Mirror, Mirror, The Monster is Me
Warnings: Unbeta'ed...and maybe some violence?
Usual disclaimers apply.
Naruto woke in a cold sweat, eyes blurry and desperately looking for something that wasn't there. He sat up stiffly, forcing his racing heartbeat to slow down by taking deep breaths. Fumbling with the lamp on the nightstand with one hand, he rubbed at his eyes with the other.
He knew he hadn't been dreaming - he usually recalled dreams and nightmares with a clarity that was truly astonishing sometimes - so why did he feel like something terrible was about to happen?
Blue eyes clear, he scanned his bedroom and it was the typical mess of a young adult living on his own - or as close to it as possible considering his roommate and best friend, Sasuke, was in the second bedroom down the hall.
There were no unusual sounds, nothing besides the soft hum of the heater kicking on to ward off the first inklings of winter chill, and the faint thumps of someone walking around in the apartment above them.
It was normal, all perfectly normal, and Naruto had to get up and check to make sure that it was as safe as he knew it was.
That damn knot of unease wouldn't go away until he did.
Slipping out from his nest of blankets and pillows - he patted the head of Gamabunta, his stuffed frog, feeling slightly comforted by the worn out toy - and made his way to the door. Shivering, he pulled on the orange hoodie he'd tossed on his computer chair before quietly easing out into the dark hallway.
A quick glance told him Sasuke must have turned in for the night as his bedroom door was closed all the way (it was Sasuke's way of telling Naruto that he did not want to be bothered without actually putting up a sign) so he flicked on the light without fear of disturbing his roommate.
Having dispelled the darkness there as well, and seeing that there was no crazy axe murderer creeping up on them to butcher them in their beds made him start to feel a little silly. Still, the unease clung stubbornly to the pit of his stomach and he went to the kitchen, flicking on the lights in the living room on the way, and feeling more and more like a little kid with every step.
There was absolutely no reason to be afraid and he scowled at the dirty dinner dishes he'd left in the sink that Sasuke had refused to clean up for him. Shaking his head, Naruto stomped his foot as he spun around. He was going to check the bolts on the door and then he was going to bed. He'd also avoid watching B-rated horror flicks for a while. Clearly, he'd watched too many leading up to Halloween and it had taken hold of his subconscious if he was literally scared over nothing.
Door secure and lights turned off, he made a pit stop at the bathroom to relieve himself. The flush of the toilet made him jump and feeling more disgusted than afraid now, he glared at his reflection over the sink.
It glared back tiredly, blonde hair sleep tousled and lips pressed together in a tight line.
And then they pulled back over his teeth in a horrible parody of a smile, even as Naruto continued to scowl.
"Fuck - " Naruto jumped back, banging his shoulder painfully in the small space and watched in shocked terror as his reflection appeared to press its hands against the mirror's surface, as if looking for a way to open it.
Too petrified to draw in the breath needed to scream, Naruto watched helplessly as his reflection started hammering at the glass, and jumped again as the blows actually reverberated in his own ears.
The sound blew the shock from his limbs and he ran out of the bathroom, down the hall and to Sasuke's room.
The door rebounded off the wall with such a loud crash that Naruto hadn't even finished yelling his name when Sasuke bolted upright, eyes wild and swearing at being woken up.
"Jesus Christ, what the hell, Naruto?!"
Torn between wanting to launch himself at Sasuke for support and staying away since he knew from experience that Sasuke could be violent upon first waking, Naruto settled for standing at the foot of his bed and throwing terrified glances over his shoulder. "Sasuke - something happened - I don't - we need to get out of here - "
"What? Did someone break in?" Alert now, Sasuke threw back the covers and got out of bed, instinctively reaching for his cell in the dark.
A part of him was telling him to calm down, that he was on the verge of hyperventilating and it wouldn't help - but Naruto was well and truly on his way to having a panic attack.
"Naruto?" Sasuke walked over to the bedroom door and Naruto whimpered, "No, don't - "
The bedroom became bathed in soft artificial light and Sasuke was looking at him with concern. "What happened?"
Shuddering, Naruto bit his lip, "Just - come on - "
Grabbing a pale forearm, Naruto dragged his flannel-clad friend down the hallway and into the still lit bathroom and pointed at the mirror, careful not to look himself. After several seconds of unnerved silence, Sasuke shook off Naruto's hand. "Seriously, what are you on, dobe?"
Eyes darting up - he couldn't look or he'd lose it all over again - Naruto focused on Sasuke's incredulous profile. "It's fucking crazy but my reflection moved."
