By Kashish Khatri, Class 9
The morning I vanished was just like any other.
The sun peeked through my window, birds chirped their usual annoying chorus, and my schoolbooks sat on my desk, unopened as always. I groaned, pulled my blanket over my head, and closed my eyes for “just five more minutes.”
When I opened them again, I wasn’t in my room.I was lying in a meadow—yes, a literal, glowing meadow—with flowers that blinked like eyes and a sky that shimmered like oil on water. I sat up too quickly and nearly fell over. The air tasted like mint and thunder. A breeze whispered my name: “Kashish…”
“What the—where am I?”
I looked around. No houses. No roads. Just endless grass, a few trees that looked like they had silver bark, and a single wooden doorframe standing alone in the middle of nowhere.A door without walls.
I did what any normal person would do—I screamed. Then I pinched myself. Hard. Nope. Not dreaming.
“Okay, Kashish,” I whispered. “Either you’ve gone totally insane… or you’re in another world.”
The door creaked open.
No one was there, but a parchment floated out and unrolled in the air. It read:Welcome, Seeker. This is the Realm Between. You have been chosen to restore balance. Your time begins… now.
The parchment vanished in a puff of glowing dust. The sky darkened. The door began to glow.And I, Kashish Khatri—just a regular girl from Class 9—took a deep breath and stepped through.
On the other side of the door was a forest. But not any forest I'd seen before. The trees were enormous—each trunk wider than my school bus. The leaves shimmered in shades of blue, green, and violet. Strange creatures watched me from behind tree trunks—some with feathers, others with eyes like lanterns.
A path made of white stones wound through the forest. I followed it.
Minutes—or maybe hours—passed before I found a wooden sign. It had no words, just a symbol: a sun and moon locked in a spiral.
As I touched it, a voice echoed through the trees.
"You carry the Mirror Mark.”
“What?” I said out loud. “What mirror?”
Then I noticed it.
My reflection—in a pool beside the path—wasn’t copying my movements.
It was watching me.
And on its hand was a glowing symbol—the same spiral from the sign. I looked down.
The mark was on my hand, too.
My reflection grinned at me. But I wasn’t smiling.
Then it spoke.
“Only one may return. Choose wisely, Kashish.”
Before I could respond, the reflection shattered like glass, and a bright light exploded from the pool, swallowing everything.
I woke up in a village made of floating houses. People walked on invisible bridges between the homes. Some had wings. Others wore cloaks that shifted colors like moods. A boy with silver eyes walked up to me.
“You came through the Door of Mirrors?” he asked.
I nodded.
“Then you must help us. The Mirrorlands are collapsing. Reality is splitting. If the Balance isn’t restored, both your world and ours will vanish.”
“But I’m just a student! I don’t even know how I got here!”
He handed me a compass—its needle spinning wildly. “This will point to the heart of the world. You must find the Twin Flame.”
“What’s the Twin Flame?”
He hesitated. “It’s the other half of you. The part that was never born in your world.”
“What does that even mean?”
But he was already fading, like a dream I was forgetting.I traveled through the Mirrorlands for what felt like weeks. Each place was stranger than the last—a city upside down, a desert of frozen sand, a sea made of clouds.
In every reflection I found—pools, glass, shiny stones—I saw versions of myself. One was a queen with a crown of light. Another, a villain cloaked in shadows. One cried. One laughed. One stared back at me with cold, hollow eyes.
Each one said the same thing:
“Only one of us can return.”I didn’t know what to believe anymore.
Was I losing my mind? Or was I discovering it?
Finally, the compass stopped spinning.
I had arrived at the Heart.
It was a tower made entirely of mirrors, twisting into the sky like a spiral shell. As I stepped inside, every surface showed a different version of me—older, younger, braver, crueler.
At the center stood a pedestal.
On it burned a flame—half silver, half crimson.
The Twin Flame.
It pulsed with power.
But standing beside it was me.
Not a reflection.
A real version of me. Same face. Same clothes. Same eyes. But she felt… heavier. As if she’d been living a life I hadn't.
“I’m the part of you that stayed behind,” she said. “The part that always wondered what if. This world needs someone to remain here to guard the balance. One of us must choose to stay.”
I stared at the flame. “If I touch it…”
“You become whole. But only one Kashish can walk away.”
I looked at her—and saw myself. Truly.
All my doubts. My strengths. My fears. My dreams.
“You’re not my enemy,” I said quietly.
She smiled. “No. I’m your choice.”I closed my eyes and touched the flame.
There was no pain. Only warmth.
Then silence.
When I opened my eyes, I was in my bedroom again. Same books. Same blanket. Same annoying bird sounds.
But my hand still bore the spiral mark.
And on my desk, where my science homework should have been, sat the compass.
Still spinning.
Still pointing somewhere I hadn’t yet been.
**
Now I understand.
The Mirrorlands were real. Maybe they still are. Maybe they exist between the seconds, behind glass, beneath dreams.
I don’t know if I was gone for a minute or a month.
But something in me has changed.
I’m no longer afraid of the unknown.
Because I’ve met it.
And it looked just like me.
React
