The Mirror Realm

13.

The air reeks, reeks of a smell that is unexplainable. The air is unbreathable, unbearable. It's so brutally frigid, temperatures colder than what a thermometer can read. Shrieks and screams sound in the distance, bellowing for it to stop. Over and over their voices bellow the plea.

Instantly, her body is revived, resurrected. Her once lifeless body now wide awake on the floor. Amy rolls onto her stomach, her muscles weak, feeling as if they've lost all their gained power.

Space is somber, though it's faintly lit by blood-red fire, burning dimly on torches connected to the stone walls. The walls seem to go on forever, never stopping.

Amy shakily lifts her body off the cobbles of the ground, her arms trembling and looming to give out. Her eyes dilate, adjusting to the new surroundings. She glances down at herself, doing a once-over look.

What happened to me? She questions.

Her skin is paler than before, seeming a sickly shade of white, seeming almost ghostly. Her hair has lost all it's color, the locks on her head once a beautiful golden-blonde, are now a light shade of chiffon. She averts her gaze, not able to stand to stare at her new form. Instead, she focuses in front of her.

A single mirror hangs from the wall, but it doesn't reflect Amy's body, instead, it peers out at the other side, where she has come from. Everything as it was before, accept the single handprint on the glass.

It finally registers in her mind what happened, and when it does, she charges to the mirror, banging her fist on the glass over and over again, wanting so desperately to go back.

"No, no, no!" She wails.

"Let me back! Let me back! Please!" She shrieks, her eyes blood-shot.

"T-this is a m-mistake! I don't want to be here, please!"

She stops her banging at the sound of a familiar exclamation. There, racing into the bathroom is Levi.

  "Amy?!"

  "Levi!" She screams pushing herself against the mirror that is acting like a window but gets no response from Levi.

  She watches as his eyes scrutinize the bathroom, then, they stop on the handprint. His little mind begins to retrieve everything that Oliver had said, his hunter green eyes widening out of realization.

  "Oh...my...g-gosh," he mutters under his breath, choking up out of fear.

  "Levi! I'm right here!" Amy shouts, but - much to her dismay - she gets no response.

  It's then that Levi lets out a blood-curdling scream, one that might have the power to break someone's eardrum. Seconds later, her parents come barging in, taking a soft hold of Levi.

  "What's wrong?" They ask. Levi points a finger into the mirror, unable to say anything.

  They crane their necks to follow the direction in which Levi is pointing, and as soon as their retinas see what it was that caused him to scream, they are about to let out one of their very own.

  Mrs. Hayes begins to breathe heavily, shakily asking, "w-what do we d-do?!"

  "Call the police!" Mr. Hayes answers immediately, a crying and freaked out Levi wrapped in a tight embrace in his arms.

  "No! I'm right here! I'm right h-here!" Amy bellows, banging on the glass again, her voice cracking at the end. "Please, I'm right here!"

  The family begins to break down on the others side of the glass, exiting the bathroom quickly, making their way to the phone.

  "No!"

  A hand reaches from behind her body, one that looks as if it belongs to a dead corpse. Its the same hand from before, the same one that came out of her closet and held up three fingers. It's the same one, claws and everything. The hand wraps around her mouth, shutting her up.

  Her screams are muffled as the claws sink into her cheek, hot tears streaming down her face like a never-ending cascade. Within seconds, her body falls limp again as it is dragged down the never-ending hallway. 

  She said the two words, and now...she has no idea what she's gotten herself into. And there is no way of turning back now. It's too late for any of that, for she is the last kill, the twelfth kill.

  The last kill and the new beginning of the Two Decade Mantra.