Halloween 2020: Choose Your Spooky Outcome: Chapter 9
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Although the claw isn’t especially tempting, given that you are certain Jim has scratch something on it by now, it’s a harder call between the mirror and mask keys. Finally, you decide to go for mirror, walking over by Thad and clutching it firmly in your grip. With one mighty tug… it sort of wiggles a bit, moving perhaps an inch. Look, there’s a reason you’re not the one dressed as Hercules tonight, and it isn’t just that Victoria picks your outfits.
On your second try, there’s better luck, with proper footing and several grunts you manage to tear the key out from the broken branch. As it comes loose, you hear the distinct sound of metal breaking, yet the key in your hand remains whole. Jim and Victoria soon come around the trunk of the tree, glimmers of metal in their hands.
“Our key appeared to suffer some sort of self-detonation,” Victoria explains. “I presume that means another selection was made.”
“I went with mirror.” You hold up the key, feeling perhaps a tag smug that your suspicions were spot-on. One key was indeed the limit.
Jim claps his hands and rubs them together. “Alright, now how do we smoke out of that thing? I’ve got some good shit stuffed in the heel of my shoe, just going to need a minute to work it loose.”
“Why would we try to use the key for drugs?” Thad asks.
“Well there’s still no roads or anything, the hell else are we going to do with it?” Jim lifts up his left foot, fiddling with a small clasp on the heel as he hops around.
Thad and Victoria both scan the area, confirming that Jim was right. Right about the roads, anyway. Probably not so much on turning the key into a pipe, but hey, this has been a weird night.
The others are stumped, but the longer you stare at the tree, the more familiar it seems. Like something from a not so long ago dream. And in the center, a knothole, with perhaps a small break in the bark.
Moving quickly, before anyone, yourself included, can question the wisdom of your act, you slide the mirror key into the knothole, twisting it with all your might. Unlike with pulling the key out, there’s little force needed for this task, and you’re once again treated to the sound of shattering metal. Thankfully, this key served it’s purpose first, as the tree is already changing shape.
Twisting, snapping, reforming, until a door stands before you, wooden knob beckoning to be turned. With a quick glance to make sure everyone is ready, you wait a few moments while Jim gets his shoe back on and stuffs a plastic bag into his pant’s pocket, and then turn the knob.
Stepping inside, it feels like you’ve opened a portal to the inside of a disco ball. Mirrors are everywhere, the floors, the ceiling, what little semblance of walls you can manage to make out. The key certainly delivered as promised, you have to give it that. An entire realm of mirrored Merlins stare back at you, some quite normal, others shifted by their reflections’ angles.
“Check it out, my costume has basically become Tiger-Dick Nine: Tiger-Dick Kicks the Multiverse!” Jim is unbothered by the change in scenery, reveling in his countless selves as he does various flex poses.
“It’s pretty confusing in here,” Thad says, reaching over to grab you by the shoulder, only for his hand to smack against a mirror. You try to take his arm instead, jamming your fingers on the reflection. “Wait, crap, where are the real versions of everyone. Or the door?”
Even as you search around, you know Thad’s eyes haven’t suddenly gone faulty. Sure enough, the door is nowhere to be seen, only the land of infinite reflections. On the shiny surfaces, all four of you are still together, close enough to reach out and grab. Except it’s nothing more than an illusion, and with every passing step, you fear the others are getting further from your reach.
A sharp, piercing noise grates against your ears, causing you to cover them with your hands. In the mirror, you see Jim and Thad doing the same, whereas Victoria is moving her sharp nails back to her side. “It seems the mirrors cannot be scratched so easily, and I suspect attempts to break them will have similar results.”
“Then we have to keep moving around,” you surmise. “We stumble along and sooner or later one of us will find an exit or each other.” Not the most strategically cunning of plans, but you are making the best of a bad situation.
Taking your own advice, you continue on, hands pressing against endless cold surfaces. As you move, however, you notice that the reflections are shifting as well. They’ve begun to drift further apart, some aren’t even on the same mirrors anymore.
“Wait! Maybe some of us should stay put.” Your words echo around the chamber, but no new ones rise to join it. “Hello! Victoria? Jim? Thad? Can someone hear me?”
No response, and even as you stay put, your friends reflections continue to shift. Seeing little other choice, you continue on, groping your way about until you see something incredibly mundane, yet here they take your breath away. Spaces, gaps, points where the endless world of mirrors finally offer a momentary break in the scenery of only reflections. Before you are three new halls of mirrors, and there’s movement down each one.
Looking them over, you catch sight of Thad down the path on the right. Something is off, though. His usual confident grin is nowhere to be seen, instead there’s a morose expression weighing him down. More than that, you can see another reflection near his, but somehow it’s too shaded to make out clearly.
Down the middle hall, you soon spy Victoria appearing equally out of sorts. She looks… is that fear? If not, it’s a close cousin. She too has shadowy reflections around her, many more than Thad did, though significantly smaller.
You scope out the left hallway expecting to see Jim using a mirror for mixing various powders, but even he isn’t his usual self. If you didn’t know any better, you’d say Jim was actually worried, and the shadow sharing a mirror with him is huge.
Looks like they’re all facing some sort of challenge, and you get to go join. Without having any idea what you’re jumping into, you’ll just have to hope you can help more than you hurt. Choose wisely, then get a move on. None of them are looking especially thrilled about the current situation.