Zander stepped out of the Google office like he'd just crawled out of a bad dream. The kind where everything is blurry, your head feels like a balloon, and your soul is just… tired. Not in a poetic way. In a literal "my spine is filing a complaint against me" way.
The hallway lights buzzed overhead, flickering like they were exhausted too. Honestly? Same. He pinched the bridge of his nose and muttered under his breath,
"God, it's a pain in the arse."
A couple employees gave him a weird look as they passed, but he didn't care. He wasn't trying to impress anyone. He was just trying to survive this internship without dissolving into dust.
As he pushed through the glass exit doors, San Francisco's late-evening air slapped him in the face. Cold enough to wake him up, not cold enough to justify this kind of suffering. The city lights were glowing, headlights streaking, people rushing everywhere like their lives were a speedrun.
Zander stood at the curb, backpack slung over one shoulder, quietly contemplating why he still put up with this. Being ageless sounded cool on paper, but honestly? It made everything worse. He could work himself to death and still not die. You don't get to drop out of the race when your lifespan refuses to hit the finish line.
He raised a hand to flag down a taxi.
A yellow cab zipped past.
Then another.
Then another.
He blinked.
Bro. What was this, a challenge?
He waved harder. A cab slowed down like it was considering him — then swerved away like it changed its mind. He groaned.
"Yo, what did I do?? Did I commit some vibe violation?"
The universe did not answer.
A montage unfolded — the kind that would be funny if it wasn't happening to him.
Zander waving desperately. Taxi zooms past.
Zander is running a few steps trying to catch one. Driver shakes head.
Someone ELSE gets a taxi right next to him while he stands there like a clown.
Now Zander is sighing from his soul.
He even tried that thing where you stand all confident and casual, pretending you're not desperate. Didn't work. They ignored him like he was a glitch in real life.
Finally — FINALLY — after what felt like fifteen years (it was eight minutes), a taxi slowed down beside him. The brakes hissed like a snake about to bite him, but honestly at this point he would've let it.
The door unlocked with a click.
Zander exhaled in pure relief.
"Bless you," he muttered as he slid inside.
The driver, an older guy with tired eyes and a neon-blue air freshener hanging from the mirror, nodded like he understood every struggle Zander had ever faced.
"Tough day?" the driver asked.
Zander let out a tired laugh. "Dude, it's been a whole season."
The taxi pulled up to a building that was somehow both decent-looking and deeply depressing at the same time. Not bad enough to complain. Not nice enough to brag. Just… there. Existing. Like it gave up trying to impress people around 2006.
Zander hopped out, paid the driver, and trudged toward the entrance. His backpack thumped against his hip with every step. He felt like a zombie returning to its grave.
He reached his apartment door — a faded teal thing with a metal handle that was definitely older than him emotionally, and maybe physically too.
He dug around his pocket for the keys.
Found gum wrappers.
Then headphones.
Then a receipt from three weeks ago.
Then finally — the keys.
Which immediately slipped from his hand.
"Bro, come on," he whispered as he bent down to pick them up.
He tried the lock.
It didn't turn.
He tried again. Nothing.
He jiggled it.
The lock jiggled back, out of pure spite.
"Don't start with me," he muttered. "I'm tired. I'm starving."
The lock clearly didn't care. It stayed firm, stiff, stubborn like it was guarding the gates of heaven.
He tried again, harder this time.
Nothing.
He pressed his forehead against the door. "Why are you like this?"
He took a step back, inhaled, exhaled, and tried to relax like he was doing a meditation exercise.
He inserted the key once more.
The lock twisted halfway.
He froze. He didn't dare breathe.
God forbid he spooked it.
He gently turned it again.
It stuck.
"Bro I swear—"
He turned it the opposite way.
It clicked.
Then froze again.
He groaned so loud his neighbor probably heard.
"Why do you hate me? What did I do to you? Is this payback for slamming you open last week? I apologized, didn't I??"
He jiggled it again — and the lock finally gave up and snapped open like it was just tired of arguing.
