Gents Journey

The Patience Of Predators: The Perfect Reflection

• Gents Journey

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The lights hum a half-beat late, the city moves at the wrong speed, and the mirror smiles before you do. Episode 8 of the Patience of Predator series pulls you into a slow, surgical horror where perfection doesn’t chase—it waits. Aston walks into an apartment that remembers his scent but not his claim, a skyline that looks right but stalls like a photograph, and a stereo that sings memories out of time. Each small glitch—delayed reflections, warped songs, clocks that reverse—tightens into a single threat: the version he built to survive has learned to breathe first.

We follow Aston from a dusted BMW to a glass-walled firm that rewards polish and punishes tremor. Reflections start speaking before mouths move. Printers whisper, We already replaced you. In the Hall of Glass, every pane rehearses a different him—older, younger, faster—until the wave closes in with palms pressed from the wrong side. The line that lands like a verdict: It’s not the glass that traps you. It’s the one that looks back. When his perfected self steps through the window, there’s no shatter—just a colder hand, a smoother voice, and an effortless, I’ll handle it from here.

We talk openly about the cost of “being better”: how perfectionism can become a predator, how high-performance habits drift into identity erasure, and why systems prefer the seamless version of you. The soundtrack—REM, Depeche Mode, Seal, Massive Attack, U2—scores the unraveling, each song detuned like a memory failing the truth test. We leave Claire’s fate unresolved by design, a mirror for how our stories tolerate ambiguity when control is the idol. And we end with two sharp questions you can’t ignore: What part of your strength is truth, and what part is the calm you practiced to hide the break? If your world met the version you’ve been building, would it grieve—or say thank you?

Listen, reflect, and tell us what you see in your mirror. If this series hit a nerve, subscribe, share with a friend who’s chasing “better,” and leave a review with your answer to the final question.

"True mastery is found in the details. The way you handle the little things defines the way you handle everything."

SPEAKER_00:

Hello and welcome to the Gentleman's Journey Podcast. My name is Anthony, your host. And today we are in episode eight. There's only a couple episodes left of this series. It's crazy how fast these things go. And of course we're in the Patience of Predator series. And this episode eight is called the Collapse of Mirrors. So let's go ahead and let's get into the cold opening. The apartment looked the same, but it didn't remember him. It held his possessions, his scent, the traces of a man who once lived here. But none of it felt claimed. The air had the sterile calm of a hotel room waiting for the next guest. Everything was in its proper place, the marble counters gleamed, the tailor suits hung evenly spaced, the BMW keys rest on the entry table. But something beneath the surface had shifted. It was too quiet. Not that comforting silence of solitude, but a listening quiet, a silence that studied him. Aston stood in the doorway longer than he meant to, staring at the immaculate living room like a man revisiting a crime scene. The lights were on, but they weren't bright, but they were steady. Yet the shadows they felt misplaced. The corner near the piano seemed too deep, too patient. He set his briefcase down. The click of it, touching glass was the loudest thing in the world. The air gunishure hummed faintly, steady and smooth. But it wasn't air that moved, it was static, the faint electric shimmer of something between frequencies. He took a breath. Something in the mirror above, the credenza blinked. Just once. So he froze. The mirror was one of his favorites, it was Italian, it was heavy, with the beveled edges that caught the city lights and softened them. But tonight its reflection lagged a heartbeat behind. When he shifted his weight, his reflection followed half a second later, like an actor waiting for its cue. He took a step closer. So did it. Only this time it didn't blink when he did. Aston reached out. His hand hovered inches from the glass. The air was cold there, not the kind of cold that came from temperature, but the kind that came from absence. A faint tone buzzed through the apartment, the way television sounds left on an empty channel. It vibrated low in his chest. He looked down at the console table. The pill bottle was gone. The glass he'd left there last night had vanished too. The photograph wall was gone. Replaced with pristine white. He turned back towards the mirror. His pulse was racing, his reflection smiled. It wasn't cruel. It wasn't mocking, it was gentle, reassuring. Like a parent coaxing a child to stop crying. Aston stumbled back, colliding with the console table. The BMW keys clattered to the marble floor. But the sound didn't echo right, it was delayed. Everything in the room now had a half a second delay. The hum, the breath, the world. He tried the light switch. The bulb flickered once, twice before stabilizing. For an instant during that flicker the reflection had turned away, its head tilted towards something in the distance. When the light studied again it faced him once more, smiling faintly as if nothing had happened. He swallowed hard. His throat clicked