Speaker 1: Welcome listeners to Tales, a podcast that brings your short
stories to life. Do narrations, sound effects, and more. These
stories were brought to you by different authors with different
writing styles, though with the same spooky vibes.
Speaker 2: So lock your.
Speaker 1: Doors, check your closets, make certain there's nothing lurking under
your bed, and.
Speaker 2: Angel thereby.
Speaker 3: The third Reflection, written by en Varo. They used to
say mirrors held the soul, that when a person died,
every mirror in the house had to be covered, not
out of respect but fear. If the soul its own
reflection before it left the body, it would become trapped, bound,
doomed to linger behind the glass, staring out forgotten. Other
stories warned of the mirror world, a place exactly like
our own, but reversed, a place considered to be silent
and soulless, empty but for the shadows we leave behind.
And sometimes they said if a person stared too long
into a mirror, something might stare back, something that wasn't them.
Hazy Cartwright never liked mirrors, not in a dramatic, superstitious
sort of way, just discomfort. As a kid, she used
to brush her teeth while facing the wall pretending she
didn't notice the bathroom mirror behind her. Even now, at
twenty one, she rarely looked at her reflection longer than
a few seconds. It wasn't vanity, It wasn't fear of
aging or body image or anything like that. It was
something simpler. Her reflection always felt slightly late, like it
blinked just a beat too slow, or tilted its head
a little off center, like it wasn't quite her, just
someone very good at pretending to be. She learned to
ignore it mostly at Renmore, that kind of behavior would
just get psychoanalyzed by the wrong professor and turned into
a lecture. This was a place of brilliance, not superstition,
where mines were honed sharp, not left to wander. But
Casey still checked every mirror before she walked away, not
for lipstick, just to be sure there were only two
of her. The first time it happened, really happened. She
was brushing her teeth in the shared bathroom of her
campus housing. It was past midnight and her roommate was asleep.
The hallway was quiet. Everything was routine. Brush prints, glance, towel,
and then pods. She couldn't explain why she looked back
in the mirror. She just did, and there, just behind
her reflected shoulder stood another version of her, not a shadow,
not a trick of light. A third figure, indistinct but unmistakable,
standing just far enough behind the reflection to be wrong.
It didn't move. Casey froze, her pulse thudding in her throat.
She turned around, slowly, methodically, heart beat by heartbeat. Nothing.
The bathroom was empty. She faced the mirror again, only
two herself and the reflection, no one else. She stood
there for a long time, toothbrush still in her hand,
foam on her lips, gone bitter. Behind her, the sink
continued to drip. That night, Casey druamt of cold glass,
of fingers tapping rhythmically from the other side, and a voice,
her own voice, whispering, Tell no one, or I'll be
the one who survives. The next morning, Casey woke up tired,
not groggy, not hungover, just drained, the kind of tired
that clung to the skin, like something had pulled her
too close to sleep, then yanked her back at the
last second. The bathroom was empty when she entered. She
flicked on the light and avoided the mirror without thinking,
brushing her teeth like she always did, eyes down, face blank.
But when she leaned over to rint, she noticed something
on the sink, a single fingerprint pressed clearly against the
edge of the glass. It wasn't hers, too large to define,
and she'd cleaned the mirror three days ago. She wiped
it out without a word and didn't mention it to anyone.
Campus was slow that day. The frost hadn't lifted, and
the paths through the old quad were patchy with black ice.
A few students slipped as they walked between classes, mostly
freshmen who hadn't yet learned to navigate the cobbled walks
without breaking their necks. Casey kept her head down, her
scarf was pulled up over her chin, earbds in playlist low.
The cold didn't bother her, but she kept catching her
reflection windows, shop glass, the steel paneling outside the library's
new science wing, and each time it felt like something shifted.
It was nothing dramatic. There was no third figure standing
behind her, no flickering eyes or reversed gestures, just something small, off,
as if the reflections weren't matching her posture exactly. Once
in the corner of the campus bookstore. She paused to
check her phone and near her security mirror, her reflection
didn't look at her phone. She stared straight at Casey
only for a second, a blink, then it was gone.
That night, Sam was still awake. She lay half wrapped
in a Sherpa blanket a documentary, murmuring on her laptop.
When Casey patted into the room, blinking out the cold,
Sam didn't bother to look away. You look like death,
she said, thanks. Casey dropped her back by the floor.
Speaker 2: Just tired nightmares again?
Speaker 3: Casey hesitated, No, just didn't sleep great. Sam muted the
laptop and caught her head. You okay, Yeah, Casey kicked
off her shoes and shrugged out of her coat. I'm fine.
A little silence settled between them, ordinary and domestic. Then
Sam asked something that should have the casual, but landed
like a stone.
