"How's it going?"
A voice echoes in the dark, not loud, but impossible to ignore.
He stands alone beneath a galaxy of stars, a figure that seems almost human, but not quite. His skin shifts like smoke, his eyes... are they yellow? Blue? Green? You can't tell. Maybe they're every color at once. Or maybe none at all.
"I'm the narrator," he says with a smile that stretches past comfort, "and I'm here to tell you a little story."
Behind him, stars pulse like heartbeats.
"It's about a boy named Arin. In this great wide cosmos, Arin is searching for something every man dreams of—"
Purpose?
Power?
Love?
Money?
The narrator shrugs. "That depends on how you see him."
I said that btw....hehe
He steps back, and the stars begin to move.'
I am a smooth criminal...
"Let's begin with his origin."
Arin was never a quiet child. Not troublesome, but stubborn. Honest in a way that didn't leave space for comfort. He said things others wouldn't dare to. He asked questions that made adults shift uncomfortably. Not because he wanted to be difficult — it's just who he was.
But that honesty, that defiance of social filters, would carve his path through some of the harshest lessons life could throw.
And as far as families go, his had... too much going on.
When Arin was just three years old, the world around him cracked open.His father, Rajiv, got into a land dispute with a group of men who built a structure illegally on his family's land. What started as heated talks turned violent. A fight broke out.
Rajiv, a soldier in the army, stood his ground. But the men on the other side knew the law — or at least how to bend it. They were from a socially protected class and could use the law against him.
If an FIR was filed, Rajiv would lose everything: his career, his honor, his uniform.So he did the only thing he could. He ran.
The conflict almost triggered communal violence in the area. A special taskforce was sent to track anyone connected. It wasn't safe. Rajiv went into hiding.
Arin didn't understand any of it. But he saw everything.
He saw his mother cry. He saw her beg neighbors for help while holding his newborn sister. He saw his father disappear. And worst of all, he saw his own grandparents turn away — abandoning their son when he needed them most.
The land that caused the chaos? It was theirs.
Arin didn't know what betrayal was. But he felt it. And children... they never forget.
For safety, Arin's mother moved with him and his baby sister to a village nearby. No FIR had been filed, but they took no chances. Rajiv didn't visit. Didn't call much. Barely took any leave.
They started over. Again.
Life in the new town was tough.
Arin was energetic, curious but painfully shy. The kind of boy who lit up around cartoons but dimmed in front of strangers.He tried making friends in preschool and kindergarten, and for a while, he had some. But they moved again this time to the other edge of the city after his maternal grandfather relocated.
And that's when the loneliness hit.
The children in the new neighborhood were older three, sometimes four grades ahead. Arin didn't fit in. So he turned inward.
His closest companions became his sister and imagination. They'd pretend to be superheroes.
Ben 10 was his favorite. He'd tie belts to his wrist and declare himself the savior of the world.
In his mind, he wasn't just a boy anymore. He was something greater.
By the time Arin turned six, he'd only seen his father twice. There was no real bond. Just memories wrapped in silence.
His mother was exhausted. Caring for two children on her own left little room for comfort. At first, she picked Arin up from school. But once he turned five, that changed. She had to manage his sister's schedule, too.
His grandfather worked at the same school, but he didn't have the time to take Arin along. Thankfully, a senior student offered to help taking Arin to and from school each day.
It helped. A little.
Still, every afternoon, Arin would watch the other kids pile into vans, laughing with their parents.He walked home quietly.Sad but silent.Because he knew. Deep down, he knew his mother was doing her best. And he never blamed her.
His mother saw him clearly: stubborn, curious, and clever. One day, Arin's grandfather caught him flipping through a 4th-grade math book while still in kindergarten. To everyone's surprise, he solved parts of it.
That's when his mother's dream began to form.
She wanted him to be something powerful. A high-ranking civil servant. Someone who could never be powerless again, not like she was when her husband had to run. Not like she felt when the neighbors turned cold.
But dreams aren't always shared. Sometimes, they're projected.
She saw what he could be, not what he wanted to be.
Arin had to mature early. There wasn't a choice. By eight, he understood romance, pain, betrayal, and longing better than most teens. Dramas and movies raised him just as much as people did. He learned how to read a person by watching how they looked away.
He stayed quiet. Introverted. Invisible, even.
But beneath the calm, something boiled.
A rage.
Not loud.
Not wild.
But deep, heavy.
It sat in him like stone. It came from things he couldn't name, the things he saw, the things no one talked about. It showed up in his silence. In the bad thoughts he never shared. In the dreams, he wasn't sure where his.
Anyways, see ya later, fellow reader...
Now get out!!
to the next chapter.