The morning sun poured gently over Burbank, California, warming the faded sign of the Amigos Orphanage Foundation. Nestled between quiet residential streets and the bustle of city life, the building stood modest but clean, with age showing in the creases of its paint and the creak of its front gate. From the backyard, the sound of children's laughter floated into the air, carried on the breeze like music from another world.
Inside, the nursery buzzed with soft activity. Toys lay scattered across the padded floor, crayons rolled under tables, and finger-painted masterpieces clung proudly to the walls. A handful of toddlers sat in little circles, scribbling with chubby hands or building uneven towers of wooden blocks.
But in the far corner, away from the colorful chaos, sat a boy.
He was small — just three years old — with long, jet-black hair that curled slightly at the ends and piercing blue eyes that shimmered with an intensity far beyond his years. His name was Noah.
While the other children giggled and played, Noah was still. Perfectly still. His wide eyes were fixed on the ticking wall clock above the door. He didn't blink. His pupils moved in precise, mechanical rhythm with the second hand, as if tracking time down to the millisecond.
He didn't flinch. He didn't speak. He simply watched.
Across the room, five-year-old Ellie tugged on the sleeve of Haley, the nursery's caregiver. Ellie's voice dropped to a whisper as she pointed at the quiet boy.
"He's doing it again," she said. "Just staring…"
Haley followed the girl's gaze. Her face softened.
"It's just Noah, sweetheart," she replied, brushing Ellie's hair aside gently. "He likes to think."
Ellie frowned. "He's weird. Like... like he can see through stuff."
Haley gave a quiet sigh. "That doesn't make him weird, honey. Just special."
Noah finally moved.
He stood and walked to the nearby toy shelf, his bare feet making no sound on the linoleum floor. He reached up and picked out a simple wooden puzzle — a twelve-piece dinosaur design with thick, colorful pieces. Sitting cross-legged on the mat, he began to solve it.
Click. Click. Click.
Within five seconds, the puzzle was complete. Without pause, he flipped each piece over, hiding the picture, and solved it again from the blank shapes alone — backward.
The other children had stopped what they were doing.
"Whoa," one boy breathed, wide-eyed.
"That's freaky," a little girl muttered, clutching her stuffed bunny.
From the doorway, Haley watched with furrowed brows. She didn't say a word, but under her breath, she whispered to herself.
"Three years old…"
Noah didn't notice them. Or maybe he did — and just didn't care.
Down in the basement of the orphanage, the air was thick with dust and memory. The walls were lined with old holiday decorations, forgotten boxes of clothes, and aging supplies no one had touched in years. Wooden steps creaked under Haley's weight as she descended, a flashlight in one hand, her other holding the edge of her cardigan tightly around her shoulders.
She moved slowly, methodically. She wasn't down here on routine duty. She was looking for something.
In the corner, half-covered by a tarp, sat a battered cardboard box labeled Electronics – Broken. She knelt beside it and dug through, pushing aside outdated speakers and tangled cords until her hand landed on cold metal.
The VHS player.
She pulled it out and stared at it. It looked new — cleaner than anything else in the box. That wasn't right. This one had stopped working weeks ago. It hadn't even powered on. Haley remembered clearly the day she told the kids they wouldn't be watching The Brave Little Toaster anymore.
But then Noah had taken it.
He'd asked — politely, in his quiet little way — if he could "see inside it." She thought it was just innocent curiosity, a toddler poking around. So she let him. The next day, it was back on the shelf. She hadn't thought about it since.
Haley plugged it into the wall.
The VHS whirred to life instantly, as if it had never been broken at all.
She stepped back, a chill running up her arms.
"He took it apart last week…" she whispered to herself, almost afraid.
That night, the nursery was quiet.
The storm outside had rolled in after sunset, and with it came the deep rumble of distant thunder. The soft glow of the nightlight flickered with each gust of wind that pressed against the windows.
Noah lay in his crib, small hands folded across his chest, his eyes wide open. Sleep didn't come easily to him. Not because of fear or bad dreams — he simply didn't need it the same way others did. His mind never rested.
Beside him, a small spiral notebook sat open. The pages were filled with crayon — but not the usual messy scribbles of a three-year-old. These were symbols. Diagrams. Numbers. Complex patterns and mathematical equations that defied explanation. Some pages even bore arcane curves, like blueprints or alien language. It looked like madness — or genius.
Thunder cracked again, louder this time.
Noah didn't flinch. He glanced up at the lightbulb above his crib. It buzzed and flickered faintly.
"It's off by 3.16 seconds…" he murmured, his voice almost too quiet to hear. There was no one else awake to listen.
And then — a sudden flash of lightning. A pulse of light filled the room for an instant.
And something… shifted.
There, just beyond the crib, the air shimmered. Only for a moment. A faint ripple — like heat above asphalt — danced across the wall. It was subtle, almost invisible. But Noah saw it.
His eyes tracked it as it moved, graceful and wrong, and then vanished through the wall.
He didn't cry out. Didn't even sit up.
But something deep inside him stirred. A sense of recognition, buried in the fog of a forgotten past.
He didn't understand what it was.
But part of him felt it.
Night cloaked the ancient halls of Kamar-Taj, yet the Sanctum remained aglow — not with firelight, but with the gentle pulse of cosmic energy. In the center of the chamber, a globe of stardust and arcane runes spun silently in mid-air, its surface shimmering with a thousand realities all unfolding at once.
At its base, cross-legged in perfect stillness, sat the Ancient One.
