The Subtle Fall

Echoes in the Algorithm

They say if you stare into the abyss long enough, it stares back.

But no one warned me the abyss would have ads.
That it would smile, recommend content, and ask if I was still watching.

After the glitch, my world fractured.
Not in some grand, cinematic explosion—
but like glass beneath pressure.
Silently. Invisibly.
Until you cut yourself on what you once trusted.

The next day, I walked the halls of my school like a shadow among shadows.
Every student wore the same face—eyes glazed, earbuds in,
thumbs twitching to invisible rhythms.

They weren't there.
Not really.

And I wasn't either.

I kept hearing things.
A phrase looping in the corner of my mind like a cursed jingle:

"You are what you consume."

In History class, I opened my tablet.
Textbook app. Lesson on revolutions.
But the page glitched again—just for a heartbeat.

Instead of Napoleon's face, I saw a man with no features.
Smooth skin. No eyes. No mouth. Only a crown of black wires bursting from his skull like a virus.
Beneath him: a quote, flickering in binary before fading away.

"He who controls attention... rules time."

No one else saw it.
Not a single gasp. Not a flicker of confusion.
They just stared into their screens like moths into flame.

I shut mine and felt the eyes.
Not theirs.
Something behind the camera. Behind the lens. Behind the glass.

Watching.

Recording.

Feeding.

When the final bell rang, I didn't go home.
I followed the signal.

There was a place beneath the school—an old maintenance tunnel they sealed off years ago.
No WiFi. No surveillance. Dead zone.
It called to me like a memory I never lived.

I pried open the rusted door.
Darkness swallowed me whole.
My phone refused to light.
Even the flashlight app blinked once—then died.

Only the hum remained.

It grew louder the deeper I walked.
Like a heartbeat—mechanical and ancient.
And then...

Voices.

Not whispers. Not screams.
Laughter.

Children laughing.
But hollow.
Looping like a corrupted file.

And among them... a new sound.

Click.

Click.

Click.

The rhythm of a thousand thumbs.
Endless scrolling.
Even here, underground.

I followed it to a wall covered in carvings.
Symbols, spirals, hashtags burned into brick like hieroglyphs for a new generation.
In the center—etched in crimson paint or something worse:

"The Architect is real. He lives in your feed."

I should've run.
But something deep inside me—a pulse of defiance, or insanity—kept me rooted.

Because in that moment, I wasn't afraid.

I was awake.

End of Chapter Two.