The Mirror's Edge

Chapter 3: The Mirror's Curse

As Jonathan and Sarah delved further into their investigation, they uncovered a hidden piece of the puzzle: a worn leather-bound journal, its pages yellowed with age. The name "Emily White" was scrawled across the inside cover. Emily, one of the original patients at Oakwood, had left behind a record of her experiences—something that no official files could ever capture.

Sitting in the dimly lit precinct, Jonathan carefully flipped through the fragile pages. Emily's handwriting was erratic, the words often trailing off, as if she had written in a frantic state. Her entries spoke of fear, isolation, and a growing obsession with what she called The Mirror's Curse. The entity had tormented her and other patients, targeting them when they were most vulnerable.

Sarah read over his shoulder, her heart sinking as the disturbing details unfolded. Emily wrote of seeing grotesque, twisted versions of herself in the hospital mirrors. "It's not just a reflection," one entry read. "It knows me, my fears, my secrets. The more I look, the more it takes from me." The entries became darker, with Emily describing how the other patients had begun experiencing the same phenomena—visions of their worst nightmares manifesting behind the glass.

"Jonathan," Sarah said, her voice quiet, "this sounds like more than a shared delusion. It's almost as if the patients were feeding into each other's paranoia, or maybe... the curse itself was spreading through them."

Jonathan's face was grim as he turned to a section near the end of the journal. Emily had written about a secret meeting among several patients, the most troubled ones, where they discussed their shared torment. The group believed they were being punished by The Mirror's Curse, an entity that thrived on their suffering. Desperate for a solution, they formed a pact—one Emily hinted at in cryptic terms.

"They thought the curse would follow them even outside the hospital," Jonathan said, reading aloud. "They believed that by keeping their secret, by enduring the torment alone, they could protect others from it. But the longer they stayed silent, the more powerful it became."

Sarah leaned forward, frowning. "A pact to protect others from the curse. But how?"

Jonathan turned to the last few pages, where Emily's handwriting became even more chaotic, her thoughts disjointed. Her final entry, dated just before her death, was chilling. It wasn't a typical suicide note, but a cryptic warning: The mirrors never forget. We tried to protect the others, but it's too late. The curse demands payment, and it will collect.

"They made some sort of vow," Sarah said, piecing it together, "to stop the curse from spreading. Maybe that's why these murders are happening now. The killer thinks they're freeing the victims, finishing what the original patients started."

"But why kill them?" Jonathan asked, his brow furrowed. "If they were trying to protect others from the curse, why would someone target them now, years later?"

Sarah flipped back through the journal, her fingers brushing over a faded passage. "Maybe they think they're saving the victims—releasing them from a torment that never ended. What if the killer believes they're continuing the pact, but in a twisted way?"

The realization hit them both simultaneously. The murders weren't just random acts of violence. They were a distorted form of mercy, carried out by someone who believed that the victims were still trapped in the grip of The Mirror's Curse—that they could only be freed through death.

Jonathan stood, pacing the room. "We need to look closer at the surviving patients. Whoever is doing this might be one of them—someone who never escaped the trauma of Oakwood. They could be reenacting the curse, convincing themselves that the only way to save the others is by killing them."

"But why now?" Sarah asked, her voice laced with frustration. "Why wait all these years?"

Jonathan paused. "Maybe something triggered it. Maybe the curse never really went away. Or maybe... the killer believes it's finally time to finish what they started."

As they continued to sift through Emily's journal, a new sense of dread settled over them. The more they uncovered, the clearer it became that this wasn't just about revenge. The killer believed they were performing an act of twisted redemption—liberating the souls of the victims from the grip of a malevolent force that still lingered in the shadows.

The echoes of Oakwood's dark past had returned, and with them, The Mirror's Curse was claiming more victims.

Their next move was clear: they had to track down every surviving patient who had been part of Emily's pact. Somewhere among them was the person who had taken it upon themselves to complete the deadly vow. But even as they planned their next steps, Sarah couldn't shake the feeling that something far more sinister was at play—something that went beyond the reach of logic.

Was The Mirror's Curse more than just a delusion? Could the darkness that haunted Oakwood Psychiatric Hospital still be alive, lurking, waiting for its final act? As they prepared to confront the truth, Sarah and Jonathan realized they were no longer just hunting a killer. They were unraveling a curse that threatened to destroy them all.