Elena hadn't slept. Couldn't.
She wandered the halls like a ghost now, clutching a rusted flashlight in one hand and the journal in the other. Every time she turned a corner, she expected to see her own face staring back at her—smiling, wrong.
Her mental sanity was being affected, as she started to grow paranoid about her surroundings; she kept questioning when that thing would show up, her existence, and that she was the real her.
It grew worse...
Reznik called a team meeting that morning. What was left of the team.
They gathered in the atrium. The mirrors from the old therapy walls had been covered with blankets. Even the reflections in puddles of water made Davis flinch.
"We leave tomorrow," Reznik said, his voice sharp, final. "Extraction arrives at dawn. No more investigations. No more mirrors."
"What about Sarah?" Davis asked.
"She's dead."
"She was smiling, Reznik."
Elena spoke before the argument escalated. "The mirror does more than reflect. It infects. The longer we're here, the less we remember who we were. The more it knows how to replace us."
Karpov hadn't spoken since arriving. Now he looked up slowly. "You think we're all still ourselves?"
The silence that followed was heavy.
That night, Elena heard footsteps outside her door.
She crept to the hall, heart hammering.
A figure stood at the far end, turned away.
"Reznik?" she called.
The figure didn't move.
"Captain Reznik?"
It turned around.
It had Reznik's uniform. His build. Even his stance.
But not his eyes.
They were pure black like ink poured over the glass.
Then it smiled—too wide—and ran.
Elena chased it down the west wing until it vanished into a rusted utility door she swore hadn't been there before. The journal pulsed in her coat pocket, burning hot.
Inside: stairs.
Down.
Down into darkness.
She hesitated. Then descended.
__
The staircase spiraled for what felt like miles. The walls changed. Concrete gave way to stone. Then bone.
The journal bled ink again.
This is where they hid it. The true mirror. The one that doesn't copy. The one that devours.
At the bottom, she found a room.
Octagonal. Silent.
In its center, a second mirror.
But this one was alive.
Its surface ripples like black water. Faces emerged— Adler, Karpov, Davis, herself—and melted away again.
It wasn't reflecting.
It was remembering.
She stepped closer.
It pulsed once. Then spoke, with her own voice:
"You brought me here, Elena. You were the first. The others followed. But only one of you will leave."
She reached out.
And her reflection reached back.
Black out~