Back inside the cabin, they uploaded the cut footage and huddled around Sigrid’s laptop, breath fogging in the cold. The screen refreshed, the video already climbing in numbers they had never seen. “Impossible,” Ása whispered, pointing. On the grainy clip, beyond their staged thrashing net, a vast coil rippled under the ice, a shadow too big to fake. Leaning closer, Jori laughed too loudly. “Someone hacked us. Gotta be.”
Arguing erupted, voices bouncing off bare wooden walls. Viktor’s hands sliced the air. “We ride this. This is our shot.” Sigrid shook her head, pale under the lamplight. “It wasn’t us. We need to leave—now.”
Pulling his phone from his pocket, Jori started a livestream, cheeks glowing with adrenaline. “See? Nothing happens,” he said, his grin shaky. Then the reflection in his screen rippled, water distorting his features. Clutching the device, he stumbled back. “It’s—” His voice cut short as his arm jerked forward into the glowing rectangle.
Leaping to his side, Ása grabbed his jacket, knuckles white with strain. His body bent at an impossible angle, torso half-vanished into the glass. With a sickening lurch, the jacket slipped through her hands, leaving her clutching empty fabric. The livestream still ran, comments scrolling in frantic emojis.
Breathing hard, Viktor backed away, eyes fixed on the phone lying faceup on the dock. Jori’s hand still moved inside it, waving frantically from beneath a rippling surface of dark water.
Kicking the door shut against the wind, Ása yanked the power cord from the wall, plunging the cabin into dim firelight. “No more uploads,” she said, breath ragged. Viktor barked a laugh, pacing near the window. “You think unplugging lamps will stop it?”
Gathering phones into a pile, Sigrid smashed the first with a hammer, glass crackling across the floorboards. Leaning against the table, Lene muttered, “If it works, the footage is everywhere. Millions have seen it.” Ása pressed her palms over her face, whispering, “We have to cut it off here, make it harder for it to spread.”
Shoving back his chair, Viktor snatched his phone before it hit the pile. “If we’re smart, we can own this. Sell the rights, control the narrative.” His eyes gleamed with desperation, fever outrunning ambition. Sigrid snapped, “Jori’s gone, and you’re pitching sponsors?”
Turning his screen toward them, Viktor froze. With no signal, the display glowed, water rippling across its cracked glass. A blurred shape slid beneath the surface of the image. Leaning closer, Ása whispered, “It’s his hand.”
The fire guttered; the cabin exhaled. Screens long-dead sparked with ghostly light: a shattered tablet on the shelf, Lene’s ruined phone lying face-down, the black television screen buzzing. Lene staggered back, hands raised. “We killed the power—this isn’t possible.”
Crouching, Ása watched her reflection twitch inside the broken shards, lips moving though her mouth stayed shut. Her reflection mouthed words she couldn’t hear, water dripping against the glass. Backing away, she shouted, “It’s not in the lake anymore—it’s in us.”
Viktor gripped his phone tighter, jaw set. “Then we use it. Before it uses us.”
Crouching by the generator, Viktor jammed the switch down, its rumble swelling against the frozen air. Lights flared in the cabin, their glow baited hooks in the dark. “We need the feed running,” he muttered, breath steaming. “People are still watching.”
Inside, Ása spun toward the window, fury sharpening her voice. “You did this? After everything?” Leaning against the doorframe, Viktor smirked, knuckles white around his phone. “This is bigger than us. We can control it.” His words barely landed before the room trembled with a low, aquatic groan.
Mirrors bloomed with water. The shattered tablet leaked ripples across its fractured glass. Leaning closer to the stove, Lene screamed as her reflection’s face stretched, mouth opening wider than bone allowed, a hand clawing through. She stumbled backward, dragged into the iron surface with a boiling hiss.
Sigrid hurled a chair through the window, shards spraying outward, but each fragment shimmered into liquid panes. Her reflection stepped free of one shard, dragging her in with effortless strength. Ása clutched her head, rushing water roaring inside her skull, every reflective surface now a doorway.
Crouching low, Viktor raised his phone, its screen pulsing with the Lagarfljótsormur’s silhouette twisting in black water. “They’ll see me,” he said, voice breaking. “They’ll see everything.” The reflection reached out, coils spilling across the floor. Viktor vanished before his phone hit the boards.
Alone, Ása staggered outside, the night sky bruised with green aurora over the lake. The worm broke the surface, ice shattering as coils arched skyward, its eyes glowing—drowned lanterns. Kneeling at the shore, she watched her reflection kneel back, mouth opening as the water surged to claim her.
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