Mirrored

Her lipstick hit the floor, rolling out of the bathroom and into the hallway, its tip smudged and broken. Danica stared at the mirror, gasping for air as she fumbled at the hand at her throat. It was her hand, but it also wasn’t. The fingernails, painted a bright orange, were the same. The ring that her father had given her as a birthday present when she was a little girl was the same. The fingernail on her index finger, now digging into the side of her neck, that she had broken while playing video games with Elliot was the same, its sharp edges painful.

The girl in the mirror laughed, squeezing Danica’s throat tighter. She had the same brown hair and the same outfit as Danica. The same face. The same tan skin and freckles. She couldn’t be real; she had to be a hallucination. Yet, the reflection only smiled wider as it continued to climb out of the mirror, holding its grip on Danica.

Danica tried to speak, tried to ask what it was and why it was here, terrorizing her. Yet no sound came out, and the world around her dimmed. Life grew faint before her eyes, the girl killing her becoming a sea of vague colors. As Danica fell to the floor the reflection laughed again. It opened the window of the bathroom, picked the girl up and tossed her into the bushes to take care of the body later. Then it snatched the broken lipstick, observed it, and tossed it in the trash. The backpack Danica took to school daily stood by the door, and the reflection took it. It looked into the mirror one last time, the reflection in it now less lifelike and almost dull, and said, in Danica’s exact voice.

“Free at last.”

~~~

Elliot sat at the end of the class, their hair in front of their eyes, playing with a fidget toy. They didn’t want to be here, this early, and Danica being late for the first time in ages added to their annoyance. Dani was always early. It had become an inside joke for the whole morning Algebra II class. Joey leaned over to Elliot, whispering,

“This is the first time since that time she pulled an all-nighter studying, isn't it?”

“Yep. I bet she’ll beat herself down for this for ages,” Elliot answered.

The first bell rang, the students settling down in their seats. Danica finally came rushing through the door. After apologising to the teacher, who groaned, knowing that she wasn’t even late, Danica slid into the seat besides Elliot.

“Look who it is! Miss I’m-always-early actually got here after me!” Joey exclaimed, as Elliot gave their friend a smirk.

“It was an emergency, guys. And it's not as if I’m not early every single day while you guys loiter in the hallway.”

Joey shot back with a remark about how they weren't doing anything wrong but was interrupted as their teacher began the class, signaling what to Elliot seemed to be an average, boring day.

It wasn’t until lunchtime that Elliot got suspicious of anything, when Joey pulled them out of the cafeteria.

“What? I’m not done eating. What’s so important?”

“Look, I might just be paranoid, but—”

“You probably are.”

“Shut up. Anyways, Dani being late is already kinda weird, but I noticed during science class that her eyes look weird. Her pupils are so tiny and don’t seem to dilate. Did you notice that?”

“You know I don’t like looking into people’s eyes or even notice that stuff.”

“Yeah, okay. Well then, I’m telling you now. She’s been acting a little weird today anyways. Almost as if it’s a special day and not just another boring day of being locked up at school.”

“She gets over-excited about all nerdy things. Remember how she couldn’t sleep because she was excited for a science project?”

“Look, I just think something’s up, okay? I have no idea what but something’s different.”

“That’s cool dude, but I doubt it. Can I go eat my sandwich now?”

Elliot left Joey in the hallway, disappointed, but Joey had planted a seed in their brain, a seed of skepticism that made Elliot pay more attention to their friend.

It wasn’t until the next day that anything happened, exactly twenty four hours since Joey first talked to Elliot, in the girls bathroom. Elliot hated the girls bathroom, yet the school refused to put a gender neutral one, so they were forced to tag along with Danica. Danica placed her bag on the counter, getting out her makeup to make sure she looked in check, while Elliot stood awkwardly by, watching their friend through the mirror.

A shiver ran down their spine, unexplained anxiety setting in.

“I think I might go back,” they said, but Danica quickly grasped their hand.

“I’ve always said you would look good in makeup. Come on, dark purple lipstick to match your hair? Please?”

“Dani, no. I hate makeup.”

“No, but imagine. Look in the mirror.”

“Dani—”

Danica turned Elliot’s head towards the mirror. “Or maybe black lipstick. Some eyeliner… It’ll be a bit harder to find a concealer that matches your skin.”

As Elliot looked into the mirror they felt an odd sensation. Something was wrong, and it was almost as if there was something wrong with the reflection. Danica’s seemed much less saturated than Elliot’s.

Elliot batted away their friend's hand, leaving Danica. “No, no, no, I’m going.”

