It looked exactly like him.
Same clothes.
Same haircut.
Same tired eyes.
But the smile on its face wasn't his.
It was calm. Almost… pitying.
"Who are you?" Ethan asked.
The doppelgänger tilted its head, as if amused by the question.
"I'm what's left when you forget."
The air changed—thickened, as though time itself had begun to fold inward. The ceiling creaked. The shadows clung tighter to the corners.
"I'm not dreaming," Ethan said. "Am I?"
The reflection didn't answer.
It moved—slow, deliberate—gliding past him like it knew the room better than he did. Its footsteps made no sound. As it passed, the air grew colder.
It brushed its hand along the wall, and where it touched, the surface shimmered faintly—like static beneath the wallpaper.
Ethan stepped back. His heartbeat felt out of place, like it belonged to someone else.
"This is real," he said.
"That's not the right word," the doppelgänger replied, tapping the glass of the mirror it had just stepped through. "It's remembered."
It turned toward him fully now, like the last part of a dream sliding into focus.
"You died, Ethan. You just haven't processed it yet."
The world tilted. That word again—died.
It didn't fit. It couldn't.
He grabbed the edge of the wall for balance. "That's not possible. I woke up. I had coffee. I—"
"You had a script," the reflection said. "It's what your mind plays while it unravels."
Ethan moved toward the door—only to find it gone again.
Nothing behind him now but more mirror.
More of himself. Or maybe not.
"I saw my own obituary," he whispered.
The doppelgänger nodded. "First sign. Then come the notes. The distortions. The doubles. Eventually… the loop."
"The loop?" Ethan echoed.
"It hasn't started for you yet. But it will. And when it does…" The thing smiled again, this time like someone remembering an old tragedy. "You'll understand what this really is."
"What?" Ethan asked, breath catching.
"A rehearsal."
The figure began to flicker, fading like a corrupted file. Bits of its face glitched, eyelids blinking out of sequence, mouth stuck in mid-motion.
"Wait—" Ethan stepped forward. "Why are you telling me this?"
"I wasn't supposed to," it said. Its voice broke into static. "But you're close. Closer than most."
Then—nothing.
It vanished mid-sentence, collapsing into itself like a program crashing to desktop.
The room fell silent.
All that remained was the mirror.
Now empty.
Ethan stared into it.
No reflection.
Only a single message scrawled across the glass in foggy letters:
WAKE UP.
A sound—like a breath being drawn in reverse.
Behind him, the door reappeared. Wide open.
And outside… the hallway twisted.
Looped.
Bent into the impossible.
He could see himself. Far away.
Walking into it again.
And again.
And again.
Dozens of versions.
All searching.
All lost.
All looping.
The loop had begun.