Arun had been thinking about selective freezes for days.
He had learned how to stop the whole world.
He had learned to unfreeze a few objects, a few small things—water drops, swaying curtains, a stray paper on the floor.
But people?
He hadn't touched that boundary.
Not because of morality or fear of damage.
Because he didn't know if it was even possible. His power behaved in ways that felt intuitive but not entirely logical.
On a quiet Wednesday evening, he decided to test it.
Not on a person.
On the idea of a person.
It started near the office staircase.
He was heading down with his coffee mug when he noticed a delivery guy unloading a box from the side entrance.
The box slipped.
The guy lost his balance.
Arun didn't think—he reacted.
The world froze.
Rain outside hung mid-air.
The box stopped an inch above the ground.
The delivery guy hovered awkwardly, one leg twisted.
Arun approached, adjusted the box back into the man's grip, steadied his foot placement, and stepped away.
Then he unfroze everything.
The delivery guy blinked. "Oh—huh. Lucky," he muttered, thinking he'd regained balance on his own.
Arun walked past him silently.
Good.
Another successful micro-intervention.
But that wasn't selective freeze.
That was full freeze.
He needed controlled freeze.
Later that night, in his PG room, Arun sat on his bed with headphones around his neck, staring at a water bottle on the table.
He raised his hand toward it.
"Freeze," he whispered internally, focusing only on the bottle.
Nothing happened.
He tried again, adjusting his mental aim—not at the world, not at everything, but at a tiny circle around the bottle.
Still nothing.
He exhaled and leaned back.
Rohan, on the other bed, looked up from his tax notes. "You're staring at that bottle like you want to marry it."
Arun didn't blink. "Just thinking."
"Dangerous habit," Rohan said, returning to his papers.
Arun smirked slightly.
He waited until Rohan's attention drifted again.
He inhaled.
Focused.
This time, he imagined the world continuing except for the bottle.
Something shifted.
He didn't hear a sound or feel a shock. But the humming fan above felt… mismatched. Out of sync.
He stood slowly.
Walked toward the bottle.
Tapped it.
It didn't move.
His heart jumped—not fear, not joy—just the awareness of a line crossed.
He walked to the window.
Vehicles moved outside.
Rohan scribbled notes.
The clock ticked.
Only the bottle was frozen.
Arun exhaled, steadying himself.
"Okay," he whispered.
Then he unfreezed it with a small mental push.
The bottle resumed its original sway as if nothing had happened.
He sat down again.
Selective freeze worked.
But he had no idea how unstable it was.
The next day, the accidental freeze happened.
And it wasn't an object this time.
It was a person.
Around noon, Arun stepped into the pantry to refill his bottle. The machine was sputtering as usual. Two interns waited behind him, whispering.
One of them said, "I heard Aditi's returning tomorrow for another review."
The other whispered, "Why does she even bother? She's practically royalty or something."
Arun rolled his eyes internally.
The first intern added, "I also heard she's cold-hearted. Doesn't like mixing with common staff. Keeps distance. Strict to the point of—"
Arun felt irritation for the first time in days.
Not anger.
Just a quiet, sharp objection.
He capped his bottle and turned around.
The second intern nearly bumped into him.
Arun reflexively reached out a hand—
instinctively
automatically
deep inside his mind—
Stop.
The moment formed itself before he could catch it.
Everything paused.
Everything…
Except the intern he touched.
The first intern froze mid-sentence, mid-gesture.
The dripping coffee machine paused.
A spoon hung in mid-air where someone had dropped it.
But the second intern—the one he had touched—looked at Arun in confusion.
"Sir? You okay?"
Arun blinked once.
His brain went blank.
Only one person was moving.
Everyone else was frozen.
He had done it again, but this time without thinking. With physical contact. With a human target.
He kept his expression calm, because panic would make things worse.
"Yes," Arun said. "Just thinking."
The intern frowned. "Everyone suddenly stopped talking."
Arun improvised. "They're listening."
"To what?"
"The machine's dying noise," Arun said, pointing at the frozen dispenser.
The intern squinted at the machine. "Can't hear anything."
Because the sound was frozen too.
Arun inhaled discreetly.
He needed to reverse this. Carefully. Without alarming the intern.
"Tell you what," Arun said. "Go to the fridge and grab the milk packet. I'll check the machine."
"Okay," the intern said, walking toward the fridge.
