SHIVA – 2035 – Last Day of the Future
> There were only three things Shiva remembered from the moment he died—the smell of melting circuitry, the scream of steel against steel, and the glowing hard disk clutched to his chest like a holy relic.
"Run diagnostics! We can't lose this!"
Alarms screamed in his ears. Glass fractured. Smoke curled through the lab like fingers of death. He knew this was it.
Shiva coughed blood into his helmet, eyes locked on the blinking data core—the final backup of all human knowledge. Every medical discovery, every ancient book, every simulation, every AI breakthrough… all compressed into the size of a palm. He had one job: take it to the Alpha Vault.
He never made it.
The railpod's front twisted in, metal folded like paper, and in that fraction of a second, Shiva knew he was going to die.
---
VIDYA – 2009 – Delhi, India
> The power had gone out again.
Vidya sighed, fanning herself with a half-folded newspaper. Delhi's March heat wasn't merciful, especially in this rented two-bedroom home.
"Lakshmi! Bring the candles! It's almost dark!"
She glanced at the old clock ticking on the wall. 6:42 PM. Her son would be home from school soon, likely with mud on his shoes and silence in his mouth. Ever since turning eighteen last week, Shiva had become quieter than usual.
She'd just stepped into the kitchen when she heard it.
A gasp—sharp, desperate.
"Aaaah!"
It came from Shiva's room.
---
SHIVA – 2009 – The Awakening
> He awoke drowning in sweat, lungs fighting for air like he'd surfaced from the ocean floor.
No alarms. No steel. No fire.
Just a wooden fan creaking overhead and the smell of old plastic.
What...
He sat up, heart thudding. His hands—smaller. His skin—younger. His room—unchanged since childhood. Posters of "Krrish" on one wall, a cracked monitor on a dusty table, and that blue curtain with cartoon prints.
It couldn't be.
Shiva ran to the mirror, nearly tripping over the carpet.
A boy stared back at him. Eighteen years old. Disheveled hair. Confused eyes.
"No... No, no, no."
His hands shook. He opened the old metal trunk in the corner. Inside—school books, a 2008 diary, and the front page of a torn Times of India:
Date: March 10, 2009
---
EMERGENCY TECH – 2035 (Alternate World)
Note: Short POV to show mystery building.
> "Sir, we've lost him. The railpod's gone."
"And the core?"
"Gone with him."
Silence.
"What was his last location?"
"Just outside Delhi, Sector 173."
"Initiate containment protocol. If the core survived the crash…"
"You think it triggered something?"
"I think Shiva isn't done yet."
---
SHIVA – 2009 – The Realization
> The shock began to fade, replaced by something deeper: awe.
He hadn't just dreamed the future. He had lived it. And now… now he was back. With his mind intact. With every byte of that hard disk embedded in his consciousness.
Every research paper. Every stock price. Every event.
The future was his.
He stumbled back, breathless. "This... this is real."
His eyes fell on a crumpled paper with scribbled formulas from his 12th board exams.
A slow grin formed.
"I'm not going to just fix the world," he whispered.
"I'm going to own it."
SHIVA – Morning Light
The morning sun streamed through the old blue curtains. For the first time in years—centuries, it felt like—Shiva didn't wake up to alarms or biometric scans. Just the clink of steel utensils and the sizzle of oil in the kitchen.
His body was stiff, like it hadn't been used properly in ages. But his mind? Alive. Hyper-aware.
He pulled on his old school uniform—wrinkled shirt, brown pants—and stared at himself again in the mirror. The face of a teenager. The mind of a superintelligence.
His fingers hovered over a notebook. He quickly jotted a note before school:
Find when Bitcoin whitepaper launched. Check online via tuition center.
Plan how to legally own digital assets underage. Research.
Begin sketching Flappy Bird mechanics. Use vector math from memory.
He snapped the notebook shut.
Game time.
---
VIDYA – Kitchen Routine
Vidya stirred the aloo sabzi as the news anchor rattled off headlines: power cuts in North Delhi, rising petrol prices, IPL preparations.
Normal things. Familiar.
But her son?
He wasn't acting normal.
He came to the table, sat quietly, and instead of half-heartedly pushing food around his plate like usual, he looked… present.
Like he'd aged ten years overnight.
"How was your sleep?" she asked, trying to sound casual.
He smiled—really smiled. "Peaceful."
That shook her more than any nightmare.
---
LAKSHMI – Observation Mode
From across the table, Lakshmi watched her brother with narrowed eyes. Her older brother was usually a boring zombie. But today?
He said "good morning" first.
He helped Baba adjust the loose chair leg.
He even offered her his toast, without sarcasm.
Who is this man and what has he done with my idiot brother?
---
SHIVKUMAR – Quiet Admiration
Shivkumar walked his children halfway to school that morning. He worked two jobs: school clerk during the day, bus conductor at night. Yet he always made time for this walk.
Today, his son walked a little slower. Looked around more. Asked questions—about people, buildings, even school politics.
As if he was studying the world.
Shivkumar smiled. "What's going on in that head of yours?"
Shiva met his eyes. "Just… thinking about the future."
His father chuckled. "At eighteen? You should be thinking about passing your board exams first."
Shiva just grinned.
If only you knew, Baba.
---
SHIVA – School: Day One
Shiva stepped into his old classroom, greeted by the familiar smell of chalk, musty books, and too many teenage hormones in one space.
People stared. Teachers called roll. Life moved at the speed of paper and blackboards.
He noticed everything:
The outdated syllabus
The broken ceiling fan
The exact timing when the principal walked down the hall (9:42 AM)
The kid two seats over who would one day start a failed startup
It was all… so slow.
But it meant he had time. He had advantage.
During recess, he borrowed a friend's phone—one of those cheap Nokia models.
"Need to check something," he said casually.
In a few minutes, he used the basic browser to confirm it:
> Bitcoin launched Jan 3, 2009. Current exchange rate: 1300 BTC = $1.
A chill ran down his spine.
He had maybe a month or two before the first surge. If he moved fast, he could become the largest private holder on the planet.
He leaned back against the bench, staring up at the dusty fan blades.
Phase One begins.
---
SHIVA – Nightfall Plans
Back home, Shiva quietly studied beside his sister while his parents dozed in front of the TV.
He pulled out a rough notebook and began sketching Flappy Bird's mechanics from memory:
Physics: gravity = 9.8 m/s² simplified
Touch input: single-tap jump
Obstacle generation pattern
Score tracking loop
He wrote pseudocode in pencil. By 10 PM, he'd finished a rough blueprint.
He would start building it at the tuition center's computer lab—his only access to decent tech. No one there would suspect a thing.
---
Ending Note – Shiva's Mind
> The world is running blind.
They think I'm just another teenager.
But I hold the blueprint to a trillion-dollar future.
I'm not here to survive.
I'm here to rewrite fate.