Chapter 18 · Mirror Image

"You’re late," the voice said. "I’ve been waiting for us to meet for a while now."

I froze. The voice didn’t just sound like me. It had the same dry rasp, the same habit of clipping the end of the sentence. I looked up. Standing ten feet away, leaning against a jagged pillar of obsidian, was a man wearing my face.

Same scar running through the left eyebrow. Same blood-stained knuckles. Same hollow look in the eyes that said he’d died a thousand times and stopped counting at fifty.

"What the hell is this?" I spat, my hand sliding toward the hilt of the blade at my hip. "Some kind of projection? A holographic trick?"

My double smiled. It was a slow, cruel expression that felt like a mirror reflecting a nightmare. "Projection? No. I’m the version of you that didn't hesitate in loop forty-two. I’m the one who took the shortcut through the Void. I’m the upgrade."

He didn't move, but the air around him shimmered. Suddenly, he was gone.

I didn't have time to blink before a fist slammed into my jaw. The force sent me spinning across the cold floor, my teeth rattling in my skull.