The mirror ruptured with a deafening crash, shards of fractured glass exploding outward like shrapnel. Time seemed to still as Ethan watched the deadly shards hurtle toward his little sister Ava.
I won't lose her too. Not after mom and dad...
Something primordial awoke within him in that moment. Ethan moved without thought, flinging out his hands as if to catch the cascading shards. But instead of piercing his flesh, the deadly projectiles stopped in midair, hovering obediently before him.
Ava screamed and crouched low, her hands shielding her face. Ethan stared at the shards in disbelief as they began to slowly spin, casting whirling kaleidoscope patterns around the room.
"W-what's happening?" Ava whimpered from behind her guarded stance.
"I...I don't know," Ethan stammered, flexing his fingers yet feeling no strain in suspending the deadly shards. They danced at his silent command as easily as breathing.
A warm power pulsed through his veins, both energizing and terrifying in its alien intensity. Ethan's heart raced as he reflexively clenched his fist - and the shards responded by shooting backward, slamming into the wall with enough force to embed themselves deep within the plaster.
"Holy Corona..." he gasped under his breath.
Ethan rushed to his sister's side, helping Ava to her feet as she trembled. "Are you hurt? What happened?"
"I don't know!" Ava's eyes were wide with shock and fear. "One second I was looking in the mirror, and the next..." Her voice cracked as she looked around at the devastation of their bedroom.
Ethan followed her gaze, dread knotting in his gut. The mirror's ornate frame now only cradled a spiderweb of cracks, devoid of glass. Razor-sharp shards littered the floor in glittering piles or jutted from the walls at haphazard angles, as if frozen in an explosion of violence.
One particularly large shard lay at Ethan's feet. He could see his own pallid reflection looking back, distorted by the irregular curves of glass.
"What power coursed through you, Reflector?" A smooth voice spoke from the shard.
Ethan flinched back. "W-what? Who said that?"
"Do not be afraid. We are but reflections of each other..."
The edges of the shard blurred, Ethan's reflected image shifting and warping until a stranger's face looked back at him. A young man with pale, angular features and eyes that burned like gemstones. He offered a thin, disquieting smile.
"I am your mirror self, Nahte - freed from the bonds of the glass to guide you toward your destiny."
"My destiny?" Ethan's head swam with confusion and no small amount of fear. This felt unreal, like a waking dream he could not escape.
"Ethan, w-what's happening?" Ava clutched his arm tightly, leaning close.
"I...I don't know," he said again, mouth dry. "But stay close, okay?"
The reflected figure - Nahte? - tilted his head slightly. "Come now, you know the truth. Deep within, you feel the power awakening - the ancient gift of the Reflectors, the conduits between realms."
"Realms? What realms?" Ethan tried to keep his voice steady, buying time to process this madness.
"Our realm," Nahte responded simply, gesturing around them. "And the boundless realm of Speculum on the other side of the mirror. You have torn the Veil asunder this day, and set forces in motion that cannot be undone."
A cold chill crept up Ethan's spine at those ominous words. Before he could respond, Ava gasped and tugged his sleeve urgently. "Ethan! Look!"
He turned to follow her alarmed gaze - and froze. The shattered mirror hung askew on the wall, the spider cracks in the frame pulsing with inner light. The fragments still embedded in the plaster walls thrummed with the same ghostly luminescence.
Ethan's heart pounded in his ears. "What's going on...?"
"Destiny calls, Ethan Specular," Nahte's reflected voice echoed through the room as the light surrounding the mirror shards grew blinding. "Lux and Speculum are balanced no more. The Bridge summons a Reflector to walk between worlds once again..."
The shards peeled themselves free from the walls in a shower of plaster, the deadly fragments spiraling inward in a dizzying vortex. Ethan pulled Ava behind him instinctively as the shards rushed toward the mirror - and passed straight through the shattered glass.
The mirror's surface now swirled with blinding kaleidoscopic lights, the fragments within swirling like schools of metallic fish. A haunting whisper beckoned from that incandescent display:
"Traverse the Bridge, and claim your birthright..."
Ethan felt the power within him resonate in answer, as if two tuning forks struck in harmony. His destiny - his birthright - called to him through that mirror...
"Ethan, no!" Ava shouted suddenly, tearing him from his reverie. "We have to get out of here!"
He looked at her in confusion - and noticed the flames licking up the curtains behind her, the heat already stifling. Their bedroom was on fire, likely sparked by the mirror's explosion of power.
Thick smoke began filling the room as the inferno spread. Ava doubled over in a fit of coughing, and Ethan knew they were moments away from being trapped.
Destiny could wait. His sister came first.
"C'mon, let's go!" Ethan grabbed Ava's hand and half-dragged her toward the bedroom door, his eyes streaming from the smoke. The mirror and its cosmic summons fell behind them as they fled into the burning hallway.
Their home was ablaze, but Ethan could only hope this was not an omen of what his own awakening power might yet unleash...