The tower is not silent.
I realize this the moment my hand touches the door.
At first, it feels like ordinary stone—cold, damp from the endless rain outside. But the instant my fingers press against its surface, faint ripples spread across it like disturbed water.
Not stone.
A mirror.
The surface trembles, reflecting my face… but not quite correctly.
My reflection stares back with the same tired eyes, the same rain-soaked hair clinging to my forehead.
But behind him—
The tower stretches infinitely upward.
Behind me in reality there is only the ruined corridor, the broken walls, the soundless rain.
Inside the mirror, the tower rises into darkness like a spine piercing the sky.
"Great," I mutter. "Another impossible thing."
The mirror-self tilts its head.
I didn't move.
A faint pulse spreads beneath my skin again—the strange light that has been appearing more often lately. The veins along my wrist glow faintly, illuminating the reflection.
But something else glows too.
Symbols.
They crawl slowly across the mirror like living things.
My reflection raises its hand.
So do I.
But he moves first.
The realization sends a chill through me.
"You're not me," I whisper.
The mirror version smiles faintly.
Not hostile.
Not friendly either.
Just… knowing.
The tower behind him shifts.
Suddenly the reflection changes.
The tower disappears.
Now I see a different place.
A street.
Rain falling endlessly.
Neon lights flickering across wet pavement.
The city.
My chest tightens.
I know this place.
It's the night everything changed.
The night the rain began.
In the reflection, people run through the streets. Sirens scream somewhere in the distance. The sky glows faintly red beneath the storm clouds.
Then I see him.
Myself.
Standing in the middle of the street.
Younger. Confused. Completely unaware of what is about to happen.
"Wait…" I breathe.
The reflection continues.
The younger version of me looks up.
Rain stops in the air.
Just like it did the first time.
And the light—
The same strange light that now runs through my veins.
The memory freezes.
The mirror cracks slightly.
Thin fractures spread across the surface, dividing the reflection into dozens of fragments.
Each fragment shows something different.
Another version of the tower.
Another version of me.
In one reflection, I'm standing alone at the top of the tower, the city below completely submerged in water.
In another, the tower has collapsed entirely, its broken structure swallowed by black rain.
In another—
I'm not human anymore.
Light pours from my body like a storm breaking open.
"What are these?" I ask the empty room.
The mirror-self finally speaks.
His voice sounds exactly like mine, yet echoes strangely, as if coming from somewhere much deeper inside the tower.
"Possibilities."
The word vibrates through the air.
"Paths the tower has seen."
The reflections shift again.
Now there are only three.
Three clear images.
The first shows the tower intact, rising proudly above a calm city. Rain still falls, but gently, like ordinary weather.
The second shows the tower fractured and burning, lightning tearing across the sky as the city collapses into chaos.
The third reflection shows nothing.
Just darkness.
Endless rain falling into an empty world.
"Those are my choices?" I ask.
"Not choices," the reflection replies.
"Consequences."
The mirror surface trembles again.
I stare at the three reflections.
Each one feels real.
Too real.
As if the tower isn't showing me predictions.
It's remembering.
The thought makes my stomach twist.
"What is this place?" I demand.
For the first time, the mirror-self's calm expression fades.
"The tower is not a building," he says quietly.
"It is a memory."
Lightning flashes outside.
For a brief second the entire chamber lights up.
And I see something I hadn't noticed before.
The walls.
They aren't stone.
They are mirrors.
Hundreds of them.
Thousands.
Each reflecting a different moment.
Different versions of the same story.
Different outcomes.
The tower isn't showing me the future.
It's showing every possible version of it.
My reflection steps closer.
Now the mirror between us looks thin enough to break.
"You came here looking for answers," he says.
The light beneath my skin pulses brighter.
"But answers are dangerous things."
Behind him, the three reflections begin to collapse into one another.
The calm city.
The burning tower.
The empty world.
All merging into a single swirling storm of images.
The mirror cracks again.
This time the fracture runs directly through my reflection's face.
His voice lowers.
"So tell me," he asks softly.
"Which reflection do you believe?"
The mirror shatters.
And the tower finally begins to wake.