The moment the intern turned his back, Arun released the freeze.
Instantly—
Voices resumed.
The coffee machine hissed again.
The spoon clattered to the floor.
The first intern continued her gossip mid-sentence, unaware.
The second intern returned with a milk packet. "Sir, it wasn't there. Did you hear that sound just now?"
Arun nodded. "Machine restarted."
"Oh," the intern said and walked away.
Arun left the pantry quietly.
His heartbeat steady.
His mind racing.
Selective freeze worked on people.
Touch triggered it forcibly.
And reversing worked cleanly.
But if he wasn't careful…
He could isolate any person from the world.
A new power.
A dangerous one.
He needed control.
Later in the day, the gossip hit a different flavor—one that made him stop walking.
A group of employees were talking near the restroom door.
One woman whispered, "I heard Aditi refuses to take any family business responsibility. Passed it all to her cousins."
A man said, "Makes sense. People like her don't want the baggage."
Another chimed in, "Yeah, she acts like she's above all this."
Arun didn't intend to stop, but the next line froze him in place (figuratively, not with power).
"She actually supports rural education programs anonymously," the woman said. "My cousin works with an NGO. They said one donor from Udaipur funds entire batches every year. They described her—it was definitely Aditi."
The man scoffed. "Come on. Why would she hide something like that?"
"Because she hates attention," the woman said. "She told them to keep her name off the reports."
Arun's brows tightened.
That didn't fit the cold-hearted gossip.
He listened more.
"And she personally visits some of the schools," the woman added. "Not with cameras. Alone. No entourage."
The man paused. "Seriously?"
"Seriously," she said. "My cousin said she talks to every child individually. Asks what they need."
The man lowered his voice. "So she's not cold?"
"She just keeps distance at work," the woman said. "Doesn't mean she's unkind."
Arun resumed walking.
Something shifted inside him—not emotion, just calibration.
The rumors he had been hearing were cheap approximations of someone more complex.
He didn't know why this bothered him.
Maybe because he disliked false narratives.
Maybe because he had seen her in rain, speaking normally to him, no arrogance.
Maybe because people were too quick to assign motives to those who said little.
He understood that instinctively.
Around 4 PM, Neha approached him again.
"Arun, Phoenix oversight needs a new internal audit script."
He raised an eyebrow. "Which team is handling it?"
Neha hesitated. "Uh… you."
"Why?"
"It came from oversight."
He stared at her.
She added quickly, "Indirect instruction. They didn't say your name. But they said: ask the engineer who validated the backfill consistency last week. That's you."
Arun leaned back in his chair. "So they want me to trace every data jump and anomaly between Phoenix nodes?"
"Yes," she said. "It's a major ask."
"And they want it when?"
Neha made a face. "Tomorrow morning."
Arun blinked once. "That's insane."
"Yes," she said. "But it came from Aditi's group."
He paused.
"Aditi asked?" he asked quietly.
"Indirectly," Neha said. "Oversight phrased it nicely. But I know how these things work. She trusts your analysis. Or at least relies on it."
Arun didn't respond.
Neha softened her tone. "Look… this is a compliment. A stressful compliment, but still."
Arun looked at his screen, thinking.
Trust wasn't something he assumed.
Responsibility wasn't something he sought.
But the fact that she was funneling critical tasks toward him—quietly, without announcements—meant something.
Maybe recognition.
Maybe testing.
Maybe both.
He stood.
"I'll do it."
Neha exhaled. "Good. Let me know if you need Rahul."
Arun nodded.
That evening, walking to the bus stop, Arun replayed the day in his head.
Selective freeze on a person.
Aditi's real reputation contradicting gossip.
Aditi assigning him a task without directly involving him.
The three events didn't connect yet.
But something told him they eventually would.
He stepped onto the bus, finding a seat near the window.
Outside, the city moved in waves of traffic and noise.
For the first time since coming to Mumbai, he felt the subtle sensation of the ground shifting beneath him—not physically, not dangerously, just… directionally.
A new arc beginning.
A new set of consequences forming.
And somewhere, far away in another part of the city, Aditi glanced at the Phoenix dashboard on her tablet and paused at one line:
"Internal Anomaly Audit — Assigned to: Arun."
She didn't smile.
She didn't frown.
She simply tapped the screen once and continued reading.
But the fact that she noticed—even briefly—meant more than either of them realized yet.