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Chapter 3: Blood in the Mirror
Rainwater dripped from William's black trench coat, forming small puddles on the rotting floorboards. He stood outside the second-floor bathroom, his fingers hovering over the doorknob, the scar above his eyebrow throbbing faintly.
"You're sure you heard something?" he murmured.
Jackie nodded, the amethyst bracelet around her wrist growing warm. "Like... nails scraping against a bathtub."
William kicked the door open.
The Bathroom: 1:29 AM
The faucet gushed rust-red water. The mirror was fogged over, with crooked letters smeared across its surface:
HELP ME
"Don't touch the water." William blocked Jackie from stepping forward. He pulled a test tube from his tactical pouch and collected a few drops of the red liquid. "Not blood," he muttered, sniffing it. "Iron oxide and... some kind of organic compound."
Jackie's EMF detector suddenly shrieked. She looked up at the mirror—
Her reflection hadn’t moved.
The real Jackie had taken a step back, but the thing in the mirror still stood in place, its lips slowly curling into a smile. Clumps of black hair slid from its scalp, revealing grayish, rotting skin beneath.
"William—" Her voice caught in her throat.
A thick tangle of black hair erupted from the drain, coiling around her ankles like a living thing. An icy numbness crawled up her legs. Jackie’s scream was cut off as filthy water surged over her mouth.
William knocked aside a laundry basket blocking his path. As the plastic cracked open, he saw what was inside—
Teeth.
Human molars, each drilled with a small hole and strung together on red thread.
Struggle: 1:37 AM
"Get down!"
The shotgun blast shattered the mirror. Countless shards hung suspended in the air, each reflecting a different nightmare:
A child’s rotting corpse curled in the bathtub
A silver dinner knife slicing into someone’s wrist
David nailed to a wall, seven candles driven into his chest
The hair loosened its grip. Jackie collapsed onto the wet tiles, her gaze catching on the words carved into the edge of the tub:
FIND MY DOLL
Dripping water smeared the letters into tear-shaped streaks. When William hauled her up, their bleeding hands touched—
And every shard of glass turned toward them at once.
"Go!"
The Master Bedroom: 1:53 AM
William shoulder-checked the door. Flakes of mold rained from the frame like snow.
A pink bedsheet bore the silhouette of a girl curled in sleep. The nightstand held a family portrait—seven smiling faces slashed apart with a knife, only the youngest girl’s features carefully redrawn, her eyes gouged into black holes.
"Emma Warren," Jackie whispered, UV light skimming under the bed. "The youngest victim."
A straw doll’s arm poked out from under the pillow. When William yanked it free, seven sewing needles clattered to the floor.
"Not a curse object," Jackie said, tearing open the blackened straw. A finger bone tumbled out. "A ward. Someone used her remains as a seal."
Nails scraped against the window. Seven wet handprints crawled upward, each palm split by a deep, deliberate cut.
The Attic: 2:17 AM
The ladder groaned under their weight like a dying thing.
A gramophone played a distorted London Bridge, the rusted needle warping the nursery rhyme into a scream. Seven life-sized dolls sat in a circle, their coin eyes glinting in the kerosene lamp’s glow.
"EMF readings are off the charts," Jackie said as her device wailed.
William’s scar burned like a brand. The pain pulsed in time with the music. The dolls turned their heads in unison—
The first one lunged, reeking of mildew. Its straw arm struck with unnatural strength, slamming William into the gramophone. As the record skipped, the melody twisted into words:
"Find... me..."
Jackie smashed the kerosene lamp over the doll’s head. Flames engulfed the straw, molten copper eyeballs sizzling as they dripped to the floor.
William blew the second doll’s head off just as the attic hatch slammed shut.
The Truth: 2:55 AM
A charred diary slid from the doll’s stuffing. William kicked aside a third attacker, his eyes scanning the child’s handwriting on yellowed paper:
"Papa says the flood will wash away sin..."
The remaining dolls suddenly stilled. Rotten stuffing spilled from their seams, forming words on the floorboards:
- Writer
