SEASON TWO: CHAPTER TWO - THE BROTHER WHO WATCHES HIMSELF
1491 Words
Liam Kimani learned very quickly that mirrors were no longer trustworthy.
He avoided them whenever possible, not out of superstition, but out of experience. Mirrors showed things too clearly—things he wasn’t always ready to accept. Sometimes his reflection moved a fraction of a second too late. Sometimes it smiled when he didn’t. And sometimes, when he was tired enough, it whispered.
Tonight, the whisper returned.
Liam stood in the narrow bathroom of his apartment, water running endlessly from the tap. He stared at his hands as if they belonged to someone else. They looked normal—scarred knuckles, faint calluses, steady veins. Detective’s hands. Human hands.
Yet he could still feel it.
The other presence.
Not pushing. Not demanding.
Watching.
“You’re not in control,” Liam said quietly, his voice echoing against the tiled walls. “You don’t get to decide.”
His reflection tilted its head.
Liam slammed his fist into the mirror before it could respond.
Glass shattered, shards scattering across the sink and floor. Blood welled instantly from his knuckles, warm and real. He welcomed the pain. Pain anchored him. Pain reminded him that he still existed.
Breathing hard, he turned away and wrapped his hand in a towel.
Sleep was impossible.
And rest was dangerous.
THE CASE THAT HADN’T HAPPENED YET
Liam’s living room was lit only by the glow of his investigation wall. Photographs were pinned with ruthless precision—faces, places, timestamps. Most were official cases. Some were not.
One image, in particular, drew his attention.
A deserted intersection. Nighttime. Rain-slicked road. The timestamp read THREE DAYS FROM NOW.
Liam frowned.
He had found the image buried in his old device—the one that appeared in his pocket the night of the fracture. He didn’t remember creating it. He didn’t remember accessing future surveillance systems.
Yet the image existed.
He stepped closer.
A red circle had been drawn around a shadowy figure standing beneath a streetlight. The figure’s posture was unmistakable.
Aiden.
Liam swallowed hard.
“You’re predicting him now?” he muttered. “Or warning me?”
The device buzzed faintly in his pocket, as if responding.
Liam ignored it.
He reached for another photograph—this one from years ago. Two boys standing beside a battered bicycle, grinning like the world hadn’t yet learned how to hurt them.
Aiden was smaller then. Softer.
And Liam remembered promising himself he would always protect him.
The memory twisted painfully in his chest.
“I failed you,” Liam whispered.
The room answered with silence.
But the presence stirred.
AIDEN FEELS IT TOO
Across the city, Aiden woke with a gasp.
His heart raced as if he’d been running. Sweat soaked his shirt. His mother slept peacefully in the next room, unaware of the war unfolding across timelines.
Aiden pressed his palms against his eyes.
Liam.
He could feel him—like a distant signal pulsing beneath his thoughts. The connection was faint, unstable, but undeniably there.
Zara had warned him.
Once souls touch, echoes remain.
Aiden swung his legs off the bed and stood, steadying himself. The floor beneath him felt… wrong. Solid, yet vibrating faintly, as if reality itself was humming.
He walked to the window.
Down on the street, a woman stood motionless beneath a streetlight, staring up at the sky with a confused expression.
She suddenly spoke—clearly, audibly:
“I’ve been here before.”
Aiden’s blood ran cold.
She shook her head, blinking rapidly, then walked away as if nothing had happened.
Memory bleed.
Just like Zara said.
Aiden clenched his fists.
This wasn’t isolated anymore.
ZARA BREAKS A RULE
Zara Mbeki had always believed rules were guidelines for less intelligent people.
Tonight, she broke one that mattered.
Her studio was sealed—no external access, no live connections. She ignored that and activated the forbidden layer of her system anyway. The air around her vibrated as the holographic projection expanded beyond safe parameters.
“Don’t collapse,” she muttered. “Just… show me.”
Reality unfolded.
Not visually—conceptually.
She saw timelines not as lines, but as overlapping states. Living probabilities. Souls glowing brighter than bodies. Some souls were stable. Others flickered.
Three burned brightest.
Aiden.
Liam.
And—
Zara gasped.
There was a fourth presence now.
It wasn’t human.
It didn’t belong.
Yet it was deeply intertwined with Liam’s essence, wrapped around his soul like a parasite pretending to be a limb.
