Mirrors
Mirrors are wonderful creations. Reflective coating laid on the back of glass, typically coated in silver or aluminum, tin (II) chloride, a chemical activator, copper, and paint. Once dried they are sold around the world, then hung in specific places in buildings such as bedrooms and bathrooms. Then they are then used to make clothing choices or give make-up advice. Humans love mirrors, and people become fascinated with the mirror in two different ways. These can be called groups. The most common group don't really care about the mirror itself, they care about what they see in the mirror. Everyone falls under this category, for every human has at least once preened in front of a reflective surface. Anyone who claims they haven't looked at their reflection with care about their physical appearance is lying. Animals are included in the this group, though significantly smaller than the amount of people and highly entertaining.
The second group of mirror lovers is much more interesting. They are more limited group, typically found home alone with their cats or in a mental institute. These are the mirror lovers that believe mirrors are portals to other worlds and have become obsessed with the notion. Not just passive belief or curiosity, but addiction. Which includes talking to the mirrors and trying to walk through them. These people spend hundreds of dollars just to cover their houses (or room) with mirrors and wait for the time when they can take a jaunt into another world.
But no matter the group, both can agree on one thing. Mirrors reflect what they see. What they see exactly is debatable, but the thought still stands. There is no hiding from their harsh truthfulness. They show everything, even what we don't want to see.
For Miko Nakadai, the image of Soundwave peeking into her bedroom window while she was in her pajamas was definitely not something she wanted to see in the morning. She'd already slammed off her alarm clock and was halfway across the room to flick on the light switch when she noticed the mechanical Peeping Tom in her closet door mirror.
The girl let out a short yelp and spun away from the full length mirror, ready to go down with a fight. Not that she could do much against one such as Soundwave. With the lights off she forgot about the conveniently dropped math textbook on the ground. This same textbook that one of her feet landed on and sent her sprawling onto the floor. Her feet went straight up in the air before she landed on her tush with a slight gasp.
"Ow.", she moaned in a quiet voice as she rubbed her bottom. It was just her and the pain for the moment. Then reality caught up with her and Miko immediately sprang to her feet- fists up again- and faced the window with the intruder.
An intruder that was now gone. Confused, Miko's fists slightly lowered as she stared at the second story window. Soundwave? Last anyone had seen of the mech was when he became trapped in the Shadow Zone during the 'giant epic battle to end all battles' last month. There's no possible way the Decepticons' Communications Officer could have escaped. Did she just imagine Soundwave peeking at her like some sort of pervert? Were the years of listening to obscure Bulgarian Shriek Metal getting to her head like Ratchet swore?
After a couple minutes with no reappearance from a certain mech, the young Japanese girl's curiosity got the best of her. Cautiously, she crept to her window, slid it open, and stuck out a arm. When a giant hand of doom did not snatch it up right away, she put her head out. Nothing happened. She eyed the dark outside world suspiciously.
Miko let out a huff and slammed the window shut. She was seeing things. The girl spun around, already going over her day in her mind. And definitely was not thinking about certain Decepticon peepers.
Until she looked in the mirror.
This time she almost screamed at the sight of the tall Cybertronian. Thankfully she managed to clamp her jaw shut before the sound could escape. Miko spun back towards the enemy. An empty window greeted her. Beyond confused at this point, Miko glanced back to her mirror and the image of Soundwave. But when she looked back, the glass window only showed the dark sky. After a couple back and forths, Miko threw her arms up into the air.
"Dude! Make up your mind! Are you here or not?"
If possible, the faceless mech in the mirror looked slightly amused at her frustration. Miko puffed out her chest- thoroughly annoyed- and gave the Cybertronian a glare. "Fine. Be that way with your weird mirror invisible-ness. But if you're not gonna do anything, then I'm ignoring you."
The mech made no move as the girl walked across the bedroom. Several times she stopped and stared down the immobile figure's reflection. To Miko's pleasure, when she check on him again after turning on the bedroom lights, Soundwave was gone. She let out a sigh of relief but kept her muscles tense. On edge, she walked over to the mirror. When Soundwave still didn't reappear, she hesitantly opened the door behind it and slid into the closet. He was still gone when she came out, and didn't rematerialize during her entire morning routine as she prepared for school.
