Page 5

Mirrors were portals between worlds. It was possible that the dark energies were trying to get inside the room to escape into the mirrors, but the array formation of these mirrors guarded this room against evil.

“Evan…”

Evan flinched, the sudden whisper sending a chill running down his spine. Crimson Eye warmed on his finger, turning completely black.

His lashes lowered, watching the shadows dancing around his feet. The trees above the glass panel in the ceiling swayed in a mysterious rhythm, casting figures on the floor that seemed agitated, alive.

“Evan…”

Not daring to move a muscle, Evan strained his ears. Responding to something he couldn’t see could lead to opening a channel he didn’t mean to open.

It was weird. Evan had come across similar situations in the past while facing off against malevolent spirits, the whispers and jump scares, and tactics to lure him into obvious traps. He’d been unfazed, almost bored, during those times. Then why was this particular time making him break out into goosebumps?

The distant whispers grazed his ear shell again in a haunting caress, like fingers grasping, nails digging. So alien, yet so familiar. As his ears strained, Evan soon caught the direction of the voices.

It was coming from inside the oval mirror.

Staring into the black void of the mirror, almost unconsciously, his fingers reached up, grazing the golden frame, over the miniature art that was starting to look a lot like ancient runes.

Who is it?

The mirror responded, whispering something he couldn’t decipher. But he felt it. The longing in that voice. Pain, so intense it clutched at Evan’s chest and clawed through his flesh, trying to reach his heart.

“Evan…”

Fingers curling tighter against the flashlight, Evan gritted his teeth through the throb in his heart. He bit down on his tongue as a ridiculously strong urge to respond to that voice rose within him.

It is trying to control my mind .

That had to be the reason he was physically out of his own control.

He bit down on his tongue until a metallic taste flooded his mouth when suddenly, a shadow moved inside the oval mirror.

Evan stilled.

A silhouette splayed against the dark, non-reflective surface, staring at him from the other side of the mirror. It was huge, stretching as tall as the mirror. A faint figure came into view. Fingers, arms, two red dots…two red eyes—

The doors burst open behind him.

Evan jolted, the world blurring for a moment. As if an unseen spell had shattered.

What was that? What did I just…?

“There he is.”

A sharp breath escaped Evan’s lips as Bruce’s voice, along with several footsteps and flashlights, barged into the mirror room. Somehow, their already twisted faces had managed to scrunch into a more severe expression, like they were suffering from constipation.

“We’ve been screaming your name for thirty minutes now. You fucking deaf?” Bruce barked.

Thirty minutes?

It hadn’t been that long since Evan came into this room, had it? And why did he not hear a single sound from downstairs if they were calling for him? With his sensitive ears, he should have…

As Evan blinked, a warm drop of moisture rolled down his cheeks, into his parted lips.

Warm. Salty.

Confused, he touched his face, fingers collecting the tears gathered under his chin.

I am…crying?

The dull ache in his chest, which had momentarily subsided, started throbbing again. Evan hadn’t cried in years.

Returning his gaze to the mirror, Evan’s dazed eyes fell on his hand, which was gripping the golden frame of the mirror. His heart dropped when he noticed his dull skin.

The light barrier had faded away without his knowledge.

Evan wrenched his hand away like he’d been burnt, his index finger accidentally catching at a pointy edge of the mirror frame. His skin tore. Blood oozed. Before he could understand what had happened, the blood trickled down his palm and onto the dusty floor.

A satisfied hum reverberated across the floor.

Fuck .

Bleeding in a haunted space was as well an invitation to hungry spirits to feast on his flesh.

“Is he really deaf?” One of the men growled behind him.

Bruce grunted. “What were you doing in here?”

Someone laughed. “Jerking off in front of a mirror?”

Evan’s jaws clenched . Ignore them.

Fools in the jaws of death often masked their fear with humor.

“Did you already come? Too bad we could’ve watched.”

“Or lent a hand.”

Ignore them.

Evan clenched his bloody fist, forcing out more blood.

