"When the mirror breaks, everyone bleeds — even the reflection."— Excerpt from The Ledger
10:49 PM – Bangalore South Division, Crime Surveillance Grid
Kabir stood before a screen filled with static — lines of corrupted footage, wiped logs, broken audio.
A sixth victim had dropped.
This time a cybersecurity specialist.Dead in his car.No marks. No entry wound.Just the eyes — wide open, staring at nothing.And the familiar red check, this time drawn in condensation on the inside of the windshield.
It wasn't just happening again.
It was escalating.
The tech team was silent. They didn't ask questions anymore.
Kabir pulled aside the director. "Where's the footage?"
"There was a 22-minute gap," he replied, sweating. "Files wiped from the inside. It's like the system let it happen."
"No," Kabir muttered. "Like someone told it to."
Back at his safehouse
Kabir stared at a fresh document he received through an encrypted drop — one only three operatives in India could have sent.
Inside:Surveillance footage of himself, altered.Overlayed with a timestamp showing him walking near the Sarjapur site — during a killing.
He wasn't there.
He had proof. But the image showed him in frame, approaching the body minutes before discovery.
Someone was framing him.
Perfectly.
And it wasn't Zayen.
Later that night – Shivajinagar
Zayen walked among the crowd like a ghost wrapped in skin. No one noticed the boy with silent eyes and no shadow.
He wasn't hiding.He was watching.
He'd read the news. He knew about the sixth kill.And he knew it wasn't him.
Yet the style… the execution… the detail…
Whoever this new player was, they weren't just mimicking. They were improving.
Dangerously.
Meanwhile, Kabir made a decision.
He drove to Zayen's house.
No more interviews. No more watching from the dark.
This time, answers.
He found the front door open again. No security. No sound.
Inside — the blackboard was covered in numbers. Sequences. Coordinates. Names.
In the center: a stick figure, drawn in red chalk.
It wore a tie. A badge. A gun.
Kabir stepped closer.
It was him.
And above it, a red checkmark carved into the slate with a knife.
Footsteps behind him.
Kabir turned.
Zayen stood there, calm.
"You came to kill me this time?" he asked softly.
Kabir didn't answer.
Zayen stepped forward.
"You think I'm doing this. But I'm not. You're chasing the wrong ghost."
"Then help me find the right one."
Zayen's eyes didn't flinch.
"That depends. Are you ready to know what they did to my father?"
Kabir paused.
Everything in him screamed trap.
But something colder in him — something older — whispered: truth.
He nodded once.
Zayen reached for a drawer and pulled out a folder marked only with an X.
Inside: files with blacked-out paragraphs, military logs, and a blood-smeared envelope.
Zayen handed it to Kabir.
"Read it. Then ask yourself who's wearing the mask."
Elsewhere…
A phone buzzed on a rooftop.
A gloved hand answered.
A voice said:
"He took the bait. They'll turn on each other soon."
The gloved hand crushed the phone and tossed it into the dark.
And behind them —another red checkmark,drawn on the rooftop vent.
This time…
with blood.