Sasuke turned his head and leveled him with one of his patented sardonic stares. "That's to be expected. Reflections are known to move when you do."
"Yeah, except this time it didn't." Naruto glared when black eyes glittered with wry amusement, "I mean it moved when I was not - it - I'm not kidding!"
Sasuke groaned, amusement giving way to exhausted irritation, "I have work tomorrow, Naruto, and so do you. Aren't you getting a little old for pranks like this?"
"It's not a prank and before you say it, it wasn't a dream either! I've been awake this entire time and I'm telling you something happened where my reflection was - something else - and it looked like it was going to crawl out and fucking murder me!" Crossing his arms, Naruto resisted the urge to throttle the other man, visibly shaking as his emotions wreaked bloody havoc on him. He glowered at Sasuke's feet, mentally despairing at the insanity of it all.
Doubt was already gnawing at him in the wake of his initial fear, but then he could hear the echoing sound of fists hitting glass in his head and he wanted to get the hell away before it happened again. What if it could actually get out - ?
A weary sigh disrupted his escalating thoughts. "It's late - you need sleep and I do too. Look, if it makes you feel any better, you can camp out in my room." To his credit, Sasuke didn't sound condescending as he offered up his floor space, only mildly exasperated. They'd had enough sleepovers growing up that neither of them felt uncomfortable at the lack of privacy.
Unable to really come up with anything to say, Naruto simply nodded and watched Sasuke's feet carry him out of the cold bathroom. Still absolutely not looking at the mirror, Naruto quickly turned out the lights and hightailed it out of there. He barely remembered to grab a pillow and blanket - he hesitated for only a second before he snatched up Gamabunta as well - and made himself comfortable on the scratchy beige carpet at the foot of Sasuke's bed.
Naruto stayed awake the rest of the night, staring at the closed bedroom door, his only sources of comfort stemming from Gamabunta tucked in next to him and Sasuke's soft snores.
Morning came, and it took the other man getting up before Naruto moved from his spot on the floor. Sasuke went about his usual routine and pretended like his friend wasn't paranoid of anything slightly reflective as he made them breakfast before work. Any other time Naruto would have been happy to bask in his friend's indulgence - it was hard won and so Naruto made a point of enjoying it whenever the occasion arose - but he simply couldn't. Every time he saw his reflection he was torn between watching it furtively and not looking at all. Ultimately, he ended out bouncing from one to the other and appeared to suffer from Tourettes.
Finishing before Naruto (who had mostly poked at his eggs and nibbled on the waffles), Sasuke cleaned up his own mess and downed the rest of his coffee. "I've got a meeting with Itachi today so I don't know when I'll be back tonight. Try to be a responsible adult, all right, dobe?"
Naruto rolled his eyes, playing with the sad puddle of syrup and starch on his plate.
"That includes doing the dishes tonight. I'm not your mother or your maid."
Pulling himself together, Naruto scrambled to follow Sasuke to the door, pointedly leaving his plate on the table. "Funny how you say that when you're constantly fussing at me like you're both."
The remark earned him a light-hearted glare. "Some days I wonder how you've survived this long."
"It's certainly not from the love and care you bestow upon me - the grim reaper probably has a bigger heart than you do, teme."
Naruto beamed as the front door slammed in his face, but not before he glimpsed the smile tugging at Sasuke's mouth.
The moment died a minute later as he realized Sasuke had left him in the apartment alone. Not caring that he still had an hour to kill before work, he tugged on his shoes and hastened outside, barely remembering to lock up behind himself. Normally he'd waste that time on his laptop lurking on Tumblr, but he decided instead of catching the bus last second, he'd rather walk. It'd be a nice alternative to the usual - the idea of sitting in the apartment by himself was almost as nerve-wracking as being next to the smudged but still reflective window on the bus. Thankfully, once he got to Jiraiya's little bookshop, the only mirrored surfaces he'd have to worry about would be the storefront windows and he had an entire day of product rotation to look forward that would keep him safe.
He was optimistic that time spent swamped in manual labor and the smell of books would make him forget all about the madness that had happened last night. This time tomorrow, he and Sasuke would have a laugh at his expense and everything would be back to normal.
Naruto couldn't imagine being this crippled for longer than that; he just needed a bit of time to convince himself that he'd imagined it in the first place. That's all.
A few hours later when he'd caught Jiraiya spiking his tea with whiskey (But it's autumn - this is the best time of year for it!) and Naruto had taken the thermos away (If I can't drink on the clock, neither can you, old man!) found him in the bathroom pouring the contents down the drain. He was perfectly oblivious to his newly acquired phobia as he'd predicted, lulled by the familiarity of a typical day in the life. Therefore as Naruto was thinking fond thoughts of Jiraiya and his not-so-conventional habits, a knock right above his head made him jolt.
