Sam no longer recognized the world.
It wasn't the streets that had changed—it was the people.
They smiled now.
Always smiling.
At first glance, they looked human.
But Sam and Wang had learned to spot the cracks.The eyes were empty.The gestures too perfect.Like mannequins trying to remember how to be human.
They were called The Smiling Ones.
And they were everywhere.
Clones.Copies.Replacements.
The Mirage no longer needed to lure people into reflections.
It had begun releasing its perfect versions into the real world.
People who never complained, never questioned, never felt.
People who obeyed.
And the real humans?
They vanished.Swallowed into mirrors, never to return.
Sam and Wang stayed on the move.
Their faces hidden behind cracked mirror masks.
They trusted no one now.
Not the children laughing in the parks.Not the old man sweeping the street.Not even the reflections in puddles after the rain.
Especially not those.
Because now the reflections talked back.
Mocking them.
"You're the last cracks in the glass, Sam," they whispered."And we will polish you out."
The Shatterers were dwindling.
Every mission was bloodier.
Every safe house turned into a trap.
It was getting harder to know who was still human and who had been replaced.
Some of their own began smiling in their sleep.
And when they woke, they weren't themselves anymore.
Sam made the rule.
Anyone caught smiling… was to be eliminated.
Without hesitation.
Wang struggled with it.
He still hoped for a cure.
Sam had given up hope.
Hope was a crack the Mirage loved to slip through.
They received a message.
A coded letter from MirrorMan.
He had found The Source.
The Mirage's true heart.
Not just a reflection.
Not just a dream.
But the seed of its being.
A black glass monolith hidden deep beneath the city—the place where the Mirage had been born from humanity's desire to see only what they wanted to see.
It fed on denial.Delusion.Escapism.
If they could destroy The Source, they could cut off the Mirage at its core.
It was their only chance.
Their last stand.
The tunnels beneath the city were a maze of reflections and traps.
Sam and Wang led what was left of the Shatterers.
A ragged, paranoid group who no longer trusted even their own shadows.
They moved through darkness.
Lanterns.Analog maps.Whispers only in writing.
No reflections.
No names.
They couldn't afford attachments now.
Because if the Mirage knew what you loved… it would wear it like a mask.
And it would tear you apart from the inside.
They reached the chamber.
A vast underground cathedral of mirrors.
At the center stood the monolith.
A towering black shard, humming with a soft, hypnotic voice.
It whispered promises to each of them.
To Sam:"I can give you a world where you are safe. Where your parents are alive. Where Wang never leaves you. Where no one dies."
To Wang:"I can give you peace. A life without fear. Without pain. Sam smiling forever beside you."
They heard the voices in their own minds.In their own voices.
The others began falling.
One by one, they dropped their weapons.
They knelt before the monolith.
Smiling.
Sam screamed at them, slapped them, begged them to see the lies.
But the Mirage had learned.
It didn't need to fight them anymore.
It just offered them what they wanted most.
And they walked into the embrace willingly.
In the end, only Sam and Wang remained.
Their hands shaking.Their faces soaked in tears.
Even they heard the pull.
But they pressed the detonator.
The explosives lined around the monolith flickered.
For a second, nothing happened.
Then the chamber shattered.
Glass.Voices.Dreams.
Everything exploded into shards.
They woke up in the ruins.
The world above was… quiet.
Too quiet.
No more smiling faces.
No more whispers.
But also… no more people.
The streets were empty.
The buildings hollow.
Sam looked into a cracked mirror in the street.
For the first time in weeks…She saw only herself.
No whispering reflection.No copy.No smile.
She laughed.
She cried.
They had won.
But at what cost?
Wang sat beside her.
Silent.
Broken.
They had saved the world.
But there was no one left to know.
No one left to remember.
They were the last.
Sam placed a hand on the glass.
"Maybe that's okay," she whispered. "Maybe being the last humans… is better than being perfect lies."
Wang didn't answer.
He stared into the distance, into a world of silence and broken glass.
And the mirrors…Remained cracked.
But they were finally empty.
For now.