Zander pushed the door with the last bit of energy he had left.
It creaked open dramatically, which honestly matched his life.
"Thanks," he muttered sarcastically to the door as he stepped inside.
The moment he entered, he kicked off his shoes and threw his backpack into the nearest couch, where it bounced once and toppled to the floor.
He didn't even care.
He dropped onto the couch and let out a noise that was somewhere between a sigh, groan, and small death.
He lay there for a moment, staring at the ceiling with the blankness of someone rethinking their entire career path.
His stomach growled.
"Alright, alright," he muttered. "I hear you."
He pushed himself up and headed for the kitchen — which was basically a sink, stove, and counter shoved together.
He opened the freezer.
A cold blast smacked him in the face as he found the pack of frozen dumplings he bought three days ago. They were rock hard. Like, weapon-level hard. If someone broke into his apartment right now, he could probably use them as self-defense.
He tore the bag open and dumped them into a bowl. They clattered like stones.
He stared at them for a second.
"Same energy," he murmured, poking one of them with a fork.
He filled the bowl with warm water and set it aside to defrost.
For a moment, he just stood there, leaning on the counter, zoning out like an NPC running on one brain cell.
The microwave hummed in the background. The apartment was quiet except for the fridge making that little dying animal noise it did sometimes.
After a few minutes, he drained the water and dumped the dumplings into a pan. Oil sizzled and popped instantly, and one droplet actually jumped and hit his hand.
"Ow! Dude— okay chill—"
He pulled his hand back, shook it out, then kept cooking anyway because pain didn't stop him anymore. Pain was just part of the ritual at this point.
The dumplings crackled and browned slowly. Zander stood over the stove, flipping them, watching steam rise, feeling… weirdly at peace. Cooking was one of the only normal things in his life. No immortality nonsense. No supernatural anomalies. No Hydro disappearing into cosmic nonsense without warning.
Just… food.
Food he made.
Food he could control.
Steam fogged up his glasses slightly. He pushed them up with his knuckle, then sprinkled soy sauce into the pan. The sizzle was loud, dramatic, borderline violent.
He plated the dumplings and moved to the small dining table — really just a repurposed desk but whatever — and sat down.
The first bite was way too hot.
He winced, fanned his mouth, and muttered, "AGH—HOT, HOT, HOT."
But after that? The food actually hit. Warm. Filling. Comforting in a low-key way.
He ate slowly, letting the silence settle around him.
For a moment, he almost felt normal.
Almost.
Zander leaned back into his cheap dining chair, stomach finally settling after stuffing himself full of dumplings that were honestly way too hot but still hit the spot. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, tossed the fork into the sink, and let out a long, exhausted sigh — the kind that carried a hundred unspoken complaints.
He shuffled toward the couch, plopped down, and reached for the TV remote lying between the cushions like it was hiding from him. "Gotcha," he muttered as his fingers finally brushed it.
His thumb hovered over the power button — but before he could press anything, he felt something.
A vibration.
At first, it was so soft he thought it was just his apartment's ancient refrigerator having another meltdown. But then it grew. He sat up straighter. The floorboards trembled. His wall shelves rattled. His window shivered in its frame.
"What the—?"
Then the whole world shook.
Not like an earthquake. Earthquakes had patterns. They had a rhythm, some kind of sense to them — chaos, but familiar chaos.
This? This felt like the planet itself had glitched.
His lamp flickered violently.
His couch trembled under him.
His TV made a high-pitched whining noise like it was about to burst.
And then —
LIGHT.
A blinding, searing white light blasted across the sky so hard that even with his windows closed, the entire room lit up like someone detonated a star outside.
Zander stumbled to his feet, shielding his eyes. It wasn't heat. It wasn't destructive. It wasn't radiation or flame or anything you'd associate with "everyone's about to die."
It was just — light.
Pure white. Endless. Expanding across the horizon like someone clicked "add brightness" on reality.
"What the hell?!" Zander shouted, stumbling toward the window.
His heart hammered. His brain raced. Not again. Not like this. Not on a Thursday night when he had work in the morning.
