The train roared through ink-drenched tunnels, the windows flashing with distorted memories. Raj stared outside—his reflection blinked without him. "This place... it remembers things I never lived." Specter sat calmly, fingers tapping a brass-bound book. "You're not riding through time. You're riding through discarded versions of yourselves." Aarav leaned closer. "Why help us?" Specter smirked. "Because I want to finish what your writer couldn't. The original rewrite failed because it lacked purpose. You... you're unstable, unpredictable. That's what I need." Meera drew the golden page. It glowed red now. "This isn't right. Something's corrupting it."
Kael scanned the carriage wall, which had begun to shimmer like water. "The ink's bleeding in," she warned. "The longer we stay here, the more we become part of this... archive." The walls pulsed, and a door melted open, revealing another passenger: a girl with wires in her hair and lips sewn shut. "Who is she?" Raj whispered. Specter stood. "Version Twelve. A failed protagonist overwritten by silence." The girl raised a trembling hand, pointing at Meera. Her stitched mouth split open—without tearing. "Erase her," she rasped, voice layered in echoes. "She doesn't belong."
A sudden jolt shook the train. Specter turned sharply. "Something's overriding the track." Kael rushed to a panel. "External interference. We're being hijacked." Outside the windows, ink tendrils lashed the train, dragging it toward a crimson station suspended in midair. Aarav drew a pulse knife from Kael's belt. "We fight or jump." Specter laughed. "There is no jumping. Only convergence." The train screeched, metal twisting. The girl lunged at Meera, screeching static. Meera struck her with the golden page—light exploded. The stitched girl dissolved into ash, whispering, "You were never the ending."
The train halted at the crimson station—architecture impossible, floating symbols warping gravity. "This isn't on the map," Kael muttered. "We're in a memory pocket." Specter's eyes narrowed. "This was supposed to be gone." They stepped onto the platform. The air felt thick, full of voices whispering familiar words. Meera staggered. "These are lines we spoke. Chapters ago." Raj pointed at a rusted plaque: CHAPTER ZERO – DELETED OPENING. "This is where we were supposed to start," Aarav whispered. A figure waited by the edge—cloaked, hollow eyes, holding a ruined quill. "Welcome back," it said. "We've missed your chaos."
Meera's voice cracked. "That's the first draft of our writer." The figure chuckled. "A discarded ghost, but not forgotten. I remember all your failed deaths." Kael raised her weapon. "Get to the truth or get out of our way." The ghost extended a finger, touching the golden page—it flared and showed new text: YOU WERE NEVER WRITTEN TO SURVIVE. Meera backed away. "That's not possible." The ghost shook its head. "But it is the truth. Your writer cheated. You were already dead. They simply refused to admit it." Raj clenched his jaw. "So what now?"
The platform split in half. From below, black wires shot upward, binding their feet. Specter growled. "The Architect Collective's coming. They hate anomalies." Kael sliced the wires free, dragging Meera toward the glowing exit door. "We need to jump frames now." "Frames?" Aarav shouted. "You mean like in a movie?" Specter nodded. "This story's collapsing into cinematic dissonance. You're slipping into filmic narrative logic." As if on cue, flickering lights appeared overhead, and everything slowed—cinematic slow motion. "RUN!" Meera yelled, breaking into a sprint.
The moment they crossed the door, a projector blinked to life behind them. A voice echoed across the station: "Scene one. Take two. Action." And the ground vanished beneath their feet. They fell—through ink, through time, through screens. Meera screamed as Ravi's hand slipped from hers. Kael twisted in the air, reaching out. "Don't let go!" The frame shattered mid-fall, splintering their descent into different scenes. A final voice whispered: "Choose your genre. Or one will be chosen for you."