Everything froze.
The rain stopped mid-air.
Cars hung motionless.
Birds paused in flight.
Only they moved—Ayaan and Anaya.
Fingers inches apart.
And as their hands finally touched…
Boom.
Their minds were yanked backwards—
through time, memory, and something far beyond either.
A sharp pull.
Then darkness.
They awoke together.
In a place they didn't recognize.
Stone walls.
Dim candlelight.
A circular room filled with mirrors—
each reflecting a different version of them.
"Where are we?" Anaya whispered.
A voice echoed through the chamber:
"You've entered Cycle Zero."
"The one you erased."
A mirror flickered.
Inside:
• A burning building.
• A ring slipping from her hand.
• Ayaan on his knees.
• A scream.
• A shot fired.
• Her falling…
• …and him choosing to forget.
"I… I let them reset me," Ayaan said, voice cracking.
"To forget you. To forget the pain."
"You promised you never would."
"I was weak."
Anaya backed away.
"Then this—this loop, all of this—was built because you couldn't live with what you did?"
The chamber trembled.
Each mirror began showing the same scene:
Ayaan turning away as she died.
Over and over.
In every cycle.
But one mirror was different.
It showed her.
Standing before a terminal.
Typing code.
Tears falling.
"Initiate Loop Project: 12:12."
"Target: Ayaan Rael."
She stared in horror.
"What… is this?"
Ayaan blinked.
"You made the loop?"
"No… I…"
But the truth came crashing down.
They both built it.
Together.
She, to make him remember.
He, to make himself forget.
A war between love and pain—
written in time itself.
The mirrors cracked.
Reality rippled.
A new figure emerged—faceless, in a cloak stitched from clocks.
"The loop cannot survive your truth."
"Then we don't want it," they said in unison.
They ran—
through the crumbling chamber,
into a corridor of blinking lights and memories.
As they ran
Flashes surged through them:
• A marriage that never happened.
• A daughter that never got to live.
• A world that ended every time they got close to happiness.
And one phrase repeated across every wall:
"Cycle Zero must stay forgotten."
They stopped at a door labeled:
"EXIT: FINAL CYCLE"
A warning blinked:
"One last loop.
One final chance.
No more resets."
They looked at each other.
Ayaan took her hand.
"Do you trust me?"
"Even when I don't trust myself."
They stepped through.
The light swallowed them.
And for the first time—
They landed not in the past.
Not in a memory.
But in something terrifyingly unknown:
The Final Loop.