Speaker 4: Did you ever hear about that mirror thing? She said,
like the stories about spirits getting trapped if they see
their reflection after they die.
Speaker 3: Casey glanced up.
Speaker 4: Why we were talking about mourning rituals liminal spaces, professor said,
mirrors were considered doorways.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Hasey kept her voice steady, I've heard that. Sam
nodded slowly.
Speaker 4: Just makes you think, if something can get stuck in
a mirror, what happens if it ever gets out.
Speaker 3: Casey opened her mouth to answer, then fell silent. She
heard the bathroom door down the hall creak on its own,
soft and ordinary, and a small, cold animal. Part of
her sat up and listened in the darkened glass of
their shared window. A third reflection blinked. She didn't go
to class the next day. She told Sam she wasn't
feeling well. Migraine something to keep it simple. Sam didn't press.
When the room was empty, Casey locked the door and
stood in the middle of the dorm for a full minute,
arms folded, listening to the apartment breathe around her. She
watched the window and the mirror above the dresser, and
the screen of her laptop. Nothing moved still. She moved
through the ritual. The dresser mirror was covered with a towel,
then the bathroom mirror, then the laptop screen. She unplugged
her phone and set it face down. The apartment felt
as if someone had quieted it on purpose. The silence
was heavy, like fabric draped over a pulsing instrument. She knew,
in the same place she knew she had hands in
a heartbeat, that she was not crazy. The third reflection
was not a dream. She saw it again that morning
with no question. Sam had showered The mirror over the
sink was fogged. Casey reached in and swiped a hand
across the glass to clear it, and there, in the
softened silver, at the very back of the surface, behind
the angle of her shoulder, the third thing waited. This time.
It wasn't only still. It smiled, a wide, wrong smile
that didn't reach its eyes. It was an imitation of joy,
all edges and teeth and no warmth. Casey spun around.
The bathroom was empty. She looked back at the mirror.
Her own face stared back at her, pale and ordinary.
But she had seen the smile. She knew it had
seen her back. It wanted her to know. By late afternoon,
the whispers began, not words at first, just ecstatic halo
at the edge of hearing, like a radio tuned between stations.
Then tiny syllables shaped in the timber of her own voice,
half formed and impossible to catch. She thought it was
her phone. She picked it up. The screen was black.
She checked the window, frost on the panes, empty walkways,
a few students bundled and hurrying. Then the bathroom mirror
was uncovered. The towel she'd wrapped it in lay, folded
and kneat on the sink, as if whatever had moved
the towel had precise domestic habits. The small unease in
her chest widened into a sense of being observed not
by a living thing, but by a persistence that had
learned how to wait. That night, she dreamed in mirrors
a long haul, lined on both sides with glass. Each
reflection was slightly wrong. One blinked twice when she blinked once.
Another opened its mouth as though the screen and no
sound came. The wrongness multiplied like a slow contagion, until
one reflection, only one, held still. It did not mimic,
it watched all at once. Every reflection in the endless
hall turned toward that still one, and in perfect terrible unison, whispered,
let her in, Let her in, Let her in. She
woke with a gasp. Every mirror in her room was uncovered.
On the wall above her bed, traced faintly in the
condensation of some other world. A square had been drawn,
a small window, a doorway, the outline of something that
had been opened and was waiting. Over the next few weeks,
things began to feel wrong. Not wrong, like a bad
dream you shake off in the morning, or the gut
deep feeling you get when you know you've forgotten something important.
This was different. It was quieter, subtler, like an instrument
just slightly out of tune. The world kept playing the
same song, but something in the harmony had gone flat.
Hasey tried not to think about the mirror, tried not
to think about how her reflection had stepped out of
the square, how it never quite moved the same way anymore.
She told herself it was nothing that she was imagining it,
but her habits betrayed her. She started brushing her teeth
with the lights off, stopped wearing sunglasses, changed her pham
screen to black and white. Little rituals, little defenses. The
campus began shifting to, though no one wanted to admit it.
One Thursday afternoon, she saw a girl standing at the
edge of the reflecting pool. The girl's eyes were wide,
locked on the water, unblinking. She didn't move, didn't react
to the people walking around her just stared, as if
something on the other side was staring back. The following week,
in the dining hall, a guid dropped his tray and froze,
not for a moment for five full minutes. At first,
his friend's laughed, thinking it was a joke, then the
laughter stopped. No one mentioned it afterward. By midterms, students
were sleeping in classrooms and study lounges instead of going
back to their dorms. One girl in Casey's anthropology seminar
burst into tears during a presentation and couldn't explain why.
Professors excused it as stress over work seasonal depression. Everyone
had an explanation, but Casey had stopped believing in simple explanations.
