The Skin

The mirror stood intimidatingly facing the boy. He touched his reflection, but the mirror was cold. His eyes sharpened to observe the mirror's reflection better. His clone, in the mirror, was completely pale like milk. Getting closer, the boy had put his hand on the mirror. Like the Ying-Yang, the reflection contrasted with the boy's hand. In the pitch-black room, the pale shadow from the mirror stared into his eyes. The boy was hidden in the darkness. However, the shadow glowed as if the sun was brought it indoors.

"Who are you?" The boy asked. The shadow didn't move his lips. He stood in the darkness against the light, starting to sweat profusely. The sweat droplets had little white reflections on the dark skin. Finally, he reacted to the situation by slowly walking backward, maintaining eye contact with the being in the mirror. The shadow seemed to have stepped into the world outside the mirror, mimicking the boy's movements. Even though a shadow was supposed to be in sync with the object, the being wasn't trying to be a shadow.

"I am you." The shadow said. The shadow stopped moving along with the boy. "You are me." The shadow said whilst morphing into a large shadow, engulfing the whole room in a white glow. The boy stood out against the fully white room.

The boy tried to escape the whiteness by running away, but all directions seemed infinite. Pale hands popped out from the walls and floor, going in the direction of the kid. The child kept running away from the disfigured hands. Knowing all escape is futile, the boy couldn't help but cry. He looked back at the mirror. In the distance, he saw it but quickly was distracted by a trail of grey spots on the floor.

The hands took a cream of the whitest white and rubbed it against those grey spots. With each spot disappearing, the hands also vanished. The boy stood over a grey pool. The hands appeared again, rubbing against the grey pool. Unlike before, the hands lifted the boy and started rubbing the cream onto his skin and clothes. The boy's dark skin started to turn white, assimilating with the pale background. The boy violently shook his body and bit one of the hands. As a result, the hands threw him onto the floor.

The boy started to run, leaving grey spots everywhere. The stern hands showed no haste in trying to clean them up. The whole world seemed white except for a small black rectangle in the distance. The boy raced towards the object at full speed. The hands' numbers multiplied like rabbits each time to clean the contamination. The boy observed the mirror, slowly enlarging to the size of the original mirror.

Eventually, the boy stood in front of the mirror with an accurate reflection. The mirror was still a few meters away from the boy. Suddenly, a pale figure revealed itself from the white universe. "The blackness you hold is a curse." The figure said. The boy was scared of the figure's words but looked puzzled. He had to do something to escape. The hands that keep appearing behind him. So, he dashed for the mirror.

The figure pushed him away from the mirror. The boy fell onto the white floor. A part of the figure became grey. "ARGH! Do not touch me!" The figure shouted, and the echo spread throughout the emptiness. The grey spots spread across the figure's body. The hands emerged from behind the mirror and began to rub the mysterious cream on the figure.

It became fully white again. "Don't pollute me!" It shouted. The boy's eyes widen, and his heartbeat hastens. The figure pulled a part of the white floor and roof to enlargen itself. The figure blended perfectly with the background except for the light shadows. The pockets of natural grey didn't seem to bother the hands. "Let the hands cleanse you!" The figure said.

The boy knew this to be a trick. He needed to escape from this terrible situation. The mirror was right in front of him. Yet, he couldn't move forward. He curled with fear before the figure could attack him. The grey pool underneath his feet put him in an opaque bubble, enveloping him in darkness. However, this darkness was pure black, unlike his skin. Putting his hand forward, a bit of light escaped through a hole in the bubble barrier.

As the boy moved forward, the mirror seemed to get closer. Even though the monster lurked in sight, it didn't attack as it seemed scared of the grey. However, the bubble barrier started to melt, and the semi-liquid barrier fell on the boy. The mirror was just a few centimeters away. But, the weight of the cement-like grey barrier melt slowed his movement. The hands continued to drench the grey with cream. The boy reached out his hand to the mirror, unable to touch it. The barrier material vaporized as the hands put more cream. The hands made their way onto the boy's skin again. With the weight gone, the boy managed to touch the mirror. He couldn't feel the cold touch of the mirror as his finger seemed to go through. The boy pushed forward as the hands continued their never-ending quest for cleanliness. The hands successfully hold onto the boy to prevent him from going through the mirror. The hands managed to spread the cream all over his legs. The cream felt different as he couldn't feel the tip of his toes anymore.

He continued to struggle. The creature in the corner of his eyes stood still. It smiled with a gracious smile. It didn't seem evil at all, but its inaction to this horror was evil. "You must be pretty like us." It said with a smile that looked just like an infant's smile.

The boy bit the hands again, and he was promptly thrown into the mirror. The boy landed in his familiar dark world again. The mirror stood intimidatingly facing the boy's back. The white figure emerged from the mirror to suck the boy back into the world. However, the figure's body that went through the mirror disintegrated into the black world. The black boy was finally safe from the white figures. Thus, the world of Ying Yang continued to maintain harmony. There were mysterious forces preventing trespassing from ever happening again. "Please never do it again. Life in harmony." They cried.