Serena sat beside her mother and told her everything.
She started from the very beginning, from the moment she woke up in that other world, confused and terrified, surrounded by ruins that didn't belong to any place she knew. She described being separated from the others, the empty streets, the feeling that something was always watching. She spoke about the monster, the cloud, the fear that pressed against her chest every second they were there. She didn't skip a single detail. Not the screams. Not the moments she thought she wouldn't make it back.
Her mother listened without interrupting, her hands clasped tightly together.
When Serena finished one part, her mother spoke too. She told her how long Serena had been gone. How the news spread. How people panicked. How entire neighborhoods woke up to find loved ones missing without explanation. She described the terror of the days that followed, the protests, the sirens, the sudden disappearances that never stopped. She told her how every night she feared that Serena would be gone forever.
"And then," her mother said softly, her eyes shining with tears, "you came back. I don't think you understand how impossible that felt. Seeing you at the door… it was like the world finally let me breathe again."
Serena swallowed hard and continued.
She talked about the moment they realized they might be able to return. How, trapped and desperate, they convinced themselves that belief mattered, that if they truly believed they could go back, the world might bend to their will. That reality itself might listen.
"And somehow," Serena said, forcing a small laugh, "it worked. We believed it… and we came back."
She laughed again, a little louder this time.
But the sound didn't feel right.
The moment the words left her mouth, something twisted in her chest. She stopped mid-laugh, the smile fading from her face. The idea suddenly felt absurd. Wrong. If someone else had told her that story, about belief shaping reality, she would've never accepted it.
She would've called it nonsense.
Yet she had believed it completely back then. All of them had.
Serena felt a chill creep up her spine.
Something was wrong, not just with what they experienced, but with how they had thought. With how easily they had accepted impossible ideas. And it wasn't just them. Everywhere she went, people spoke with the same strange certainty, the same calm explanations for things that shouldn't make sense.
It was as if doubt itself had been dulled.
She looked at her mother, suddenly unsure whether to continue. The room felt quieter than before. Too quiet.
For the first time since coming home, Serena wondered, not what had happened in that other world
but what had followed her back.
Serena's first thought was simple, and horrifying.
By coming back, they hadn't returned alone.
Something had come with them. Something unseen. Something patient.
At first, she tried to push the idea away. Fear could twist memories, reshape conversations, make normal moments feel wrong in hindsight. But the more she thought about it, the worse it became. The fear didn't fade; it sharpened.
Her mind returned to the first moment she had seen Liam again.
Not the relief. Not the familiarity.
The words.
She remembered how he had spoken. Calm. Certain. Too certain.
We figured it out, he had said. We need to stick with each other.
At the time, it had felt comforting. Logical, even. But now, sitting in her childhood home, the memory made her stomach tighten.
And her response…
She closed her eyes.
She had agreed instantly. No hesitation. No questions. She hadn't asked him how they figured it out. She hadn't asked why. She hadn't even asked if he was really himself.
She had just… accepted it.
That wasn't like her.
Normally, she would have questioned everything. She would have pushed back, demanded details, tested the logic until it broke. And Liam, Liam was worse than her when it came to caution. He never trusted easy answers. He always kept distance until he was sure.
But he hadn't.
Instead of being wary, instead of asking who she was or how she survived, he had immediately tried to stay close. As if proximity mattered more than truth. As if separation itself was dangerous.
That didn't make sense.
The realization settled over her slowly, like something crawling beneath her skin.
It wasn't just that something had followed them back.
It was that something had already changed how they thought.
Their instincts. Their doubts. Their sense of self-preservation.
They hadn't been forced. They hadn't been threatened.
They had simply… agreed.
Serena opened her eyes and looked around the room, the furniture, the walls, the familiar objects she had grown up with. Everything looked the same. Everything was the same.
And yet, she felt farther from herself than she ever had in that other world.
If something had returned with them…
Then it wasn't hiding in the shadows.
It was hiding in their choices.
And the most terrifying thought of all crept into her mind:
What if this wasn't the beginning?
What if it had already succeeded, and all that was left was for them to believe everything was fine?