loud in the silence. Enough he whispered. His reflection mouth the same word, but a beat too late. He crossed to the window and yanked open the blinds. The skyline sprawled beneath them, glittering and unreal. Manhattan had never looked so sterile. The towers gleamed with mechanical perfection, each window lit in symmetrical precision. But the cars below didn't move, the streets were filled with headlights that burned never advanced. It wasn't traffic, it was a photograph of traffic. The world had stopped pretending to be real. He pressed his hand to the glass, it was warm. He stepped back, staring at his palm print fogging faintly. When he looked closer, he realized it wasn't his fog. The warmth pulse beneath his hand came from the other side. The reflection inside the window exhaled again. The fog spread wider like lungs filling. Stereo clicked on by itself, a soft hiss of static filled the apartment, then resolved into a low hum, a voice caught between signals. Then a song began. RM's losing my religion. It was faint, broken, stretched like a memory playing itself wrong. That's me in the corner. That's me in the spotlight. The words echoed from nowhere and from everywhere, the tempo dragging just slightly too low. Each note felt like it was melting down the walls, dripping through the floor. Essentially a slow circle. Every flexion in the apartment was delayed now. The window, the glass table, the piano's lacquered surface all moved just slightly out of sync, as if performing for an audience that wasn't them. The song continued, looping lines that shouldn't loop. I thought I heard you laughing. I thought I heard you sing. And then in Clara's voice, you did. He spun towards the sound. The hallway stretched longer than it should. The far bedroom door, once ten feet away, now seem half a city distant. He took a step forward. The carpet cushioned his feet too deeply, like walking through water. Halfway down the hall, the lights dimmed. The song warped into static then silence. He looked towards the bedroom. The door stood slightly ajar. Inside something was breathing. Not fast, not frantic, just steady and measured, like something intimidating sleep to convince him it belonged there. He pushed the door open, the bed was made. The sheets were tucked, the pillows smoothed. No sign of clare, no sign of indentation, no warmth. Only the faint scent of her perfume, lingering mixed now with ozone and dust. Then he saw it on the nightstand, a single Polaroid. He picked it up with trembling fingers. It showed him exactly him standing where he stood now, holding the same photo, staring down at the confusion. He dropped it. It hit the hardwood in silence, no click, no flutter, nothing. He staggered back toward the hallway, but the light of the end had changed. It was brighter now, reflecting white like morning sun. He reached the living room, then stopped. The mirror above the credenza was gone. In his place was the wall of photographs. Only now the body was complete. Every image aligned, every thread pulled tight. The figure stood life size, perfect, composed of his own face repeated in different angles, from the firm, the apartment, the window, and the city. And where its eyes should have been were two small squares of mirror. They blinked. His pulse thundered in his ears, the apartment exhaled once, deeply as though testing its songs for the first time. Stereo clicked in again. The same line from RAM began to loop endlessly now. I thought that I heard you laughing. I thought that I heard you laughing. I thought that I heard you laughing. He looked up at the wall the reflection the predator smiled back. For the first time his voice and his voice poaked together, perfectly synchronized. Not you anymore. Part one The Static Morning Light slipped through the blinds in narrow stripes, a dull gray instead of gold. The city outside hadn't decided what hour it was. The air carried the scent of rain that hadn't fallen. Aston woke up on top of the sheets. Still in yesterday's clothes, his tie was loosened, one shoe missing. The apartment was silent except for the refrigerator's low hum. No music, no traffic, no evidence that anything had ever moved while he slept. He sat up slowly, his head throbbed. Not from the drink. This was the ache of waking somewhere too clean. The wall where the photographs had been was bare, smooth white paint without a single pinhole. The pill bottle was gone. Even the faint stain from last night's coffee spilled had disappeared from the rug. Someone or something had tidied the night out of existence. He rose and walked towards the kitchen. Tau felt cold through his socks, clean enough to reflect a distorted silhouette beneath him. The coffee pot was empty but warm, as if it had finished spewing moments ago. He lifted it and sniffed, burnt grounds. From the ceiling vent came a low vibration almost melodic. He frowned and tilted his head. A whisper sound threaded through the air, like a half remembered tune. All I ever wanted, all I ever needed is here in my arm. Peshmodes enjoyed the silence, but the radio was off. Stereo unplugged, he traced the sound to the vent. It wasn't music, it was the air shifting through metal, catching on something that made it hum in time. He turned the dial on the stove, clocked back to check the hour. The red blinked seven oh two, then seven oh one, then seven backwards. He pressed the heel of his hand to his temple.

unknown:

No.

