The old Grayson Institute had been closed for decades, its windows boarded up, its walls cracking from time and weather. Locals whispered about the experiments that once took place inside, strange treatments for mental illness that bordered on torture. But to graduate from the university's psychology program, Mara needed a final research project—one that would stand out.
And so, she found herself standing at the rusted gates of the Grayson Institute, recorder in hand, heart hammering in her chest.
The university archives had given her little more than yellowed records and vague anecdotes. The most intriguing mention was a room simply referred to as The Reflection Room, with notes redacted and references cut off mid-sentence. Whatever had happened there, someone had tried to hide it.
She stepped inside.
Dust coated everything. Floor tiles curled up like dead leaves. The air smelled of mold, iron, and something faintly sweet—like decaying fruit.
Mara's flashlight flickered as she wandered the halls. Every sound—her breath, her footsteps, even the creak of the building—felt magnified. The deeper she went, the more the shadows clung to her skin, thick and reluctant to let go.
She found the door marked R-108 – Reflection Room. It was smaller than she expected. No ornate markings. No locks. Just a plain wooden door, slightly ajar.
Inside, the room was windowless and featureless, save for a single, tall mirror mounted to the far wall. It stretched from floor to ceiling, pristine and polished despite the dust blanketing everything else.
Mara walked toward it, her own reflection stepping in perfect sync. She raised her recorder.
"Test log one. Grayson Institute, Reflection Room. Initiating observational phase."
As she studied the mirror, she noticed something unsettling.
Her reflection's eyes didn't match hers.
They were... focused differently. Slightly off. Like it was looking at her, not being her. She moved her hand—so did the reflection, but there was a fraction of a second's delay. Barely noticeable. Almost certainly her imagination.
Almost.
She set up her equipment—a small camera, an EMF reader, and her recorder—and sat on the floor. Her intention was to spend a few hours documenting the psychological effects of prolonged exposure to isolation and reflective imagery.
She lasted twenty minutes before something changed.
The room grew colder, though her thermometer stayed constant. The shadows outside the mirror deepened, thickened, until the only clear part of her reflection was her face.
Then the mirror blinked.
She saw it. Just for an instant. Her reflection closed its eyes.
But she hadn't.
She rewound the camera. Nothing. The footage played back normal—no blink, no delay. Just her staring at herself like a lunatic.
"Get a grip," she muttered. "You're tired. It's a dark room. You're projecting."
She stood and paced the room. The air felt heavier now, as if the walls had inched closer. Her vision tunneled. She heard... scratching. Faint, like nails against wood. Coming from inside the mirror.
She turned to look again.
The reflection was gone.
Not distorted. Not warped.
Just... gone.
The mirror now reflected the room, yes—but she wasn't in it. The equipment sat there, untouched. But she herself had vanished from the image.
"Mara to base," she joked nervously into her recorder. "Either I've died or this mirror's a portal to nowhere."
Then the whisper came.
Not from the recorder.
From behind her.
"Mara..."
She froze.
"Mara, Mara, Mara... why did you come alone?"
The voice was hers—but soaked in static. A perfect mimicry if you gutted it, dragged it through rusted gears, and stitched it back together.
She turned slowly.
Her reflection was back.
But it wasn't sitting anymore. It stood with one shoulder forward, head cocked like a predator assessing prey. Blood ran from its nose. Its mouth split wider than hers ever could—almost to the ears.
Then the lights cut out.
Total darkness swallowed the room.
She stumbled back and slammed into the wall. Her flashlight clicked back on, but the beam was dim, flickering.
The mirror showed movement. Shadows dancing. Mara raised her phone to record it.
But her screen showed something different.
A live video feed of her—chained to the floor in the middle of the room, screaming, skin flayed open at the arms. Her real body was untouched, but her reflection was... mutilated.
"Stop. Stop it!" she shrieked, slamming the recorder to the ground.
The reflection looked up, matching her movements again. But now it grinned with rotted teeth, and its eyes were hollow. Worms wriggled from the sockets, dripping black ichor that ran down the mirror like tears.
"You see me now," it whispered. "They left me here. They told me to look inside myself. And I did. I kept looking. I found every awful thing I ever was... and I made more."
Mara backed away, shaking. "You're not real. You're not—"
"Not yet," the Reflection said.
Suddenly, the mirror pulsed like liquid glass.
A hand pushed through.
Human-like, but pale, translucent, fingers too long, each tip tapering into claws of reflective black.
Mara turned and ran, heartbeat thundering in her ears.
Through the halls, stumbling over debris. Her flashlight beam bounced wildly. She didn't look back. She didn't want to see what followed.
But she heard it.
The soft padding of bare feet behind her.
And the whisper: "Let me wear your skin."
She tripped and hit the floor hard. When she looked up, she was in another room—lined wall to wall with mirrors. Not just one.
Dozens.
And in each, a different version of her.
Some cried. Some bled. Some screamed with stitched mouths. One had no eyes. Another stood silently, smiling as her jaw slowly unhinged, lower and lower, until it split open like a serpent.
The real Mara collapsed to her knees.
"I want to go home," she sobbed.
In unison, the mirrors answered:
"Home is here now."
_______________________________________________
Three Weeks Later
The footage was found by campus security, after Mara's professor reported her missing. The camera showed her speaking calmly, recording her observations. Then static. The final frame before corruption was a single, flickering image:
Mara, sitting cross-legged, smiling blankly into the camera.
Behind her, the mirror was shattered.
The room is sealed now. No one speaks of it. The university denies the room ever existed. But sometimes, late at night, the janitor swears he hears a voice echoing from behind that wall:
"I am you. You are me. Come reflect."
They say if you stand outside Room R-108 at midnight with a mirror in hand, your reflection will smile before you do.
And it will keep smiling after you stop.