He pressed his hand against the cold glass as the brightness slowly — painfully slowly — faded.
When it finally dimmed, the silence hit him first. Heavy. Thick. Like the world was holding its breath.
He pulled the window open.
And froze.
The world outside was not… the same.
Buildings were still there. People were still screaming, confused, pointing at the sky, running into the streets — the usual reaction to something insane. But the atmosphere? The skyline? The entire texture of reality felt wrong.
Colors were off. The air shimmered. The distant horizon bent subtly, like the curvature of Earth had shifted overnight.
And then he saw it.
Walking down the sidewalk was…
a fox.
But like, standing.
Walking upright.
Wearing a hoodie.
Scrolling on a phone.
Not bothered at all.
Behind it, a 7-foot bull-looking dude crossed the street like he was doing grocery errands.
A rabbit woman with a backpack ran past a crowd of humans who were absolutely losing their minds.
Zander's jaw slacked.
He blinked once.
Twice.
"Holy…" he whispered, feeling his soul leave his body, do a U-turn, and come back wearing sunglasses.
This wasn't hallucination. He knew hallucinations. This was way too detailed. This was too structured, too consistent. The world didn't just… fill itself with anthropomorphic animals for fun.
He leaned halfway out the window like he was checking if someone pranked him.
Nope.
Everything was real.
A neon blue sky pulsed once overhead, like a heartbeat in the clouds, sending shockwaves of color rippling across the atmosphere.
Zander muttered, half in awe, half in pure exhausted disappointment, "Oh my god, this is The Merge… Hydro told me about this. He freaking told me. And I thought he was messing around."
He slammed the window shut.
Reality was clearly broken, and he was too tired to emotionally process that while barefoot.
He grabbed the remote again with shaking fingers.
Click.
The TV flickered on — but instead of some comedy show or gaming stream, every channel was a mess of emergency broadcasts. Reporters yelling. Scientists panicking. Anchormen trying not to scream on live TV.
He flipped through channels, watching chaos unfold in montage fashion:
— A news reporter in New York desperately trying to maintain professionalism while a giant humanoid raccoon bought a pretzel from a street vendor behind her.
— A helicopter shot of Paris where half the sky looked like Earth, and the other half looked like a fantasy painting that gained consciousness.
— A school in Tokyo where anime-looking characters and normal kids were screaming, everyone unsure who was real and who was "fiction made real."
— A group of penguin soldiers (yes, penguins) marching down an Australian beach with laser rifles.
— A Brazilian beach where mermaids were very clearly confused AND annoyed that the ocean suddenly changed color.
Zander's hand covered his mouth. He wanted to laugh hysterically. Or faint. Or both.
"This day couldn't get any… better?" he said out loud, the absurdity forcing him into dark humor mode.
He leaned back, staring at the screen like someone who just realized the universe is not only broken — it's trolling him.
"I swear this world hates me personally," he muttered.
He clicked again.
Now the broadcast showed something more professional — NASA's official emergency briefing. Two familiar faces appeared on the screen:
Dr. Aisha Vance
and
Engineer Ravi Patel.
The two had been on TV multiple times — they were the same pair who analyzed cosmic anomalies, wormholes, time fractures, and eventually the early signs of the Merge.
Dr. Vance, poised, sharp-eyed, wearing a navy blazer despite the chaos around her, stepped forward to the mic. Ravi stood beside her, visibly stressed, holding three tablets and switching between them like he was playing speed chess with the universe.
The room behind them was crowded with scientists yelling jargon, diagrams flashing on screens, and a whole bunch of people who definitely looked like they hadn't slept in two days.
Zander leaned closer to the TV.
Aisha began speaking, voice steady — almost too steady:
"To the citizens of Earth… what we experienced moments ago was not an attack, nor was it an extinction event. You are safe. No casualties have been reported."
Zander snorted. "That's a damn miracle."
Aisha continued:
"What we are witnessing is a dimensional convergence event. We have confirmed: our Earth has merged with another parallel Earth… significantly larger than ours."