Her bald head gleamed under the soft golden light, her ageless face serene. Robes of flowing silk draped around her like liquid, barely brushing the floor. Around her, the air thrummed — not with sound, but with something deeper. Something beneath sound. The quiet tension of the universe... stirring.
Then — a tremor.
Faint but undeniable. The vibrations kissed the air around her fingertips. Her eyes opened, glowing softly.
A ripple pulsed across the spinning globe — barely visible, a shimmer of disturbance in the grand weave of time. A crack. A spike. A wrinkle in something that should be smooth.
The Ancient One's gaze narrowed.
"A fracture," she whispered, leaning closer. "A child?"
She stood, her robes gliding behind her like mist, and stepped toward the arched window that overlooked the Himalayan peaks. Snow blew silently in the distance, but she was not looking at the world outside. She looked through it — into the layers beneath.
"No sorcerer. No spell," she murmured, more to herself than anyone else. "Just… presence."
She raised her hand toward the globe. It twisted at her command, fragments of time and space blinking into view — flashes of faces, landscapes, alternate possibilities. One thread shivered, almost resisting her gaze. A single point of disruption.
Burbank, California.
A soft knock echoed behind her.
"You felt it too?" came a familiar voice.
Wong entered, his expression grim. His hands were clasped behind his back, but his posture betrayed unease.
"There's a disturbance," the Ancient One said, never turning. "Something sparked the fabric of time. Something… unnatural. But it isn't magic."
Wong stepped closer, peering at the globe with a furrowed brow. "Is it dangerous?"
The Ancient One was silent for a moment. Then she spoke, her voice lower now.
"Unknown. But it doesn't belong."
She turned away from the window.
"I must go."
The storm had passed, leaving the world in a hush that felt too quiet — the kind of silence that pressed against the walls and held its breath. Outside, the sky hung low and clouded, still heavy with the scent of rain and static. The orphanage creaked softly, settling after a long, thunder-rattled night.
Haley sat at the front desk, a cup of lukewarm tea forgotten beside her paperwork. Her pen scratched lazily across a form when the doorbell rang — not loud or insistent, but soft and melodic. A chime that seemed oddly out of place.
She froze for a heartbeat. Then slowly stood and approached the door.
When she opened it, the cool air met her skin, but it was not the breeze that made her shiver.
A woman stood on the doorstep. Bald. Clad in golden-yellow robes that looked untouched by the weather. Her posture was still, her presence quiet — but there was something about her that unnerved the senses. As though reality itself bent politely around her.
Haley blinked.
"Can I help you?" she asked, trying to sound more polite than confused.
The woman gave a single nod.
"Yes. I've come for the boy."
Haley frowned. "I'm sorry — who?"
"The boy who does not belong here," the woman replied, her tone composed, almost gentle. "Blue eyes. Black hair."
Haley stiffened. "Noah?"
She hesitated, instinctively stepping between the stranger and the interior of the building. "Are you… with the county? Some new adoption thing? You should've called—"
The woman tilted her head. "No," she said simply. "He is… something else."
Her voice carried a quiet finality, as if that should have explained everything.
Haley's patience began to fray. "Look, lady, I don't know who you are, but you can't just—"
"She's here."
The voice came from down the hallway. Both women turned.
Noah stood barefoot at the far end of the corridor, a small silhouette in the dim light. His long black hair clung to the sides of his face. His blue eyes — those eerie, ancient eyes — were fixed on the visitor.
There was no fear in his gaze. Only understanding. As though he had been waiting.
"I felt you," he said, voice soft, "before you came."
The woman smiled faintly, as if a theory had just been confirmed.
"You are not what you seem," she said.
Neither moved closer. Yet something passed between them — not words, not thoughts, but something older.
Neither blinked.
Noah responded, with a voice far too steady for a child his age.
"Neither are you."
The hallway held its breath.
Haley knelt beside Noah, her hands gently resting on his small shoulders. His skin was warm, but his eyes were distant — focused not on her, but on something far beyond the walls of the orphanage.
"Noah," she asked softly, "do you know her?"
He shook his head. "No. But I'm supposed to go."
Her throat tightened. "You don't have to, sweetheart. Not if you don't want—"
"I don't belong here," he interrupted, voice level but not unkind. "You've been kind to me… but I don't sleep. I know things. My brain won't stop."
Haley blinked back the sting in her eyes. "You're just gifted, baby. That's all."
Noah's lips curled in something like a smile — but it didn't reach his eyes.
"No. I'm broken… or different. She knows why."
The footsteps of the woman drew closer. The Ancient One knelt beside him, moving with the grace of someone who had walked between worlds. She extended a hand and placed it lightly on Noah's shoulder.
A pulse of golden energy hummed beneath them. A circle of glowing runes swirled to life on the floor — silent, intricate, alive. Arcane light shimmered upward like threads of silk. And yet, Noah showed no fear. Only calm acceptance.
Haley's voice trembled as she looked at the stranger. "Please… promise me he'll be okay."
The Ancient One didn't lie. "I cannot promise anything," she said. "But he will no longer be alone."
Noah turned to Haley one last time. His voice, though small, carried the weight of something older than three years.
"Thank you," he said, "for feeding me."
For a moment, that was all. A boy, a goodbye, and a hallway soaked in unspoken sorrow.
And then — a final flash of golden light.
The runes flared, and the portal swallowed them both.
When the glow faded, the hallway was empty again.
Haley stood alone.
No sound. No lingering shimmer. Just air. Just silence.
Her eyes drifted toward the wall clock at the far end of the hallway.
Its second hand ticked once.
Then the glass shattered.