Finally, Miko swung her backpack onto her shoulder, still eyeing the mirror warily. It was acting as all mirrors should, by not showing robotic aliens trapped in another dimension. She walked backwards out her room. Halfway out the door, her hand snuck forward and flicked off the light switch. The room was immediately plunged into darkness. At once, the mirror had a familiar frightening figure filling the frame. Miko stiffened as reflection Soundwave's visor slowly turned to face the terrified girl.
Quickly, Miko turned the lights back on, unwilling to face the mech in darkness as before. Any fear of that was crushed when the mech disappeared as soon as the room brightened. Miko's brain took a couple seconds to process the information before a figurative light bulb lit up. She held her breath, then reached for the light switch again.
Light off.
Soundwave.
Light on.
No Soundwave.
Light off.
Soundwave.
The process was repeated several times before Miko was satisfied. She stopped the flicking- continued to eye the unmoving reflection- turned off the lights one last time and slowly shut the bedroom door. The door clicked when it closed, but Miko kept her hand on the knob. She stared at the door handle, mind focused on what she'd just been through. Jack and Raf might know something about it.
"MIKO! Hurry up! You're going to be late for school and you still haven't eaten breakfast yet!"
The cry of a slightly agitated adult halted her hand from reaching her cell phone. Miko gave it a forlorn look, then shouted "Coming!" She'd have to talk to the boys later.
Later turned out to lunch time. Jack was sitting against their tree, balancing a food tray on his legs when Miko and Raf arrived, the younger boy settling down on Jack's left while Miko took his right side. They liked to eat outside when the weather permitted, with a view of the entire parking lot. Jack chose the spot, and always faced the motionless vehicles when sitting. Miko figured Jack was acting as a look-out, watching for trouble.
"So", Miko casually broke the comfortable silence, "Who wants to talk about Soundwave?"
Raf jerked to a halt, spilling the food off his fork. Jack sat up suddenly and started choking on his lunch. Raf pounded on the older boy's back until the coughing died off. When his airway cleared, Jack gave Miko a concerned look and rasped, "What?"
Miko shrugged, nonchalantly sweeping loose morsels into her spoon, "You know. Soundwave. Megatron's third in command. The Con we trapped in the Shadow Zone. Same mech that was creepin on me in a mirror this morning."
There was a pause, then...
"So he watches you too!", Raf bursted, "I was worried I was the only one!"
Jack sighed and leaned back against the tree, "Great. We're all being watched then."
"Wait", Miko set her utensil down, "Soundwave was creeping on both of you, and you guys didn't say anything! I only saw him for the first time this morning and I'm telling you now!"
"Didn't want to bother anyone."
"I thought he was haunting me because I opened the second Groundbridge that trapped him in the Shadow Zone."
Miko gave the two boys an unconvinced stare. "I can't believe you guys!", she huffed and threw her arms into the air, then waved them in the boys faces, "How long have you known?!"
"I first saw him about two weeks ago. I was grabbing something from my mom's room and caught him watching in her dresser mirror. He was literally inside my house. I think he was intangible, cause he going straight through the floor without damaging it. Could only see him from the waist up", Jack shivered at the memory, "Since then I've seen him on and off."
Raf adjusted his glasses, "I have to agree with you on the intangible part Jack. Soundwave has been following me for about a week. The bathroom in my new house has a huge mirror. That's where I first saw him. My nose was runny and I went to grab some toilet paper to use as a tissue. I nearly fell into the bathtub when I spotted his visor poking through the wall."
"Woah", Miko breathed, then annoyance flashed on her face, "So then Mr. Dark-and-Silent-bot was only hanging outside of my window cause he could? Lame…. Or maybe I moved faster than he expected and he didn't have time to actually get into my house before I saw him.", She perked up at the thought, happily accepting the theory.
"Well.. the Bots always did say you were unusually fast for a human", Raf reluctantly conceded. Miko beamed. "That was usually followed by a bunch of swearing.", Raf added.
Jack examined the scenery, easily imagining Soundwave towering over them at the moment, "Think he's watching right now?"
