Room Of Mirrors (LIKELY NOT TO BE FINISHED)

Michael

I found myself standing in a damp, dusty room with the others. I could not remember how long we've been standing here, how we got to this room, nor how we managed to all end up in a small, perfectly curved semicircle facing the inside of the room. It was as if we were a choir of angels who appeared like POOF! into the room, but they did not see any one to sing to so they got bored and fell asleep standing (because have you ever seen an angel sitting down?), then all the other angels woke up and fled home because that's the logical thing to do when you've snoozed on the job, and left the rest of us here for whoever manages angel apparitions to find us and smack our butts off. Come to think of it, that's not a very angelic thing to do. Anyway, we were all standing in this crazily smooth semicircle in a strangely familiar room.

There was a singular plank of wood horizontally nailed into the peeling walls, and atop it lay so many thick books that I feared it would break off if any more were added. To the left of that plank, from the plank's point of view, was a small bed without a mattress nor a blanket, just a small pillow that looked as old as my great-great-great-great-great-grandma Cherry. A small figure slept on that bed, but her sleep could hardly be called 'sound'. Every few seconds, she would either cry out in pain or beg the air to stop, and she curled up into a ball with her hands covering her head, whimpering softly. My heart clenched and unclenched as I watched the poor girl; she must have gone through some serious trauma to have nightmares that bad. Most likely abuse as a child, seeing that she did not fight back.

I tried to run to her side and wake her up, but I found that I could not move from my spot. Eyes wide, I scanned the room and found Lancelot standing at a corner behind us, again talking worriedly into his earpiece. His eyebrows furrowed even deeper than before (didn't know that was possible, but hey, you learn something new every day!). Sweat barrelled down his face and plastered his hair to his face, something I did not know could happen in a virtual world. Maybe it was an effect of staring at him too long, but he appeared to be shivering with either rage or fear. Or maybe he was just cold. The cold wind that sneaked in through the cracks in the ceiling could account for that.

Yet, something about his uneasiness gave me the chills. If someone who was supposed to be familiar with this story- thing could be faced with such uncertainty, what about the people who were completely new to it? Chills ran down my spine as wild scenes of worse- case scenarios flashed in my mind. The glitch we saw in the first story came shooting to the front of the crowd. I remembered seeing a book named after the rehabilitation programme, and it being opened to the first chapter with exactly the same words that Lancelot said while introducing us, then a small breeze blowing that flipped it to the first page of the next chapter, and after that everything turned to static and I could not make out anything at all. I had begun to contemplate all this, when a shriek snapped me out of my thoughts. The girl had bolted upright in her bed, eyes wide and sweat drenching her threadbare pajamas. She panted like she had just run twelve rounds around the perimeter of South-East Asia, and she put a hand over her heart in an attempt to calm herself down. Studying her face, I recognised her as Mathilda from part one of 'Mathilda's Monster'. When she finally recovered from her nightmare, Mathilda wiped the sweat off her face and walked into what I believe was her bathroom to wash up.

She emerged wearing a bloody green apron over the white lab coat she had worn the previous day. Picking up a spool of thick thread and a large needle, she proceeded out of the room. When she disappeared behind the door, I felt a weight being lifted off my feet. Lancelot walked ahead and gestured for us to follow. I took a step forward and realised that we could only move around when we needed to follow the story. Taking a last look at the room, I could not be less surprised at how crisp and real the scene was. The wood grain was soft to the touch and a little moist, showing signs of decay. I rapped gently against a beam. It whined loudly and fell to thd ground with a light thump. Termites scuttled out in droves from inside, and headed into the corridor that Mathilda had just exited through. As I watched the bugs escape, I caught sight of a glossy black shoe tapping impatiently. The clearing of someone's throat led my eyes up to Lancelot's impatient-looking face, glaring daggers at me.

"Pardon me, Ms. Applesteins, but could you please remove yourself from the floor and stop holding the rest of us up? The mirror doesn't wait for curious floormats." I could have sworn that he smirked when the others giggled at that ridiculous name, and my cheeks reddened to replicate oversized tomatoes.

Only on the third event here and you've already gotten yourself an enemy. Your own guide, Michael! Really, I don't know whether to be shocked or impressed. He's probably going to taunt you forever. You are so screwed.

Nothing to lose if I do this, then.

Getting up on my feet, I flashed my kindest smile and said, " Of course, Lottie, darling! Lead the way." Poor old Lancelot looked like he had just been punched in the face. Roars of laughter erupted around us and he turned an even deeper hue. "Why you little- " He was cut off by a tap on his shoulder. Regaining his composure, he turned around to face a blonde- haired girl I recognised as the one I had sitten next to in the whats-its-face Room. "Excuse me, Mr. Lance, but I think we really should continue on with the story. We might have missed some parts, and it wouldn't do for us to just stand here, now would it?" She asked, grinning like a cheshire cat. I snuck her a grateful smile behind his back. Heaving an exasperated sigh, he rubbed his temples and turned back to me.

"We'll settle this later."

"Of course we will, Lancy, dearest! But I believe we have to move on now, don't we?"

If looks could kill, I think I would have withered and exploded into flames simultaneously under his gaze. Lancelot snarled at me before whipping around to face the sniggering group. "Alright, alright! Settle down and get your idiotic arses out the door and into the lab. If I see anyone laughing..." Before he could finish, everyone had scuttled out of the room, and I had escaped far away, far, far ahead of everyone.