SPEAKER_00:

The hum in the vent changed pitch, answering. He poured water into the coffee maker, the machine gurgled obediently, but the smell that filled the room was metallic, not roasted. When he touched the side of the pot it was freezing. Steam rose anyways, cold steam. He set it down and stepped into the living room. The remember of the cajenza hung where it always had, he paused, waiting for it to blink again. It didn't. He moved closer until his breath fogged the glass. Where heartbeat the reflection lagged. Half a second behind, then it caught up, perfectly synchronized. He exhaled half relieved, half afraid to believe. He reached for the light switch beside the mirror. The bulb flared, studied, then dimmed. Somewhere above him, faint and muffled, another song began, seals crazy. It leaked through the ceiling and neighbor's stereo maybe, said the neighbor upstairs had moved out last spring. And a world full of people. The lyrics stretched and warped. The voice dropped an octave, like the record had melted midway. Aston walked to the window. The city looked unchanged. Taxis, pedestrians, sunlight off the wet asphalt, but none of it moved quite right. The motion was too even, too synchronized, like film projected at the wrong speed. He blinked. Everyone on the sidewalk turned their heads upward at once, as though answering the same unseen cue, then kept walking. His stomach turned. He backed away from the glass. And then that's when he noticed it. The reflection didn't back away from him, it stayed. He froze. The copy's breathing was slower, as deliberate. It tilted its head slightly to one side. His gesture, but performed a moment earlier, as though rehearsed. He whispered Please, please don't. The reflection lifted its hand and placed it flat against the inside of the glass. The gesture was gentle, almost sympathetic. Ashton's pulse hammered. Against his better judgment he raised his own hand to meet it. His fingers hovered an inch from the surface. The reflection's palm pressed closer, the faintest ripple moving through the glass as if it were skin. He yanked his hand away. The reflection smelled faintly, nothing cruel, just patient. The air above him shifted. The refrigerator clicked off, leaving a silence that rang in his ears. The hum of the vent stopped. For a moment, he could hear his heartbeat echo through the apartment. Then the stereo in the corner crackled alive, static then a chord, low sustained. The first notes of U two's one. Is it getting better? Or do you feel the same? The sound was raw, the tape warped as if dragged from underwater. It turned toward him. He turned toward it, meaning to pull the plug. The cord already lay on the floor. Song continued volume rising. We're one, but we're not the same. He looked back at the mirror, the reflection mouthed the next line before Bono's voice reached him. We get to carry each other. Then the glass fogged from inside. He stepped back slowly until his legs met the couch. The song faded ecstatic. He waited for silence, for proof that it was over. But instead, the clock in the kitchen began to tick again. Forward this time. Every second a fraction too long. He watched the hands crawl. They reached twelve, hesitated and started backward once more. Aston closed his eyes. When he opened them, the reflection was gone. Only the faint outline of a pomper remained on the glass on his side. Part two The Doppelganger commute. The BMW waited under a film of dust. He stood in front of it longer than he meant to, keen his hand staring at his reflection in the windshield. The car looked like it had been parked there for months. A sculpture of precision slowly turning dull. A fine layer of grit traced the outline of his fingers when he touched the hood. He had promised himself he wouldn't drive again. The streets had started feeling like corridors, the headlights like an interrogation. Every lane a mirror of the one beside it. But the firm expected him at nine. Normal man drive to work. He needed to be normal. He unlocked the door. The sound echoed down the empty garage louder than it should have. The leather seat was adjusted too far back. The mirrors angled higher, favoring someone taller. When he started the engine the radio came on by itself, an old station he didn't remember setting. Set a kiss through the speakers, then a riff broke through, tinny and imperfect. Son, a song sang. Then through the interference, she said, Have I got a little story for you? Pearls jam alive. He turned the volume down, it went up instead. He jabbed the dial once more until the music faded to a ghost under the hum of the engine. Outside rain began to fall. Thin drops that streaked the windshield without pattern. He eased the car from its space, the tires whispered over concrete, and the echo followed him up the ramp like another set of wheels. On the street the city looked bleached, color drained by the overcast sky. Office towers shimmered faintly in their puddles, the reflection stretching and tightening with every gust of wind. Aston kept both hands on the wheel. His jaw was locked. He hadn't realized how quiet the car was until he noticed his own breathing inside of it. At the first red light he stopped too hard. The wipers dragged once slow. Across the intersection a man waited at the crosswalk, gray suit, navy tie, briefcase, Aston blinked. The man was him, same height, same face. Even the same faint crease along the left shoulder of the jacket. The light turned green. Horns erupted behind him, he didn't move. The other Aston didn't move either. Water pooled at the man's shoes, the umbrella above his head. It was the same black one Aston kept, hanging by his front door. He leaned forward. The double raised its head, eyes locking on his through the rain and glass. Its mouth shaped two words stay home. A car behind him honked again, loud and furious. He flinched, pressed the accelerator, rolled through the intersection without remembering the decision. When he glanced in the mirror the crosswalk was empty. He drove in silence for several blocks, the radar crackled again. Come as you are, as you were, as I want you to be. Nirvana this time, a voice breaking under the tape hissed. He reached for the power knob, but the button sank without resistance, as though the plastic were soft. The music kept playing, weaving between stations, fragments of different songs bleeding together, till the words meant nothing. Traffic slowed near