It was a rainy Tuesday afternoon when she met Matt
Peerce in the library. They'd been friends since freshman year,
bonded over a sheared hatred for group projects and suittual
love for late night breakfasts. Study sessions had become part
of their routine, quiet, consistent, easy. That day, they were
tucked away in a back corner on the second floor,
books spread out between them, half finished notes scattered across
the table. The fluorescent lights overhead flickered now and then,
but neither of them paid much attention anymore. Matt was
mid sentence reading from a paragraph on folk symbolism when
he stopped. His eyes stayed fixed on his notebook for
a long moment before he finally spoke. Case He said quietly,
I've been seeing things. She looked up when eyebrow raised
in mirrors, he continued, still not meeting her eyes in
glass in car windows at night. I keep telling myself
it's just my reflection, but it's not. In one of
my roommates, Jordan, he's been acting strange. He's not himself.
He won't look in mirrors anymore, and he never shuts up.
But lately, Matt swallowed hard, he's been flat. Hasey didn't
answer right away. Matt rubbed the back of his neck, nervous. Ah,
I haven't told anyone. I didn't want to sound crazy.
You're not crazy, she said softly. I've been seeing it too.
The words hung heavy between them, and that was when
she noticed her, the girl standing at the far end
of the stacks, same girl she'd seen at the reflecting pool,
same hoodie, same unblinking stare. Matt Casey whispered, don't look now,
but we've got company. He turned anyway. The girl didn't move,
didn't even blink. She just stood there, motionless, like she'd
been waiting for them all along. Casey snapped her book
shut and shoved it into her bag. Let's go, she said, quickly,
somewhere with fewer mirrors. They ended up in an old
lecture hall in the Philosophy building. The windows were fogged
from the rain. The room was empty. Matt leaned forward
on the desk, his face pale. Okay, he said, talk
to me, and so she did. Casey told him everything,
or at least as much as she could without breaking
herself open the mirror the way her reflection moved, the
moment it had stepped out of sync, the fear. She
hadn't spoken aloud until now. Matt listened, his eyes wide,
the color draining from his face with every word. One
of my frat brothers, isn't him, he murmured. He still
talks the same, still looks the same, but it's like
the warmth is gone. His timing's off, no facial ticks,
no quirks, just a mask, and no one notices. Casey asked,
they're too distracted, or maybe they see it and don't
want to admit it. Outside, the storm thickened until the
rain sounded like fingers on the roof. Inside, the lecture
hall felt small and overheated, like a room that had
just been told a secret it wasn't meant to keep.
Casey's voice dropped to a near whisper. They're slipping. Matt
blinked who she hesitated. There was no neat answer, no
name she could pinned to the terror. Not yet. All
she had were fragments, the girl at the pool, the
frozen student in the dining hall, the third shape that
had stood behind her in the mirror. So she didn't answer. Instead,
she let the silence say what she could not. The
truth sat between them like a held breathing was watching,
and they were no longer the ones doing the watching.
Days had passed since the girl in the library and
her unblinking eyes, since Matt had first admitted that something
was wrong with the mirrors, and since then it hadn't
let up. Perflections shimmered where they shouldn't, bath through mirrors
spider webbed with tiny fractures and no known impact. Students
whispered about migraines, vertigo, sudden nosebleeds. A junior in the
math building fainted during a group presentation. A professor in
the humanities department collapsed mid lecture, eyes fixed on a
black monitor that hadn't even been turned on. His pupils
were blown wide, lips parted, like he was seeing something
no one else could. Casey kept her head down. Her
phone camera was turned off. Her laptop screen was covered
with Matt's tape. She draped a scarf over the mirror
above her dresser and used the tiny one on her
unpacked only when absolutely necessary, and only for seconds at
a time. She and Matt met almost daily, now quiet places,
uncrowded halls, once an unused corner of the student's union basement,
where vending machines hummed beneath buzzing lights. He was unraveling something,
pulling at threads in old yearbooks, archived newspaper clippings, half
lost campus myths about the shadowed glass, something buried under
layers of superstition and dismissed folklore. He promised he was
close to finding more, but Casey didn't feel close to
anything but panic. She came back to her dorm late
that Thursday, after a solo library session that felt like
walking through a graveyard made of windows. The hallway was dim,
unusually quiet. Sam's door was cracked open. Hasey hesitated. Lights
pilled from the shared bathroom, warm and ARTI Sam. She
called no answer. She pushed the door open. Sam stood
in front of the mirror, barefoot on the cold tile,
hand outstretched, her fingers barely grazed the glass, but the
surface rippled like water. Hasey's breath caught her whole body
went still. Sam didn't move. There was something off about
the way her shoulders hung, the tilt of her head,
the angle of her wrist. It wasn't just stillness, but
Casey couldn't understand that moment what was going on?
Speaker 2: And then, hey, you left your charger in my.
