2 The End Ⅰ

My day was a dull one, just like every other day. It's not as if I lead a miserable life, I have adventures just like the other guy, but, I don't seem to enjoy the minor delicacies of life as much as others do. My family is sweet and caring, my friends are just as nice, and I go to the second-best university in the state. You know what, I can feel people reading this and judging me as I enjoy a life of comfort and am still rambling about how dull days are a regular anomaly for me. I always have this feeling, to not feel happy for no reason and I would barely even care to talk about myself to anyone. I just feel very scared all the time.

Fear is one of the factors that has always put a limitation on my confidence and personality. Like any other regular day, I was heading to the university. It was about 20 minutes away from my dorm. I was waiting at the bus stop for my friend. He came a bit late as usual. "Top of the morning to you mate!" he said. "Hey man, how's everything?" I asked in response. Joab was a very nice and gentle person. In times where I needed help, he helped me as much as he could to the best of his limit. For a brief moment, I got lost in the nostalgia of those times and felt some joy remembering all of those issues we tackled together. I was called back from my lucid state by a light hit that landed behind my head. I realized that it was Joab who hit me. He said, "Hey, wake up man, we're here, time to roll''. But I was pretty sure I was just daydreaming for a few seconds. I was pretty confused. "When did I sleep?". He told me that when we entered the bus I had fallen asleep and he didn't want to disturb me. I nodded but still wasn't very clear about what was happening. We got off the bus and headed towards the main building.

On the way, I saw a girl. I had never seen her until now. I realized that she might be a new student. She was extremely pretty and seemed very nice as she was interacting with the other students. I wanted to meet her too, but my fears kicked in and it immediately made me think that I would look like a creep if I were to just go and introduce myself to her out of nowhere. The next moment a quick jab hit my stomach, and I saw a very weird smile on Joab's face. He teased me by saying "Oh, looks like you really are getting older." These words of his were followed by a series of intimidating eyebrow movements. I had a blush on my face. Then I started feeling awfully drowsy, which then cleared my doubt about me sleeping earlier. I told Joab that I would meet him directly at the lecture hall and that I had to wash my face in the washroom.

I was feeling awfully sleepy. I washed my face and started walking back towards the hall. There was a pretty big commotion when I got out. Suddenly one of the people from there noticed me, rushed towards me and started questioning me about where I had been all this time. Joab appeared over there and then hugged me. Tears were flowing through his eyes. At this point, I had absolutely no context to what was going on. I was then told that I had been missing for three whole days. I was so confused now that my brain stopped processing all the information and I went completely blank. When my senses resumed, I remembered something. I realized that I had started daydreaming on the bus stand after I greeted Joab back and didn't even get on the bus. I was supposedly woken up by Joab after we reached, I might've boarded the bus in my partial lucidity. I was pretty damn sure, I had those nostalgic thoughts for merely a few seconds. But the question is why don't I remember what happened in between and even if I did, how was this phenomenon occurring.

I was then thoroughly being questioned, and it continued for around 7 minutes. Exactly a few moments later a soft breeze came by. But we were indoors, and all windows were closed. What started with a small breeze rapidly started turning into turbulence, and then some sort of vortex, It became so much so that it caused havoc inside. Furniture was breaking, people were falling, crashing, and getting badly injured. Everyone was in a state of confusion as something vicious had taken us by surprise. The wind stopped and a figure slowly started to materialize out of thin air. I closed my eyes, then I opened it. I saw dust everywhere around me.

Everyone inside a certain radius, vapourised. Joab was luckily further away, but many people weren't, all of these people just disappeared. I looked the other way and some sort of manifestation approached me. Just then Joab raged towards it with a broken stick that he found near him. Just when he reached a certain distance from the figure, he was back at his position from where he started before a few seconds. Three seconds to be precise. He raged again and the same thing happened. It was as if he was being reset as if he was a part of an endless loop. Before he could try again, something appeared out of nowhere and started moving awfully fast towards our little hellish spawn, and it slid through it. It was her, the new student. I felt everything slow down as if everything was being played in slow motion.

Every 0.25 seconds I felt things slow down more than the previous 0.25 seconds. I could somehow understand exactly how much time it took for my surroundings to get slower accurate right up to the millisecond. I just understood it simply without reason. In the coming 3.75 seconds, time completely came to a halt. I looked at the new student and even before I thought I would ask what was going on, she said "There is no time to waste, we have to get going, somewhere far enough from people." She grabbed my hand and forced me to go with her. "What about the others, what will happen to them?". She replied, "Their fate has been sealed, They all will die. Just don't blink for the next 5 seconds". "What!?, Why can't they be saved? I said. "Be grateful that you don't have to see them die" she replied. I couldn't control my tears and rubbed my eyes.

The next thing I saw was devastating. Everyone else had been vaporized just like the others. Even Joab. Before I could say anything, The girl said "I told you not to blink, now you have seen them all die. Before anything else bad happens we have to escape." I started following her but I was full of guilt and I was in shock, but in a few seconds we were on some mountain. Only a few seconds passed, but this time I couldn't understand how much time exactly had passed for us to reach the mountains. "That was a long run, probably my longest run yet. We have to rest here for the next 3 hours until the flow of time begins again.". "Flow of time?!?" I said. "Oh, You are a first-timer huh? Right. You'll know in some time." I was still feeling guilty; I didn't reply, just nodded in agreement.