Graham Masterton - Mirror

The wind blew stronger. They felt rain on their faces. Across the street, a tall man with a head like a sheep hurried home with armfuls of groceries. His yellow eyes gleamed at them furtively, then turned away.

The market was right on the intersection of Franklin and Highland, its windows brightly lit. Martin began to jog as they approached, and Alison jogged to keep up with him. Even before Martin had crossed the street, he had glimpsed Emilio at one of the checkout counters, waiting to pay. That dark, tousled head; that small, pale face.

'There!' Martin exclaimed in relief. 'Look, there he is!'

Emilio wasn't difficult to pick out. He was the only person in the market who wasn't distorted. The cashier behind the register had a long rodentlike face with the skin texture of a withered carrot, and was tapping at the keys of the cash register with a long claw. Right behind Emilio waited a woman with a tiny head and a vastly swollen body, her small face nothing but a tight cluster of scarlet spots. As Martin and Alison reached the window and looked around the market, they saw nightmarish creatures moving up and down the aisles, some of them crawling like spiders, others with huge nodding heads like Mrs Capelli, others who were more like dogs. They were seeing firsthand the world that Lewis Carroll had written about in Through the Looking-Glass — the world which he had been able to describe only in a children's fantasy, because of its unbelievable horror. It was the world in which people appeared as they really are; and that was more than the Victorian imagination would have been able to accept.

As the creatures in the market passed the curved security mirrors at the far corners of the aisles, their appearance momentarily changed, and they took on a semblance of their everyday selves, except that their faces were swollen by the distortion of the mirrors, and their bodies and legs were shrunken like dwarves.

'Oh, my God,' murmured Alison. 'It's like some terrible kind of zoo.'

But Martin was set on getting hold of Emilio. He banged on the window; and banged again; and at last Emilio looked up and saw him. The little boy's face — at first despondent -broke into a wide smile. Martin beckoned him frantically to leave the market and come on outside.

Emilio dropped all of his groceries and came running out of the store and into the street. Martin opened his arms for him, and they hugged each other tight.

'You came!' sobbed Emilio. 'I didn't think you ever would! I thought I was stuck here forever and ever!'

Martin wiped Emilio's tears away, and affectionately ruffled his hair, and then stood up. 'It's time to go back,' he said. 'I don't think anything bad is going to happen to you if you step back through the mirror. But we have something important to do. Something dangerous.'

Emilio trotted along beside him as they made their way back toward the Capellis' house.

'Will you do it?' Martin asked him. 'You're the only one who can.'

Til try,' Emilio panted.

The wind was howling so strongly by the time they reached the house that they could scarcely walk against it. Sheets of newspaper tangled around their ankles and dry palm leaves whipped at their faces. The streets were almost deserted; but Martin could hear the howling of the fire sirens over the wind, and the distant shouting of a huge crowd, like a distant ocean lashing against the shore.

Martin picked up the loose end of the rope that they had left lying in Mr Capelli's driveway and wound it over his elbow as they went back into the house. Emilio tugged at Martin's sleeve and said, 'I don't have to go back to them, do I?' — meaning the mirror-Capellis. Alison put her arm around him and smiled. 'No way, Jose. You're staying with us.'

They climbed the stairs, with Martin still winding in the rope. The door marked ilbqsD was slightly ajar, and the sound of extraordinary garbled opera music was coming out of it, like a record being played backward. Alison ushered Emilio quickly past the door, although Emilio couldn't keep his eyes off it. God only knew what grotesque memories he would retain of what had happened there; of what distorted monstrosities he had seen; man in all his glory.

Martin had almost reached the head of the stairs when his own apartment door opened. He stopped, his heart bumping. Alison said fearfully, 'Who is it?'

The door hesitated, then opened a little wider. 'Who is that?' called Martin.

His question was answered almost at once. Out of the door came Martin himself, followed by Alison. Their own reflections, identical in every way, but somehow invested with an independent life of their own. They stood at the head of the stairs side by side and looked down at Martin and smiled benignly.

Martin felt a terror unequaled by almost anything he had experienced in the days since he had first opened his eyes and seen Boofuls standing over him. If he had encountered Boofuls at the head of the stairs, or Miss Redd, or that vicious cat Pickle, then he probably could have coped. But to come face-to-face with himself, smiling so blandly, that was more than his nervous system could cope with. 'Oh, God,' he whispered. 'Oh, God, that's the end of it.'

Alison stood white-faced, paralyzed with fear. 'What's wrong, Alison?' taunted her mirror image. 'Don't tell me that you, of all people, are afraid to look at yourself?'

Martin's mirror image smiled, and took the hand of Alison's mirror image as if they had been secret friends for years. 'What a daring fellow you are, Martin! Into the world of mirrors, just to save your five-year-old friend.'

Martin's mirror image came down two or three stairs, until he was standing directly in front of him. 'You always had big ideas, didn't you? Little man, big ideas. Well, I guess that we can forgive you. Every man's entitled to dream. And your best dream was Boofuls. Boofuls!, a musical by Martin Williams. Look what it led to! It changed the world, didn't it?' Martin hoarsely said, 'Get out of my way.' 'Oh, come on, now, Martin, you're talking to yourself. The only person in your way is you?

Martin felt the blood drain out of his head. His mouth was dry, and he was close to collapse. But something told him that his mirror image was speaking the truth. The only person standing in his way was him. His vanity, his ambition, his carelessness, his bad tempers. Indirectly, he had caused the deaths of all those one hundred forty-four thousand innocent people.

In the Bible, James had said, 'For if any man is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was.'

Now, however, Martin knew what kind of person he was; and he knew that it wasn't this smug, smiling character who was standing in front of him now.

'Get out of my way,' he repeated. He felt his strength returning. He felt his confidence surging back. 'Get out of my goddamned way!!'

Instantly, as fast as a cobra, Martin's mirror image threw back its head and stretched open its mouth. Out from its lips poured the slippery pink head with snapping teeth, its eyes blazing bright blue. Martin dodged, ducked back, but the creature's neck swayed around and its teeth snagged at his shoulder, tearing his shirt and furrowing his skin.

Alison screamed; and Alison's mirror image screamed, too, not in fright but in shrill triumph. But Martin scrambled back down the stairs, missing his footing and tumbling down four or five of them at once. And as the snapping head came after him, he looped the rope around its neck and yanked it viciously tight.

The head choked and gargled, its eyes bulging. At the head of the stairs, Martin's mirror image gargled, too, and fell onto its knees. Whatever this vicious head was, it was deeply connected to the innards of Martin's mirror image, and if he could manage to strangle it, he could strangle his mirror image, too.