The man had been hiding in the collapsed storefront for days.
Time didn't work right anymore. Just an endless stretch of moments where he tried to remember the basic arithmetic of survival: breathe quietly, move slowly, don't make a sound.
The furniture store had seemed safe at first. Big showroom. Lots of places to hide behind overturned couches and shattered display cases. But safe was relative now. Safe just meant you hadn't died yet.
Before the NIRAYA turned into hell, he'd been in his bakery at dawn. Mixing dough. The smell of yeast and butter. Radio playing old Hindi songs. Arguing with his supplier about flour prices because that's what you did. You argued about normal things.
Now he pressed against a wall with someone else's blood dried stiff on his apron. He couldn't remember whose blood. Couldn't remember their face. Just the sound they'd made when the infected pulled them down.
The kitchen knife in his hands wouldn't stop shaking. Hadn't stopped since he'd grabbed it off the counter on his way out. Big chef's knife. The one he'd used for cutting bread every morning for ten years.
His name is Arjun Bakshi.
Arjun closed his eyes. Tried to remember what fresh bread smelled like. Tried to remember his shop. The morning regulars. Mrs. Kapoor who always bought two croissants. The college student who paid in exact change. Normal people doing normal things.
He tried to remember being human instead of prey.
Then he heard it.
Engines.
His eyes snapped open.
Engines meant cars. Cars meant people. Living people with fuel and direction and maybe—God, please maybe—a way out of this nightmare.
Arjun didn't think about it. Didn't weigh the risks or calculate the odds.
Thinking was for people who had choices. He didn't have choices anymore. Just desperation and the sound of engines getting closer.
He burst from his hiding spot and ran.
His legs pumped. Lungs burned. The knife slipped from his fingers but he didn't stop to grab it. Just ran with his arms waving overhead like a drowning man reaching for air.
"STOP!" The scream tore out of his throat.
"PLEASE STOP!"
Every infected in earshot turned toward the sound.
One of the fast ones locked on immediately. Started running. Hold on, they were fast. Faster than any human should be. Faster than fear.
But Arjun kept his eyes forward. Kept them fixed on the two vehicles pushing through the street ahead—a beat-up sedan with a cracked windshield and a flatbed truck with dented sides. Both moving slow. Careful. Weaving around debris.
The runner was right behind him now. He could hear it. The footsteps. The breathing—wet and wrong and so close. Death was three steps back and gaining.
The cars were twenty meters away.
Fifteen.
Ten.
The runner's fingers brushed his shoulder.
Then the world exploded with sound.
The gunshot cracked across the afternoon like thunder. The runner's head snapped back. Spray of black blood. It dropped mid-stride and skidded across the pavement in a twitching heap.
Arjun stumbled. Nearly went down. Caught himself against an abandoned car and looked back at the body.
Not moving anymore. Actually dead. Finally dead.
The vehicles screeched to a stop in front of him. Doors flew open.
A man jumped out of the sedan. Thin. Exhausted. Blood all over his clothes. Eyes that had seen too much and stopped sleeping. He ran at Arjun.
"Are you bitten?" The man grabbed his arm. Not rough but firm. Checking. "Show me. Arms. Neck. Quickly."
Arjun's brain was still processing. Still catching up with the fact that he wasn't dead.
But something about the man's face was familiar. The shape of it. The eyes.
"Reyan?"
The man blinked. "What?"
"Reyan Sharma. You lived on Laxmi Road. Apartments near the market." The words came out in a rush. "You came to my bakery every morning."
Reyan's eyes widened. "Arjun? The baker? Holy shit, Arjun—"
"NOT THE TIME FOR REUNIONS!" A voice boomed from the truck—military-sounding, commanding. "Get him in the car and MOVE! More of them are coming!"
Reyan grabbed Arjun's arm and pulled. Half-dragged, half-carried him back to the sedan. The back door was already open—Samir had gone to the driver's seat. Hands reached out from inside.
Strong hands. Steady hands that pulled him in and shoved a water bottle at him.
"Drive!" Reyan shouted, jumping into the front passenger seat and pulling a little girl onto his lap. She had a stuffed rabbit. "Samir, drive!"
Arjun looked around. Two people crammed in the back with him. An older man with a gray beard and tired eyes. A young guy with cracked glasses held together with tape.
The sedan lurched forward. Tires squealing against asphalt.
Arjun twisted to look out the back window. More infected were coming. Drawn by the noise. The gunshot. His screaming. Too many to count. A wave of them.
The truck followed close behind. Two vehicles racing through empty streets. Past burning buildings. Past overturned cars. Past bodies that might or might not be dead.
"Thank you," Arjun said. His whole body was shaking. "God. Thank you."
Arjun looked down at the water bottle in his hands. It was shaking. His whole body was shaking.
But for the first time since the world ended, Arjun felt something other than terror.
Hope.
Small. Fragile. Probably stupid.
But hope.
He held onto that water bottle and watched the burning city pass by the window and held onto hope like his life depended on it.
Because it did.