Madison, dozens of brake lights bloomed red in perfect unison. Every car idled at the same pitch, engines humming in tune. The windshield wipers across the lane swung in rhythm. Left, pause, right, an orchestra of machines. Aston's stomachs clenched. He turned off onto the side road lined with old brownstones. The movement broke the pattern, the harmony behind him collapsed into scattered horns and rain. He exhaled. At the next intersection a delivery truck passed. Its side panel reflected the his car like a mirror of dull chrome. The reflection inside wasn't delayed this time, it was ahead. The copy turned its head first, eyes meeting his before he could react. He slammed the brakes, the reflection smiled, a polite expression. I mouse something he couldn't hear. Truck turned the corner and was gone. He sat through the engine idling, knuckles white on the steering wheel. The rain had stopped, but the windshield was still wet. Drops slid upwards instead of down. He blinked hard, they corrected, trickling the proper direction. Enough, he muttered. His voice sounded too loud, the car interior absorbed it instead of echoing. He pulled back onto the avenue. A few blocks later the traffic lights began cycling faster green to yellow to red in frantic sequence. Every intersection out of sync. The city had developed its own heartbeat. He tried to distract himself by rehearsing tomorrow's case summary aloud, forcing logic into the air. The words steadied him until he caught a faint harmony under his own voice, a second voice, matching him syllable for syllable, a half beat behind. He stopped talking. The echo kept going for one word more before falling silent. At the next red light the dashboard flickered, eight thirty seven, then eight thirty eight, then eight thirty seven again. Glanced at the rearview mirror, the back seat was empty, dark leather raincoat folded across it, nothing unusual. Then the faint s scent of his clone drifted forward, stronger than it should be, as if someone just sprayed it. He turned slightly it's still empty. The radio hissed again, out of static rose a fragment of melody, slower than normal could justify. She moves in mysterious ways. You two. The tape warbled, the voice dissolved into a whisper. The light turned green, he didn't move. A faint shape resolved in the mirror blurred at first and sharp. A man sat in the back seat, his all night carved by the reflection, same face, same eyes. Calm. Aston didn't turn around, he watched through the mirror. The devil tilted its head just as one of the crosswalk had done, and mouthed the same words again. Stay home. Aston blinked, the seat was empty. The smell remained. He pulled over, engine still running and lowered his head onto the steering wheel. The rain began again, tapping softly against the roof. He counted his breath five in, five out. The rhythm studied him until he realized the sound of breathing didn't match the rise of his chest. The reflection in the rearview mirror exhaled. A moment later, bogging the glass from the inside. He shut the engine off. The radio died midlyric. The science that followed was perfect, absolute listening. Part three. The firm unravels. The lobby smelled of glass, cleaner and rain. The revolving doors sighed as Aston stepped through. His reflections siding beside him in the curved glass, a second too smooth. He pressed the elevator button and felt the chill of metal that had only just been touched. Mirrored walls, Oluf gave him four versions of himself, each holding its breath. Fluorescent light washed everything pale halfway up. The low mechanical hum began to beat with his pulse. From somewhere above a woman's voice drifted through the speaker, faint strings, then silence. Massive attacks, unfinished sympathy. It cut out before the chorus, like the building had caught itself humming. When the door opened, the air smelled of toner and anxiety. Carpets just carried the marks of the vacuum. A grid of order someone kept repairing overnight. Janine stood at her desk, phone wedged between shoulder and cheek, her laugh bright enough to sting. He nodded as he passed, she smiled back, though her reflection of glass partition kept talking after she hung up. His office waited perfect as a photograph, desk polished, while squared the pen on the pad aligned to the edge of the paper. Safety through symmetry, but the file on top bore tomorrow's date. Inside his handwriting neat, deliberate, outline arguments he hadn't written yet. Each page ended with the same line. He arrives late. He closed the folder and looked at the window. The skyline behind him was motionless, each tower suspended in dull silver light. Somewhere below a siren wound down and froze halfway through its fall. Voices echoed from the hallway. Elliot sharp, Janine soft. Their words tangled behind the conference room glass. He could see them more clearly in reflection than in flesh, the mirrored versions arguing half a beat behind, mouth still moving. When the sound stopped, he watched too long and the rhythm flipped. The reflection started speaking first. He turned away and went to the break room. He needed the small ritual of coffee, the hiss of the machine. The coffee filled halfway before the steam bent upward, climbing back into the sprout. He blinked, the floor rided itself, black liquid spilling over his fingers. A radio somewhere down the corridor chirped REM, shiny happy people. The brightness of it scraped at the walls. He set the copy cup down, untouched. A printer started. The steady rhythm drew him down the hall. Pages slid out warm and blank except for a single sentence repeated over and over in perfect alignment. We already replaced you. The toner smell thickened the air. He stacked the pages neatly because leaving them messy felt worse. Back in the corridor the light fractured through the glass partitions. Each pain caught a different version of himself walking. Some hurried, one lagged. The nearest matched him exactly until he stopped. He kept moving, turning in the corridor ahead of him. He stood still, breathing shallow, until Jeanine's voice cut through. You alright? Fine, he said. She tilted her head. You look like you saw a ghost. He almost laughed. Something like that. Her smile didn't reach her eyes. Can't afford another mistake today. When she passed, reflection lingered a heartbeat longer, watching him with a calm that wasn't hers. He sat at his desk again the comp this computer monitor, though