As Tara collapsed into his arms, the frozen silence still wrapped around them.
Slowly… her eyelids fluttered.
She opened her eyes.
For one impossible moment, she looked straight at Advik.
Blink.
A faint, shaky breath escaped her lips.
Advik's heart slammed.
She could move.
Inside a world where everything else stood frozen… she could move.
How…?
Before he could even speak, the stillness shattered.
Sound crashed back into the world. Wind rushed. The speeding vehicle roared past them.
Reality returned all at once.
Afraid anyone might notice something strange, Advik quickly steadied her and gently lowered her onto the roadside, pulling his hands away.
Within seconds, people rushed toward her.
Voices overlapped. Someone called for help. Others lifted her carefully and hurried toward a nearby hospital.
Advik stood there, unable to move now for a different reason.
What just happened…?
He lowered the volume of his headphones and stopped a passerby.
"Excuse me… which hospital did they take her to?"
The man told him the name a hospital only a few streets away.
Advik turned, ready to go
But his phone rang.
His friend.
He hesitated… then answered.
"Come fast," his friend said urgently. "Someone important is here to meet you."
Advik closed his eyes for a second, torn between worry and responsibility.
"…I'm coming."
By the time he reached the apartment, faint dried blood stained the edge of his coat. People in the corridor stared at him strangely as he walked past.
Inside, a client was already waiting, explaining a project about designing a house model.
Before Advik could even sit, his friend noticed the coat.
"Hey! What happened? Why is there blood?"
Advik replied calmly,
"A girl met with an accident. I helped."
The client nodded politely, but Advik still heard the man's hidden thought clearly:
Why involve himself… if police trouble comes, he'll suffer too…
Advik finished the discussion quickly and saw the man out.
The door closed.
Silence filled the apartment.
He dropped onto the sofa, staring blankly ahead.
For the first time, the noise in his head wasn't other people's thoughts.
Only one memory repeated.
Her eyes opening.
Her moving inside the frozen world.
Her breathing.
Tara…
Did something happen to her…? Was she badly hurt…?
His fingers tightened slowly.
Was that… my power?
Did my ability change…?
For the first time since discovering he could hear minds…
Advik felt uncertain of his own ability.
And strangely…
Scared.
Meanwhile — at the hospital
Tara slowly opened her eyes.
Pain throbbed through her head. Scratches burned across her arms and legs as the doctor carefully dressed her wounds.
Fragments of memory drifted through her mind.
The road.
The headlights.
Falling.
And then
Silence.
Did time… stop?
Was I about to die?
Did I just imagine that because of fear…?
Nearby, someone muttered irritably,
"People these days never even look at the road… always lost in their thoughts."
The words made her chest sink.
But another gentle voice followed:
"Are you alright?"
She turned weakly.
It was her manager the one who had brought her safely to the hospital.
Relief softened her expression.
Still, one question wouldn't leave her mind.
What really happened in those few seconds…?