Lyos Lever spent the morning in a haze, haunted by the memory of his reflection’s smile and the whispered “Soon” that had followed him from sleep into waking. He kept the mirror covered, but every reflective surface-windows, the screen of his phone, even the polished metal on the elevator doors-seemed to pulse with a hidden threat. He avoided his own gaze, afraid of what he might see.

  At the foundation office, the atmosphere was tense. Liora was waiting for him, her face drawn with worry. She pulled him aside before he could even set down his bag.

  “Lyos, something happened last night,” she said, voice low. “There was another incident. Not a politician this time-a child. She was found wandering the streets, catatonic, repeating your name.”

  Lyos felt the blood drain from his face. “I… I don’t know her. I swear, Liora, I don’t remember anything.”

  Liora’s eyes searched his, desperate for truth. “She described you, Lyos. She said you smiled at her, and then she couldn’t move. The same as the witness from the attack.”

  He shook his head, panic rising. “I don’t know what’s happening to me.”

  Liora squeezed his arm. “I believe you. But the police are starting to ask questions I can’t answer. You need to tell me everything. No more secrets.”

  He nodded, swallowing hard. “I’ll try.”

  She led him to a quiet office and closed the door. For the first time, Lyos told her everything: the blackouts, the dreams, the messages, the thing in the mirror. Liora listened, her face pale but determined.

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “I’m not sure I believe in ghosts,” she said when he finished, “but I believe something is happening to you. And I believe you’re not the only one.”

  Lyos looked up, hope flickering. “You do?”

  She nodded. “I’ve been digging through the foundation’s archives. There are old reports-staff who vanished, patients who claimed to see themselves in mirrors, unexplained deaths. It goes back decades, Lyos. Maybe longer.”

  A chill ran down his spine. “What do we do?”

  “We find out what the Architect was really doing. And we keep you safe. From whatever’s inside you-and from anyone who might want to use you.”

  Before Lyos could answer, her phone buzzed. She glanced at the screen, frowning. “It’s the hospital. The child’s awake.”

  They hurried through the city, Lyos’s nerves fraying with every step. At the hospital, a nurse led them to a small room. The girl sat on the bed, knees hugged to her chest, eyes wide and unblinking.

  Liora knelt beside her. “Hi, sweetie. My name’s Liora. This is Lyos.”

  The girl’s gaze snapped to Lyos. For a moment, her expression twisted-fear, recognition, something darker. She whispered, “You smiled at me.”

  Lyos’s heart broke. “I’m sorry,” he said, voice shaking. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

  The girl shook her head. “It wasn’t you. It was your face, but not your eyes. The eyes were wrong.”

  Liora glanced at Lyos, then back at the girl. “Can you tell us what happened?”

  The girl hesitated, then whispered, “He said, ‘Don’t look away. If you do, you’ll forget who you are.’ Then everything went black.”

  Lyos shuddered. The words echoed his own fears.

  After the interview, Liora pulled Lyos aside. “It’s getting worse, isn’t it?”

  He nodded, tears stinging his eyes. “I’m losing myself, Liora.”

  She hugged him, fierce and sudden. “We’ll fight it together.”

  That night, Lyos returned home and found a new message waiting for him, scrawled across his notebook in handwriting that wasn’t quite his own:

  “Soon, you won’t remember which side of the glass you’re on.”

  He stared at the words until they blurred, then turned every mirror in the apartment to the wall.

  But as he lay in bed, eyes closed, he felt a presence watching from the darkness-a presence that wore his face and waited, patient and hungry, for the next time he slipped.