The silence here was different. It wasn't
quied--no, it was watching. Heavy. Like the
air was aware of me.
I stood on something, though I couldn't
tell if it was floor, stone, or just thought
holding me up. Darkness pulsed around
me, not empty but alive. Breathing.
Whispering in a voice too soft to hear but
too loud to ignore.
Then, the whispers stopped.
A light blinked ahead--dim, flickering, like
it wasn't sure it wanted to exist. I walked
toward it, each step echoing a second too
late. Time felt slippery here.
The hallway formed as l moved. Not build,
but remembered. A mirror on each wall,
but none showed me. Only....others.
Faces. Some twisted in terror. Some
smiling too wide. All staring straight at
me.
"You're not supposed to be here", said a
voice behind me.
I turned
No one.
Then the mirrors began to hum. A low,
guttural vibration that reached into my
chest. One of the faces moved. Not in the
glass--out of it. Slipping through like
water through silk.
A child. Hollow-eyed. Grinning with too
many teeth.
It raised a finger and pointed down the hall.
She's waiting."
I din't ask who. I already knew.
The child didn't blink.
Its grin stretched wider as if the skin of
its face didn't know where to stop.
I stepped back.
"You're late," it said.
The voice wasn't childlike. It was dry, like
something crumbling apart inside an
empty room.
"I don't know who you are," I whispered.
It cocked its head.
"No. But she does."
It turned and began walking--not walking,
gliding--down the corridor of mirrors.
Each step it didn't take echoed anyway. As if the hall was remembering steps from a different time.
I followed. Not because l wanted to.
Because l had no choise
The light flickered again, dimmer now.
The faces in the mirrors began to cry.
Not scream. Not wail.
Just silent tears-- hundreds of them,
sliding down glass like rain.
And each tear left a trail of black.
"She's beyond the last one," the child said.
"But not everyone gets that far."
"Why not?
It didn't answer. It just smiled again, and
that smile--
It spilt.
Down the middle.
The mirrorrs ahead shimmered, and one by
one, they cracked...
Then they opened.
The mirrors opened like invisible doors,
but inside them, there was no reflection.
Only a shifting darkness... like breathing
fog.
The child stopped
"I won't go any futher,' she said, her voice
now carrying a hint of fear.
"She chose you.
She wants you."
"She...who?"
The child vanished before l could finish
the question. Not by running. Not fading.
She just... wasn't there anymore.
I looked down the hallway beyond the
opened mirrors.
It was narrower.
And alive.
Not something build, but something
grown.
The walls groaned, the floor shifted like
flesh over bone.
I took a deep breath.
It burnet going down. The air was different here--thicker, like smoke you couldn't see.
A whisper slid from inside the wall:
Are you ready to meet yourself?"
I stepped forward.
Tired of being afraid. Or maybe... fear was
claiming more and more of me.
My footsteps made no sound.
The lights went out.
Only one red pulse at the end of the hall--
like a heartbeat struggling to continue.
There, at the end, something was waiting.
Not human.
Not entirely alien.
But know.
She turned toward me, slowly.
She had my face. But older. Tired. Cracked
from within.
"You opened me." she said. " Now, we both
have to stay."
I shook my head, backing away -- but the hallway
didn't let me.
Behind me, the walls had sealed shut. No
more doors. No more mirrors. Just her...
me.... standing in the middle of it all like
she had always been there.
"You think you're still dreaming," she said.
Her voice was mine, but fractured -- like it
had forgotten how to speak.
I tried to answer. " Am i not?"
She smiled, and something inside her face
twitched -- not human. "Dreams don't
echo this long."
The red pulse at the end of the hall
flickered faster. Like it sensed my fear. Or
maybe.... maybe it fed on it.
She took a step forward.
"Your buried me," she whispered. "Every
time you turned away. Every time you
pretended. But l never stopped
screaming."
Her eyes began to weep something dark.
Not tears. Memory. Thick black memory
dripping down her cheeks.
"You didn't leave me behind. You left
yourself."
I pressed against the wall. It was soft
now. warm. Beating.
"I want to wake up," l gasped.
"No" she said gently. "You want to
remember."
Then she opened her mouth--wider than it
should go. And the red light filled
everything.
I tries to scream, but the sound stayed
inside me heavy like wet ash.
She stepped closer. I din't back away this time.
Because deep down, I remembered.
The door wasn't opened today.
It had always been open.
And now, I saw what waited behind it
wasn't her.
It was me.
The part I buried. The part I feared. The
part that waited.
The red light blinked once more....
and went out
Darkness didn't fall.
It rose.
But that thing... it wasn't just a reflection. It wasn't just a nightmare. There was a weight to it, a pull that felt real — like gravity. Even when I tried to turn away, something inside me leaned toward her. Her voice still echoed in my head:
"You let me in..."
She made no sound when she moved, but I felt her getting closer — a shift in the air, a vibration in the floorboards like something was rising from underneath.
I turned back to the mirror, but it was no longer a mirror. It had become a void — pitch black and endless. It showed nothing, and yet, I felt like it was watching me.
A thin, black extension — like a finger, small and shriveled — slowly emerged from the darkness. It stopped midair and began to tremble. She didn't just want in anymore. Now, she wanted to pull me through.
Whispers filled the room — not from outside, but from inside my head. Dozens of voices. Some laughed. Some cried. Some called my name over and over again, in voices that sounded like mine.
The only light in the room began to pulse — breathing in panic.
"Don't turn your back," a voice warned from inside the void.
I froze.
Then came the knocking.
Not on the door.
On the mirror.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
It matched my heartbeat. Heavy. Slow. Intentional.
A single eye opened in the center of the glass.
Not human. No iris. No white. Just a black sphere, wet and reflective, but it stared at me — stared through me.
"You let me in," she repeated. "Now it's your turn."
The walls pulsed. The ceiling twisted. My body stayed still, but I felt like my mind was being pushed — like I was slipping into a dream layered inside another dream.
The mirror cracked.
It didn't shatter. It opened.
It swallowed me whole.
I woke up — or I thought I did.
Same bed. Same room. Same smell. But something was... wrong.
The floorboards were rotting. The walls were covered in symbols — glowing faintly red.
The mirror was gone.
In its place stood a door. Rusted iron. Bolted. Breathing.
Behind it, a faint light flickered.
And a scent filled the air — smoke and wilted flowers.
Then her voice again, closer than ever:
"Don't try to run. There's nowhere left to go."