Dropping the metal thermos with a clang against porcelain, Naruto's heartbeat started triple time. He looked up into the mirror and watched his reflection's bloodless lips curl into a rictus smile while his own jaw dropped in alarm.
"It's not real - " Naruto gasped, backing away to brace himself against the opposite wall.
It waved mockingly before slamming a hand against the glass. The surface rippled menacingly under the assault.
"Shit -" Naruto edged around the door, mentally screaming to get away, far far away and plowed right into Jiraiya.
Strong hands gripped Naruto's shoulders, anchoring him as a deep voice laughed, "Woah there! You nearly knocked me over, kid. You wouldn't want to be responsible for hurting a helpless old man, would you?"
Naruto didn't respond. What he had seen was replaying in his head in a terrible loop, and he could taste the bitterness of bile rising in his throat.
Jiraiya pushed him back to arms length, laughter fading awkwardly as he took in his panicked state and the shaking he felt under his palms. "Are you okay, kid?"
Squeezing his eyes shut, Naruto swallowed hard, forcing his fear down. There was no way the other man would believe him. Naruto could barely believe it himself - what the hell was happening to him?
Instead, Naruto pasted on his goofiest smile and did the only thing he could think of in this situation - he played it off. "You need to call pest control, seriously! The spider that greeted me in there would have easily devoured a lesser man!"
Jiraiya shook his head in disbelief before chuffing him soundly on the back of the head. "Consider it cosmic payback for depriving the elderly of their worldly pleasures. Now back to work - those books won't organize themselves!"
Grumbling and rubbing his sore head, Naruto was actually quite happy to do just that. Anything to forget for a second that he was losing his grip on reality - and to put as much space between himself and the bathroom as possible.
Later, Jiraiya shooed him out into the cool night after the younger man had loitered around as long as he possibly could. He'd goaded the shop owner into a round of Scrabble after the store was closed (Jiraiya's greatest weakness next to booze and curvy women) but as usual their competitiveness drove them both to dangerous levels of pigheadedness and that was the end of it. Naruto dithered on the street corner over what to do next as he idly observed traffic go by.
He desperately didn't want to be alone - since the incident that afternoon, he'd done everything he could to keep people within earshot for the rest of the evening. He'd even gone so far as to leave the door cracked when he'd needed to use the restroom - which had been a personal record for how long he could go without. Whether it was a coincidence or circumstance that kept whatever it was from happening, he didn't know, but either way he was going to do his best to have company. Except it was getting late and Sasuke wasn't going to be home for a while longer and of course, none of his friends were available to hang out.
The real problem was that he couldn't keep avoiding it - unless he straight up handcuffed himself to some poor soul - and Naruto didn't know what to do about that.
As he tried and failed to reason with himself, he was finding that he was pretty well divided between two opinions; either his imagination was playing nasty tricks and it would go away with perseverance or he needed to seek professional help and find out what was wrong with his brain. Neither one appealed to him and the tension was eating him up, which was definitely going to drive him insane before anything else.
Mumbling to himself, Naruto sighed, ruffling blond spikes with rough fingers. "This is nuts. It'll be fine. I'll just go home, make a huge serving of ramen and veg out in the living room with some mindless TV. It's that easy and I'm being stupid."
Denial will solve life's strangest mysterious if applied with enough stubbornness after all.
His little pep talk had gotten him as far as the foyer where he flicked on the lights before slumping against the door. His legs were aching from the exertion of walking both ways to work and that was on top of the bone deep fatigue that was his body trying to shut down after going more than twenty-four hours without sleep.
"Let Sasuke squish me when he comes home. I'll be a Naruto pancake and tasty." Laughing deliriously at his own rambling, Naruto dragged himself up. "Bed. Bed is the destination, the final frontier. It's also sacred ground and therefore no monsters can touch me." His dad had told him that every night he had tucked him in and on nights when that hadn't been quite enough to dispel his imagined terrors, his father's words had chased away what was left. "And I'll gut the meanest monster if they ever tried to hurt our only son."
This time it was Kakashi's old promise of protection that made him feel better over Iruka's. Naruto repeated it to himself as he walked (not ran!) to his bedroom. He left the light on as he shed his rumpled clothing and was out by the time he'd curled around his squashiest pillow.
His last coherent thought was he probably wouldn't feel it if he was murdered before the sun came up.
"Hey, dobe! Get up!"
Snapping awake, Naruto blinked rapidly as his body tried to catch up with his sudden awareness.
