The day after discovering the Haze, Eryan woke with a tight knot in his chest. Sleep had been shallow, broken by dreams that were both vivid and unsettling. In them, shadows whispered across familiar streets, and time itself seemed to ripple like water under an unseen wind. He shook his head, trying to dismiss it.
Coffee in hand, he walked the familiar route to work. The city seemed unchanged—the same concrete streets, the same neon signs, the same hum of tires and chatter. Yet, a subtle distortion lingered at the edges of his vision. A taxi paused a fraction of a second too long at a crosswalk, a pigeon hovered unnaturally mid-flight.
Eryan's pulse quickened. He had only experimented in the Haze before, but now he was beginning to sense that his powers were bleeding into the real world.
At the library, he tried to maintain normalcy. He stacked books, filed papers, and greeted coworkers. No one noticed anything unusual. But as he passed a window, he saw it again: a falling leaf suspended for a heartbeat longer than it should.
His hand twitched. He tried to resist the urge to reach out. Controlling time in public was risky. No one had seen him yet, but what if someone was watching—someone who shouldn't exist in the ordinary world?
Lunch passed slowly. Eryan found a quiet corner on the rooftop garden, his mind buzzing. He closed his eyes and concentrated. Small objects responded almost instinctively. A paper cup wobbled in midair, a stray pen hovered, then slowly rotated as if acknowledging his presence. The thrill was intoxicating, but fear followed close behind.
I'm not imagining this. And I'm not the only one.
The thought hit him unbidden. His powers were unusual, yes—but the world beyond this ordinary façade was already stirring. He could feel it, like faint vibrations beneath the concrete, currents he could not yet trace.
That evening, back in the Haze, he explored further. The gray mist stretched endlessly, silent and patient. Eryan tested finer manipulations: multiple falling objects, small reversals of motion, subtle accelerations. The Haze responded perfectly, almost knowingly.
Then, he noticed something new. Shapes began to flicker faintly at the edges of his vision—figures that weren't fully there, blurred as if he hadn't yet focused long enough. His heart raced. Am I imagining them?
A whisper echoed in the gray air, soft and distant, like a thought not quite his own: "They are watching."
Eryan froze, every instinct screaming to run, to shut down the Haze, to retreat to his ordinary apartment. But curiosity anchored him. Who? What?
Hours passed—or maybe minutes. Time felt inconsistent. He experimented cautiously, observing the shapes and the faint threads that now seemed to run through the mist, connecting points that didn't exist outside. The Haze wasn't just a private space—it was becoming something more, something alive.
By the time he returned to his apartment, night had fallen completely. The city lights below twinkled as if unaware, ordinary in every sense, yet Eryan knew the truth: the currents of the hidden world had begun to brush against him, and he was no longer just an observer.
And somewhere, faint and imperceptible, he felt it: a presence waiting, patient, deliberate. The ordinary world had shifted. And the ripples had begun.