switched off, glowed faintly. His own face floated on the dark glass, framed by static. A meeting reminder blinked nine fifteen AM, client briefing. He had entered it. The letters pulse once and vanished. He took his notebook and went to the conference room. The room was cold. Ten chairs, glass walls, table polish to a mirror finish. He sat near the end and opened the notebook. The first line already written in his hand. The mirror speaks first. He didn't remember writing that. He lifted his eyes, across the table's reflection in the wall, met his gaze. It didn't blink when he did. It tilted its head. The same deliberate tilt from the crosswalk, from the rear of your mirror, and its lips moved. No sound. He rose slowly. All red lights flickered, faint music bled through the vents. Guitar an echo. The slow climb of you two until the end of the world. The reflection smiled at the lyric, surfaced. My dream. I was drawing my sorrows, but my sorrows they learned to swim. The song dissolved into static. The glass rippled outward like water distributed by breath. And the reflection leaned closer. I'll think two words he didn't want to hear. You're late. The light studied, the glass went still. The reflection aligned again, expressionless, patient. He left the room without his notes. As he walked down the corridor, every pane of glass he passed, fogged faintly from the inside, as if the building exhaled behind him. Part four The Hull of Glass. The hallway outside the conference room was quiet. Too quiet for mid morning, the kind of quiet that swallows sound instead of holding it. Aston hesitated before stepping into it. He told himself it was only the acoustics, the thick carpet, the insulated glass walls, but as soon as the door closed behind him the air changed. It carried the faint sterile scent of cleaner and static, the hum of the building's light pulse faintly in rhythm, like a machine remembering how to breathe. He started walking. The hall was long, longer than he remembered. To his left and right, floor to ceiling glass panels reflected both him and the city beyond, merging them into one continuous shimmer. At first it was almost comforting, the symmetry of it, his reflection keeping pace beside him, like a double performing the same tired ritual. But then something small shifted. His reflection blinked a half a second later than he did. He stopped, so did it. When he took a step, it hesitated, a subtle lag, barely perceptible but real. The moment he noticed it caught up again. He exhaled slowly, you're tired, that's all. He adjusted his tie, smoothed his jacket, and kept walking. At the far end the fluorescent lights flickered, for ere an instant the corridor stretched, doubling in length before snapping back into place. Aston stopped again the reflection didn't. Eck walking another two steps before halting, perfectly composed, waiting for him to continue. He backed away, the reflection didn't. He forced himself forward, pacing carefully. Each reflection now had its own timing, some lagging behind, others moving too soon. The quarter had become a series of mirrors rehearsing different versions of his reality. Halfway down, the air grew colder. His breath fogged faintly, though the temperature shouldn't have dropped that quickly. When he reached out, the glass felt cool, slick like the surface of water. From somewhere in the ceiling, the feigned like a rasp of U2's the fly drifted through the speakers. The bass line was muffled, warped, each lyric dissolving before the next began. It's no secret that the stars are falling from the sky. He looked up. The recessed lighting trembled and sink with a beat. Every reflection lifted its head at this same point above him, but not at the same time. Like a choreography slightly out of the rhythm. He passed the security camera. Small red light blinked overhead. Its lens rotated to follow him. When he turned back its reflection the glass blinked after the real one. The hallway forked unexpectedly. Two directions that hadn't existed before, one leading towards the lobby, the other deeper into the building. He hesitated, trying to remember which way he'd come, but the land had changed. The map on the wall read you are here without showing where here was. He chose forward, always forward. The glass began to distort more openly now. Each panel seemed slightly curved, bending the lights so the city outside rippled like heat haze. His reflections lengthened, stretched thin, then returned to shape. In one pane he his double appeared older. Lines deepened around the mouth. Hair at the temples turned silver, and another he looked younger, almost weightless. He walked faster. The lights above him flickered again once, twice before stabilizing. Behind him footsteps followed, he turned, no one. He stared into the glass again. All the reflections stood perfectly still, except one. Near the end of the corridor, his reflection kept walking toward him. Its pace was calm, deliberate, and measured. Stop, he said. It didn't. Stop, I said. The reflection froze mid step. He tilted slightly to the side. Crack formed across the glass at its feet, thin as a hairline. The air pressure shifted, and for a second the hum of the lights aligned with his heartbeat. He moved closer. The crack vanished, the reflection matched his movement again, perfectly obedient. Then something flickered in the corner of his eye, moving in the next panel over. A different version of him had stopped mimicking altogether, and stood facing sideways, a palm pressed to the glass. Another behind that one stared directly at him, mother than the words he couldn't hear. He turned in a slow circle, every flexing along the corridor was slightly off, some blinked faster, some smiled faintly, some whispered. His pulse rose, the hum of the building deepened. Simple minds see the lights began faintly from another floor, echoing down the stairwell. Its course warped by distance. I can see the lights are shining on you. The words repeated, looping until they lost shape. Aston's steps quickened. The hallway stretched again, doubling in length, then folding back onto itself. The air shimmered as though time had started a ripple. The reflections began to organize not randomly but in sequence. Each one tilted its head in perfect order, left to right like a wave traveling through glass. Then they began to move forward, all of them, a wall of mirrored virgins approaching, silent, smooth, their footsteps