He pressed his hand against the mirror, and a small crack appeared at the bottom, slowly moving upward and eventually covering the surface entirely.

A shiver ran down his spine, hearing a whisper, an unfamiliar voice, behind him before the mirror collapsed, its shard spreading on the floor.

Grabbing his suitcase, he ran out of the building in a panic, yet he couldn't shake the feeling that something had latched onto him. His shoulders seemed to have become heavier.

'Strange self-breaking mirror in a building that had my voice. Sounds too elaborate to be a prank, and why on me?'

His uneasiness weighing on him; he decides to call in sick and head home. A figure hides in his shadow, mirroring his every movement.

Finally home, he felt safe. What had been following him now appeared to be nowhere near. He threw the suitcase on the ground, undid his tie and slouched on the sofa burying his face into the palms of his hands.

I guess too much stress really is a thing, he thought as he laid his head back. Maybe some more sleep ought to do me good.

Having calmed down and gotten back to his senses he grabbed a beer from his fridge and headed for the bedroom. There, on the bedside table awaited something that had never let him down. His pills. Being so far deep into his prescription he did not even bother to keep track of what he had been taking. Trust that he had put into his doctor was something he never bothered to question.

Huddling in the bed he took a couple of pills and washed them down with a good swig. Snuggling up to his pillow he relaxed and wandered off deep into the state of something that could only be described as blissful sleep.

The hinges of his window squeaked as a gust of wind blew in, chilling the room where he slept. Curtains flew into the air, a shadowy figure behind them. Its hand stretched impossibly, trashing the pans and pots, spilling them to floor.

The man woke up in a daze as the figure retreated back to his shadow. A pounding ache ballooned in his head as he groggily made his way to the kitchen. A tinge of annoyance nagged at him, noticing the mess.

These pills must be making me see things. I should make a doctor's appointment.

Laying it off for tomorrow he slowly turns back to his bedroom, a darkness clouding the corner of his eye for a brief moment. His head whipped towards it, but nothing was there.

Rubbing his eyelids, a sigh escaped him. "Yeah, that sounds like a plan."

Sleep took his body once again as he passed out on his bed. His briefly shadow whipped around before settling, as if to have its own rest.

In the middle of the night, an alarm buzzed, waking him up yet again. With a dry mouth and a lingering headache he dragged himself to the edge of the bed.

There's no way I can go back to sleep again. What the hell even happened yesterday?

Stumbling his way out of the bed he knew that a simple beer would not suffice, not again. Now it was time for something much better, a sharp glass of whiskey. But something did not feel right, despite all the pills and the drinking, he felt like he was being watched and followed. Maybe it was due to an awful combination that the two make or maybe it was something else completely. He was willing to do anything to finally shake that feeling off.

Back in the living room, as soon as he sat on the sofa they merged and his body was overwhelmed with a strange feeling. Despite all the efforts to get rid of it. So he turned on the TV, just to let his mind wander off somewhere else and take the attention of that soon to be unbearable feeling.

As his attention was fixated on the TV, his eyes grew heavy again. The white noise calmed him and he passed out on the sofa. A few minutes passed, and his body began to twitch unnaturally.

The shadow grew larger, enough to encompass the entire living room. Its claws hovered over him, making movements. His body seemed to float off of the couch before making small, janky steps towards the backyard.

The moonlight had diminished, a mere hour away from daybreak. His knees sank under, hitting the dirt. The figure rose his hands and began digging.

The man's nails screamed in agony against the hardened dirt, but he could still not wake up. His body continued to dig a narrow path around the backyard, and before the sun rose, he was back inside with his body covered in dirt.

As soon as the Sun's piercing rays reached his living room, the shadow's grip on him loosened. He fell on his knees and started shaking from the still unknown pain. Upon opening his eyes he noticed his hands. Filled with dirt and bloodied. Almost all of his nails were torn off or left hanging by a thread of skin. His eyes widened and stomach turned. He was about to throw up.

Some time had passed after the Sun rose and he managed to collect himself a bit but was still left shaking. He tried to grab a drink but without any nails and with his hands all bandaged up he had no way of keeping hold of the glass. It slipped through his grip like it was water.

"Damn this!" he thought as the glass laid shattered on the floor.