Speaker 3: The real Sam's voice cut through the silence as she
stepped into view two Sam's, one by the sink and
one of the door. The girl by the sink turned,
eyes pitched black and wet like oil, and she moved
too fast, too sharp, toward the real Sam. There was
no scream, only a crash. The two SAMs collided hard,
knocking into the towel rack. Casey jolted forward, instinct overruling
terror real. Sam clawed at her attacker, who looked exactly
like her, but moved with something colder inhuman. She was
trying to force Sam back towards the mirror, gripping her
jaws like she meant to push her in get off her.
Casey yelled. She grabbed the hair brush from the counter
and slammed it into the reflection's head. It staggered but
didn't fall. Sam elbowed the thing in the gut and
lunged away. Casey swung again, this time a shampoo bottle,
then a metal soap dish. Finally, Sam grabbed the ceramic
lid from the toilet tank and brought it down with
both hands. The reflection let out a sound like shattering porcelain,
and then it cracked all the way through, splitting apart
like glass under pressure. It collapsed to the floor, shards
of reflective nothingness skidding across the tile, melting into nothing.
The moments they touched the drain, the room went still.
Casey backed into the doorway, panting. Sam was shaking and
bleeding slightly from the lip hair stuck to her forehead.
Speaker 2: What the hell was that?
Speaker 3: She whispered. Casey didn't answer. Her eyes had locked onto
the mirror. It was broken, not just cracked, spider webbed
from corner to corner with deep, jagged fold lines. She
didn't know if it had shattered from the fight or
from what they'd just destroyed, but it was the first
time she'd seen a mirror bleed light, faint golden leaking
from the fractures, like sunlight through a ruined stained glass window.
They didn't stay in the dorms that night. Sam grabbed clothes,
Hasey grabbed keys, and they left. Fifteen minutes later, they
were on Matt's doorstep. He let them in without a word,
saw the look in their eyes, and locked the door
behind them. We have to go, Casey said, tonight. Matt nodded, good,
because I've found something from his bag. Matt pulled out
an old book, leather bound, its cover bear the title
long gone. The pages were thin and brittle, like they'd
crumble if handled too roughly. Casey didn't ask where he'd
found it. She just listened, watching the way his fingers
lingered on a marked page. Before he could begin, a
whisper brushed the back of her neck. Her name spoken low,
like a secret only the dark should know. She turned sharply.
Nothing was behind her, just her own reflection in the
black glass of the television across the room. It was smiling,
still smiling, even after her face had gone still. The
apartment was quiet, not calm, never calm any more, but quiet.
Matt handed sam glass of water. She was still shaking,
one arm wrapped around her ribs, where the reflection had
slammed her. Dark bruises were already spreading beneath her sweatshirt.
Casey sat stiff at the kitchen table, her eyes flicking
to the window every few seconds, just in case the
night turned reflective. They told Matt everything. He didn't interrupt,
didn't doubt, just listened. When Casey finished, he dragged both
hands through his hair and let out a sharp breath
through his nose. I was hoping we were all, he said,
But it lines up with what Casey asked. Matt got up,
pulled a tablet from underneath a stack of text books
and opened a hidden folder. Ages of files and half
buried notes flickered on the screen. I've been collecting stories,
he said, not just here, worldwide forums, obscure blogs, dead podcast,
no One talks about anymore. You ever hear of the
mirror suppression experiments during the Cold War, Hasey and Sam
both shook their heads. Exactly, he said, most people haven't,
But something happened back then. Reports came out of East Berlin,
poland even remote villages in China, people behaving strangely, paranoia spiking,
officials caught talking to themselves in empty rooms, and then
almost overnight.
Speaker 2: Peace You mean the Cold War?
Speaker 3: And then Sam asked. Matt nodded, yeah, Treaties signed, the
Iron Curtain dropped, leaders changing stances without warning. It was
like the whole world caught its breath. He hesitated that
added it wasn't the first time either. During the last
months of World War Two, Hitler started me making irrational decisions.
His commanders questioned him. He abandoned strategies. Some historians say
it was stress illness, but others say something changed, like
he wasn't fully himself anymore. You think that was the
mirrors Casey asked, Maybe there were accounts of him talking
to mirrors alone, refusing to let anyone clean them. People
thought it was madness, But what if it wasn't. Matt
lured his voice. Some think this whole thing. What we're
seeing is a kind of fail safe, something that intervenes
when people push too far, when we get too close
to the brink, like replace it us. Sam whispered, Only some,
he said, I think it starts with those who carried
too much potential for damage or collapse, suffering. Some get
replaced quietly, others maybe the reflections go too far, get
too eager. Casey was silent for a long time. And
what about now, she asked, Why now, Matt hesitated? We're
not in a good place. Climate change, increase in violence,
the conflict sparking up between Iran and Israel. Everywhere there
is some kind of unrest, and maybe we just don't
know how bad it is. A sudden hum rolled through
the room, sharp enough to stop all three of them
mid breath. The television it had been off, or it
should have been, but now it buzzed faintly, a low
static that made the hairs rise on Casey's arms. Sam frowned,
turning her head toward it. Do you hear that? Casey nodded,
her throat dry. She pushed herself up from the couch
and edged closer, each step, slow, reluctant. The black screen
looked empty at first. Then their reflections appeared, three of
them just standing there, still normal, except Casey's reflection wasn't
normal at all. Her lips hadn't moved, her face hadn't shifted,
but the image in the screen stretched wide in a
grin that was too knowing, too sharp. The smile grew,
lips pulling further than they should, until the reflection winked.
