Georgina's lungs burned as the thing wearing Ethan's face dragged her down another flight of stairs. Each step slammed beneath her shoes like a drumbeat, a countdown she couldn't stop.
The stairwell was empty, fluorescent bulbs humming faintly overhead, but every few seconds the lights would flicker—and in those slivers of darkness, she saw it. Not Ethan, but something taller, warped, jaws unhinged in a smile too wide to be human. When the light steadied, the illusion was gone. Only Ethan's familiar back remained.
Her chest tightened. You're not him. You can't be him.
The photograph was still clutched in her palm, damp with sweat. She glanced at it again, desperate for guidance. The ink had shifted. New words bled across the paper, dripping like fresh paint.
Don't let him take you outside.
Georgina's stomach lurched. She yanked her wrist hard, twisting against his grip. "Ethan—stop! You're scaring me!"
He didn't turn. Didn't answer. Just kept dragging her, relentless, toward the exit.
The heavy steel door at the bottom of the stairwell loomed closer.
Back in the apartment, the real Ethan stumbled through broken glass, disoriented but breathing. His hands bled from the mirror's shatter, crimson streaks smeared across his palms, but he barely felt the pain.
"Georgina!" His voice cracked, echoing through the empty rooms. "Where are you?"
The silence was unbearable. He rushed to the stairwell, boots crunching over fragments. The air there felt wrong, colder, like someone had opened a door into a freezer.
And faintly, far below, he heard it: the slam of a stairwell door.
"Damn it." Ethan gritted his teeth and bolted down the stairs two at a time, heart pounding. Every landing stretched longer than it should, every shadow watching him. He couldn't shake the feeling that the building itself was shifting against him, stretching the distance between floors.
But he kept going. Faster.
He had to reach her before it did.
Georgina slammed her foot against the doorframe, halting the impostor's pull just long enough to speak. "If you're really Ethan—tell me the first thing you said to me when we swapped bodies!"
For the first time, it looked at her. Not with Ethan's warm confusion, but with something darker. Its head tilted slowly, as though the question amused it.
"You cried," it said. "You touched your face in my body and cried. And I laughed."
Her blood froze. That wasn't how it had happened. Ethan hadn't laughed. He had been just as shaken as she was.
This thing had been watching. Mimicking. Waiting.
Her scream ripped out raw. She shoved hard, twisting free from its grip. The photograph fell from her hand, fluttering down the stairwell like a dead leaf.
The thing lunged.
Georgina bolted up the next flight, heart slamming, her shoes slipping against the steps. She didn't dare look back. She didn't want to see its face fully revealed.
Ethan was only two floors above when he heard her scream. His stomach clenched.
"Hold on, Georgina!"
He tore down the stairs, nearly tripping in his rush. His breath came in ragged bursts, adrenaline burning through his veins.
Then he saw it.
The photograph, drifting down the center shaft of the stairwell. He reached out, caught it midair. His hands shook as he read the new words scrawled across the front:
It's not me. Don't trust it.
His throat went dry. He shoved the photo into his pocket and kept running.
Georgina burst through a side door into a basement corridor she didn't recognize. Pipes lined the ceiling, dripping condensation. The concrete floor was slick beneath her shoes.
She spun, listening.
Silence.
For a moment, she thought she'd lost it. Then—
Tap. Tap. Tap.
She looked up. The sound wasn't footsteps. It was fingers, drumming against the pipes above. Slowly. Deliberately.
She backed away, her breath coming fast. Her spine pressed against the wall.
Then, from the shadows ahead, Ethan emerged.
Not the one from the stairwell. A different one.
Bloody hands. Torn shirt. Wide, frantic eyes.
"Georgina," he panted. "It's me. Don't run. Please."
Her world tilted. Two Ethans. One in front of her, one somewhere behind.
Her pulse screamed in her ears.
"How do I know?" she whispered.
He took a shaking step closer, his voice desperate. "Because I'm still bleeding from the glass. Because I would never hurt you. Because—" His voice cracked. "—because I was trapped in the mirror. And you saw me."
Her heart stuttered.
From behind, the stairwell door slammed open. Heavy footsteps echoed, closer and closer.
Georgina's eyes darted between the two figures.
One Ethan, pale and broken, begging.
The other, approaching from the dark. Silent. Hunting.
She was trapped.
And she had no idea which one was real.