The Room of Mirrors

~°°~

"Sorry for the scare," Lethe apologized. "You would have screamed."

"Yeah, I womder why," Boreas murmured, sarcastically. There was a burn in his eyelids and his throat, and a blur on the corner of his eyes that he actively ignored. Instead, he glared at the brunette, unconsciously counting the freckles on her cheeks. "Also. Cam you led go now?"

"Right, right, sorry. Did you just spat on my hand? Fucking disgustin—"

Boreas rushed and hugged the scowling brunette, feeling her shoulders stiffen under his arms. "You were gone for the whole day," he said, voice shaky. "You're okay."

"Why would she be not okay?" chirped another voice. Another hooded person appeared right behind Lethe. Squinting in the dark, Boreas recognized the familiar rounded, pimpled face, the wild, raven-black hair unbraided, and their short, yet rather demanding stature, enveloped by the dimness of the night. Eris. They cocked their head to the side questioningly, eyes were tightly shut and nose scrunched.

"You haven't told Eris?" Boreas asked as he broke the embrace, hands wiping the skin under his eyes, his movement highlighting his moles. His eyebrows furrowed. "Wait, what happened to your face? There's bruises—"

The brunette impatiently tapped the tiles, dismissively waving her hand. "It doesn't matter. Get up or I'll personally drag you."

"You haven't told me what?" Eris inquired, their voice loud and brash.

Lethe winced at the loudness. "Lower down your voice. The rest are sleeping. Later. I'll explain." She glanced at Boreas who was currently pulling a shirt and a coat out of his snoring lockers. "Just hurry, for fuck's sake."

Suddenly remembering a certain detail, Boreas interjected as he wore the spat out clothes over his undershirt, "Wait, wait—How did you guys even know the password of my room?"

"We didn't," replied Eris, shrugging lightly. "Tickling the door helps."

"Tickling?"

"Wear this." Lethe tossed a hooded cloak as Boreas covered his pillow with a blanket, making it look like someone was sleeping underneath. He caught it with one hand. Boreas' nose wrinkled as he sniffed the tattered cloth but still wore it over his head.

"Good," the brunette chirped. "Now we're all wearing our hero suits."

She proceeded to drag Eris and him out of the room, a dark mutter under her breath. They plunged into the darkness, wincing when some tiles loudly creaked as they rushed by. Boreas' heart thrummed like a guitar played by a four-year-old. Their rushed footsteps echoed down the corridors, their arching shadows and passing silhouettes watched by the painted angels above.

They all froze simultaneously like deer on the headlights as another set of footsteps click-clacked faintly. Behind them, another pair of shoes was tapping against the tiles. Boreas squeezed both Eris' and Lethe's hands and shut his eyes tight, feeling that familiar pressure on his chest and the somersault of his stomach. Teleporting always felt like falling,

When he reopened them, they were no longer in the hallways. It was dark, pure pitch black, dusty, and suffocating but atleast secluded. Nothing possibly following them now. It was impossibly crowded, the three of them clogged together into a mush. Boreas shuffled further to give some space, only for his legs to hit something. Plates?

They're in the kitchen cupboards.

"Sorry, I panicked but, Lethe can I ask? Where are we going?" Boreas asked.

Eris tooted in at the same time, voice in a harsh whisper, "Okay. What the fudge is going on?"

"Just trust me. Okay?" Lethe replied, her tone sure. Yet, her hand that held Boreas' shook fervently as she muttered something in repeat under her breath like some sort of mantra.

...To where time ate them?

Boreas furrowed his eyebrows.

"No, no, I meant, I could teleport us there," Boreas said, softly. "As long as it's somewhere near twenty meters."

"The Dining Hall. The very front."

Boreas swerved to his left, to where Lethe's voice was. "You will explain everything."

He saw her shadowed silhouette nod just as a circle of light from his palm formed and swallowed them all. It took four teleports. The familiar, enormous clock resurfaced, as well as the chandeliers, the tables, the hall, the mirrors and its paintings. They stood exactly where they got their Peculiars. Boreas staggered, as the same stabbing pressure made a reappearance, but this time, much stronger. Blood dripped down his nose.

"I'm fine," he reassured quickly before the two panicked, wiping the liquid off his nose. "I'm just drained. Used my Peculiar a lot in the training." He repeated, "I'm fine. Lethe, do what you're planning to do."

Lethe's breath hitched as she hesitated. She looked around hastily, as if as confused as him.

Boreas ran a hand over his head, a migraine forming. "Don't tell me—"

"The note didn't specify."

"Curses of Elpis," Boreas ranted. "I don't even understand what note you are talking about. Did you bring us here for nothing?"

Lethe stared at her feet, uncharacteristically meek. "They knew it was me. There wasn't any time. The things.." She fiddled the hems of her tunic anxiously. "Weren't watching now. But they will tomorrow and tomorrow's tomorrow. I'd forget."

At this angle, the swollen bruises right above her eye were in clear view. A small hunch formed on Boreas' brain. One that made him sick.

Eris, meanwhile, looked utterly flabbergasted. "What the actual fuck is happening?"

"Okay," Boreas muttered quietly, pinching his nose. "Could you show the note? Who wrote it?"

Lethe chuckled humorlessly as she took out a small crumpled piece of paper and handed it to Boreas. "Who else? Kai."

"Who the fuck is Kai?" Eris grumbled, frustratedly scratching her head. "This is gonna be ignored isn't it?"

It was indeed promptly ignored.

"Go to where time ate you," Boreas read out loud. His nose creased, making the moles on each side quirk upwards as his eyes hovered above and glanced at the floating clock above. "I see..." He glanced back to the paper and flipped it to the other side. A shape of an octagon was drawn and below it was written: Go to it once you enter. But how do you enter? Where were they supposed to enter to?

