. And then just… waited."
Zoya's expression darkened.
"That's the Root testing the boundary," she said. "Seeing how thin the seal is."
Manraj swallowed.
"It felt like something expected me to answer."
"And you didn't," Zoya said firmly. "Good. Don't."
He snorted. "Wasn't planning to."
"Good," she repeated. "Keep ignoring your cosmic river parent."
He shook his head, half amused, half terrified.
Before he could answer, Zoya's phone buzzed.
Notification: TUNNEL SCAN ALERT — 5:42AM Movement detected. Subsurface shift.
Zoya and Manraj locked eyes.
"That's near the old entrance," she said.
Manraj stood. "We need to see it."
Zoya grabbed her jacket.
"No, WE need to go. Because if you go alone and get dragged into a river dimension during sunrise, I will kill you myself."
He managed a smile.
But it didn't reach his eyes.
---
THE RIVERBANK — DAWN
The river looked normal again.
Too normal.
The surface glimmered with early light, and the morning crowd had begun to gather—scooters rattling over the bridge, chai vendors clanking steel kettles, dogs nosing through trash.
No one sensed the quiet wrongness beneath the water.
Except them.
Zoya crouched near the patched stonework where the first fracture had once opened.
She pressed her palm flat against it.
Her Silence flickered faintly—like a pulse.
Manraj watched her.
"What is it?"
Her eyes narrowed.
"…an echo."
He crouched beside her.
"Of the Root?"
"No." She shook her head. "This one feels thinner. Sharper. Like someone scratching at the wall."
Their eyes met.
Same thought. Same name.
"Azhar."
Manraj's chest tightened.
"Can he get out?" he whispered.
Zoya stood, brushing dust from her fingers.
"If it were anyone else? No." She paused. "But Azhar breaks rules on principle."
Manraj's throat tightened.
"Then he'll try."
Zoya gave him a sideways glance.
"He always does. It's his entire personality."
Before Manraj could respond—
A ripple rolled across the river.
Small. Almost delicate.
But wrong.
Zoya stiffened.
"You felt that, right?"
Manraj nodded slowly.
"Yeah."
Another ripple.
Then another.
Then the water bulged upward—just barely—like something beneath it exhaled.
Zoya stepped in front of him instantly.
"Okay. Back. Back, back, back—"
Manraj didn't move.
"Zoya. It's not the entity. It's… something else."
She didn't lower her guard.
"And you think that makes it better?"
The river swelled again—this time in a concentrated point near the bank.
A vertical disturbance.
Not a portal. Not a crack. Not a vortex.
A signal.
The water rippled outward, forming shapes that lasted barely a second—
a jagged shadow
a silhouette
a hand
a chain
a door
a heartbeat
a face—
Zoya froze.
"Wait—WAIT—Manraj look—"
The silhouette repeated.
Clearer.
A figure standing in a dark corridor.
Tall.
Lean.
Shoulders tense.
A familiar posture.
Azhar.
Manraj's breath caught in his throat.
"Azhar," he whispered, stepping closer.
The echo-waves repeated—flickering like an unstable transmission.
Zoya pressed closer, studying the pattern.
"This isn't a message," she murmured. "It's a bleed-through."
"What's that mean?"
"It means Azhar isn't opening a door." She swallowed. "He's trying to claw through the wall."
The next ripple hit harder, sending a small splash onto the stone where they stood.
Manraj knelt carefully, touching the wet patch.
His fingers tingled.
Shadow energy.
Worn thin. Tired.
But unmistakably Azhar.
"He's alive," Manraj whispered.
Zoya placed a hand on his shoulder.
"I know."
Manraj exhaled shakily.
"He's trying to reach us."
Zoya nodded slowly.
"Yeah. And if we don't figure out how to reach back…" She gestured to the river. "He'll tear himself apart doing it."
The river went still.
Glass-still.
Then—
BOOM.
A deep, muffled thud echoed from beneath the surface like someone pounding on a submerged door with their entire body.
Manraj stumbled back.
Zoya grabbed his arm.
"That wasn't the Root," she whispered. "That was him."
Another boom. Closer.
Another. Stronger.
The repaired stone under their feet vibrated.
Manraj felt the number in his chest shift—
38 → 37
He gasped.
Zoya's eyes widened.
"Oh no. No, no, no—That's not the countdown's pace. It shouldn't drop this fast—"
"It's matching him," Manraj whispered, horrified. "Every time Azhar hits the barrier… the countdown jumps."
Zoya grabbed him by the hoodie.
"That means he's thinning the seal. If he breaks through—"
Manraj swallowed.
"The Root comes with him."
A massive boom rippled upward—cracking a line through the stone.
The river surface quivered.
Manraj pressed a hand over his chest.
"Zoya—he's hurting. I can feel it."
"I know," she whispered.
The river rippled again—
And this time, the silhouette was clear.
Azhar.
Kneeling.
Breathing hard.
One hand pressed to a dark wall.
His head lifting—
His eyes glowing faintly—
Looking directly upward.
At Manraj.
Manraj exhaled hard, voice breaking.
"Azhar…"
The silhouette flickered—
And Azhar's mouth moved.
One word.
One unmistakable word:
"RUN."
The river swelled.
The stone beneath them cracked wider.
The countdown in Manraj's chest pulsed—
37 → 36
Zoya grabbed his wrist.
"Manraj—MOVE—NOW!"
He stumbled back—
Just as the river erupted upward in a jagged column of blackened water.
Not the entity.
Not a Root call.
Not a portal.
Something else.
Something forced open from the wrong side.
Azhar had pushed too hard.
Broken too far.
And something inside the Root had pushed back.
Manraj felt the pressure hit him like a hammer.
Zoya's Silence flared outward—
and shattered like glass.
He gasped, choking on air that suddenly felt too thin.
Zoya dragged him toward the street.
"Come on—MOVE—GO—GO—GO—"
Behind them, the river convulsed.
The black column twisted.
A new voice leaked out—
thin
inhuman
and hungry:
"Eryth…"
Manraj staggered as the 36
burned deeper into his chest.
Zoya pulled him forward, refusing to let go.
"DAY TWO," she gasped. "And the shadows are already waking."
Manraj looked over his shoulder—
at the river boiling behind him.
At the thing rising out of it.
At the countdown burning in his chest.
"Zoya…" he whispered.
"This isn't forty days."
She swallowed.
"No," she said.
"This is the beginning of something worse."