“In here.” I said to Mira in a low commanding tone of voice. I quickly began dragging her confused but willing form toward the dressing room she had just been in trying on the clothes I had picked out for her earlier.

The conversation I needed to have with her really needed to be done somewhere private. And despite the lack of other customers around, a dressing room was the only really passable option at hand.

Hopefully, Dad wouldn’t get too impatient waiting around for us while he was people-watching back at the store’s front entrance.

“Wait a moment. Where are you taking me exactly?” Mira protested lightly, seeing where I was dragging her off to.

I did my best to ignore her complaints, as I did a quick look around the small hallway of the dressing area, before sequestering us both away inside. Still just the two of us for now. Bad for this shop's bottom line, good for the two of us.

Whipping the curtain closed behind me, I turned back around to see the bewildered face of Mira, her intense stare looking to me for answers.

“Y-you want to talk in here?” Mira squeaked, a slight crimson blush blooming on her cheeks.

“Yeah, I mean, it’s the best we can do on short notice, right?” I said with a smile on my face that had a notable nervous quality to its character. “I have something important I want to talk with you about, okay?”

“A-alright, fine. It must be pretty important to suddenly throw me away and confine me in your makeshift prison here.” Mira grumbled, looking down at her feet sheepishly.

Rolling my eyes at her dramatic interpretation, I focused my thoughts back on how best to broach the strange topic I needed to bring up with her.

How do you bring up with someone that you’ve been having strange prophetic dreams about them exactly? Should I just say, ‘Hey Mira, I’ve been having dreams about you.’ or ‘Hey Mira, I’ve got this strange and mysterious quest that’s all about you and your possible criminal connections.’

Maybe a mix of the two.

“So, Mira…” I started strongly, feeling a bit of my usual shyness coming back to me at that moment. Well, guess I still have a ways to go and more work to do before I really start getting better about at that.

“Yeah?” She replied, still unamused about our current situation in the dressing room turned makeshift prison.

“You know how I’m, uh, a supernatural right?” I inquired nervously, my fingers beginning to fidget while my hands clasped together.

“Uh-huh, I noticed it like right away when I saw you at that party.” Mira pointed out, her own nervous beginning to fade as mine increased.

“Well, you know how all supernaturals have their own different powers and abilities? Each of them potentially being different and possibly even unique.” I began to twiddle my fingers, in time with how I was trying to build up my moment in talking with her.

“Sure, I mean I don’t really know the details about all that stuff. Your kind doesn’t usually share it with non-supers, but yeah, I’m aware you all have cool and flashy skills that you can use.” Mira said with a more confident expression on her face now. She even went so far as to cross her arms in front of her, demonstrating her feelings now rather clearly to me.

“Right, right, so, well the thing is I have a special skill, unique even, related to dreams.” I revealed to her. The others at the IDPA might disagree with telling Mira about my unique skill, but since it was related to her it seemed important to at least tell her something. Plus, I did want to earn her trust, and revealing something important about my abilities seemed like a good step in that direction.

“Okay, that’s interesting I guess, but why is it so important that you dragged us both in here and got super duper serious about it all of a sudden?” Mira pouted, but she did uncross her arms then. Small progress.

“Well yeah, the thing is the dreams that particular skill gives me are kind of like warnings and hints about the future.” I casually replied.

“Huh, cool. So what, you had a dream or something with me in it, or something?” Mira guessed.

“Close enough, the dream I had was before we even really talked, before we got our English project together.” I corrected slightly, wincing internally as I needed to go over the last hurdle. “So yeah, I had this big long elaborate dream about you the night before that seemed to like, reveal all sorts of things about you and your life I guess. Most of which I still don’t really understand yet, but I’ve been slowly piecing together ever since I talked to you. Also, I got a quest from the Akashic Record to understand why I had that dream about you.”

I quickly blurted out that last sentence at the end, more out of obligation than any real desire to say it.

Now it was time to see how Mira reacted.

“I see, so you’ve been spying on me this whole time then.” Mira coldly chided before, after a second or so her expression shifted slowly into a playful smirk.

“Why are you smirking about that?” I demanded churlishly.

“Why not.” She said with a shrug.

If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

“Because I don’t know if you're being serious right now or not.” I complained. “I mean, if I heard someone was getting detailed dreams about my life, I’d be pretty weirded out about the idea of it, let alone talking with them about it.”

Mira shrugged again.

“I guess I’m just more used to this magic stuff than you are.” She explained with her arms crossed in front of her again. “And I never said I didn’t think it was weird or invasive, but you are working with the IDPA, so I’m not in the least bit surprised that you have skills that you’ve used to spy on me.”

“Mira, it wasn’t like that.” I protested. “I never asked for this skill, or for it to give me a dream about you, but it did.”

“...Okay, I believe you, but I’m going to go ahead and guess something important happened in this dream for the Akashic Record to give you a quest about it and for you to bodily throw me inside this dressing room here.” Mira inquired in her usual polite style.