All of it was hastily written. Maybe Kai too didn't have time. Boreas sighed and handed it back to Lethe.

Boreas paced around frantically, looking down at his feet as if it'd give him answers.

A struck of deja vu bolted him and the realization followed.

"The tiles," he said, eyes wide as he backtracked. "They always looked like they don't fit. They don't. They were messed up. On purpose." He shakily pointed at one to another. "That and this and..."

"It forms a triangle!" Lethe lapped her hands together. "The symbol of the Dome. There are six. Perfect. Let's step on it."

Eris harrumphed depressingly as Lethe led them to a pair of tiles. "Earlier, I wish I could see. Now, I still do. It's just that I also wish I fucking know what's going on."

"Boreas, you go that side. I'll take this one."

Boreas prodded as he was told, stepping on the tile cautiously. Nothing happened. He suggested, "Maybe we have to step on it at the same time?"

Lethe cocked her head at the idea and shrugged her shoulder-length hair out of her face. "Okay, let's try it. One, two, three!"

Still, nothing happened. Sounds of muffled footsteps from somewhere rustled softly against their ears. Boreas felt his heartbeat rise.

"Uh, guys?"

Lethe faced Boreas intensely. "The Professors, they always appear out of the ground. When we got our Peculiars—the Professor appeared out of nowhere—"

The footsteps sounded closer.

"What was the first thing he—she—said?"

Closer.

Boreas felt his brain turning like a wheel. "The first thing they said. They said a greeting. All Professors always say a greeting—"

And closer.

"Good morning?"

His ears pounded and rang.

"Good night—"

Boreas tried to open his mouth again, only to find he couldn't. His body was gone; falling into the void that appeared out of nowhere. He was falling, flailing in the air only to suddenly collide somewhere. He groaned, slumping against unfamiliar tiles. They weren't the weird patterns of the First Sector nor the sophisticated ones of the Second. They were cracked and dusty of the old. He sat up. Two things. First, the walls were filled with mirrors. Second—he stared in pure unbelief at his reflection in the mirrors—his face was distorted. Only his eyes remained. Dim blue.

Okay, whatever Eris or Lethe told you, at that day and that exact time, Boreas Poitraz swore that he did not scream. Simply, he just let out an extremely manly whine.

As he did, something even weirder happened. His voice was also gone, changed into voices of unknown men, women and children. No face, no voice. Total anonymity.

On his left, someone fell as well, face planting on the floor.

"Where the—" They grunted as they sat up only to face the tiles again because another person dropped right above them.

"Fuck, I looked," screamed the newcomer, immediately hands reaching to their eyes. Black. Beady. "Wait. Nothing happened?" They tentatively put their hands down. "Nothing happened. I can see!"

They galloped around joyously then kneeled down and kissed the tiles so hard they banged their forehead. Boreas stared, dumbfounded. Okay. That's definitely Eris. He glanced at the poor, crushed person from earlier. Lethe?

This one was now sitting up, glancing at their reflection in the mirror. Brown eyes. "The fuck happened to my gorgeous, beautiful and amazing self?"

Yep. Lethe.

The mirror she was looking at split open into a mouth and swallowed her. And before Boreas could do and say something, Eris cried out dramatically and followed Lethe, plunging into the mirror as well. "No!"

Boreas massaged the bridge of his nose, groaned and entered the mirror as well. He stumbled on somewhere dim, his breaths bated and dry as if the air was made of dust and stench. "Guys?" He coughed. "It's so dark here." And cold. He held his coat tighter.

"I can't produce any flames for some reason." Boreas could imagine Lethe furrowing her eyebrows as she said that.

Eris replied, "I don't think Peculiars work here. Mine isn't working, atleast. Thankfully."

Boreas fumbled the insides of his coat, producing a Light Glyph. Faded light filled the room. Dust wafted around the beam. The mirror they had gone through stood stagnant but Boreas had this irrational fear that it could blot out of existence. "Guys," he swerved around to where Lethe and Eris were. "We need to go—" He halted, as stunned as the other two. "Woah."

Prison cells stood tall, rust filling their hinges as dirt and dry blood decorated their insides. There were numbers etched on it as if someone and something was still counting the days, waiting to be released, to be free. Expired and unknown medicines cluttered the floor, and frantic handwritten notes of unknown languages were pinned on web-filled walls. Boreas bit the insides of his cheek as his face paled even more so, with a hue of green.

A corpse lay there, its bones were still steady and whole. Its jaw was wide open and its bony hands still held the corroded prison bars as if it hadn't accepted its demise just yet. Maybe if the trio stared hard enough it would have raised its head and waved a greeting or atleast stiffly nod in acceptance and crumble into ashes.

Boreas flinched when its skull suddenly slipped out and rolled down, stopping near his shoes. A spider slithered out of its eyes and crept on ragged gray trousers.

The problem was that it wasn't in any of the trio's trousers. It was on someone else. Someone who wasn't there earlier. With hitched breath and goosebumps crawling on his skin, Boreas slowly raised the light to the face of the sudden visitor.

Choppy auburn hair framed his hollowed cheeks and features. Numbers filled his pale-white skin and his frail hands were curled on a glowing book. His ears were rather sharp and long, his irises were a dim green. They were blank and bloodshot, eyes that were old yet young; had probably seen life and death, one that had seen empires rise and fall. The boy tilted his head, lips quirking into a small, stilted smile as if he had used all his strength just to do so.

And just like that, he disappeared as quickly as he appeared.

The trio did not scream. They did not even speak. They all rushed back to the mirror with the speed of light and their own heartbeats, fear empowering their legs yet also paralyzing them.

"You guys," panted Eris, eyes as wide as plates. "You better fucking explain what is happening."

~°°~