I stood in a room which was divided between black and white cleanly in the middle.

I watched as an identical reflection of mine looked at me from the glass at the end of the room.

I stood quietly, waiting for what had to happen.

I didn’t have to wait for long.

With a shink, the ceiling split and nooses came down from it.

Counting and having a sinking feeling in my heart, I saw that there were ten nooses.

With nary a sound, figures began appearing behind each noose on a platform, figures who looped the noose over their neck and stood silently.

My heart trembling, I moved forward with quivering lips.

“Mother,” I cried out.

“Father!” I ran.

“Aaron,” I pounded at the glass wall that had risen to separate me from the figures.

“Sia!” I scratched at the glass desperately, nails turning bloody.

“Ares!” I yelled.

“Devil Teacher!” I screamed.

“Rogue Teacher!” I sobbed.

“Thomas!” I gazed emptily.

“Frizelda,” I watched on in fear.

Then a final figure stepped forth through the original glass on the far side and taking a noose in his hands, he smiled at me with a wry smile.

Then he looped the noose over his head and, as one, the figures on the platform looked at me.

My breath stopping and my heart pounding, I saw their lips move, and the words came thundering over.

“A choice was made, a soul was condemned. A choice you now have, A path to save.”

The figures, in unison, chanted the words three times before they fell silent, staring at me with soulless eyes.

Stopping my struggles against the glass, I remembered those words.

After I had fought the goat, I had found them in the passageway leading to the stream of potion.

Shouting out, I yelled, “I made the choice. I chose to save!”

Then the figure on the far right, my identical reflection, spoke, “Indeed, and your path led you here. You will choose one person to die every minute and in the end, five people will be left alive. Choose!”

horror-struck, I gazed at him dumbly as my mouth moved, but words failed to come out.

Finally, letting out a howl of anger, I punched the glass as hard as I could.

The glass remained whole, but my fist was red and trembling.

Then my reflection spoke again, “Choose. Now!”

I gasped out in pain and cried with a trembling voice, “I can’t. I can’t! Please, give me another way!”

“There is no other way,” my reflection thundered in a harsh voice.

Then with a whoosh, the platform opened up underneath Frizelda and I averted my eyes as I choked with emotions and the shock of what was happening.

“You have one minute to decide on who dies next.” said the figure as he played with the noose.

“No, No, No... Please!” I mumbled.

A minute later, the platform opened up again, and Ares was the next victim.

Kneeling down and vomiting hard, I clutched my stomach as I emptied its contents and I felt acidic bile reach up in my throat again.

Sucking in deep breaths, I stared in hate at the reflection while, unnoticed, the cleanly divided black and white space now began tilting toward black.

“Stop!” I screamed.

The nightmare didn’t stop and next was the rogue teacher, but I couldn’t see it because I had averted my eyes.

“Three people died without you making a choice. So three more people will die because of you. You have two people whom you can save. Make. Your. Choice.”

I looked at my reflection with hate and the black portion crept closer to me.

I watched as Thomas fell through the platform, his skinny frame barely causing any strain to the noose.

I clenched my fists as tattoos began spiraling around my hands.

I watched as my parents fell together, just as they were together in life.

My eyes turned red and bloodshot.

I watched as Aaron fell and my heart broke.

Then I dug my nails into my palms so hard that they began bleeding profusely.

I watched as Sia seemed to meet my eyes before she, too, swung in the air.

I felt my broken heart shatter even further.

Then it was the devil teacher who put the noose around his neck and I seemed to see all the lessons he had taught me and I felt he was teaching me one last lesson before he, too, hung.

Then the noose tightened, and blood flowed from my eyes.

Smiling cheerfully at me, my reflection lifted the noose and said, “Congratulations. You have killed every single person you loved and saved yourself. You may now take me away,”

And then the blackness flowed into me and I watched in the mirror as the red tattoos flared into existence, but then steam began rising as they hissed against the darkness.

All in futility, as the reflection walked toward me with a measured step and stood one inch behind the glass and stared at me, spreading its arms wide in an embrace.

Then he stepped through the glass and through me and I gasped as pure chaos seemed to enter me.

Raising my head and howling, I saw myself turn black slowly.

Then I seemed to see my devil teacher mouth a word as he swung in the distance... Sally.

“I cried! I wept! I laughed! I Loved! I lived! I Raged! I fought! I Died! I set the world alight!”

And the darkness receded bit by bit amidst cries of agony from the reflection as I stood taller and taller.

“This...is…. an... illusion!” I thundered out.

“So what if it is!” The black reflection cried out.

“You caused their deaths. You made the choice of not making a choice!” he continued to say.

As though punched in the gut, I stumbled back.

Seizing the opportunity, the black reflection cried out even more urgently, “You could have saved 5 of them. 5! Not 1, but 5! If you had only made a choice. But you let them all die. For what? For your honor? Your pride?”

Stumbling back further, I began turning black again in the mirror.

Then firming my feet, I drew in a deep breath and said, “You are right. I did not make a choice, and that will haunt me. But in not doing so, I made my choice!”

Stunned, the black reflection fell silent.

Looking in the mirror at my half normal, half black body... I mentally recited,

“My path is that of a man who can walk in the shadows or the light, but I shall walk it with swiftness and purpose. I will stand for what I believe in and nobody can shake my belief in my path. I will forge ahead or perish!”

That might not be my path, but I too shall forge ahead or perish. Because whether it is... whatever I was now... or what I was before - there are people waiting for me. The same people who were now scattering into mist in front of me as the nooses fell limply to the ground.

Taking one last look at the mirror, I felt rage consume me and I channeled it all into my fist and I punched out.

The mirror shattered, and perhaps a piece of my soul shattered then too.

I do not know.

What I do know is.

This. Has. To. End.