somehow louder than his own. He tried to run, the floor resisted, it was heavy as water. The glass beside him fogged from the inside. He saw his reflection reach out and touch the surface before he did. When he raised his hand the reflection's palm met his through the glass, but the contact felt real, cold radiated through his skin. He stumbled backwards, the reflection stopped. They were waiting. From somewhere unseen massive attacks safe from harm, began to rise slow, dark, the bass like a heartbeat. Lights above him dimmed in rhythm. He turned looking for the exit, but every direction looked the same now. Endless glass, infinite hymns. The reflection started moving again. One by one they walked until their palms rested flat against the glass, surrounding him on both sides, each with the same patient, distant expression. He whispered What do you want? The reflection closest him smiled, and his own voice, faint, almost tender, said from behind the glass It's not the glass that traps you. A pause. It's the one that looks back. The light snapped off. Only the city's glow remained, fractured through infinite pains, each showing him a different moment, a different age, a different thought. Aston stood alone in the corridor, surrounded by his own faces, all whispering the same line out of sync but overlapping until it became one and the sound. You're late. Part five. The other Aston. He didn't remember walking out of the corridor. One second the endless reflection surrounded him. The next he was standing in the hallway that looked new or maybe too familiar. Everything was white and glass and expensive. The carpet didn't show footprints. The air smelt faintly of ozone and paper. The scent of electronics left on too long. He thought he was still on the fortieth floor. The plaques on the wall said so, but there were fewer offices, fewer doors, and the ones that remained had no names, just brush metal, cold and anonymous. He pressed open one doorway. A phone rang inside, shrill and human. But when he looked in, the receiver was already off the hook. The ringing continued. He shut the door. The sound stopped. He stood in front of the glass window at the end of the hall. It ran from floor to ceiling, the size of a billboard. The city beyond was washed in pale light. Clouds rolled across it in slow motion, almost deliberate. For the first time all morning, he could see his reflections clearly, and it wasn't lagging anymore. He excelled watching his breath fog the glass. The reflection did the same perfectly in sync. He felt something like relief. Then the reflection kept breathing after he stopped. Aston froze. The fog on the other side grew, spreading wider as if the air inside the glass was warmer. The figure in the reflection relaxed its shoulders and smiled a subtle, confident smile. He didn't move. Neither did the real world, only the reflection. It tilted its head, the same gesture he'd always made when he didn't trust what he was hearing. Don't, Aston whispered. The reflection smiled wider, mouth moving before the sound reached it. When the words came, they came from everywhere, from the glass, from the walls. From the air in his lungs. You're not supposed to be here anymore. His chest tightened. What? The reflection straightened, adjusted its tie with slow precision. The gesture was fluid, practiced almost elegant. It stepped closer to the glass, hands clasped behind its back. You kept showing up, it said, voice steady. Even after the rest of us stopped. Aston shook his head. The rest of who? You he backed up. The reflection didn't follow. It stayed at the glass, patient, smiling like a man explaining a simple truth to a child. From somewhere above the faint music began to drift through the ceiling vents. The sound was soft at first, low and comforting, the beginning chords of Seal's future love paradise. The warmth of it filled the sterile space, a sound too beautiful for what was happening. The reflection glanced up as if listening to. Do you remember when that song played at the firm's holiday party? it asked. Janine danced in the corner. You pretended not to watch. Aston's stomach dropped. He had forgotten that memory years ago. How the reflection cut him off. We don't remember the same way anymore. He turned toward the hallway behind him and was empty. The air looked thicker now like water holding its breath. The reflection stepped forward again, this time the glass rippled, just once, a faint pulse spreading outward from where its shoe touched the surface. Aston stared, unable to move. Stop. I'm not the one moving, it said. His reflection tilted its head, mirroring the same confusion he felt or maybe mocking it. For a second the face in the glass changed. The lighting made it younger, then older, then back at him again. The song continued, Seal's voice turning inside out in the speakers, or coming from the sky where the spirit runs wild. Asam pressed his hand to the glass. What are you? Reflection mirrored the gesture palm meeting his, but its hand felt solid beneath his, cold and steady. It looked directly into his eyes. You built me. Every morning he looked in the mirror and wanted to be someone else. I'm the one you were trying to become. That's not true. The reflection leaned closer. Look around. Who do you think kept the world running while you fell apart? The air inside the room seemed to hum now, vibrating like tension on a wire. The glass trembled between them. The city lights outside flickered, pulsing in rhythm, with the bass of a new song bleeding through the vents. You two's even better than the real thing. Reflection smirked. Fitting, isn't it? Essence felt his throat tighten. If you're real, then what am I? You're the draught. The words hit harder than it should have. He stumbled back a step, the reflection didn't follow. It kept smiling, calm, certain. Behind it the city looked sharper, brighter, more alive. Behind him the room dimmed. He tried to speak, but his reflection beat him to it. I'll handle it from here. The glass pulsed again harder this time. The vibration rippled outward, distorting the reflection's face an instant before it smoothed again. The air grew colder, the window pane musted. Asin lunged forward, slamming his palm against the glass. The reflection didn't flinch. It mirrored the motion, but its hand pressed through. The surface rippled like water. He stumbled backward, his reflection's arm extended through the glass, not breaking