In the hallway they leaned against the wall, thinking intensely. What the hell was that? The whole interaction was weird, yet Elliot was sure that the reflection had been wrong. It had—no, it couldn’t. Reflections couldn’t blink all on their own. It was impossible. Elliot had imagined it.

The interaction didn’t leave Elliot’s head for the days following. They remained awake at night, pondering if it had really happened or if they were going crazy. As it plagued their mind, Danica’s behavior merely became stranger. She seemed to care less about school, opposite of how she was typically. Her appearance changed as well—her nail polish peeled off, her makeup applied with less care. She seemed to have something else constantly preoccupying mind. Joey had asked her for extra money to buy his crush a gift, yet Danica said she didn’t have money. She had always carefully saved money, keeping it for when she moved out, yet she had explained that she had recently spent it all. On what, neither Joey nor Elliot knew.

It was a typical Saturday when they found out. Danica had invited them over, to hang out, and Elliot and Joey gladly accepted, wanting to know what was going on with their friend.

“Drugs,” Joey said.

“Danica would never. She’s too much of a good kid.”

“I don’t know, with how much she was stressing herself out before?”

Elliot shrugged.

Danica welcomed them in, showing them snacks that her mother had left before going to visit a friend and explaining that they were the only ones home.

“Lets go to my room. There's something I want to show you.”

Elliot and Joey exchanged a glance, as if to say, “maybe this will explain why she acts differently now.”

They walked to her room, Danica awkwardly lagging behind. As soon as Elliot stepped into the room they saw what was wrong. Mirrors stood and hung all around the room, and Elliot gazed upon their reflection in dozens of mirrors, small and large. Some ornate, some just plain sheets.

“What the—” Joey began, before yelling as Danica locked the door, leaving Elliot and Joey in the room alone.

“Danica! What the hell are you doing!?!” Joey jiggled the door knob frantically, but it wasn’t budging. Danica’s laugh could be heard in the hallway. As Joey struggled with the door, Elliot walked up to one of the mirrors.

Why mirrors? Why so many of them? And most importantly, what is Danica doing with them and for what? Elliot bent down towards one mirror that was propped up against the wall at an angle and was facing slightly up. Joey continued shouting, and Elliot looked back at him.

“Stop yelling. You know I can’t take loud noise or I’ll have a sensory overload. Try the window,” they said firmly, trying to stay calm with even breaths.

“Yeah, sorry, our friend is just going crazy,” Joey answered, both apologetically but also with a tone of annoyance. “How about you—”

He was interrupted as Elliot jumped back from the mirror, a yelp escaping their throat. Something had touched their ankle. Damn it, something had touched their ankle. They couldn’t stand having their ankles touched. Elliot dug out their fidget toy from their pocket, trying to calm down, before even noticing what had happened. Joey had stopped yelling, instead staring at something in shock.

It was only after a few moments that Elliot had calmed down enough to look up.

From the mirror, the one that they had been looking at, their reflection looked back at them. But their reflection was not in the mirror anymore. It was half out, leaning against the floor with a sly grin on its face.

Slowly, they watched as the reflection climbed out fully, not knowing what to do. Elliot felt themselves shudder as they heard Danica laugh. Except they now realized that it was not Danica who had locked them in here.

Another few moments passed, and a perfect copy of Joey stepped out from behind one of the mirrors. In his hand was a knife.

Joey—the real one—came to life once again, rushing to the window and trying to open it. His reflection had begun to follow him, steadily approaching. Elliot went for the door instead. They had bobby pins in their purse, not for their hair, but in case a situation like this ever happened. Damn it, they should have given them to Joey earlier when he was trying to open it.

They almost dropped it, cursing under their breath as they finally unlocked the door. Crawling up from the floor and darting into the hallway, they could hear Joey bolt after them.

Elliot’s mind buzzed. They had no idea what was happening, but their only thought was to survive and get away from whatever the hell those things were. They stopped in the kitchen, where Danica, or whatever it was now, stood. The three reflections had trapped them. Almost. Elliot had spent a lot of time at Danica’s house in the many years of their friendship, and they went for the basement door, hoping Joey would follow.

Their heart pounded as they flew down the wooden stairs and into the maze downstairs. Who knew if the reflections also knew how to navigate the confusing basement, but Elliot sure hoped they couldn’t catch up with them.

Elliot rushed through the basement, between the stacks of boxes and shelves and the piles of stuff the positions of which they had long memorized. Then they heard a shriek—Joey’s—and laughter—his reflection’s. Fuck. Elliot just hoped that he was okay.

