Humans are extraordinary creatures. We possess an almost uncanny ability to adapt to trauma, suffering, pain—any hardship life throws at us. It is this very resilience that has allowed us to rise to the top of the world. We may not match the cheetah's blistering speed, the elephant's raw strength, or the snake's lethal venom, yet we dominate. But is this dominance truly stable? I sometimes wonder: what if, by some twist of fate, another species—or being—rose to supplant us? What kind of world would emerge then?
…Fu fu… Hey, wakey-wakey.
A soft voice pulled me awake.
"Huh… ah… what… ouch…" I muttered, clutching my throbbing head. A sharp, pulsing pain radiated behind my eyes.
"Oh, what happened to you, honey? Did you have a bad dream or something?"
I lifted my gaze toward the voice. A woman stood there—warm, concerned, maternal. My mother.
Wait. She's my mother.
The words slipped out loud before I could stop them.
"Oh, honey, what's gotten into you? Of course I'm your mother. Who else would I be?" She smiled gently, a touch of amusement in her eyes. "Jeez, you're acting strange today. We'll talk this evening, okay? Now get ready for school."
With that, she left the room.
The moment the door clicked shut, I scanned my surroundings. The space felt strangely familiar… yet wrong. This wasn't my room. The last clear memory I had was the incident with my sister—no, my stepsister. And now, somehow, I was here.
A cold, uneasy sensation curled in my chest—not quite fear, but something close.
My body, however, didn't share the emotion. It moved on its own. Legs swung off the bed. Feet touched the floor. I tried to resist, to seize control, but it was useless—like puppeteering a body that refused to acknowledge me.
I walked—it walked—toward the full-length mirror.
And then I saw her.
A girl stared back. Pale as fresh snow. Long, curling white hair cascaded over delicate shoulders. Lashes stark white framed eyes that burned with an eerie beauty: red, dominant and molten, threaded with faint streaks of blue. Beautiful. Unnaturally so.
My gaze dropped.
She wore only underwear.
"No… no… no…" I whispered, mortified. "Why is she…?"
But the body didn't blush. Didn't flinch. It simply continued—calm, mechanical—dressing for school as though nothing was wrong.
One hour later I found myself stepping out of the house, school bag slung over one shoulder.
The air felt heavy. Ominous.
I glanced around. The walls shimmered. Objects flickered like bad video footage.
The sky above fractured into pixelated shards. Pain exploded behind my temples—worse than before, worse than the college gate.
My thoughts scattered.Everything tilted.
Then—blackness.
…
Clunk. Clunk. Ting. Ting. Tap-tap-tap.
I opened my eyes to a familiar ceiling.
My ceiling.
My room.
"Oh god… I'm back," I breathed, bolting upright. "It was just a dream. Just a stupid, vivid dream."
I stumbled to the mirror.
Same face. Same messy hair. Same tired eyes. Sushant. Me.
Relief flooded through me so hard my knees nearly buckled.
The wall clock read 4:45.
AM this time.
I stared at the numbers, pulse hammering. In the dream it had been PM. Same digits. Different world.
I shook my head hard. "Chill, Sushant. It's just a dream. Calm down. You need coffee."
I shuffled to the kitchen, brewed a strong black, added sugar, cradled the hot mug like a lifeline, and headed back toward my room—determined to shake off the lingering dread. Fatigue. That's all it was. Overwork. Stress. Nothing more.
I crossed the threshold.
Blinked.
The room vanished.
Sunlight hit my face. Warm concrete under my feet. The sharp smell of exhaust and street food. People—enormous people—strode past, towering over me like living buildings.
The coffee scalded my hand. Real heat. Real weight.
I staggered backward, hoping—praying—to feel my bedroom doorframe behind me.
Instead, my spine met solid wall.
I pressed both palms against it.
Cold brick. Unyielding.
"Oh… huh… what… WHAT THE HELL?!"
The scream tore out of me, raw and helpless.
This wasn't a dream.
The air was too real. The heat too real. The towering strangers too real.
And I was trapped inside someone else's body, in someone else's world, with no idea how I'd gotten here—or how to get back.