The first sign that I wasn't alone came from a mistake that wasn't mine.
It happened at 8:32 a.m., the morning after my first intervention.
I was on the bus, standing near the back, watching the route map flicker as the vehicle rolled through traffic. The display updated every few seconds, recalculating arrival times based on speed and congestion.
I knew that system.
I had helped audit a similar one years ago.
When the map froze, I noticed immediately.
The estimated arrival time for the next stop read 08:35.
We were already slowing down.
The doors opened.
People stepped off.
The clock on the bus ticked to 08:36.
The display didn't change.
One second passed.
Then another.
Then the screen refreshed.
Next stop: 08:34.
Backwards.
A ripple of murmurs passed through the passengers. Someone laughed, assuming it was a glitch. The driver frowned but said nothing, tapping the console once before pulling away.
I felt my pulse steady instead of spike.
This wasn't my intervention.
I hadn't been testing. I hadn't been watching closely. I hadn't done anything.
And yet, the system corrected itself.
Too cleanly.
At work, the feeling followed me.
A coworker stopped mid-sentence, blinking in confusion.
"Did I already tell you this?" she asked.
"No," I said, automatically.
She nodded, relieved, and continued.
But she had.
Word for word.
At 11:47 a.m., my phone vibrated.
A new message.
Different number.
"You saw it too, didn't you?"
I stared at the screen.
The phrasing was cautious. Not accusatory. Not instructive.
Tentative.
I typed back slowly.
"Saw what?"
The reply came after a pause—long enough to feel deliberate.
"The correction. Not yours."
That was enough.
I didn't ask how they got my number. I didn't ask who they were. Those questions felt… premature.
Instead, I asked the only thing that mattered.
"Where?"
Three dots appeared.
Disappeared.
Reappeared.
"Not here. Not yet."
Another message followed immediately.
"You're watching too closely."
My stomach tightened.
"So are you."
This time, the response was instant.
"Not by choice."
The rest of the day passed in fragments. Small irregularities. Minor lapses. All of them corrected before anyone could react—except me.
Except whoever had just contacted me.
At 7:10 p.m., I received a final message.
"Rule one: if it fixes itself while you're not looking, someone else triggered it."
"Rule two: don't try to find them."
I locked the phone and stared out the window as the city blurred past. Streetlights flicked on in uneven patterns, then smoothed into perfect synchronization a heartbeat later.
Someone else was touching the system.
Not observing.
Not interfering.
Triggering.
And if the rules were already being shared, then this wasn't a private anomaly anymore.
It was a network.
I went to bed that night for the first time since it began.
Sleep came quickly.
Too quickly.
As I drifted off, a single thought surfaced—uninvited and heavy.
If there were others like me…
Then eventually, one of us would push too far.