"Positive. With all three of us here, he's definitely going to be", Raf smiled sadly at the older boy, "But with Miko being watched now, we should be seeing less of him individually."
"Our own personal creeper", Miko said, then added, "At least he can't touch us."
The boys nodded their agreement. Any thought of lunch was now abandoned. Miko stuck a piece of grass in her mouth and shuffled over and laid on the ground. A couple moments silently passed before she spoke again, "What's up with the 'only seeing him in dark mirrors' thing though?"
"I was wondering about that", Jack admitted, "It seems so specific."
Raf nodded, "I thought so too. But when I tried to research mirrors and other dimensions, all I could get was paranormal stuff. Those sites talked about using magic or the 'the combined force of the anger of millions of dead souls' to cross dimensions. We've seen stranger things explained by science, so I eliminated that as a possible explanation. But the more I searched, the less reasonable explanations I found. Eventually I stopped looking."
There was a couple seconds of silence. Miko chewed on the blade of grass before speaking, "My mother always said that we could never hide anything from a mirror, even the things we don't want to see. A girl with lots of friends can look into a mirror and see a lonely soul. The most positive boy in school could see someone suffering from depression staring back. Standing in front of a mirror is standing in front of truth."
"Deep.", Jack commented.
"Nah", Miko raised her head and gave him a wry smile, "I'm pretty sure she got it from Mulan."
Jack snorted in amusement. Raf's eyebrows furrowed as he absorbed what had been said. "Either way, it's the best explanation we've got despite how dysfunctional. Soundwave is trapped in the Shadow Zone. We were intangible when we were there. It explains how he could get into our houses without destroying them. Do you guys remember how everything was darker there?"
When they nodded Raf continued, "I feel like that's a factor. Maybe there needs to be an absence of light for the Shadow Zone to be seen", the young genius shrugged then let out a sigh and slid down the tree a smidge while rubbing his face, "I really have no idea. All we've got are half-baked theories and ideas that don't make much sense."
And in a quieter voice he added, "Ratchet might have had a better explanation."
Jack scooted closer to the younger boy and slung an arm over his shoulders. He was silent for a moment, then gave the bespectacled boy a small squeeze. They were all missing the Bots. "If you can't think of anything, then I doubt Ratchet could."
"Yeah!", Miko sat up, "Besides, old Doc bot is too stiff. He'd only believed us after a butt load of scans and years of trying to convince him that we're not crazy."
Raf laughed. Jack gave Miko a grateful smile and the girl grinned back. They spent until the school bell rang discussing their thoughts and other theories. When it finally did go off, all three let out a disappointed groan.
The kids shuffled around to grab their lunch trays and started back towards to building. They'd only gotten halfway when Miko paused. She snatched her almost empty milk carton off her tray and held it out towards them expectantly.
"A toast! To our new stalker!", she said cheerfully, lifting the carton to the sky before downing the rest of the milk. Jack and Raf shared a long suffering look, then grabbed their individual cartons. The two boys bumped the containers against one another before draining them as well. Then the group continued their trek to school. The thought that Soundwave was watching them still made their stomachs roll, but it wasn't as bad now knowing that the others were going through the same thing.
Hello! How did you guys like this drabble? It was interesting to write, that's for sure. I was thinking about what Soundwave could have been doing while stuck in the Shadow Zone when I realized that if it were me, I'd watch the people who sent me there. Then I thought it would be creepy to first see something like this the dark. Immediately my mind came up with several scenarios, and the thought of only seeing Soundwave in dark mirrors stuck. More thoughts kept coming, and the plot bunnies wouldn't leave until I wrote them down.
Sorry for any confusion in the whole explaining-the-travel-mirror thing. I thought I could find some legit theory of mirrors being portals to other worlds, but I couldn't find what I was looking for. Not smart enough to come up with an actual sciencey thing either. And I knew Raf would be the type to look into this stuff, so I couldn't have nothing. That is why an answer is vague. If you couldn't tell, Jack, Miko, and Raf have all been relocated and going back to school. Don't know where it is. Just a random high school somewhere in America.
Anyway, thanks for reading and giving this story a chance! Comment, follow, and favor on your own agency. Thanks!