They kept running,
he didn't stop.
Neither did Rehan.
The trees around them blurred into walls of green and shadow. Everything looked the same — twisted trunks, snarled roots, and hanging moss that brushed their skin like cold fingers. There was no clear direction anymore.
"Ayaan…" Rehan panted, slowing down. "Something'swrong. We're going in circles."
Ayaan looked around. He recognized none of it — but he felt it. The pull. Like the forest was rearranging itself around them. Every tree watched. Every path misled.
He nodded. "We're not… getting out that easy."
The silence between them grew heavier.
"I thought I saw Sameer again," Rehan murmured, voice barely above a whisper. "Back near that broken pillar… I swear he looked right at me."
Ayaan froze. "You saw him?"
"I don't know what I saw," Rehan admitted. "But whatever it was… it wasn't him. It knew what we wanted. It knew what Sameer meant to us."
A gust of wind passed through the trees — dry, sour. It smelled like ash and damp stone.
Their pace slowed. They didn't speak again for a while. There was too much to think about. Too much that didn't make sense.
Then something caught their eye.
Half-hidden beneath tangled vines stood a small structure — wooden, decayed, leaning to one side like it hadn't been touched in years. A hut. Barely standing.
Ayaan looked at Rehan.
"Wecheck it?" Rehan asked.
"Do we have a choice?"
The door groaned open. The air inside was thick — musty and stale. Cobwebs draped the corners. The floor was warped and soft under their feet.
Someone had been here once. Not long ago.
On the floor, half-buried under a fallen coat, lay a torn scrap of paper. Ayaan picked it up.
A rough hand-drawn map. Their surroundings — or something close. At the bottom, marked in red, was the area they had just escaped from.
Next to it, scribbled in jagged letters:
"It listens. It copies. Don't say their names."
Goosebumps pricked up Ayaan's arms.
Rehan leaned closer to the cracked wall. Something was carved on the wood with knife or something sharp.
"Third entry triggers return."
"Memory is its mask."
"Don't trust the voice — it will sound like home."
Ayaan whispered, "We're the third, aren't we?"
Rehan's face was pale. "I think so."
A sound outside made them both flinch.
Thud.
Then silence.
Another thud — heavier this time. Like footsteps. Slow and deliberate.
They crouched low, eyes on the door.
Then — not the door.
The wall.
A gentle knock. Three times.
A chill ran down Ayaan's back.
He grabbed a metal rod from the corner. Rehan reached for a splintered shard of wood.
The knock returned.
And then, a voice:
"Guys…?"
Soft. Fragile. Familiar.
"It's me… Sameer. Please. I'm cold."
Ayaan looked at Rehan, hope and horror colliding in his eyes. "It's him."
Rehan shook his head slowly. "No… it isn't."
"How do you know?"
Rehan didn't blink.
"Because I saw Sameer die."