Darshan stood frozen, staring in absolute disbelief as chandu grabbed his plate and casually walked past him.
"what did i just see?" his mind reeled. "is this an illusion.... or what?!"
what did chandu with his eyes, watching his every movement analyzing every single word.
"everything... it's happening exactly the way it did in that video. his dialogue, his expressions, not a single detail has changed. what the hell is going on here? where are we?"
cold dread began to tighten around darshan's heart.
as he mechanically scooped food onto his own plate, his thoughts raced frantically.
"are we trapped somewhere? is this a dream? no, it feels too vivid to be a nightmare. are we stuck inside some kind of massive hallucination?"
shaking, he walked over and sat down at the dinner table.
across from him, chandu was laughing and chatting animatedly with the other guys. darshan couldn't focus on the conversation. he was hyper-fixed on everything around them.
suddenly, the face of one of the students talking to chandu went completely haywire.
for a terrifying split second, the boy's face glitched! his features tearing apart like a corrupted digital file and his disorted eyes locked dead onto darshan.
a moment later, the glitch snapped back to a normal, and the boy resumed talking as if nothing had happened.
darshan's heart hammered violently against his ribs.
"no. this is definately a trap. i have to tell chandu. we need to get out of here right now, or we are going to be stuck in this loop forever."
"hey darshan," chandu broke in, tilting his head. "what's wrong with you?"
gowtham smirked from the side. "bro is always spaced out over something lately!"
as gowtham spoke, his face glitched too. for a brief, agonizing beat, his expression transformed into a menacing, hollow glare aimed straight at darshan.
darshan's throat went completely dry.
"their faces.... everyone here... there's something horribly wrong with them." his brain was firing on all cylinders, screaming at him to flee. "i have to make chandu understand. no matter what."
10:30PM.
Back in room 7, the atmosphere was suffocatingly heavy. darshan finally closed the distance between their beds and sat near chandu.
"chandu, listen to me carefully. i need to tell you something really importent."
chandu didn't look up from his phone. "yeah, bro? what's up?"
"chandu, look at me," darshan pleaded, his voice trembling. "we are trapped somewhere. everything happening here is twisted. it's not right."
chandu stopped scrolling, looking confused. "trapped? what do you mean?"
"this isn't the real world! we are trapped in some unknown, bizarre place!"
chandu stared at darshan for a long, silent moment then, he burst into a loud, mocking laugh.
"what the hell are you talking about, man? did you lose a bolt in your head or what? there's no such thing. go to sleep."
"no, chandu, you don't understand! just listen to me-"
"dude, it's late," chandu interrepted, waving him off. "don't creep me out with all this 'trapped' nonsense. just go to bed. everything is fine."
darshan let out heavy, defeated sigh. he dragged himself back to his mattress, his stomach churning with anxiety.
beside him, chandu was still chuckeling, mindlessly scrolling through reels.
darshan stared at him, a mixture of profound dread and utter helplessness washing over him.
the night dragged on. darshan couldn't sleep.
the ticking of the clock felt agonizingly loud in the dead silence.
TICK. TICK. TICK.
he pulled out his phone to check the time. 12:42AM.
eventually, exhaustion won, and darshan drifted into a tense, shollow sleep.
2:00 AM.
true to the timeline, chandu stood up and walked out of the room to use the restroom.
and right on cue, a massive, towering presence materialized in the shadows behind him.
inside the dark room, darshan jolted awake.
"AAAAAHH!!"
chandu's blood-curdling scream echoed from the corridor.
darshan bolted upright. the bedroom door was flung wide open. he grabbed his phone: 2:17AM.
sprinting out of the room, darshan saw it, the pitch-black silhouette was looming in the distant corridor, its gaze fixed on chandu.
chandu had run up dog-legged staircase to see who was lurking, and just as the entity lunged forward to throw him down, chandu shrieked and bolted back down the steps.
"chandu!!" darshan roared, sprinting toward him.
chandu broke through the hostel entrance, gasping for breath in the courtyard. darshan slammed into him, grabbing his shoulders.
behind them, the 7 foot silhouette stood at the threshold of the corridor. it braced itself, preparing to launch into a terrifying, unnatural sprint straight toward them.
"we have to run! now!" darshan screamed.
together, they bolted away from the hostel, tearing into the dark night.
once they had put some distance between themselves and the building, chandu instinctively slowed down to look back exactly like he did in the video.
"chandu, don't stop! keep moving!" darshan yelled, pulling at his arm.
suddenly, a horde of black silahouette began pouring out from the hostel doors, flooding the streets.
"chandu, run!"
darshan gripped chandu's hand tightly, dragging him forward.
"is there an escape route? any alleyway? any side street?!" darshan's eyes darted wildly in the dark. "how do we break out of this? just give me a way out!"
they burst into the city center, their feet pounding against the pavement.
but chandu's lungs were burning. the sheer exhaustion was cathing up to him. he slowed to a halt, gasping for air.
"chandu... come on... we need to find an exit... a way out of this world.."
chandu collapsed onto the sidewalk, completely spent. "macha... i can't. i can't do it anymore." he was hyper ventilating, unable to take another step.
through the darkness, the swarm of black silhouettes closed in on them, moving with terrifying speed.
"chandu, get up! they're coming right for us! we have to fight through this, we have to escape!"
but chandu remained frozen on the ground, completely paralyzed.
as the creatures swarmed them, the surrounding world began to lose its light.
the entire city center started turning pitch black, dissolving into an abyss of pure darkness. terror distoted darshan's face.
"what do i do? what can i do?!"
as the shadows lunged forward to consume them entirely, darshan tightly shut his eyes, bracing for the end.
CRACK!!!
the sharp, deafending sound of shattering glass echoed through the void.
suddenly, a brilliant, piercing blue light cut through the darkness, washing over darshan and chandu.
the suffocating pressure vanished.
slowly, darshan opened his eyes. he lifted his head, squinting against the neon glow.
standing directly in front of them, bathed in the radient blue light, was tall, imposing figure.
TO BE CONTINUED.....
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