Mirror House

The world after the landquake was a raw, unfinished thing. They navigated a treacherous landscape of razor sharp rock that was still warm to the touch and slick with primordial brine. The air smelled of hot stone and ozone. It was a world fresh from the kiln, and they were trespassers in its cooling. Ira, in the wake of his catatonic awe, had retreated even further into himself. The Pulse had not broken him; it had pulverized him, grinding his delusions into a fine, silent dust. He followed Sera now with the blank, unquestioning obedience of an automaton.

They spent two days climbing through the impossible new mountain range. The raw, black peaks tore at their clothes and spirits. Lio felt as though they were crossing the spine of a new god, its bones still sharp and unforgiving. Then, as they crested a high, jagged ridge, they saw a sight so jarringly out of place it felt like a deliberate, surgical incision in reality.

Nestled in a small, circular valley, an amphitheater of black rock, was a patch of impossible green. And in the center of that verdant circle stood a house.

Lio's breath caught in his throat. His father stopped dead, a low, wounded sound escaping his lips. Even Mina, for a moment, was still.

It was their house.

Not a ruin, not an echo, not a waterlogged corpse of a memory. It was their house, whole and perfect. As they stumbled down the treacherous slope toward the valley, the impossible details resolved with hallucinatory clarity. It was the same pale blue paint on the shutters, the one his father had mixed himself years ago. It was the same crooked porch step he had tripped on his entire childhood. The same great oak tree stood out front, its branches reaching with a familiar grace, but here its leaves were a vibrant, healthy green, not the sickly, salt choked yellow he remembered.

This was the house of his early memories, a place that existed before the first encroaching tide, before the dampness and the rot, before the world had begun to hold its breath underwater.

"It's a trick," Lio said, his voice hoarse. "It has to be."

As they stepped onto the miraculously lush grass of the valley, the full, uncanny horror of the place became apparent. This house wasn't just intact; it was pristine. Perfect. The garden, which in his memory had become a swampy, saline grave, was here bursting with flowers—roses and lavender whose scent he had long forgotten. There was no peeling paint, no warped wood, no tide marks staining the foundation. The windows were spotlessly clean, reflecting the bruised sky with a perfect, mocking clarity.

It was a beautiful, meticulously crafted lie.

Mina, recovering from her initial shock, seemed to accept the impossibility with a child's simple logic. She ran forward, a delighted gasp escaping her. "Look!" she cried, pointing at the old rope swing hanging from the oak tree. "The rope isn't broken on this one!"

The statement hung in the air, underscoring the profound wrongness of it all. This was not their home; it was a museum exhibit of a life they had lost.

Ira was transfixed, his eyes wide with a dangerous, dawning hope. This perfect echo of the past was a direct rebuttal to his failure. It was a vision of the life he had lost, the home he had failed to protect, now offered back to him, cleansed of all sin and decay. He began to walk toward it, his steps slow and reverent, like a pilgrim approaching a holy shrine.

Sera grabbed his arm, her grip surprisingly strong. "No, Ira," she said, her voice tight with a fear so palpable it was almost a taste. "Don't. This place isn't for us."

"But Sera… it's home," he whispered, his voice thick with a painful, desperate longing. He looked at the pristine front door, at the familiar brass handle gleaming in the strange light. "It's perfect."

"That's why it's wrong," she hissed.

Lio was caught between them, a witness to the silent, desperate tug of war. He saw the lure in his father's eyes—the seductive promise of comfort, of peace, of a life where the water was not at their door. And he saw the raw terror in his mother's face—the certainty that this was not a sanctuary, but a new and exquisitely cruel kind of trap.

His father pulled free from Sera's grasp and took another step toward the door, his hand trembling as he reached for the handle. The Mirror House stood waiting, its windows like watchful eyes, silent, perfect, and deeply, terribly wrong.