A Broken Monster

The mirror showed a reflection that wasn't my own. I had green eyes, but I saw red ones. I had blonde hair, but the hair of the person staring back at me was snow white. I wanted to smile, but I saw the fowl mouth of another. The reflection was of a boy, someone I had met before, once, in my dreams.

"Who..." The word came out, and the mouth of the male mimicked my own. The voice was deeper than my own, and now he stared at me like he trying to look through me. Yes, through me, like he knew there was something I was hiding. How could he know that? I stared back, wondering who would break first.

Then I blinked, my eyes watering from staring so hard. Fully expecting the red eyes to blink back, my eyes opened again, and in that millisecond of time, the male was gone. The reflection changed.

Now, in the reflection of the mirror, I saw my bare back. It was like the mirror was somehow now behind me, and yet it was right there, in front of me. As I stared into it closer, leaning forward, I suddenly cringed as a sharp pain seared in my back. It happened again, and again, like a needle was stabbing me over and over. I watched my reflection and soon enough, I realized what was happening to me. Slowly, as the stabbing pain continued, I saw black ink searing into my skin. I felt it, and I could see it, but when I reached behind me, there was nothing. What was happening to me?

Between the pain and cringes, I watched the wings form like a tattoo. Were they wings? Yes, angel wings? No, they were darker, worse. They were definitely wings, but nothing like an angel. I didn't deserve angel wings. These wings, I figured it out, were the wings of a dragon. The dragons in the valley. The dragons in the valley that were no longer in existence.

I cringed again, and my eyes shut. I couldn't handle the pain anymore. I opened them again, slowly this time, and suddenly the reflection was gone, as was the stabbing in my back. I looked in the mirror and this time, it was my face in the mirror. My eyes, not the red eyes. My hair, not the white hair. My face, not the face of the boy in my dream. I was looking at the reflection of a girl with green eyes, blonde hair, and now a scowl on my own face. I looked at my reflection in the mirror, but as I stared, now trying my hardest to look through my own self, I realized something. I didn't know who the girl in the mirror was.

As I looked in the mirror, I felt no more confused of who was staring back at me as I did when the boy with red eyes was staring back at me. What changed? I turned around, showing my back in the mirror, and the wings were still there. The wings that were not etched in my skin, like a reminder that I too have become a monster. The boy was a monster, I learned that. He was the reason why I was here in the first place. I remembered what he said...

"Don't you understand why I am doing this?" He said.

"No actually. Not at all." I admitted. He shook his head in defeat. I knew what he thought about humans. What he thought about me.

"It takes a monster to destroy a monster." He said. This time it was my turn to shake my head.

"No no, I think you have it all wrong."

"How so?" He looked intrigued by my rebuttal. It was my turn to stick up for myself. For my kind.

"From my understanding, it takes a monster to create a monster." I said. Colik raised his head, looking at me straight on.

"Are you calling the gods all monsters?"

"If the gods put me in this world- did this to me- then yes, I believe I am." I remembered saying...

So was that it? Did I create a monster of myself? I didn't know I was talking about myself then. Or was going to be talking about myself? Was that how that worked? Speaking things into existence? The tattoo on my back... the symbol of the dragons in the valley, and yet they were no more. Was that next? Was I looking into the reflection of my future? Was I too, soon going to be non-existent?

What was it about mirrors in this world that made me more confused of my own identity. It kept happening. I remembered the last time I looked in a mirror. I couldn't not remember? I mean how could one forget watching a white swan suddenly turn black? The black swan. The red eyes. How could ones reflection match that of another person?

And before I knew what I was doing next, I slammed my fist into the mirror. The pain from the shards against my knuckles didn't even match the pain from the stabs on my back. And just when I thought it couldn't be worse, fear flooded me as once again, red eyes reflected back to me through the broken pieces.