Ignore them. Ignore them .

“We could’ve recorded it for Boss.”

“Boss would kill us if we fucked him before he could.”

Unable to help it, a chuckle burst out of Evan’s lips. The laughter died down behind him.

Rubbing his bloody hand on his pants, Evan shook his head, still chuckling under his breath. “Do you see these?” he aimlessly twirled a finger around the room, turning to the group of annoyed men. “Mirrors. Take a good look. Tell me what you see and if you expect me to fuck that?”

The men blinked, mouths agape and stance frozen. They couldn’t believe their eyes. Had they insulted and assaulted the boy enough over the years that he’d finally snapped?

The satisfaction of their dumbfounded expressions lasted only a few seconds for Evan. As usual, Bruce was the first to turn from ice to sizzling lava.

“What the fuck did you say?” Rushing forward, he grabbed the collar of Evan’s undershirt with one hand, grasping his jaw with the other, digging his crusty nails into his skin. “You think you’re some shit just 'cause Boss's been a bit soft on you? Don’t forget your fucking place!”

Despite himself, Evan scoffed. “Maybe if you stopped licking your Boss’s ass all the time, he’d consider giving you some credit too.”

Unmasked fury blazed across Bruce’s face. He shoved Evan back a step, then delivered a solid punch straight across his face.

Pain burst across Evan’s cheek, his whole upper body swinging to the side. Losing his balance, he crashed face-first against the oval mirror, the flashlight slipping from his grip. As he tried to stabilize himself, his bloody hand splayed against the mirror pane.

At least, Bruce hadn’t punched him as hard as he could. Evan knew what that felt like.

He shook his dizzy head before straightening, and his eyes fell on the mirror. His body tensed, as if an invisible force had locked him in place.

From inside the mirror, a pair of glowing scarlet eyes glared at Evan, right beside where his hand had left a bloody print on the non-reflective surface.

Spirits must not be looked in the eye…

But Evan couldn’t look away. As he stared, the mirror surface absorbed his blood clean, the entire frame quaking with ominous tremors.

Evan sucked in a sharp breath, but before he could process what he was seeing, Bruce hauled him back by the back of his coat.

“Why are you running now? Let me show you exactly how I plan on earning credits.”

Bruce grabbed a fistful of Evan’s hair and yanked his head back. One of his men tore off Evan's coat while another caught his arms and twisted them painfully behind his back, rendering him defenseless.

But Evan’s eyes were fixated on the mirror…the little tremor in its frame. On the faint, black smoke seeping from its edges.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

With a boost of adrenaline, Evan pushed back into Bruce’s chest and jumped, jamming his boot into the face of the minion in front of him. When their grip loosened, his boot met the crotch of the other two men, too quick to anticipate. Falling to their knees, the men whimpered on the floor, clutching onto their throbbing area. Just as Evan breathed a sigh, the grip on his hair tightened painfully.

“Let go of me, fucker!” Evan sneered, trying to elbow the face behind him.

Bruce chuckled in his ear, effortlessly catching his arm. “You can’t run now, little shit.”

“But you have to, dickhead! If you don’t wanna die.”

His teeth scraped Evan’s neck. “Keep struggling. I like tha—”

Evan’s elbow finally connected with his stomach, hard. Bruce’s grip went slack from his hair with an oof .

“Sorry,” Evan jumped away with a cold laugh. “You’re not my type.”

One of the men, still grabbing his numb balls, rushed into Evan, slamming him back against the mirror. This time, the glass surface cracked against the impact.

Fuck, if that mirror broke—

Bruce’s kick was brutal against Evan’s stomach, sending him—and the mirror—flying back.

He crashed flat on the floor, blood spurting from his mouth on impact. A crack reverberated somewhere in his body, but he was too distracted. Witnessing—in gut-wrenching pain—as the mirror tipped off its stand.

It swayed momentarily...then crashed to the floor with a deafening shatter.

Evan’s arms flew up, shielding his face against the flying shards.