Ravi stepped in, tapping his tablet.
"To put it in perspective," he said, "the combined planetary mass now exceeds even Jupiter. Yet gravitational collapse did not occur. This indicates the new planet — what we are calling the 'Unified Sphere' — is supported by unknown external stabilizing forces."
Zander blinked. "Bro, what?"
Aisha switched the visual screen behind her: a simulation of two worlds colliding but then seamlessly blending like puzzle pieces adjusting until they fit.
"This was not a natural phenomenon," she added. "Something — or someone — intentionally altered cosmic law to make this possible."
Zander's heart dropped.
Hydro.
It wasn't him. Not this time. But he definitely knew about it. And he definitely didn't warn Zander. Of course.
Aisha kept explaining, her voice steady even as the world behind her continued glitching:
"The white light that covered the globe was a stabilizing wave — a fail-safe to prevent destruction during the merge. It rewrote atmospheric layers, geological boundaries, and biological limits to allow two incompatible worlds to coexist."
Then Ravi pulled up footage — footage from space.
Zander's eyes widened.
Where Earth used to be… now floated a massive double-layered world, continents stitched together like a mosaic from two different universes. Energy rings glowed around its equator, shimmering like auroras wrapped tight around a planet.
It was beautiful.
Terrifying.
Impossible.
And real.
He changed the channel.
Another news anchor was interviewing a zoologist who was absolutely losing it on live broadcast because a wolf businessman just applied for a bank loan.
He changed again.
Another anchor screamed because a medieval knight teleported into London and challenged traffic lights to a duel.
He changed again.
A Tokyo host was calmly interviewing a girl who claimed to be from a video game while the cameraman tried not to panic at the dragon flying overhead.
Zander rubbed his face aggressively.
"This is so strange," he muttered. "Like actually, what even—"
He switched back to the NASA broadcast.
Aisha was answering questions now, her tone tired but focused.
"We believe the two Earths existed parallel to each other for billions of years. At some point, their timelines synchronized enough to allow overlap. The source of that synchronization is unknown."
Ravi added:
"We also need everyone to remain calm. The new residents of this planet — the anthropomorphic animals, the fictional races, the mythological beings — are as confused as we are. Many of them did not choose this merge. But they are not hostile."
Zander scoffed.
"Yeah, tell that to the penguin SWAT team."
Aisha raised her hands slightly, asking for calm.
"We will continue providing updates as we analyze this new unified reality. Humanity is not alone anymore… but we don't believe we're in danger."
Ravi looked off-camera, then back at the people watching.
"The world as we knew it has changed forever. But we can adapt. We always have."
The feed cut to static for a second, then returned to a map of the now-merged continents.
Zander turned the TV volume down and sat back, sinking into the couch.
He didn't panic.
He didn't freak out.
He just… sat there.
Processing.
Thinking.
Letting the weight settle in his bones.
He whispered to himself:
"…This is really happening."
He laughed under his breath — tired, disbelieving, borderline hysterical.
Not because it was funny.
But because for the first time in months, something insane happened and he wasn't hurt, stabbed, chased, kidnapped, or forced to fight for his life.
He just… had to deal with a bigger Earth.
A weirder Earth.
An Earth where humans and fictional beings lived side by side.
"This day couldn't get any better," he repeated softly, sarcastically.
Then he looked out the window again.
A cat-human hybrid was arguing with a taxi driver.
A bird-woman was filming everything on TikTok.
A human child was riding a llama-person's shoulders.
A raccoon in a business suit was eating ramen from a cup with utter peace.
Zander blinked.
"This is… kinda insane," he murmured, almost impressed. "Hydro's gonna have a field day with this crap."
He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, remote dangling loosely in his hand.
For the first time in a long time, he didn't feel tired.
He felt awake.
Completely awake.
The world outside wasn't dying.
It wasn't ending.
It was just… evolving.
Becoming something huge.
Something cosmic.
Something unpredictable.
And he was stuck right in the middle of it.
Still ageless.
Still hurting.