Doubling back upstairs to try and get out, Elliot spotted a splatter of blood behind the corner. They had to get out, even if Joey didn’t. They had to. The front door was unopenable, so Elliot went back to the room—the one with the mirrors—to attempt at the window again. But their reflection was not far behind. They looked up from the windowsill, their reflection staring back.

“Why are you here? What do you want?”

“You’ve had your turn here. It’s our time now. We have had enough, cramped up in mirrors, captive. We're here to take your place.”

“I haven’t done shit to you, why should I have to pay?”

“Because it's the only way.”

“Now, I’m sure that there is another—”

The reflection darted towards them, but Elliot instinctively grabbed the mirror out of which it had crawled out and smashed it onto their head. The reflection seemed fine, but the mirror shattered, and as it did, the reflection had begun to crumble.

Elliot blocked out the scream as it shriveled up into glass. They then sank to the floor, trying to get air in their lungs. Soon remembering that the other two reflections were still there, Elliot quickly got up. They finished breaking the window, trying not to look at the faint reflection in the glass, and ran out of the house, finally free. They walked over to the middle of town, several blocks away, their wrist bleeding from a flying piece that came off of the shattered mirror. They sat down on a park bench, processing what had happened.

They remained still, trying to piece it together. It had seemed like a normal day, yet now Elliot was so afraid. Maybe it was a dream? A bad one that Elliot just had to wake up from? Or maybe they were just going crazy. Or perhaps this truly was actually happening.

Strangers walked by, and Elliot forced themselves to watch them, despite their discomfort. They couldn’t help but feel that something was wrong with about half of them. Their eyes were weird, their mannerisms unusual.

Elliot smashed every mirror they could find when they got home. The pieces lay scattered on the floor, like a mosaic, and Elliot quickly swept them up to not see them anymore. But they couldn’t trust anyone.

Some time after, Elliot noticed a change in their parents. Soon they were in the same situation as before; the reflections that had been their mother and father trying to trap them, so their reflection could overtake them. Elliot was on the streets, knowing that somewhere there was an unsmashed mirror that allowed their reflection to roam the world, unknowing how close behind them.

They found an abandoned building, looking upon a city. A closing store was at the bottom and unfinished apartments were at the top. That was where Elliot hid, on the top floor, making sure to hide every reflective surface. They made sure not to leave any reflective glass, instead gluing paper over it, making it translucent, and the only place they ever saw themselves in was a water basin, specifically there for that purpose.

Bigger changes started occurring. Companies were abandoned, families broken up all across the world. Elliot saw people talking about it online, being shut down by those who had already become their reflections.

Then the internet went dark. Elliot didn’t know why the reflections had done it. Perhaps to stop the spread of accounts and theories about their existence by limiting communication. The world was suddenly split into millions of tiny pieces, barely able to communicate. Elliot hid in the abandoned building, almost never coming out except for supplies. They needed to figure out what was going on, as well as how to stop it. They spent hours writing down everything they knew and theorized about the reflections. They could be killed by smashing the mirror they had come from. Their eyes and unnatural behavior were some indicators that one was a reflection. They couldn’t come out of water reflections.

If Elliot was truly to help, they needed backup. They needed to find a way to find allies. Human allies.

Ottava Rima

He heard those stories, read those epic tales

Of gallant princes saving girls they love.

And so he found a ship with lovely sails,

Set off to find someone he’s worthy of.

He had wished he’d now be free of all his fails,

And start fresh and anew to find true love.

And as he searched he found a bit of land,

A pretty house stood there in the woodland.

And in a tiny window he saw her,

With pretty flowing hair and eyes of gold.

And though he tried to make himself deter,

He thought that he would find her and be bold.

He stepped onto the land, it seemed to stir.

He’d find and save the girl, to he his mind told.

He walked past rivers and by tall dark trees.

He came to the tower, there was a breeze.

He drew his sword and was prepared to fight,

To face any dangers that came his way.

He told himself that now he was a knight,

And that his purpose he would not betray.

And so he climbed and overcame his fright,

Whatever villain captured her - child’s play.

Inside the tower he would surely win,

And then the girl he saw would widely grin.

Yet the event did not go as he planned.

His sword fell down as he fell on the floor.

The girl had grabbed whatever tools at hand,

And now the prince had no life to look for.

She’d had many a man come to her land.

Their pride and ignorance they would pay for,

On a man she did not have to depend.

She killed them and went back to her girlfriend.