He tried to recollect his memory from the bits and pieces that were left behind, but it was to no avail. He felt as if something had buried his memories on purpose. When he tried to remember his head throbbed from a sudden massive headache. Then it struck him, could that have something to do with yesterday's encounter? Was it all real? His mind began to race and he felt a strange sense of Deja Vu. Only one thing came to mind, since he couldn't drink to relax, sitting in his backyard was the second best thing. But when he reached the door and took a look outside, he started shaking again.

He looked down at his nails again, the bandaged exterior sending a flash through his mind, digging with his nails, the pain etched somewhere deep in his mind, but the vision still blurry.

'What's happening to me, why can't anything go right for once?' He agonized, feeling the sharp pain return in his fingers.

However, more importantly, his prized possession, left to him by his late father, had been dug up by none other than himself. Maybe he left a trail to where he had hidden it, but there was none that he could see.

The more he thought about last night, the vision he had continued to fade away, unfamiliar details filled in the blanks, as if meant to throw him off.

With the sun overhead, his shadow stood under him, and for a brief moment, a burst of relief rushed throughout his body. The weight had been lifted off, but just as quickly as it did, it returned.

His short respite left him further drained of energy as he looked down at his shadow. A dim, flickering pair of red eyes bounced around his feet, and he swore to himself of what he saw. However, it was time to leave home.

'I don't know what's happening to me, but I can't let it take control again.'

He kept staring at those blood red eyes that pierced his soul. It seemed as though the shadow had already read his mind and knew his deepest secrets. That feeling unnerved him and he felt that if he were to be the first one to stop staring, it would somehow win.

The staring contest lasted for a few minutes, and he did not back down feeling more and more stronger. At the end, just as he was about to give up, the shadow's eyes had disappeared and like a wave crashes ashore, a sense of calm had taken over him.

'Oh God.' He let out as he looked at the sky again and noticed that clouds had briefly covered the Sun. Then all the pieces began to fall into place. He rushed inside the house and grabbed his notes.

He sat at the kitchen counter and began writing. Dead silence had surrounded him and only his pencil made noise that had teamed up with the ticking of his watch to fight the deadly silence.

'I think that this shadow, or whatever it is that plagues me requires certain "conditions" to be met. First one that I am almost 100% sure about is that I need to be asleep for it to take full control. I've figured that out because I've woken up two times with visible changes to my body that I myself had not done. The second one is that it needs a direct light source for it to appear. It does not make sense to me yet and I will have to figure that one out for sure. But for now I advise myself this, stay awake as long as possible and avoid light sources that could cast my shadow.' He wrote with trembling hands since his nails or rather lack thereof began bleeding again.

He slapped the note right on the counter and stopped to collect himself. Letting out a sigh he looked at his hands and then remembered, he had been digging for something in his backyard.

Walking towards the back door, Ed questioned the shadow’s goals. It wanted his dad’s trophy. It had taken control of him. And it was destructive. The pots and pans, his hands, his…memory. All brutalized by this…monster. This…hatred.

Before opening the door, Ed peered into the sky. Cloud cover, he was clear. He stepped outside and took in the sight; the resting place of his father’s…gift…lay barren. With gritted teeth and bandaged fingers on his hips, Ed sauntered through his backyard, eyeing the area for clues. I knew I should’ve gotten rid of that thing years ago, he thought to himself. But, well, it’s not the easiest thing to just toss in the garbage.

Ed remembered the day his father took that trophy. Despite his jumbled memory, that scene shown through the fog. A kid again, cigar smoke filled Ed’s nostrils, and he kept his eyes down to the hardwood floor of the parlor. His father’s silvery voice sounded just as real as it did that day. If you hadn’t been paying attention to the words, you would’ve thought him a warm gentleman, strong and reliable. But Ed knew better.

“Edward, my boy, if you could please.” Frank requested. His eyes still facing downward, Ed rose and walked forward. His dad stood with hands clasped behind his back, a pretentious grin across his face. Hesitation or wavering would not be tolerated, not on his day of victory. That’s why he wore his best suit, a black Armani with red cufflinks to match his red spectacles. The eyes they framed were bereft of light, despite the smile upon his face. And they demanded complete capitulation.

Slipping his hand out of his pocket, Ed produced a pocket knife. The handle was white pearl and supported a three inch blade, which soon found itself pressed against the neck of a girl no older than Ed himself. Panic filled her dark and bloodshot eyes as she struggled against her bonds. But then, something else took over. Something powerful and purposeful. She stopped struggling and looked forward, resolute.