Sasuke rapped on the door smartly. "You're on your own for breakfast but I picked up some groceries last night so you have your choice of disgusting sugar cereals. I'm headed out. Don't go back to sleep!"
"Aw man..." Naruto flung back his covers, forcing his sore limbs into motion. He winced as he ran his tongue over the wooly film coating his teeth and the stench of his own body odor; yesterday had been more of a mess than he had previously thought.
Yet, he'd survived the night, so clearly he'd been overreacting.
Grabbing a fresh set of boxers, Naruto marched determinedly into the bathroom, looked at the mirror, flipped it the bird and turned on the shower. He'd fed his fear more than enough - he was not going to let his imagination win this round.
"Kiba would tell me to get laid and Sakura would tell me to lay off the Internet and get an actual hobby." Naruto scoffed, quickly scrubbing himself down. Speaking of his friends, next day off he had, they were definitely hanging out. It'd been weeks and adult life wasn't going to suck the fun out of every waking moment if Naruto had any say in the matter. He'd start by duct-taping Sasuke to the couch when he got home and having a movie night. They still hadn't watched The Avengers and it'd been on their Netflix queue for ages.
Though only after he cleaned up the apartment some. Sasuke had held up his end of the chore duties and Naruto was seriously starting to slack.
Rinsing off, Naruto felt like a new person. He was a man with the plan - and an empty stomach. Sasuke had mentioned cereal and Naruto sincerely hoped he'd gotten Lucky Charms. Eager to find out, he collected his dirty clothes without a thought for anything else.
He didn't see his reflection sneering triumphantly as the tips of its fingers penetrated the surface of the mirror before being forced back to the other side.
The rest of his day passed by in a pleasant whirlwind of work and conversation with the added bonus of sharing lunch with one of his favorite regulars. Hinata was mousy and still hadn't conquered speaking without stuttering, but she let Naruto ramble on about fandom memes and made the best food. She'd blown him away a few times with her cooking and it was always a surprise when that got her to open up - that girl loved to take care of people and Naruto could appreciate that especially when it was accompanied with deliciousness.
It was always fun to boast loudly to Jiraiya about how he got all the ladies to take care of him even if Hinata had brought enough for all three of them.
Jiraiya was still ribbing him amiably when he left at the end of his shift, right as the sun was setting. "Say hello to the wife for me. It must be hard for the Mrs. to be the breadwinner in the relationship with such a deadbeat for a partner."
Naruto stuck out his tongue. "Why don't you do it yourself? I would pay to see Sasuke rip out your entrails with his bare-hands." Double checking to make sure he had his keys, Naruto saluted in farewell. "And I'm not a deadbeat - I make an excellent husband!"
With that parting remark, Naruto made his way to the bus stop. It really was starting to get chilly and he wasn't keen on repeating the hike he'd made yesterday. The idea of being on the bus didn't make him shudder as it had before thanks to a bit of light research he'd done while reorganizing the textbooks.
It had bothered him whenever he thought about what he now referred to as the Mirror Phantasm - he'd been quite proud of himself for coming up with that epithet - and the Merck Manual had supplied him with the perfect answer.
Brief Psychotic Disorder - wherein an individual can suffer from psychosis seemingly out of nowhere for a brief period of time and completely recover. It was that simple and Naruto could pack it up neat and tidy and never have to think on it again.
Besides, seemingly strange things happened to people all the time for whatever reason - didn't mean that his life was going to come to a screeching halt.
Naruto sighed contentedly as he spotted the bus pulling up alongside him. Perfect timing today, he thought, and easily climbed on as it came to a stop right when he arrived at the designated post. He plopped himself in the back, cheerfully noting he had the whole bench to himself. Sprawling comfortably with his legs kicked out and hands folded inside his hoodie pockets, Naruto let his mind wander.
When he really looked at the bigger picture, Naruto counted himself lucky that he'd only had a minor mental breakdown. Truly, he'd been blessed with a happy life; not even the tragedy of his parents dying shortly after his birth could be counted as such when he'd been adopted by two of the most loving individuals on the planet.
Naruto sincerely hoped that one day he'd be in a relationship that beautiful and fulfilling. He snickered as Jiraiya's words echoed back at him - he really couldn't imagine being in love with Sasuke. Sure they were as close as close could be without the benefits of a sexual relationship but Naruto kind of equated it with what he thought maybe twins felt for one another. Their friendship was somehow better than that; it was something a lot of people couldn't seem to understand without thinking they were in each other's pants all the time.
