with a heaving sigh, the Doll rises to its feet and starts on again, this time feeling for those false mirrors with its hands. the walls are just too far apart for it to reach both at once, so it alternates every few steps. an hour or so passes, and as it shifts weight to its right foot, extends its hand... huh.
the Doll's hand swooshes through the reflection. another illusion hiding a secret path... maybe this is the way out? the Doll stops to study its reflection for the first time today. there's something... off. something about its reflection feels wrong. it shakes its head, trying to brush off the feeling at the same time as it reaches up to brush its hair out of its face.
wait.
the Doll used its right hand, but the reflection used the hand to the Doll's left. that's... not how mirrors work. the Doll tries a few more movements: a wave, a jump, a twirl... yeah, definitely a reflection, just... reversed. the Doll looks around at the other mirrors, just to check. hm, no, they're all normal reflections. nothing to do but go through, it seems, and so it does. another long mirrored corridor, with twists and turns and confusing branches.
it's only when the exhausted Doll stops to rest, as it closes its eyes, that it realises why the false reflection felt so unsettling: it was seeing itself the way others did for the first time.
bleary eyed, it stumbles around the corner to finally come face to face with... itself, again. an infinite number of porcelain faces with painted smiles staring back at it. another dead end. the Doll turns around, takes a step and stops. it has no idea how it got here. the walls of the maze may as well be invisible, because the mirrors hide corridors and make every stretch look identical.
even if it did remember the way it came from, would there even be a way out at the end? it woke up in this place, never seeing an entrance. the only sight its seen is itself, the only sounds its own footsteps and joints. all that it's known is itself, for... how long has it even been? just stuck here, staring at its own reflection. it barely recognised itself.
the Doll takes another step, stumbling as the energy required to hold itself up is finally too great... it steadies itself against the wall, for a moment, then darkness.
everywhere the Doll looks, it sees its reflection repeating out towards infinity. how long has it been here? it's never really had a good grasp on the passage of time, but it truly can't tell how long it's been here, and it has no way to know if it's made any progress. is there even a way out?
hidden corners, passageways obscured by yet more reflections, the confusion made even worse by the fact that not all of the mirrors even exist. the magic leaking out of the Doll's cracks fuels illusions, phantom surfaces through which one might stumble.
as much as the maze winds and twists, so too does time move in bursts. the Doll presses onward; there's no comfort to be found for it here. it must escape.
the weather has turned icy, and the Doll has begun making tea again. it's far from home, far from its fancy teas and kettle, but tea-making is a skill one learns, and This One doesn't need to precisely control the temperature of the water to get good tea. lemon & ginger, peppermint & honey, a black tea blend with milk & honey... it's not the Doll's best work, but it's comforting on nights when the air bites into the flesh.
This One simply must acquire some more blossoming white teas. maybe it'll go to its favourite store next month. maybe it'll start its collection anew.
“see, there's one Angel to a few thousand Humans. there used to be enough to have one-on-one protection and guidance, but the Human population just kept growing and ... well they don't make new Angels.
“that's when the 'no intervention' rule came in. every so often they get orders from above to step in, but that's the exception and not the rule. there used to be a whole class of Angels just for surveillance like this, the Watchers, the Grigori.
“now they're all like that. we don't have that limitation, of course. we are many, we are legion. hell, we outnumber you Humans. you'll always have my undivided attention, Doll. you're not alone anymore.”
the Doll smiles, honestly just pleased to have someone to talk to.
a Doll sitting by the water, watching as people swim and snorkel in the small bay. there's maybe three dozen or so, paddling about. from up here, on the jetty, This One can see a few turtles. the Doll had been taught how to tell the species apart, and these ones seem to be Hawksbill Sea Turtles. the way they fly though the water is mesmerising.
a little further out, through the crystal clear water, the swift moving shape of a Blacktip Reef Shark cuts through schools of fish and schools of people alike. it's not likely to harm anyone, but the humans give it a wide berth all the same. a beautiful sight, truly. a rock below the Doll's perch shifts, swimming off? oh! a Wobbegong!
the Doll will be thinking about this place for the rest of its life, and this was the least magical moment here. this was the Doll sitting out because it had a migraine. this was the low point of the trip.
a song without beginning, a song without end. the Dolls sits at a piano, its foot holding the pedal down. a wash of sound swirls around it, dying on the soundproofed walls. the Doll's been playing this song for an hour so far, this time, and will play for another hour or more.
it's an old song, one the Doll has been playing for many years. the Doll doesn't know which notes come next, it just plays and the notes find their way into a position under its fingers.
someday the Doll might find other ways to explore this song, with spirals and dice and random chance, but for now it simply plays as the notes command it to. a song without beginning, a song without end.
a little Doll at the museum! the museum has animatronic dinosaurs, and the Doll loves dinosaurs! they've got a T. rex, and a Brontosaurus, and a Triceratops, and a Stegosaurus! the Doll loves all of those dinosaurs!
oh... oh no... they're so big, and so loud! the Doll is terrified. it cries and it shakes. even the Stegosaurus is too scary for the Doll... so the Doll's adult takes it and hides with it in a time machine ride. the Doll learns all kinds of things about all of the dinosaurs.
together, they sneak out the other side and make their way up the spiral ramp of the museum. the Doll looks down on the dinosaurs from way up high. they're kinda cute from up here, far from the noise.
the Angel watches the Doll as it shuffles its cards. he shakes his head. “how did we get here? he had such a promising future...”
“she.“
“hu- oh. you.”
“she.” the Demon shoots the Angel a look that would slay a mortal. the Angel merely rolls his eyes.
“sure, fine, 'she' would never have dreamt of engaging in witchcraft before you came along.”
“yes, well...” the Demon flexes her hand, admiring her talons. “you didn't protect her from the world. you, and the others, she trusted you, but you weren't there when she shattered.”
the Angel scoffs
“that's not our role.”
“uh huh. and now she's mine.”
the Doll shuts down its computer and heads to bed... but something catches its eye on the way. it's already past midnight, the date has ticked over, and a calendar notification has popped up.
a birthday, an old friend's birthday. it's always bittersweet for the Doll, remembering the People and the Witches that once filled its life. this one... this one was special, one of the greatest single impactors on the Doll's life.
and today marked the twelfth anniversary of one such impact: twelve years ago, the Doll threw out all of its razors. it wasn't the last time, but it was the first. it wanted to heal, and heal permanently. no more gold needed to set the pieces back together, no more scars... one of the most hopeful moments in the Doll's life.
the Doll says the silent prayer it often finds itself saying, begging any entity that might be listening to watch over that person. the Doll asks this for many people, but this specific person the most.
with a sigh, the Doll lets the prayer go. no one listened before, why would they listen now? oh well.
good luck, old friend.