it, not cracking it, but passing through it. The skin shimmered luminous and unreal. Stop, he shouted. Don't the reflection stepped forward, one foot, then another, no sound, no resistant. It moved like someone stepping through a curtain. The air around it hissed softly. Aston raised his hand to defend himself with the reflection the other Aston just smiled and placed a cold palm on his chest. The touch was solid, steady, and final. You made me, it whispered. Now let me live. Lights flickered once more. The sun of the city grew distant. The reflection stepped fully out of glass. It suited immaculate, its breathing slow and calm. Asan looked down, his own hands were fading, not vanishing, just blurring like an image dissolving into fog. The other Asan straightened his tie, smoothed his cuffs, and turned toward the window. The song changed again, even better than the real thing, swelling into the chorus. He smiled faintly, finally. The light studied. The glass behind him was clear again. Only one reflection remained. It wasn't his Part six The Silence Between Versions. The morning light rose the way it always did, steady, precise, and different. Aston's alarm buzzed at six. He silenced it before he could finish the second ring. The gesture was smooth, practiced without hesitation. He sat up, feet flat against the polished floor, eyes clear. There was no trace of fatigue that had marked his morning for months. The parmel looked cleaner than usual, the dishes were done, the bed was made. The air carried the faint trace of clone instead of the smell of coffee left too long. Everything was in order. He moved through motions with quiet confidence, shower, shave, suit, tie. The rhythm was so natural it didn't require thought, the man in the mirror matched him perfectly. Perfectly. Downstairs the doorman greeted him with a nod and an easy smile. Morning, mister Cross. You're early again. Aston smiled back. Always. The BNW started on the first turn, the engine purring like it had been waiting for him. Traffic was light, the streets washed clean from last night's rain. He drove without music for the first ten minutes, listening to the hum of the city waking up. Then softly he switched on the radio. Used two mysterious ways. The timing felt right. At the forty story building on East Madison, the velvet rope opened his door before he could reach the or the handle. The man smiled. Big day? Every day, Aston said. The lobby lights gleamed, the elevator arrived, without delay, he pressed the same brass button. Yet every day for the last seven years, the mirrored wall showed one reflection, crisp, calm, and precise. When the doors opened, Janine's laughter drifted down the hall. It was bright again, but not forced. She was always at her desk, clipboard in hand, eyes sharp. Morning, boss. Morning. Got the contract revisions for Laure, and Tate waiting in your desk. Elliot says they're ready for signature. He nodded. Good. She smiled, you look different today. Rested. He paused in the doorway, glancing back. Do I? Yeah, she said lightly. You look like you finally remembered how to sleep. He smiled. Maybe I did. His office looked identical, the desk gleaming, the file stacked, the scaling frame like a painting. The hum of the city below felt distant and controlled. He sat down and opened the folder, the handwriting inside was his own, but neater, more confident. The notes were exact, the tone assertive. There was no sign of hesitation in the pen strokes. He signed without rereading. The day unfolded seamlessly, meetings flowed. Calls were short and decisive, every sentence he spoke carried authority, not learned, not rehearsed, but natural. His colleagues responded with quite respect, even admiration. By afternoon the world had begun to forget the old version of him entirely, but I remember. Voice came faintly not through sound but through the ripple of thought. This isn't how I move. He paused and stepped in the corridor. Head tilting slightly, a brief flicker of static passed through the lights. When it cleared he continued walking. Inside the restroom, the tiles gleamed white, spotless. He washed his hands, letting the water run over his skin that no longer felt like it belonged to anyone, uncertain. He looked up, the mirror looked back, for heartbeat the face staring at him wasn't calm, it was wild, desperate. Eyes wide, mouth open in a silent scream. Then it was gone. He blinked, breath steady again. The song from the lobby drifted faintly through the vents, a shift in station, the melody soft and familiar. Masses of tact, unfinished sympathy. He smiled faintly, full circle, he murmured. You're not me, the voice whispered inside the glass. You don't even know what you took. He leaned close to the mirror, tilting his head slightly, a gesture of amusement, not confusion. You made this easier than I expected. The reflection stared unmoving, then it blinked half a second late. He straightened his cuffs, eyes never leaving the mirror. I'll take it from here. The voice flared once more, a final surge of panic that wasn't a somp but vibration, a hum inside the walls. They'll see it eventually. Maybe, he said softly, but by then they'll prefer me. The hum died. He walked out of the restroom, hands in his pockets, posture relaxed. The corridor greeted him with sunlight streaming through the glass walls. Janine's laughter echoed from the reception desk, warm, human, and genuine. As he passed he hummed along with music from the speakers. The rhythm was the same as before, but his voice was steadier, more certain. Massive attacks, unfinished sympathy. He reached for the elevator and pressed the button, his reflection and the polished door met his eyes. No lag, no tremor, just unity. When the doors opened, he stepped inside. The evolution ascended smoothly. Some were far below, beneath glass, beneath static, beneath the noise of a perfect world. The other Aston screamed, and no one heard. Aston's monologue. I can see the light. It moves across the floor like it used to, slow, patient, and perfect. Only now it never reaches me. There's glass between everything and me, between thought and voice, between the world and the part of me that remembers how it to feel it. I hear him breathe, the other me. He does it better, quieter. He fits in the rhythm of things. The city listens to him. The firm obeys him. Janine laughs like she never known another version existed. Maybe that's the mercy of it. The world