Absentmindedly pulling the cord for his stop, Naruto sat up straight to ease the strain on his back from slouching. In reality, what was probably going to happen was what Naruto heard girls talk about - the whole dying old maids with a bunch of crazy cats sharing their existence with equally batty girlfriends. Which made him wonder what the male equivalent of that was; neither him nor Sasuke were big on cats or pets in general.
Pondering that, Naruto nodded to the bus driver as he got off, and made his way around the corner towards home.
"Oy!" Naruto called as he let himself inside, kicking off his shoes right there in the doorway not caring that Sasuke would scold him for it later. Not receiving an answer, Naruto shrugged out of his hoodie and tossed it on the couch before heading into the kitchen to grab some food. Finding some Italian in one of those plastic takeaway containers - Itachi must have treated Sasuke sometime yesterday - Naruto grabbed a fork without bothering to nuke it.
Slurping up pasta noisily, he booted up his laptop and made himself comfortable on the couch. Naruto glanced at the clock and mentally allowed himself half an hour before he would start the laundry.
Two hours later found Naruto sighing and reluctantly getting off the couch. "Man, that was intense!" He should have known watching Legend of Korra was a bad idea but - "Wish I was a bender..." He picked up his dinner trash and frowned, noting the time. "Sasuke must have got held up again..." Still, he could at least clean up the kitchen and start a load before getting ready for bed.
Dutifully taking care of the dishes - not that there were many what with Sasuke continually coming home late and him not really eating much over the past couple of days - Naruto gave everything a quick wipe down and prepped the coffee machine for tomorrow morning. He went back and straightened up his shoes so Sasuke wouldn't trip over them when he walked through the door and snagged his hoodie with the thought of throwing it in with the laundry.
Naruto's head was still swimming with fantastic images of people wielding the raw forces of nature as he stuffed the tiny washer and dumped detergent in haphazardly. Wincing as he shut the lid too hard, he reminded himself to come back in forty minutes to throw it all in the dryer.
Resisting the urge to get back on the computer and resume watching his shows, Naruto instead forced himself to straighten up the chaos that was slowly overtaking his bedroom. He hummed tunelessly as he threw away randomly discarded receipts and noted he probably should change his bed sheets soon. Order temporarily restored, he quickly shed his clothing to put on some soft sleep pants and bit back a yawn.
He checked on the clothes - still not done - and then went to the bathroom to brush his teeth. If the clothes weren't finished after that, Naruto would leave a note for Sasuke so he could throw them in the dryer.
Naruto leaned his hip against the counter while he brushed; fatigue was setting in fast and he was already imagining the relief of crawling under cool sheets. Eager to make that thought real, he spat out the foam in his mouth, rinsed, and reached to place his toothbrush away in its holder.
A hand seized his wrist over the faucet, grasping it so tightly he was sure it would break.
Spasming, Naruto followed the tan fingers that looked eerily like his own up to where it stuck out from the distorted surface of the mirror.
"No...nononono! Let go!" Naruto clawed at the hand gripping him, trying to relieve the pressure but then it was pulling, "NO!" his feet left the floor - it was pulling him into the mirror!
Gasping in pain, terrified, he clutched the edge of the sink desperately, "Please - stop -!"
There was a horrible crunching sound and the pressure exploded into shrapnel of agony that radiated outwards from his wrist and Naruto lost his hold on the counter.
The world spun before - smack! Naruto landed sprawled on icy tile, stomach churning and cradling his damaged arm to his chest.
Blinking away tears, he tried to get his bearings, taking deep breaths. Naruto staggered to his feet, knees bruised, and dear god, his wrist -
His reflection stared back at him, its smile ominous.
A new kind of terror took over - he was on the wrong side of the mirror. Everything was reversed and that monster was in his world now.
"Wait...! Take me back..." Naruto punched the mirror with his good hand. "You fucker - take me back!"
Not Naruto laughed mockingly, eyes flashing.
"Bastard!" Naruto punched the mirror again, screaming as it stayed solid under the blow. "BASTARD!"
His reflection, the monster that looked like him but wasn't, flicked off the light.
Naruto was plunged into darkness.
A/N: So funnily enough this was supposed to be a Halloween fic but...I'm slow. Bad timing aside, the story behind the story is that I found the two sentence horror post on Tumblr and one of them was about mirrors. As a kid I'd had this horrible thought that if I turned my back on my reflection, it would pull me into the mirror and take my place. Reading that post had reminded me of that fear and I had to write something as a result. Ta da? Part of me wants to keep going with this (Not Sasuke is something I kind of want to write especially with Naruto helpless on the other side) but for right not this is a one-shot. Thanks for reading and review if you liked!