THEN (Around 5:45 A.M.)
Taj stumbled as they sprinted, his spectacles flying off his face and skidding across the floor. He dropped to his knees without thinking, reaching for them.
Taj heard Reyan shouting something—run, move, don't stop—but the words were distant, underwater, meaningless. His hand reached down automatically, fingers closing around the familiar plastic frames.
One lens was cracked. The other had a fracture running through it like a lightning bolt.
He should run. He knew he should run.
But when he lifted the glasses to put them back on, he froze.
He saw them. His parents. Standing at the end of the hallway. Watching him.
His father wore the same green cardigan he'd worn every winter for the past fifteen years. His mother's sari was the blue one with the gold border, the one she saved for special occasions.
They looked exactly as they had the last time he'd video-called them. Two weeks ago. From Kolkata. Eight hundred kilometres away.
"Beta," his mother called softly. "Why aren't you coming home?"
"You're not real," he said. "You're in Kolkata. You're safe. You're—"
"We came to find you," his father said. His voice was tired. Disappointed. "We've been calling. Why don't you answer?"
Twenty-three times. Taj had called twenty-three times. No answer. No answer. No answer.
"I tried," Taj said, and his voice cracked. "I tried calling. You didn't pick up. I thought—I thought you were—"
"We're right here," his mother said. She smiled, but it was sad. The smile she used to give him when he failed an exam, when he quit medical school, when he told her he was staying in Niraya instead of coming home. "We've been here the whole time."
Behind him, Reyan was shouting. Samir was shouting. The infected were groaning, feet shuffling, getting closer.
Taj didn't hear any of it.
He took a step forward.
"Beta, don't make us wait," his father said. He turned, started walking away. "We're leaving now. If you don't come, we'll go without you."
"Wait!" Taj stumbled forward, leaving his knife on the floor without realizing. "Wait, don't go!"
His mother looked back over her shoulder. "Then stop wasting time. Come home."
They walked around a corner. Disappeared from view.
Taj ran after them.
The emergency exit door slammed open under his shoulder. Morning light—dim, grey, barely there—hit his face like cold water.
His parents were ahead of him, walking across the courtyard toward the street. Not running. Not fleeing. Just walking, like they were taking a morning stroll through the neighborhood.
"Ma! Baba! Wait!"
An infected lurched out from behind an overturned motorcycle. Grey skin. Black veins. Mouth open in that endless groan.
Taj's fist came up without thinking. He'd never punched anyone in his life—never been in a fight, never even raised his voice in anger—but now his knuckles cracked against dead flesh and the infected stumbled back.
Not enough.
It lunged again, and Taj grabbed a broken piece of rebar from the ground and swung. The metal connected with the creature's temple with a wet crunch. It went down.
Taj dropped the rebar. His hands were shaking. His parents were still walking.
"Why won't you wait?" he shouted. "Why won't you stop?"
His mother's voice drifted back, soft and sad. "Because you never listen, beta. You never come when we call."
Another infected. This one faster. Taj grabbed a chunk of concrete and brought it down on its skull. Once. Twice. Three times. Until it stopped moving.
His vision was blurring. Tears or blood or both.
"I'm listening now!" he screamed. "I'm here! I'm coming!"
They were almost at the fence now. The chain-link barrier that separated the courtyard from the footpath beyond.
His father looked back one more time. "Then prove it."
They walked through the fence.
Not around it. Not over it.
Through it.
Like it wasn't there.
Taj stopped running. Stared at the fence. At the gap where his parents had just passed through solid metal like ghosts.
"No," he whispered. "No, you're not—you can't be—"
But he was already climbing. Fingers in the chain-link. Feet finding purchase. Up and over, dropping to the other side in a graceless heap.
The footpath stretched ahead of him. Cracked pavement. Abandoned cars. A fruit cart tipped on its side, rotting mangoes spilled across the ground.
His parents stood twenty meters ahead. Waiting.
"That's it," his mother said. "Come on, beta. Just a little further."
Taj walked toward them. His legs felt numb. His chest hurt. He couldn't remember the last time he'd taken a breath.
"Why did you come here?" he asked. "Why didn't you stay in Kolkata where it's safe?"
"Because you're here," his father said simply. "And we couldn't leave you alone."
"I'm not alone. I have—I have friends. Reyan and Samir and—"
"Do you?" His mother tilted her head. "Or are you just following them because you have nowhere else to go?"
The words hit like a physical blow.
"That's not—that's not true."
"When was the last time you belonged anywhere, Taj?" his father asked. Not unkind. Just honest. "When was the last time someone needed you instead of just tolerating you?"
Taj opened his mouth. Closed it. Couldn't find an answer.
"That's what I thought," his father said. He turned away. Started walking again.
"Wait!" Taj stumbled forward. "Wait, please, I'll do better! I'll come home! I'll—"
He didn't see the infected until it was too late.