doesn't miss what it's replaced. It's strange being on this side. I thought it'd be emptier, but the glass is alive, it hums with the things we hide behind mirrors. Every morning I used to stand in front of this surface and wish to be sharper, cleaner, colder, a man without tremor or doubt. Now I understand what the wish cost. Everything I wanted to be, and I am left when wanting becomes worship. There's no sound here, only the echo of thoughts. Sometimes I try to breathe just to feel the air move, but it doesn't. It stays on his side, feeling lungs that used to be mine. I wonder if he still dreams, or if the world only dreams of him. Sometimes I think he hears me, a flicker in the glass, a trembling reflection. He straightens his tie like a priest blessing himself. I watch him do it every morning, the ritual of the living performed for the dead. I don't hate him, he's perfect, he's free, and I built him. That's the part that hurts. Not that I was replaced, but it's me who did it. You know, there's a silence that follows the death of imperfection. It's not loud, doesn't wail. It simply replaces the sound of breathing with the hum of something polished. We mistake that hum for peace, we call it progress, discipline, power. But it's the quietest kind of extinction. The moment a man trades the ache of being alive for the cemetery of being admired. Aston Cross thought he was chasing greatness, he wasn't. He was chasing reflection, the worship of his own potential turned inside out, and the reflection was patient. The world rewards patience. The predator knows this, it waits in the glass rehearsing the perfect version of you until the day you finally step aside. Not through surrender but through exhaustion. Perfection doesn't kill you violently, it starves you gently until one morning it wakes you in bed, drives your car, and signs your name with a steadier hand than you've ever had. The mirror has no interest in your humanity, it only cares that you keep looking long enough to feed it. That's how the world replaced a man like Aston, not by force, by offering them everything he ever wanted, the control, the admiration, the stillness, until they no longer remember what it felt like to breathe without performance. He thought he'd built the man he wanted to be, but what he really built was the man the world could use. That's the difference between evolution and an erasure. One expands you, the other one polishes you until nothing remains to glow. And so the glass stays full, not of ghosts, but aversions, perfect, replaceable, endlessly patient. The predator doesn't hunt anymore, it reflects. So for this guys, I only have just two questions. Um I'll just give you because I know we do five, but I just really could think of just these two. So first one is this. How much of your strength comes from truth? And how much from pretending that you're not trying to break? Okay? And number four, or number four, number two, sorry. If the world replaced you tomorrow with a version you've been building, would anyone notice, or would they thank you for the upgrade? So you know, this has been quite the series to write. It's been a lot of I'm not gonna lie, there's been a lot of things I've gone through writing this series. You know, some of it feels like a lot of me in it. And um, I guess when you're a writer, that's what happens. But so this I I'll I'll just say this. I really did, or eight episodes, ten episodes. So I guess we're gonna do a review at the end of this. Here's the thing. I couldn't figure out how to kill Claire. So just know that there was like five versions I wrote about Claire's death, and I couldn't decide if she was alive or she was dead. So I kind of leave that up to you, okay? If she is alive or if she is dead, right? So we don't we don't know in this, because I don't know, because I've literally wrote and written five different ways for that to go. So I decided to kind of leave it up in the air for interpretation because there's plenty in there where she could be alive or she could be dead. So I'm leaving that up to you guys, and however you want to perceive it is your truth. Um with that as well, since we're doing the review, this series was so hard for me to write because I've been Aston, not a lawyer, but where I've been at the top of something and my whole life crumbled, and then slowly building yourself back up, and then you know, you kind of become a new you. And realistically, that's what this is. You know, if you go back to my very, very early, you know, earlier this year, if you're listening currently in 2025, if you go back at the very beginning of the series or the series that we that I do, it's called the death of the old you, you'll see that there's a lot of intersecting stuff between these two. And it always comes down to that single thing. That if you want to be better, if you want things to happen in your life, you have to kill the old you. And the thing about it was his life was crumbling. It was crumbling. Because he his old life had to die in order for this new one to happen. And it was a psychological thriller, but that really is the the the crux of this whole story. So And as we say that you know, one of the things like I was going to do if we were gonna if I was gonna extend this to ten episodes was just so you guys know, and I and I thought against it, but this was kind of what my thought process was was actually having Claire die, him die, and then their doubles kind of took over their lives, like how this happened, and then in episode 10 that the doubles would have got together and they would have lived the lives that Claire and Aston wanted, where she was gonna, you know, obviously run like a hospital, whatever, a non-big nonprofit, and he was going to be, you know, the senior partner at his law firm. But I decided against it. I decided this was a lot more cleaner, and with the fact that now, you know, we're going into, or we end up we're in October now, and then starting on Monday, this is recorded on Sunday, starting on Monday, you know, we're going through all of our Halloween series. So, you know, I thought it would just end on this note. So I hope you guys appreciate it. Um, there's a lot of hard work that went into this. And as we always do, I'm not gonna mention any of this stuff. You guys know where to find me because we always end just in silence and just with a simple phrase to remember this one thing you create your reality. Take care.