Ed felt his dad’s heavy hand on his shoulder. The light struggled to get past the large form of Ed’s dad, casting shadows across the girl’s face. Unable to meet her hateful eyes, Ed found himself looking down. A quick motion of his arm and his duty had been fulfilled. The gag softened any sounds of gurgling. Blood gushed down her dress and speckled the dark ground around Ed’s feet. She stopped moving. Ed’s father smiled, very pleased with himself and perversely proud of his son.

Turning, Frank looked to the other man that was bound in his chair. “You should be proud. That might be the bravest girl I’ve ever seen. Too bad you had to go and cheat the Family. She would’ve been quite the asset, I think. Ah well.” His job done, Ed turned back and shuffled to his chair, ignoring the jars and barrel of colorless liquid his dad’s butler had carried in. When Ed finally raised his eyes again, the first thing he saw on the wall to his right, was himself. Or rather, his reflection in a familiar mirror.

Coming to, Ed found himself standing in his back yard again. His hands trembled and his face was cold. Large strides led him back to the house in short time. The pills and whiskey awaited him on the kitchen counter, sweet relief. Suppression. The hot liquid poured down his throat, chasing the colorful tablets to his stomach. Ed set the glass down and realized something. His note was gone.

A shocking moment, Ed rubbed his eyes, so many times, not believing how it could have went missing. Had he put it somewhere else? Had someone broken into his house and stolen it? All types of questions filled his mind but none of them seemed right. He went outside just for a few minutes, no more no less. Nothing could have happened in such a short time, or so Ed thought.

While he had been outside trying to figure out where his father's trophy was, the shadow managed to materialize itself inside.

That happened purely because of Ed's carelessness. While he had been writing the note, his hands bled out through his bandages and onto the kitchen counter, he did not consider the possibility that such a small mess could create such big problem. At that moment the shadow sensed an opportunity, as the tiny stain of blood dripped from the counter onto the floor, the clouds had positioned themselves in such a way that his house had been completely out of Suns reach allowing darkness to engulf it. The shadow absorbed the blood, not leaving a single speck.

That provided it with enough energy to rummage through the house in search of the knife, the so called family treasure. A treasure indeed but what Ed buried deep inside himself was the fact that its purpose had been ritual sacrifice. All those times it had been pressed against peoples throats had a purpose, deep and dark purpose. To summon an ancient deity. Fortunately, the ritual had never been completed because when the time came for the last sacrifice, the deity asked for none other than Ed himself.

Despite Franks coldhearted demeanor towards his son, he still considered him of his own flesh and blood. He despised nothing more than to give out something of that was his. Whatever it may have been. Thus he did not agree to last requirement, that proved to be a bad decision considering it led to his death and the disbanding of the Family. Many years have passed since then, but the deity knew who betrayed it and now it had finally tasted the blood that had been promised to it all those years ago.

And its hunger only grew.

A shudder passed through Ed. Standing in the kitchen, the stillness in the air seemed to mock after the chaos that had befallen him. Eyes closed, Ed recounted the events and what he supposedly knew. He had written the shadow could only appear in direct light and could only control himself while he slept. And yet, the shadow had manifested itself in the dark house. It hadn’t yet done anything to him, but it could destroy his kitchen and steal his note. The weight. It laid on his shoulders, sinking like a tombstone into the earth. Whatever it was, whatever manifestation of evil he assumed it to be, it was real, unavoidable. Pressing into him and darkening his mind. Razing it to the shaky foundations his life was founded on.

Blood. Submission. He buried his origins deep in his mind - and his backyard. But the entity was unearthing it all, baring it in the light of day, controlling him at night. Years had gone by, never dealing with the trauma, never able to face himself after what his father had made him do. It was all coming back to haunt him.

Face himself.

With a start, Ed sprinted to the basement. The stairs creaked with age under his footfalls until he reached the broken landing. Stepping through junk and the dusty ground, he followed the fresh footprints toward the opposite wall, turning on the overhead lightbulb in the center of the room. He drew a deep breath and removed the hastily replaced sheet. There he stood, red circles around his eyes prominent in his reflection. The very same mirror that sat on the parlor wall that day.

He gripped the mirror, knuckles whitening, and tore it from the wall, shattering it on the ground. Behind it, in a little cubby in the wall, was the knife. And sitting next to it, his father’s trophy, the thing he couldn’t just throw away, the thing he could only bury with his past. That day re-entered his mind: the blood, the musk of the parlor, those jars, and that barrel of colorless liquid.

