The Boy Who Fell Up

The Boy Who Fell Up

A Tale of Falling, Rising, and the World Between Worlds

1 — The Night the Sky Took Him

Elior had always felt like he was meant to be somewhere else.

Not in a way he could explain—not in words, anyway. It wasn’t that he disliked his home, his village, or the people in it. It was something quieter than that, something deep in his bones.

He would spend hours lying in the tall grass, staring at the sky, tracing the paths of birds as they soared through the clouds. He would watch the way the wind carried the leaves, how they spun and danced before settling somewhere new.

His mother would find him there sometimes and shake her head. “You’ve got your head in the clouds again.”

Maybe she was right.

Maybe that’s why, on the night the world turned upside down, Elior was the only one who wasn’t afraid.

The storm arrived out of nowhere.

One moment, the air was still—the next, a deafening wind howled through the valley, rattling doors and bending trees until they groaned like tired old men. The sky churned, thick with rolling clouds, their underbellies flashing with lightning. Rain came in torrents, spilling from the heavens in cold, stinging sheets.

Elior stepped outside, his heart racing. There was something different about this storm—something alive.

Then, without warning, everything changed.

The trees, which had been thrashing wildly against the wind, suddenly stretched toward it. The rain, which had been pounding the earth, stopped midair—then reversed.

Elior froze.

Droplets shimmered like tiny stars as they lifted from the ground, pulled upward in glimmering streams. The air hummed with an energy he could feel in his teeth. The village lanterns flickered, then went dark.

And then—

His feet left the ground.

The earth let him go.

The force took hold of him, but it wasn’t like falling. It wasn’t even like floating. It was as if something had reached down and claimed him, plucking him from the world like a starfish from the tide.

Higher.

Higher.

The rooftops shrank. The village became a blur beneath him. The clouds swallowed him whole, wrapping around him like thick wool—

And then—

He pierced through the sky.

2 — The World Above the World

The moment Elior broke through, the storm vanished.

No wind. No rain. No sound.

Just an endless expanse of white.

He floated there, weightless, turning in slow, dreamlike motion. He looked down, expecting to see his village, but it was gone. No land. No sky. Only this strange, in-between nothingness.

Then—

He fell again.

Not up. Not down. Not in any direction that made sense. The world bent around him, colors bleeding into light, space stretching and warping—

Until everything shattered like glass.

Elior crashed through a canopy of glowing, silver trees.

The branches, soft and liquid-like, bent under him, absorbing the impact. They cradled him, then lowered him gently to the ground.

Dazed, he sat up, his breath uneven.

The world around him was nothing like the one he had left.

Mountains floated in the sky, their roots curling through the air like the fingers of sleeping giants. Rivers twisted in impossible directions, flowing up cliffs, spiraling into the sky before vanishing into nothing. The air itself shimmered, alive with an energy he could feel in his bones.

And standing over him—watching—was a girl.

She had dark, star-speckled eyes and hair like the night sky, curling with strands of deep blue and violet. A wooden staff rested in her grip, carved with ancient symbols that glowed faintly in the dim light.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” she said.

Elior groaned, rubbing his head. “Tell that to the sky.”

For a moment, something flickered across her face—something like amusement. Then it was gone.

“Then it must’ve made a mistake.”

She offered her hand.

Elior hesitated only for a second before taking it.

Her grip was solid. Warm.

And for the first time since falling up—he felt real again.

3 — The Land of Forgotten Things

The girl’s name was Kora.

And this place, this strange, impossible world, was called Vareth.

“It’s where lost things go,” she told him as they walked through the glowing silver forest. “Memories. Names. People.”

Elior frowned. “People?”

Kora pointed up.

Elior followed her gaze and felt his stomach twist.

High above, drifting between the floating mountains, shadowy figures moved. Not solid. Not entirely human. Some flickered at the edges, like candlelight in the wind. Others stood frozen in mid-motion, as if trapped between moments.

“They fell up, just like you,” Kora said. “And they never found their way back.”

Elior swallowed hard.

Vareth was beautiful. But it was also unsettling.

A world that felt like a dream you wake up from—but never really leave behind.

And deep in his chest, he felt something stir.

That same quiet whisper.

“You don’t belong here either.”

But if he didn’t belong here… where did he belong?

4 — The Keeper of the In-Between

The answer came in the dark.

One night, wandering too far from Kora’s village, Elior felt the air shift. The shimmer around him sharpened—something watching, waiting.

Then a voice rippled through the trees.

“Little traveler.”

Elior turned.

A being taller than the sky loomed before him.

It was woven from the blackness between stars, its face a featureless mask with a single, vertical slit down the center.

The Keeper of the In-Between.

And it was offering him a choice.

5 — The Choice

Kora found him before he could answer.

“Don’t,” she whispered. “No one who leaves remembers this place. If you go, it’ll be like it never happened.”

Elior hesitated.

Could he really forget? Could he erase this world, this feeling?

But could he stay forever, in a place that wasn’t his?

Then—he knew.

He turned to the Keeper, heart steady.

“Then let me choose both.”

6 — The Boy Who Walks Between

The world shifted.

The stars unraveled.

The sky folded in on itself—

And then—

Elior was home.

But he was not the same.

He could still hear the wind whispering secrets. Still see the cracks in the sky where Vareth bled through.

And sometimes, when the world felt too heavy—

He would close his eyes—

And he would fall up.