The screen warped with a flicker. Casey's body snapped into motion.
She yanked the thorough blanket from the couch and flung
it over the TV, smothering the image in one desperate motion. Okay,
she said, her breath unsteady, so we need a plan.
The three of them stared at the fabric covered screen,
listening to the faint hum, still bleeding through the cloth.
Matt was the first to break the silence. His voice
was low but certain.
Speaker 2: We don't have lung.
Speaker 3: After that, the changes came quickly. What began as private
fear spread across campus like a slow infection. Students whispered
nervously in hallways. Mirrors disappeared from bathrooms, whole dorm floors
stripped reflective surfaces and covered them with bed sheets, newspapers,
anything that would stick. At first, the university tried to
stay quiet, an email about unusual stress responses, then a
vague health advisory, finally a full statement from the President's office.
Speaker 5: Due to as serge and viral induced neurological symptoms reported
across multiple buildings, we are enacting an early closure of
the term. Students are advised to evacuate campus housing within
seventy two hours. Online course access would resume after assessment
by the health board.
Speaker 3: No unbelieved it. The school had weathered COVID, a flu epidemic,
even a fire that gutted half the Humanity's wing. But
this was an illness. This was something else, and there
were too many stories to ignore. A student live streamed
her dorm a mirror as it flickered, her reflection moving
several seconds late, smiling when she wasn't. The video lasted
two hours before disappearing flagged as a violation of community standards.
Three professors took sudden sabbaticals after confessing they had seen
themselves in windows that weren't their own. A teaching assistant
collapsed to middle lecture, his pupils blown wide, hands twitching
against the blank face of a muted projector screen. Migraines
swept through the psych department. Nearly half the staff called
out sick. No one asked questions. Hasey sat cross legged
on the floor of Matt's apartments, her knees pulled tight
to her chest. The hum of the space heater filled
the silence, joined only by the restless tap of Sam's
fingers against her water bottle. Matt paced the room like
a caged animal, again and again and again. She responded,
He said, suddenly, Reinfeld, the archivist he see, sat up straighter.
What did she say? Matt stopped pacing just one line.
You're not crazy, but you're behind. You need to get
here before the convergence line sets. What the hell does
that mean, Sam asked, brow furrowed. I don't know, Matt admitted,
but the term came up in one of her old podcasts.
I'm trying to find the transcript now, but her sight's
been scrubbed, like completely. Even the wayback machine has blanks.
Casey ran a hand down her face. Her fingertips trembled slightly.
We should go, she said, quietly, before this thing closes
in too far. Matt nodded, i'll pack, Sam said. Casey
offered to grab coffee from the cafe two blocks down,
just something warm to shake the ache in her chest.
They agreed a few minutes alone wouldn't hurt. She stepped
out into the cold gray of mid morning. Campus was
unnaturally quiet, too many cars packed, too many lots. Students
rolled suit cases down sidewalks, eyes scanning every glass door
they passed. She walked quickly, head down, hands shoved into
her coat pockets. The air felt thinner to day, stretched
near the edge of the quad. She passed an old
furniture shop with wide display windows. She glanced up and stopped.
There was no reflection, just the street behind her, the
leafless trees, the yellow paper taped to the glass, but
not her. She leaned closer. Her reflection faded back in slowly,
first her coat, then her face, her eyes, but it
didn't move with her, not right away. It blinked too slow,
tilted its head a second too late. Then it smiled.
The lips moved slowly, stretching just a little too far,
as if the skin were bending around something deeper. And
then it began mouthing something move sound, No breath, just
a shape behind the glass, forming words only Casey could feel.
She didn't hear them, not with her ears. She felt
them behind her eyes, her own in name, and then Matt's,
and then again and again. She stumbled back. The reflection stopped,
the smile widened, and then the glass spider webbed, a
thin crack spiraling outward from her reflection's temple. Casey turned
and ran. The drive out of the archivist's house was
longer than they expected. The city slowly thinned into suburbs.