It came from the side—from a doorway he'd walked past without checking—and slammed into him with the weight of a freight train. Taj hit the pavement hard, stars exploding across his vision.
The knife. He needed the knife.
But the knife was gone. Dropped back in the hallway. Back with Reyan. Back in the world he'd left behind to chase ghosts.
The infected's face loomed above him. A woman. Middle-aged. Someone's mother. Her mouth opened wide, strings of saliva stretching between yellowed teeth.
Taj tried to push her off. Couldn't. His arms were weak. His body was shutting down. The fear and grief had hollowed him out until there was nothing left.
"I'm sorry," he whispered. Not to the infected. To his parents. To Reyan and Samir. To everyone he'd ever disappointed. "I'm sorry I wasn't better."
More infected were coming. He could hear them. Shuffling feet. Low groans. The sound of death approaching.
He closed his eyes.
This is fine, he thought distantly. This is easier.
Then his mother's voice, sharp and urgent: "TAJ! GET UP!"
His eyes snapped open.
She was there. Right there. His mother, standing over him, her face twisted in fury he'd only seen a handful of times in his life.
"I didn't raise a quitter!" she shouted. "I didn't raise someone who gives up! GET. UP."
Taj's hand found a rock. Loose concrete. Something. He brought it up and smashed it into the infected woman's face. She reeled back, and he kicked her away, scrambled backward on his hands and knees.
Three infected closing in.
He tried to stand. His legs wouldn't work. Knelt there on the pavement like he was praying.
Maybe he was.
His glasses were in his hand. The cracked ones. The broken ones. He gripped them like a lifeline.
"Ma," he said quietly. "Baba. I can't—I can't do this."
His father knelt beside him. Taj could feel him. Real and solid and warm. A hand on his shoulder.
"Yes you can," his father said. "You always could. You just never believed it."
The infected were five meters away. Four. Three.
Taj closed his eyes again. Waiting for teeth. For pain. For the end.
The gunshot cracked the world open.
The infected closest to him jerked, a hole appearing in its temple, and collapsed.
Another shot. Another infected down.
Light flooded Taj's vision.
Not from the gun. From above.
The sun was rising.
Taj looked up, and the morning light hit his eyes full-force—golden and warm and impossibly, impossibly bright after three days of grey hell. It reflected off something metal nearby, a car window maybe, and for a moment the whole world was nothing but light.
He blinked.
His parents were gone.
The street was empty except for infected and a group of strangers with guns and Reyan screaming his name from somewhere.
"HERE! FOOTPATH!" Reyan was already climbing the fence, his daughter clinging to his back.
Samir and Vikram burst through the door seconds later, weapons raised, and all of them converged on the scene as another gunshot finished the last infected near Taj.
NOW (Around 6:37 A.M.)
Taj leaned back, slumping in the seat, hands gripping the cracked glasses like they were the only solid thing in the world. The adrenaline that had carried him was finally leaving him in a heavy, hollow wave.
"You… okay?" Reyan asked, glancing at him from the driver's seat.
Taj swallowed. His throat was raw. "I… I don't know," he admitted. "I saw them. My parents. And then… they were gone."
"Sounds like stress. You've been running nonstop." Vikram muttered.
"No," Taj said sharply, almost defensive. "It wasn't just my mind. It… it felt real." He pressed the glasses to his face, then pulled them away again. "They weren't angry. They were… waiting for me."
Silence fell over the car. Even Samir stopped muttering coordinates from the backseat. Only the engine hummed and the faint groans of distant infected drifted through the streets.
Reyan finally said, "Doesn't matter if it was real or not. What matters is that it got you moving. That's enough for now."
Taj blinked, trying to clear his vision. The city outside was chaos, every corner a potential trap. But inside the car, surrounded by Reyan, Vikram, and Samir, he felt—strangely—somewhere safe, even if just for a moment.
"I… I need to be useful," Taj said, voice quieter. "I can't just sit here."
"You won't be sitting," Samir said. "Not with me around." He gave a small, lopsided grin. "We need every hand we've got. Especially yours."
Taj nodded slowly. The cracked glasses in his hand felt like a lifeline—not just for seeing, but for remembering that he could still do something. Still matter.
The car crept through the streets, abandoned vehicles and debris all around. Every shadow could hide a threat. Every sound could be the end. But for the first time since Niraya fell apart, Taj felt a spark of something besides fear.
He could fight. He could survive. He could keep moving.
Because stopping… stopping wasn't an option.
And then—
"STOP!....
PLEASE, STOP!
Everyone froze.
The voice came from somewhere ahead, sharp and urgent.
"PLEASE!"
The words echoed in the street.
Something—or someone—was out there. And now, no one knew what would happen next.
Then,
the gunshot cracked across the morning air.