Meditation has taught Pravda to accept things as they appear without trusting her own perception. Reality is but a mirage of effects. As she learned to look at things from the perspective of others, she understood that she herself would be perceived as varied as the number of people she met, provided they took notice of her. The point was whether a person took notice of her. Long as people refused to acknowledge her, it was futile to introduce herself. Ignoring her meant they did not want to know. They would always find ways and excuses to evade her. Communication depends on a common ground of shared assumptions, otherwise every encounter leads to head-on confrontation: “Who is not with me, is against me.” Welcome to the zoo of alpha animals …

The dreamer entered the twilight zone from the other side of the mirror’s silver lining. To stay sane and not get sucked down the drain by the drab rationality of his fellow beings, he had taken refuge in the dreams provided by Hollywood, Bollywood and rock’n’roll: promises of avenging angels who would come across the astral sea, riding the avalanches of the Apocalypse to do away with sanitation and rationalization to allow for humans to ascend to an higher level of existence and explore the range of their potentials beyond life insurance and survival mode …

All those nights wasted in agony over promises that never materialized, leaning with his back against the mirrored wall of the one and only club far and about, waiting for a song that would lure him on out on the dance floor where he would sweat out the poison stored up in his system. The poison he was being fed every day by his sane and presumably sentient fellow beings, haunting him even in his dreams. Where did his yearning originate that suggested things he had never seen or felt? It suggested that the real life had to be found in the beyond of reality …

Reality a hallway of mirrors that reflect our own expectations. How to break on through to the beyond? What would he find, once he had broken through the smooth, slick and cold surfaces? Never having been offered anything but lies, made not only reality but also himself hard and bitter, taking cover inside a castle built of frozen tears. Nothing could scale or penetrate the walls. To him, a smile was but a frown turned upside down, intended to lure him in and trip him up. Those scintillating, scantily clad ladies that winked at him from glossy pixel puzzles had to be carnivorous flowers of flesh. Once he would fall for one and surrender to her embrace, the fleshy folds of her wound would wrap themselves around him and the juices would digest and absorb him, to be embedded into the code of an alien’s DNA, with nothing left of him, not even traces of a memory …

The mirror is the interface where dream meets matter-of-fact reality. The dreamer staring at his own reflection as he tries to guess how he might be perceived by the latest of scintillating ladies that had crossed his path in matter-of-fact reality. Depending on the time of day and his mood, the prospect seemed promising or depressing. So what was his real self, the promising or the depressing version?

Countless hours wasted in front of the mirror, and never did he receive an answer. Carrying a copy of the latest image he had found in the mirror around with him wherever he went. Reality a hallway of mirrors. How to break on through? No matter how many times he reached out, the cold, indifferent surface did not relent or respond. The mirage just shrugged at him, turned around and walked away, or jumped in his face, making him jump in fright …

The battle of opposing forces and interests had strengthened both their defenses until they could barely move, trapped inside their armor. Unable to move and exercise, their hearts grew brittle with the wear and tear of time, consumed by unanswered yearnings. When they did not care anymore, a slight, but gentle touch sufficed to break the brittle defenses, the glaciers of frozen tears melting and the waters rising to meet the rain that was pouring from the heavens to cleanse their hearts …

The frozen, polished surface of the mirror liquefying to allow for Pravda and the dreamer to reach out, their fingers touching and intertwining, pulling each other in gently. Their hearts quaking with terror and fear as they felt each other’s breath on their lips. Ready to die and be devoured as their lips made contact, transmitting the deep tremors they were shaken by, their breath and heartbeat fusing as they rode the crest of their fearful yearning. It was now or never, nothing else would ever matter again …