The thick golden chains around the mirror snapped, and a sudden burst of heat enveloped the room.

Somewhere under that loud crash, there was a shrill, agonized cry. The walls and the floor beneath Evan hummed in satisfaction as faint whispers bloomed into his ears again.

Evan lay flat on the floor, his arms caging his head, eyes squinted at the dark clouds creeping into the sky beyond the glass pane. Unnaturally fast, the clouds obstructed the moonlight from entering the room.

Darkness ascended as the moon hid away. The array formation faded.

Fantastic.

Unaware of the shift in the atmosphere, one of the men hauled Evan up by the collar.

“Come here,” Bruce grabbed Evan’s jaw as blood flooded his mouth, trickling down the corners of his lips. “Today I’ll teach you a lesson.”

Evan’s brain turned foggy as the heaviness in the air wrapped around him, his unfocused eyes falling on the shattered mirror.

A subtle rumble shook the floor beneath them, but none of the others seemed to notice. Not even when a cloud of black smoke formed through the cracks on the mirror. The rage and resentment wafting from it made Evan choke on thin air.

It smelled like death.

“Run…” He managed to grit out, grabbing onto Bruce’s arm. “Go!”

“You think I’m afraid of you?” Clenching his jaws, Bruce raised his fist to land another punch.

Evan shut his eyes and clenched his jaws, waiting for the burst of pain to bloom in his face.

But it never came.

The flashlights flickered in the men’s grasp, making Bruce’s fist halt three inches away from Evan’s face. Within moments, the few sources of light in the room went out one by one, dousing them in complete darkness.

A chaos of curses and terrified yelps erupted.

Bruce shoved Evan back, keeping a loose grip on his collar.

“What the fuck happened?” He barked. “Why are the—”

His next words ended in a choked gurgle. A strained wheezing breath.

Bruce stilled. Slowly, his fingers uncurled from Evan’s collar and fell away.

Evan blinked in the dark, holding onto his aching stomach and spitting a mouthful of blood. When no curses or fists flew in his direction, his stomach knotted with dread.

“Hello?”

Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud.

Evan flinched as something dropped onto the floor near his feet. He reached into the dark, blindly swinging his hand through empty air.

Empty.

Groaning, he crouched, feeling the floor for his flashlight, and found it lying a few feet away from him. As he slapped it against his palm a few times, it flickered on for a second. A brief second that shed light over the four bodies lying on the floor.

“Fuck!” Evan fell back on his ass, the flashlight tumbling to the floor once again.

Click. Click.

The flashlight flicked on and off, blinking glares over the men who’d stood tall and alive a few seconds ago. The same men who were now just a pile of bones on the floor with a thin, wrinkled layer of skin over their skeletons.

Click. Click.

All life, along with blood and flesh, had been sucked from their bodies. Their eyeballs and their arms below the elbow were missing too.

With a final click , the flashlight died.

Breathing raggedly, Evan scooted back, all senses strained to the point of agony.

A light whipped past his periphery, and his eyes snapped in the direction, squinting into the darkness.

It was strange. He was not the kind to be afraid of the dark, but this particular darkness seemed to physically threaten him. His fingers flexed, blue light flickering between them—

Whoosh!

A flare of red light rushed past Evan’s side, swirling around him before disappearing a few feet away. Like eyelids peeling open, a pair of glowing scarlet eyes lit up in the pitch black. Evan sucked in a sharp breath.

It escaped. The thing from the mirror…it escaped. And it was staring right at him.

Wait...I have my ring. Slowly trying to gain back his stability, Evan reassured himself. It can’t possess me as long as I have my ring.

Despite his reflexive urge to divert his eyes, Evan held the scarlet gaze, struggling to stand up. Every part of his body ached, bruised and otherwise, especially his heart.

With a shaky breath, Evan straightened. He’d personally confirmed that this exorcism was beyond his abilities, so he’d come prepared.

Plan B. Time for Plan B.

What the fuck was Plan B?