The suburbs bled into quiet farmland, and eventually the farmland
dissolved into low hills dotted with weather worn trees. It
wasn't remote, not really, but it felt like a place
the world forgot for just long enough. The gravel driveway
crunched beneath the tires. A modest white house stood at
the end, sloped, roofed in boxy the kind you'd find
on old postcards. The curtains were thick, and every window
shimmered faintly from behind the cloth or paper. There were
no mirrors, not even a glint from the glass. Casey
stepped out of the car and stretched, cracking her neck.
Sam was quiet, still visibly stiff from the attack earlier
that week. Matt rubbed the back of his neck. As
they approached the front porch. The door opened before they knocked.
Come in, said the woman with a short gray braid.
You're expected. She didn't ask their names. The archivists name
was Marla Reinfield. She wasn't what Casey expected. No unblinking stairs,
no robes, no mysticism, just jeanes, a faded green sweater,
and the kind of calm that either came from deep
wisdom or exhaustion. Her house smelled like old paper and
dried herbs. Bookshelves lined nearly every wall, organized by strange
categories resonance, threshold, phenomena, mirror anomalies by region. They sat
in her kitchen, a simple space with a large square
table and a low hanging lights. Reinefield poured coffee for herself,
offered the others tea or water. No mirrors, no screens,
even the coffee machine had been sanded down to remove
any chrome. Tell me what you've seen, she said, and
so they did. Sam haltingly at first, described what happened
in the bathroom, that thing that wore her face, the fight,
the shatter. Her voice shook, and she paused often, Hasey
picked up the story when Sam couldn't. She also told
Rhinefield about her near death experience, the ice, the breath
that stopped, the three minutes that should have ended everything,
and how her reflection had watched her ever since, but
never moved first, never attacked, just watched. Hinefield sat silently
through the whole thing, eyes steady, fingers wrapped around her
mug like a tether. When they finished, she set the
mug down and leaned back in her chair. That's rare,
she said softly, a reflection that doesn't advance and a
fractured one that doesn't return. Hasey frowned, So what does
it mean? Rhinefield didn't answer. Immediately, she got up, walked
over to a cabinet and pulled out a thin, leather
bound book. She flipped through the pages as she spoke.
I know Matt's already explained to you guys why we
think this is happening, and that it's happened multiple times before.
The thing is, we never really know who's been taken
and who hasn't. The people we knew before a reflection
surge may not be the same ones we're standing next
to afterward. You could be talking to someone for years
and never know if they're still them. She turned the
book toward them, a sketch of a figure, almost humanoid,
but warped in the center, like its body was a ripple.
Its face was a smear of pencil strokes. There are
three reflections, Reinfield said. The first is how the world
sees you. The second is how you see yourself. The
third is what the world should never see at all.
Matt's voice was low. The third is what's crossing over now,
she nod at once. They don't belong, but they're coming anyway.
They stood to leave an hour later, heads heavy with
more questions than answers, But before they reached the door,
Reinefield stopped them. One last thing. She said, would you
all mind standing in front of something? She gestured to
what a covered frame leaning against the wall, A mirror? Yes,
I want to see what happens, especially after Sam's fracture.
I have theories. They hesitated. Casey glanced at Sam. Sam shrugged,
still pale but steady. Reinefield removed the cloth. It was
a tall mirror, old with a dark wooden frame carved
into thorny vines. Casey stepped up first. Her reflection stared back,
no delay, no flicker, just her. For the first time
in weeks, it felt right, relieved, she stepped back. Sam
went next. Her reflection appeared, but not like Casey's. It
was far back, like looking down a long tunnel of mirrors.
Sam's double was there, but distant, like it couldn't come closer.
Sam's shoulders relaxed slightly. I'll take that, she muttered. Then
Matt stepped up. Nothing just blank glass. He laughed nervously.
Guess I'm the vampire now, But as he turned away,
his reflection hit the inside of the mirror. Hard hands
pressed flat against the glass. The crack spidered across the
bottom right corner. Matt froze. The reflection's mouth opened. It
didn't match his lips. That's not me, Casey, Sam, that's
not me. He's not me. I've been replaced. Rhine Felt
lunged and threw the cloth back over the mirror. Silence.
No one breathed. Matt's hands tremble. He stepped back from
the covered glass, leg it might explode. Hasey stared at him,
heart pounding. She felt the room tilt. Reinefield didn't speak
She simply walked back to her chair and sat lit
a candle with shaking fingers, and didn't look at Matt again.