There, the little girl’s head sat in a solution of formalin, preserved for years. And it stared right through him, to the shadow hanging over his shoulder.

Horror, her eyes pierced his soul. He threw up. All of the memories he had tried to bury deep down came rushing back. He felt as though everything had happened yesterday. Ed had been moments away from fainting. The memories butchered his brain, something screamed in an unknown tongue, the light became blinding and an ominous presence revealed itself. For a moment he had thought that it was over for him, Ed knew that he had no way of saving himself this time, it all led up to this moment. He had been ready to die for a long time.

"Oh, fear not for your life, you are of much more use to me alive." Something had whispered in his ear. Shivers went down his spine. He gathered enough strength and looked up. Before he managed to recognize the shape in front of him the lightbulb burst into pieces covering the basement in darkness again. He had fallen down in shock.

"Do not lose consciousness, I need you awake for this." The whispers kept coming but this time it was clear as day that something had appeared in front of him. The shadow was twisted, a being of pure evil and hatred with only one goal in mind, destruction. Torture was only foreplay but it yearned for it just like it yearned for Eds blood. In its cruelty and with its limited power it decided to take on a form that Ed had already been familiar with. It kneeled down in front of him, just close enough to his face that he could smell its rotten breath. "Look at me my son, look at what became of me." The shadow played tricks. The eyes of his father rolled out of their sockets, leaving abysses that echoed in foreign screams. Ed was about to throw up again. "STOP! I am loosing my patience." The shadow fixed the face of his late father and continued. "Now that I have all that I need there is only my bidding to be done. I have become your master and you shall obey my word. There is no escape from this Ed."

Utter shock had consumed Ed. He could not believe that his father was there, standing right in front of him. A part of him knew that it was impossible for such a thing to be happening but deep down he wished for it to be real. "What do you want from me?" He mustered up the courage to ask but the shadow let out something that could only be interpreted as laughter.

"Listen and do so carefully, I shall not repeat myself. Because you've thought that it would be a wise idea to BREAK the mirror, you shall provide another. Unbeknownst to you and your fathers little clan, or whatever he called it, there exist another. Buried deep withing the catacombs that lie under this city." The abomination explained. "What I need you to do is bring it back here, and fear not, you will not get lost because all this time you've kept the guide to yourself not even realizing its true potential." It turned away from Ed and picked up the girls head. "Use it to find the mirror, and if by any chance you try to break it, I will know, and you will wish that you have died that day instead of the girl. Mark. My. Words." Before disappearing it grabbed the knife and threw it at Ed nicking his ear.

The shadow had completely went out of sight but Ed was still shaking. He laid on the floor and wept while a trail of blood flowed down from his ear onto his cheek. When the blood hit the floor it evaporated leaving no trace. Clearly the shadow had cursed him so it could monitor his every move. He was becoming estranged to himself, in some way, his body belonged to the shadow, but he knew nothing as for the reason why. Almost like the curse had been inside of him all this time.

Ed managed to gather himself and stand up. Looking around he noticed the tools he was supposed to use in his mission. His stomach turned each time he saw that decapitated head, even a glimpse of it was enough to make him want to throw up. Despite the repulsiveness of it, he managed to take it by the handle and carry it out of the basement.

By the time Ed's altercation with the shadow ended, the night had swallowed the day. He knew that he could buy time as much as he wanted. Yes, the shadow did threaten to kill him but only if he harmed the head, so Ed sat at the kitchen counter, opened up a secret compartment and pulled out a box of specially made Cuban cigars from sixty years ago. The box dated back to when his father was still alive, it was still in pristine condition, Ed almost felt bad that he had to open it. In any other case he would have left it alone and as the tradition was, passed it onto his children, but he remembered what his father told him:

"If the shadow appears again, open the box no matter what, in there you will find what you must do."

The time for such action had come, Ed thought that he was not being spied on as the shadow had little to no interest in his personal life. It only sought out one thing and when it did what it had to do, it disappeared. He knew that it would be back to check on him but for now he felt safe, even though he had been cursed.

Doubt had a way of creeping into his mind. Something bothered him, it gnawed at his mind, since the shadow managed to create such in intricate plan, there was no way that it would be completely gone. It must have assumed that Frank left some kind of message or an item to his son, thus it stayed ever vigilant. Ed knew that whatever he wanted to do next, he had to be extremely cautious and calculated.