Still just trying to live his life.
He exhaled slowly — a long, heavy breath that carried all the weight of this new world.
And whispered:
"…Day two of being alive. And the universe is already throwing boss fights at me."
THE NEXT MORNING
Zander woke up to sunlight stabbing through his curtains like it had a personal vendetta. He groaned and rolled over, face smashing into his pillow. His entire body felt like a dying phone battery stuck at 3% — functioning, but barely.
He pried one eye open.
His phone was buzzing like a mosquito on caffeine.
"Ugh. Already?" he mumbled, grabbing it.
Notifications flooded the screen — news alerts, emails, missed calls, group messages, government advisories, NASA updates, even some weird talking-animal influencers trying to get clout off The Merge.
But the one notification that caught his attention was from his job — the Google Admin panel he was supposed to check every morning.
He tapped it.
[ IMPORTANT NOTICE:
Due to spatial-temporal restructuring caused by The Merge event, the office building is currently fragmented across multiple coordinates.
Estimated recovery time: 5 MONTHS.
You are granted paid leave during reconstruction.
Thank you for your patience.]
Zander stared at the screen.
"…Five months?" he muttered.
Then he snorted.
"God, that's so short."
He wasn't even joking. After everything he'd seen last night, five months sounded like Amazon Prime delivery compared to the existential disaster humanity was currently chilling in.
His phone buzzed again — this time violently, like it was being possessed.
GROUP CALL INCOMING.
He recognized the names popping up: Atlarus, Bea, Nate, Terry, Yurei, Kai, Kristine.
"Oh hell," Zander breathed, accepting the call.
The moment the screen loaded, Atlarus's face appeared — hair messy, eyes wide, looking like she'd been awake for 72 hours.
"ZANDER! ARE YOU SEEING THINGS RIGHT NOW?? I'M SEEING— I DON'T EVEN KNOW— THESE PEOPLE, OR— OR SPECIES??"
Zander blinked. "Good morning to you too."
"I AM LOSING MY MIND," Atlarus yelled, pushing her camera close like she wanted him to physically feel her panic. "There's a guy outside my house who looks like a tiger in a school uniform. A TIGER. IN A SKIRT. WHAT IS HAPPENING?"
"I'm basically seeing the same things here," Zander said calmly, rubbing his face.
Then Bea joined the call.
Then Kai.
Then Terry.
Then Yurei.
Then Nate.
Then Kristine.
Suddenly his phone screen was a chaotic Zoom call with way too many emotional teenagers who did *not* read the user manual for cosmic events.
Bea's voice cut through first, sharp and irritated like always:
"Okay what the hell, there's a fox-thing running across the sidewalk doing parkour. PARKOUR. On my street. At 7 AM."
Nate yelled from his camera, his deep Hawaiian voice shaking the mic:
"I JUST SAW A BUFF EAGLE MAN AT THE GAS STATION. WHY IS HE SO JACKED? WHY IS HE BUYING ENERGY DRINKS?"
Terry, wrapped in a blanket like an anxious burrito:
"Guys… I think one of those frog-people stole my slippers."
Kai, groggy but fascinated:
"Bro there's like… a dragon outside? Not full-size dragon. Like three feet tall. Baby dragon. Looks kinda cute. Should I pet it?"
"NO," Bea snapped. "DO NOT PET THE DRAGON, KAI."
Yurei calmly adjusted his glasses. He was way too collected.
"There are strange readings everywhere. Whatever merged with us… it's not just lifeforms. The entire physics grid is bent. I can feel the ley lines shifting."
Kristine screamed from the background:
"A BEAR MAN ASKED ME FOR DIRECTIONS AND I PANICKED AND SAID 'UH, LEFT?' AND IT WASN'T EVEN LEFT!! I LIED TO A BEAR MAN, GUYS, I'M GONNA DIE!"
Zander closed his eyes, massaging his temples.
Yup. This was his squad.
"Look," he finally said, raising his voice over the overlapping chaos. "ALL of you, calm your asses down for like… ten seconds."
They all paused.