The house felt heavier than before, not darker, not colder,
just heavier, like the walls were listening now after the
mirror incident, with Matt's reflection, the grin, the pounding, the words,
none of them had spoken much. They sat in silence,
the hum of the countryside broken only by a distant
wind chime swaying on the porch. Rhinefield stood near the fireplace,
arms crossed, staring at nothing. I have a few things
I want to give you before you go, she finally said,
some supplies and a suggestion. Find somewhere remote, a camp site,
a cabin in the hills, just stay off the grid,
but close enough for radio or cellular service. This will pass,
but not yet. She didn't wait for agreement. She disappeared
down the hallway and left the three of them alone
in the living room. Matt paced by the window. Sam
watched him, arms wrapped tightly around herself. Casey sat in
the chair by the door, staring at the place the
reflection had cracked the mirror. Sam cleared her throat lightly
that was something, she said, motioning vaguely.
Speaker 4: But honestly, all of our reflections are being weird.
Speaker 2: Yours was just the worst.
Speaker 3: Matt gave a nervous, breathy laugh. Yeah, he said, mine's
always been dramatic. Casey leaned forward, eyes distant. Remember first semester,
she said, suddenly, the homecoming bonfire, when Matt got caught
sneaking whiskey into his thermos and blamed it on a
kid who didn't even go to our school. Matt blinked,
then smiled too quickly. Oh God, yeah, that kid. What
was his name? Uh? Derek, Sam said, smoothly, catching the cue.
Casey smiled at her with gratitude in her eyes. Derek
kept denying it, and Matt got him banned from the
grounds for the whole week. I apologize later, Matt said,
I think you didn't, Sam said sweetly. They all laughed,
a practiced, theatrical kind of laughter, and then silence returned.
The floor creaked. Reinefield stepped back into the room, but
she wasn't holding a backpack or a book or anything
remotely helpful. She held a gun, a black pistol steady
in her hand, aimed squarely at Matt's back. Sam and
Casey saw it first. Their faces dropped into stillness, shock
blooming wide across their features. Matt noticed too late. He
turned what the Reinefield didn't flinch. Her finger hovered near
the trigger, Her eyes locked on him with cold, unwavering certainty.
You're not him, she said, whoa, whoa? Okay, Rhinefield, Matt said,
raising her hand slowly. Let's not Here're smarter than this,
she interrupted, eyes fling briefly to Casey and Sam. Both
of you you saw it in the mirror. You heard it.
Don't insult yourselves by pretending. Matt took a step back.
Casey rose slowly, hands raised. Two. Please, Casey said gently,
let's talk. Reinfield shook her head. Once he's gone. You
know it. Whatever this thing is, he's wearing your friend's skin.
Sam's jaw clenched.
Speaker 2: What do you want us to do?
Speaker 3: Reinefield held out her free hand, and it's worth thick
plastic zippies tie his wrists ankles. Two do it carefully?
Help her, she said, motioning to Casey. If he tries anything,
he knows what happens. Casey hesitated only a second. Matt
wasn't moving case, come on, he said, it's me, you
know me, But her head moved anyway. She knelt beside him,
heart pounding, zip ties trembling in her grip. Sam moved behind,
doing the same, neither of them meeting his eyes. Matt's
chest rose and fell with quickening breaths. I'm not, I'm
not whatever that was, he said, one rest the second.
He didn't fight. I remember everything he said, everything about us,
about click ankle, click duck. When it was over, Casey
stood and turned to Rhinefield. If you made all of
us stand in front of the mirror, she said, softly,
you should too. Rinefield didn't answer it first, but after
a beat she nodded. She walked to the standing mirror,
the same one they'd all faced earlier. The sheet came down.
Her reflection stood there, still composed and furious. It looked
nothing like her calm, soft spoken exterior. The eyes blazed,
the fist clenched, it trembled with frustration. Casey stepped forward,
her breath catching it's angry. Rhinefield smiled faintly. I covered
the mirrors as soon as that started. I think I
left mine stranded. She pulled the sheet back over it slowly.
Casey turned and looked at Matt, still bound, breathing hard,
eyes darting. Sam stood next to her, lips pressed in
a thin line.
Speaker 2: So Sam said, what the hell do we do now?
Speaker 3: Casey looked to the mirror, then to Rhinefeld, then to Matt,
and her heart was no longer sure. The room was
heavy with silence. Matt sat restrained in one of Rhinefield's
old dining chairs, wrists bound in front of him, with
his zip ties, ankles looped in a second pair. She'd
hand it to Sam. His face was pale, not angry,
not yelling, just watching them, blinking slow and steady, like
someone trying to remember what part they were supposed to play.
Casey stood across the room, arms crossed tightly over her chest.
She couldn't stop pacing. What if, she said, What if
the mirror was just tricking us? What if that wasn't
mad at all? Or or it was but only to
get in our heads. Sam didn't answer right away. She
was sitting on the floor, back against the couch, knees
pulled up to her chest. Hasey turned to her, Sam,
you saw what I saw right the reflection, It said,
It wasn't him, but maybe that was part of it.
