The world was quiet.
Too quiet.
Ethan sat up in bed, his hand still resting on the note that lay beside him. The words blurred slightly as he stared at them, trying to make sense of what they meant.
"You're in his dream. Wake up."
The chill that ran down his spine wasn't from fear. It was something deeper. A recognition of something that had been lurking just beneath the surface, a feeling he hadn't quite understood until now. It wasn't just that he had been dreaming. It was that his entire existence, everything he thought he knew, had been shaped by someone else's mind.
The thought was dizzying.
He stood slowly, his body feeling heavy. Each movement seemed to take more effort, like he was waking up from a long sleep that he hadn't even known he'd been in.
He needed answers. He needed to know what this was. Why this was happening.
Ethan walked over to the window and looked outside. The street below seemed normal enough. Cars passed by. People walked by, their lives continuing as though nothing had changed.
But Ethan knew differently now. The world didn't feel the same anymore. It felt like a constructed facade. A web of illusions.
He turned from the window, walking toward the desk in the corner of his room. The notebook he had been scribbling in for weeks was still open, its pages filled with chaotic thoughts, strange symbols, and fragmented memories.
He picked it up and flipped through the pages, his mind racing. Every memory, every detail, was out of place. The timelines didn't align. The events didn't fit. It was all a puzzle, a twisted, fractured puzzle that he had been trying to piece together.
Why didn't it make sense?
Ethan's eyes stopped on a specific page, one that had been nearly torn in half. The ink was messy, as though the words had been written in a hurry.
The note from the shadow in his dream echoed in his mind: "You're the dreamer. But you've been dreaming for too long."
The realization hit him like a thunderclap.
He was the one who had created this world.
He had been the one dreaming, all along. Everything—the glitches, the echoes, the fragmented pieces of his life—was just his mind trying to process something too painful to face. Something he had buried so deeply that it had created this entire reality to shield him from the truth.
And now, he was stuck. Trapped in a cycle of repetition, unable to wake up, unable to escape.
A knock on the door.
Ethan froze.
It was a sound so simple, so real, but it felt wrong. It didn't belong here.
The door swung open before he could react. Standing in the doorway was a woman he hadn't seen in years.
Her name was Lila.
Her eyes met his with an intensity that made his heart skip a beat. Her expression was unreadable, a mix of sorrow and resignation.
"I thought I'd find you here," she said quietly, her voice trembling slightly.
Ethan opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out. He felt the world around him shift again, the edges of reality warping and folding in on themselves.
Lila stepped into the room, her gaze never leaving him. "You don't remember, do you?"
He shook his head, a sense of dread washing over him. "Remember what?"
She gave a sad smile, stepping closer. "You don't remember the night you died."
Ethan's chest tightened, his breath caught in his throat. His mind screamed at him to reject it, to deny it, but the truth settled over him like a weight.
The night he died.
"I… I don't…" His voice faltered. His eyes darted to the note on his desk, to the words that had haunted him. "What happened? What did I do?"
Lila looked down for a moment, as if searching for the right words. When she looked up again, her eyes were filled with unshed tears.
"You died in a car crash," she whispered. "But it wasn't your fault. You didn't cause it. You didn't even know."
Ethan's stomach turned. A flash of memory broke through the fog. The sound of tires screeching, the blinding lights. The scream of metal as it twisted and bent. A crash. And then—nothing.
The realization was like a punch to the gut.
He had died.
But the world—his world—had continued. He had continued, trapped in this loop of fragments, unable to accept what had happened.
Lila reached out, gently touching his arm. "I've been trying to wake you up, Ethan. But you're not ready."
Ethan swallowed hard. "I'm… dead?"
She nodded. "You're dead. But you're stuck here, in this place—this dream. This… echo. You've been reliving your memories, trying to make sense of it all, trying to find a way to wake up."
"Why?" Ethan whispered. "Why me?"
"Because you couldn't face the truth. You couldn't face the fact that it wasn't your fault. That it was just an accident. So your mind built this place to protect you."
Ethan stared at her, the pieces of the puzzle falling into place. This world, this endless loop, was his mind's way of shielding him from the truth. His guilt, his fear, had manifested into this endless cycle of repetition.
"But now," Lila continued softly, "you have to let go. You have to wake up."
Ethan felt his heart race. "How?"
Lila smiled, though it was tinged with sadness. "By facing the truth. By accepting that it's over."
Ethan's breath caught in his throat. The weight of it all threatened to crush him. But as Lila's words sank in, something else emerged—an understanding, a clarity.
He had been running from the truth for too long. And now, it was time to stop.
He looked at Lila one last time, her figure blurring at the edges, her presence fading like a dying dream.
And then, the room dissolved.
The world—his world—disappeared entirely.
⸻