He took a breath.
"Look… we just gotta process this. We're not getting attacked. The world's not blowing up. Buildings are still standing. So nothing dangerous is happening right now. Nothing's on fire. No kaiju, no meteors, no… eldritch tentacles—"
"—yet," Bea muttered.
"NOT helping," Zander said.
He continued, "Point is: we just gotta get used to this. Accept that things are weird — super weird — and that we're living in some multiverse collage now."
He heard a tiny sniffle. Kristine again.
"Are we… gonna be okay?"
"Yes," Zander said confidently. "We just gotta stay level-headed. You guys got this."
Bea clicked her tongue. "He's right. Freaking out isn't gonna fix anything."
Atlarus exhaled hard. "Okay… okay. I'm trying."
Nate nodded. "If Hydro were here he'd probably say something like 'just chill, bro,' and then ignore half of this."
"That actually sounds exactly like him," Terry added.
Kai laughed nervously. "Hydro probably slept through the Merge."
Yurei sighed. "Honestly? Probably."
Zander chuckled faintly. "Yeah… knowing him, he's fine. Wherever he is."
The group calmed down. Slowly. Awkwardly. Like a bunch of toddlers trying to act mature for the first time ever.
Then Zander cleared his throat. "Alright, guys… I gotta go. There's something I gotta check out."
"Wait— where are you going?" Bea asked.
"Yeah, bro, you safe?" Nate added.
"Don't die," Kristine said dramatically, clutching her pillow.
Zander smiled tiredly. "I'm fine. I'm just… gonna look around. See what changed. You guys should stay inside for now."
Everyone gave their goodbyes:
"Stay safe, man." — Nate
"Don't do anything stupid." — Bea
"Text us if you see something messed up." — Atlarus
"Bro if you find another dragon send pics." — Kai
"Hug yourself for protection." — Terry
"Hmph. I'll monitor the ley lines." — Yurei
"BYEEEE ZANDERRRRRRRRR—" — Kristine
Call ended.
Silence filled the apartment again.
Zander let out a long, tired exhale.
He walked toward the window and opened the curtains.
Outside looked… normal.
Kind of.
People were out walking, cautiously.
Some humans.
Some not.
An anthropomorphic deer woman in a business suit waited for the crosswalk signal like she'd done it a hundred times before. Two kids — one human, one cat-person — ran past chasing a glowing butterfly that definitely wasn't from this planet. A group of raccoon-humanoid bikers zipped by, laughing like the apocalypse just gave them an excuse to party.
A boar-man walked his dog.
A human couple took photos with a talking crow.
A lizard teen skateboarded past like he was late for school.
Zander pressed a hand to the glass.
"…This is so weird," he whispered. "Like actually weird. Why do these people exist now?"
His mind drifted.
If this was The Merge — the one Hydro mentioned in passing years ago — then everything was about to change. Society. Biology. Culture. Reality.
Multiversal tourism.
Inter-species politics.
New criminal organizations.
New ecosystems.
New everything.
An echoing voice of Hydro is heard, but he's really not here, "The Merge makes Earth into the biggest crossover in existence."
He sighed, head pressing against the window frame.
"I can't believe he was right. Again."
Down on the street, a goat-woman was struggling to use a vending machine. A human jogger politely helped her. She bowed. He panicked and bowed back. They awkwardly bowed at each other like an anime loop for five whole seconds.
Zander squinted.
"…yeah, Earth's cooked. We're done."
Still…
he couldn't deny it.
Despite the chaos, the fear, and the mind-melting weirdness—
The world was kinda beautiful like this.
Bigger.
Stranger.
More alive.
And Zander — ageless, tired, overworked Zander — felt something spark in his chest for the first time in a long time.
Curiosity.
He straightened up.
Stretched.
Rubbed his messy hair back.
"Alright," he whispered to himself. "If this is the new normal… guess I better get used to it."
Zander walked away from the window.
He had a feeling today was gonna be one of those days you tell your grandchildren about.
If he ever stopped being ageless long enough to have grandchildren.