Zara’s tablet flashed red warnings.
SYSTEM LIMIT EXCEEDED
PERCEPTION OVERLOAD
She ignored them.
“No,” she whispered. “You’re not hiding from me.”
The presence shifted.
And for the first time, Zara felt something look back at her.
Her vision blurred violently. She screamed as information flooded her mind—images of collapsed cities, timelines folding in on themselves, people screaming without mouths.
Zara collapsed to her knees, gasping.
When the overload finally ceased, she lay trembling on the floor.
One thought burned through her terror.
It’s learning.
THE DETECTIVE INTERVENES
Liam moved fast.
He didn’t know why—only that urgency had seized him with bone-deep certainty. The device in his pocket buzzed again, harder this time.
He checked it.
A single message appeared:
INTERSECTION CONFIRMED.
CASUALTY PROBABILITY: HIGH.
The image from earlier appeared again—the future intersection.
Aiden’s silhouette glowed faintly.
“No,” Liam said sharply.
He grabbed his coat and keys and left the apartment without another thought.
Rain had started again, light but persistent. The city felt tighter, closer, as if the streets were narrowing deliberately.
Liam drove hard, instincts guiding him through traffic.
As he approached the intersection, a strange sensation washed over him—like déjà vu mixed with dread.
He slammed on the brakes.
There, standing exactly where the image predicted, was Aiden.
Alive.
Confused.
And completely unaware of the speeding vehicle skidding toward him from the opposite direction.
“MOVE!” Liam shouted, throwing open the door.
Time slowed.
Liam felt the presence surge forward, urging him, guiding his movements. His body moved before thought—faster than humanly possible.
He tackled Aiden out of the way as the vehicle smashed into the streetlight, metal screaming.
They hit the ground hard.
Aiden gasped, stunned, staring up at him.
“Liam…?”
For a moment, neither spoke.
Rain fell around them.
The presence retreated slightly, satisfied.
Aiden’s expression shifted from shock to anger.
“You knew,” Aiden said. “Didn’t you?”
Liam didn’t deny it.
“I saw it coming.”
“You didn’t tell me.”
“I didn’t want to scare you.”
Aiden shoved him off. “You don’t get to decide that anymore!”
Liam rose slowly. “This isn’t about control. It’s about survival.”
“Whose?” Aiden demanded. “Mine—or yours?”
The question hung heavy between them.
Liam’s jaw tightened. “Both.”
THE TRUTH NO ONE WANTED
They stood beneath the flickering streetlight—the same one from the photograph.
Aiden laughed bitterly. “You’re watching me. Tracking me like a case.”
Liam’s silence was answer enough.
“You’re becoming it,” Aiden said softly. “The thing inside you.”
“That thing saved your life.”
“And it will destroy you!”
Liam stepped closer. “You don’t understand what it’s like. I see everything. Every outcome where you die. Every timeline where the city collapses. I’m trying to prevent it.”
“By becoming a monster?”
Liam flinched.
“I didn’t choose this,” he said. “Neither did you.”
Aiden’s voice shook. “Then stop hiding things from me.”
The presence stirred again, agitated.
Liam felt it pressing, whispering:
SEVER CONNECTION
DELTA IS LIABILITY
Liam clenched his fists.
“No,” he said aloud.
Aiden stared. “What?”
“Nothing.”
But the lie tasted bitter.
A WARNING FROM ZARA
Zara’s call came through Aiden’s phone, frantic and distorted.
“Aiden—listen to me,” she said. “It’s accelerating. The presence isn’t just using Liam—it’s learning from him. From you.”
Aiden glanced at his brother.
“What does that mean?” he asked.
“It means,” Zara said slowly, “the fracture is no longer passive. It’s adapting. And Liam may not be the last host.”
Liam closed his eyes.
“So what’s the solution?” Aiden asked.
There was a pause.
“I don’t know yet,” Zara admitted. “But I do know this—if the connection between you two deepens any further… one of you might not survive it intact.”
The line went dead.
Rain soaked them both.
Aiden looked at Liam, fear and resolve colliding inside him.
“Then we end this,” Aiden said. “Together. No secrets.”
Liam nodded slowly.
But deep within him, the presence smiled.
Because secrets were already forming.
And the fracture had just found its favorite brothers.
- Writer