Maybe this is what they do, get inside us, make
us doubt. She trailed off. Sam's eyes met hers.
Speaker 2: Case come on, you know it's not him.
Speaker 6: Casey looked down on Yeah, here, I do the lie
she told about the first semester, the memory Matt didn't react.
Speaker 3: To had settled it, and still the real Mat might
be out there somewhere. What if we can get him back,
Casey said, suddenly, if they can get out, maybe we
can pull someone in Riinefield. Standing near the curtained window,
spoke without turning. I haven't found anything that proves it's possible,
but if a reflection can manifest here, that means there's
still a tether, and tethers go both ways, so we try.
Casey moved to what the mirror now upright and exposed
cracks webbed across its surface, but it hadn't shattered, not yet.
They set the plan quickly. Matt the not Matt would
be placed in front of the mirror. Casey and Sam
would wait just out of sight, watching for signs, watching
for ripples. They'd done this before Sam's first breach. They
knew it could work. They sat him down. Minutes passed,
five ten. Casey's breath caught as she leaned forward, maybe
a sound, a slam. Another side of the mirror, Mat
appeared the real Matt. His face was streaked with tears,
eyes wild, slamming his palms against the glass. Let me out,
he screamed, the mirror ripple. Casey and Sam leaped into view,
grabbing for him. His arms were reaching through, now stretching impossibly,
fingers grasping the ears, and then the reflections surged. Sam's
was closer, this time, still out of reach, but nearer
than before. Casey's was right there. It lunged, gripping Casey's arm,
nails by hooks, digging into her skin, sid out, nearly
losing her grip on Matt. The mirror pulsed, light bending.
Sam kicked at the glass, grabbing hold of Matt's shoulder,
and they pulled. Acey twisted, using her free arm to
elbow her own reflection in the neck a fast, savage blow.
The figure smiled, stunned for just a second, and Casey
used the moment to dig in her heels and heave
Matt out of the mirror's reach. Matt stumbled forward, reel solid,
gasping and sobbing as he collapsed into their arms. Then
as a single shot rang out, Matt's body consulsed in
their arms. But it wasn't blood, it was glass. His
face shimmered, then cracked. Pieces broke away, hitting the hardwood
floor like pebbles. The reflection Matt shattered, collapsing in on
itself in pieces. Reinefield lowered the gun. The room was
silent again. No one spoke for a full minute, just breathing,
just relief, just the sound of Matt weeping into Casey's shoulder,
reel and alive. Later, Reinefield handed them as satchel of supplies.
Take this, she said, head somewhere remote, a campsite, keep
your mirrors covered, and whatever happens, don't trust anything that
doesn't feel right. She also handed Casey the pistol. You
may need this again. They thanked her, hugged her. Sam
lingered in the doorway, whispering something none of them heard.
Then they were gone. The world was unraveling, not into
fire or war, not yet, but into doubt. There were
rumors now, social feeds and video clips. No one could
explain people isolating the way they did during the pandemic taping.
She over their windows, blacking out televisions. Some universities shut
down early, others issued strange advisories. Hasey kept the radio
on as she drove. Matt was in the passenger seat,
staring quietly out the window. Sam sat in the back, Hey,
she said, after.
Speaker 2: A while, can we stop?
Speaker 4: I need to use the restroom.
Speaker 3: They pulled into a small gas station on a rural highway,
one of those places with flickering neon signs and shelves
full of dusty snacks. The attendant barely looked up. Casey
noticed most of the mirrors had been covered with spray paint,
thick and ugly, but even here little slivers of silver remained.
Sam went to the bathroom while Casey and Matt wandered
the aisles. The bathroom was dimly lit. Most of the
mirror above the sink had been blacked out with paint
someone had tried, but in the corner just enough remained
to catch a face. Sam leaned in. Something shimmered behind
the glass. She reached out and wiped the paint off
the edge, just a little enough to see her reflection
was right there, closer than ever it wasn't still. It
was sobbing silently, violently, mouth open in a scream, hands
slapping the glass. Sam tilted her head slightly, studying it.
Then she smiled, calm, easy, like someone who'd been waiting
for the right moment. She leaned in closer, watching her
own reflection. Writhe behind the surface, and she whispered, don't worry, Sammy,
I'll take care of your friends. The mirror shimmered.
Speaker 4: The Third Reflection was written by En Varro, narrated by
Terry Lisa Anthony, and produced by Tommy Boy Production. Now,
if you see something in the mirror that moves before
you do, don't blink. Some reflections don't want to mimic you.
They simply want to replace you. And if yours is
still smiling long after you've stopped, well that just means
it knows you've heard this episode. Thanks for listening to
the Tales podcast. Hit that follow button, and don't forget
to leave a review until next time.
Speaker 2: Listeners,