The alley shrank around me.
Cold bricks.
Static air.
Shadows twisting like they were alive.
Two figures closing in:
The Rememberer — glitching, growling, hungry for identity.
The Other Me — smiling like she already wrote the ending.
And the stranger?
He stood between them and me, shoulders tense, jaw clenched, holding my wrist like it was the only thing keeping the universe together.
"Anshu," he said softly — too softly for how terrifying the situation was.
"You have to choose."
My voice cracked.
"Choose WHAT?!"
He didn't turn around.
Didn't look at me.
His entire focus was on the two nightmares approaching us.
"Choose which version of you survives."
My lungs seized.
"No. No, I'm not doing this. I am NOT picking between myself and… myself?! This isn't a Netflix poll!"
"You have to!" he snapped — a rare burst of frustration.
"If you don't choose, the universe will choose for you."
The Rememberer lurched forward.
Its limbs scraped the pavement with a wet, static screech.
The Other Me floated closer, head tilting in that slow, unnerving way.
"Aw… poor thing," she cooed.
"You're always so indecisive."
"I am NOT!" I yelled.
Honestly, I was. But she didn't need to know that.
She drifted closer, white eyes glowing like hollow moons.
"Let me make it simple," she whispered.
"I deserve to live. You don't."
I flinched.
"You killed me once," I hissed. "Isn't that enough for you?"
She smiled.
"It didn't stick. Let me try again."
The Rememberer hissed, glitching violently.
The air shook.
The stranger finally turned his head slightly toward me — not fully, just enough for me to see his eyes.
Terrified.
Pleading.
Protective in a way I didn't understand yet.
"Anshu," he whispered, "Listen to me."
He stepped closer.
Too close.
Close enough that I could feel the warmth of his breath on my cheek.
"You exist because something impossible happened."
His eyes softened.
"You survived a timeline collapse no one could survive."
"I didn't survive," I whispered. "YOU erased that world—"
"To save you," he said sharply.
"To save the real you."
The Other Me giggled.
"Oh sweetheart… he never told you, did he?"
The stranger's jaw tightened.
"Don't."
"Tell me WHAT?" I demanded.
The Other Me floated between us, smiling at me with a twisted gentleness.
"He didn't erase the timeline to save you."
Her smile widened.
"He erased it to keep me inside."
My heart stuttered.
"He trapped me," she whispered.
The stranger shouted, "DON'T LISTEN TO HER—"
But the words hit me harder than anything so far.
He didn't erase the world because I died.
He erased it because…
she lived.
I stumbled back.
"You… trapped her?"
My voice shook.
The stranger stared at me, pained.
"She was destroying everything—"
"YOU DESTROYED MY LIFE!" she shrieked at him.
The alley's walls cracked from the force of her voice.
"You locked me away! You kept me from MY son! MY world! MY life!"
She turned to me, glowing eyes wild with grief.
"You think you're the victim? You STOLE my place."
"I didn't steal anything!" I cried.
"I didn't even know you existed!"
"That doesn't matter," she hissed.
"You exist. And because of you, I don't."
The Rememberer growled louder, as if feeding off the tension.
The stranger stepped in front of me again, shielding me with his entire body.
"I won't let either of them take you."
The Other Me laughed.
"And who will stop me? You? The murderer who rewrites worlds like diary pages?"
He flinched.
She smirked.
"That's what you didn't tell her, didn't you?"
I felt the air freeze.
"What… didn't he tell me?" I whispered.
The stranger looked at me then.
Really looked.
His eyes full of something that hurt more than fear.
Guilt.
"Anshu… I didn't just erase that timeline."
He swallowed hard.
"I erased your memories of it."
My knees almost gave way.
"You… you WHAT?"
He reached out a trembling hand.
"I had to. You were breaking. You were losing yourself—"
The Other Me laughed like a broken music box.
"Translation: he didn't want you remembering who you used to be."
My breath came out sharp and uneven.
"I had a LIFE?" I whispered.
"A child? A home? And you— YOU TOOK IT FROM ME?"
He grabbed my shoulders, voice cracking.
"Because remembering was killing you, Anshu—"
"No," the Other Me said softly, stepping closer.
"Because remembering would've destroyed HIM."
The stranger turned pale.
She tilted her head.
"Oh? Didn't she know?"
Her smile sharpened.
"You loved him in that timeline."
My world collapsed.
My voice broke.
"Is that true?"
He squeezed his eyes shut.
"Yes."
My heart shattered.
The Other Me whispered into the chaos:
"That's why he saved you. Not because you were special.
Because you were HIS."
The Rememberer screeched so loudly the air split.
Reality buckled.
The stranger grabbed me.
"Anshu — CHOOSE."
"I CAN'T!" I screamed.
"HOW DO I CHOOSE WHICH VERSION OF ME DIES?!"
The Other Me glided closer.
"It's easy," she whispered.
"Pick the one with the life worth living."
And before I could react—
She lunged at me.
---