Valeria walked through the city, trying to blend in.
Everything looked… perfect. Too perfect.
Clean skies. Bright faces. Laughter in the background like a song on loop.
But beneath it all, she felt the hum.
Like a buzzing under her skin.
The code wasn't settled. It was alive.
She passed a digital billboard. It flickered.
Then—
> ERROR_413: MEMORY FRAGMENT DETECTED
She stopped.
No one else reacted.
Only she could see it.
A man walked past her, smiling.
But in his reflection on a glass wall—
He vanished.
> "No way…"
Valeria turned around.
The man was still there. Talking on the phone.
But the reflection said otherwise.
> "This world… it's not finished," she whispered.
That night, she couldn't sleep.
She closed her eyes—and saw flashes.
> A room on fire.
A scream.
A version of herself… standing in front of a broken mirror.
The next morning, she found a black card under her door. No name. No text. Just a symbol:
> { }
Code brackets.
She flipped it over. A line of numbers appeared.
> 0001.0110.1101.1001
She didn't know why, but her hands trembled.
Her body remembered even if her mind didn't.
Later, at a café, her reflection on the table screen began to speak—
without moving her lips.
> "We are not alone.
Ghost data is leaking.
Find the Fifth Number.
Before it finds you."
Valeria gasped and pushed the screen away.
People looked at her, confused. Concerned.
She stood up and ran.
The world wasn't real.
Not completely.
Not yet.
And someone—or something—knew she was waking up.