Blue sparks flickered unsteadily between his fingers, as if his spiritual energy was struggling to heed his command. Just as he conjured a small ball of energy in his palm to shoot an attack at the thing, a warm gust of wind wrapped around Evan. Invisible claws strangled his body in an iron fist, and the ball of spiritual energy faded away.

Evan’s limbs turned rigid, and a heaviness unlike anything he’d ever felt descended on his chest, making it difficult to breathe.

He collapsed to his knees, gasping for air, his entire body trembling against the restraint on his lungs. A faint blue spark flickered in his eyes but didn’t last.

That thing was trying to suck the spiritual energy from his body.

Due to the turmoil of emotions he’d gone through in a span of only a handful of minutes, his spiritual core had been partially exposed, reflexively trying to form a whole-body barrier over Evan. And although it had happened suddenly and without Evan’s command, that thing had sensed his core opening and was already draining the energy from his body.

The ring scalded his finger. Burning through the skin. But he couldn’t move.

Click. Click.

The flashlight flickered on momentarily, and a movement up ahead caught his attention.

In the blinking light, Evan watched in absolute horror as a ball of black smoke swirled into the air, floating above the shattered mirror. That was where glowing eyes had been.

Red sparks crackled like lightning amidst the storming black cloud. The hundreds of mirrors around reflected that red shimmering smoke, making it seem as though it was everywhere.

And then, the shapeless cloud started growing, taking form, the force of its energy making Evan choke.

A giant silhouette materialized from the smoke, long hair blowing in a wind that had no way of entering a room without windows. Two protrusions sprouted amidst the mass of hair, curving away from the glowing red eyes like horns. The lower half of its body was still a ball of smoke.

The sight knocked out whatever air was left in Evan’s lungs. It was disturbing yet mesmerizing. Something he probably shouldn’t have seen but would never regret witnessing.

A halo of red light radiated from the silhouette, and a faint sound brushed past Evan’s ears.

A breath.

Like the first inhale of life after being underwater for a long time.

Evan’s lungs, on the other hand, burnt with the lack of air, vision blurring and head spinning in circles.

When the silhouette formed its lower half and landed on two solid feet, Evan’s body gave in to its overpowering force, tumbling to the floor.

“Little Storm…”

A ringing went off in Evan’s ears, painful and familiar at the same time.

Dazed and disoriented, he gasped short, quick breaths as the silhouette moved towards him, one deliberate step at a time, the mightiness of its form hypnotizing him for a brief moment.

Then that moment ended.

Fuck… I can’t die like this.

With the little strength left in his body, Evan forced his limbs to move, raising a trembling hand as Crimson Eye blazed angrily on his finger.

“Be...g-gone...” A faint blue glow ghosted his skin as he tried to force out a bit of spiritual energy. Not lasting too long, the glow dimmed. He was too drained. Too weak.

The glow of his ring dimmed, too, before fading off completely.

Crack.

Evan’s hand froze midair.

With another crack, the red crystal of Crimson Eye crumbled, turning to black dust right before his eyes.

Evan blankly stared as the ring—his mother’s last memento and the final shield protecting him—disappeared.

His hand trembled in the air, unable to drop or hold up.

Memories flooded his head. Pleasant and painful and everything in between. Faces. People. His mother and sister. Rhea and Aaron. Despite his truce with death as the ultimate bearer of freedom, he’d not expected his end to come so soon.

I wish I could’ve seen Celie one last time…

Two blurry feet stopped near his collapsed form, the sinister aura encompassing the silhouette burning bright.

Evan braced for the impact of whatever attack it would launch at him. But instead, something warm—fingers—wrapped around Evan’s suspended hand. They were firm yet gentle, hot yet somehow soothing.

He tried to focus on the face of the silhouette, but exhaustion weighed on his eyelids. They gave in, shutting for good.

The pair of glowing scarlet eyes narrowed at Evan.

Then a breath carried across the room in a soft whisper.

“I’ve been waiting…”