“In the dream itself, not really.” I started to explain. “It was mostly an overview, I guess, of things about you. You working with alchemy, you gathering ingredients in the wilderness, and you uh, spending time by yourself in one of the school’s bathrooms."

“O-oh.” Mira suddenly became much more shy after I said that last bit. Immediately she dropped her arms to her said, her head and face becoming downcast and nervous looking.

“Yeah I saw images and scenes about you, but alongside those were some of your thoughts and feelings as well. At least the version of them the dream decided to share with me.” I told her with a small and hopefully comforting smile.

“I… see.” Mira replied quietly.

“So, uh, yeah, I’m not going to assume any of those um, aforementioned thoughts and feelings are true unless you specifically tell me so yourself.” I told her with a strong and determined voice now.

“...Thanks.” Mira said, her voice almost a whisper.

“That's alright Mira, I know we haven’t really known each other all that long now, but I… well, I don’t want to hurt you.” I revealed, a bit awkwardly.

“I don’t want to hurt you either.” Mira replied, with slightly more energy this time. “Not anymore at least.”

Quest Updated!

Side Quest: Girl in the Mirror

You’ve had a dream and a vision about a girl with purple in her hair and unusual ears hidden within. Why? Find out who she is, and how her fate might be tied to your own.

Objectives: (1/3)

“W-what the frick Mira?!” I stammered out. “You were planning on hurting me?”

Mira only shrugged, keeping her thoughts and feelings to herself for now.

“My quest just updated after you just said didn’t have any plans to hurt me anymore. The completed objectives for that quest increased by one Mira!” I loudly whispered in the still secluded but still public dressing room we were both in.

Mira shrugged again before saying. “I thought you might try to arrest, abuse, or even kill me. If you met someone you believed had plans to do those things, what would you do?”

“Not goad them about it the first time they talked to me.” I retorted, remembering how Mira had blatantly accused me of basically that when I first talked to her.

“I was trying to feel you out, get a sense of what kind of IDPA agent you were.” Mire calmly replied.

“So I guess I did well enough that you didn’t make plans to attack me then?” I asked, increasingly bothered by the idea Mira had made plans to come after me before now.

Though thinking about it, those were the final words dream Mira had said to me from the reflection in the mirror. I thought it was just an expression of dislike she had toward me, or what I represented. I had no idea that the warning and threat were so literal until now, though maybe I should have considered that possiblity more strongly.

“I wouldn’t have attacked you directly of course. That would’ve been completely stupid.” Mira revealed. “I would've probably mixed up some kind of strong poison and then put it in your food or drink whenever there was a convenient opportunity.”

“G-great, well, um, I’m super glad you didn’t do that then.” I answered rather nervously at the casual way Mira had just explained her plan to kill me.

“Me as well.” Mira said with a warm and almost sincere-looking smile.

Letting out a long sigh. I forced my mind to refocus on the present, and why I was talking to Mira about this stuff in the first place.

“Back to what I wanted to talk with you about.” I said in a stern voice, trying to steer things back on track.

“Aside from you spying on me in your sleep and my aborted plans to murder you.” Mira said with a small impish smile on her face.

“Yes, aside from that.” I replied icily.

“So early on in the dream I had about you, I saw you working with a bunch of different ingredients and doing some form of chemistry, or what I assume is probably actually alchemy.” I explained.

“Mhmm, yeah, I do a lot of alchemy work outside of school. I help my Mom with her business, and I’m technically in training as her apprentice.” Mira responded.

“Technically?” I inquired.

“Well, my Mom, never really gave me the choice. She needed the help, and she likely will continue needing that help in the future. Having me trained and able to do more alchemical work will make things easier for her in running the business.” Mira said with a bored, apathetic shrug. “I’ve accepted it.”

Judging by the Mira from my dream, she wasn’t as accepting as she was purporting to be right now.

“So you and you’re Mom do a lot of business related to alchemy then?” I asked, hoping that my question would lead me in the direction I was hoping to get to.

“Yeah, that is what I just said.” Mira replied emotionlessly.

“Okay, well…” I paused gathering up my resolve to ask about the other big piece of info I needed from her. “What do you know about this new drug called ‘spike’ or whatever?”

“Not much.” Mira calmly replied. “I’ve heard of it, but never had the money or interest in something like that. There are plenty of other legal alchemical recipes I already know how to make if getting high was my goal. Which it’s not… usually.”

“Okay, setting aside that last comment for the moment, you really don’t know anything about spike?” I pressed.

“I really don’t. No more than you do I’m assuming.” Mira answered, but her eyes were looking at me a bit more warily now. “Why do you ask, exactly?”

“Well so, some of the ingredients that I saw you working with, in my dream, were also ingredients that are, apparently, important in the manufacture of spike.” I revealed.

“What ingredients?” Mira pressed.

“Grave Breath and Wolfsbane.” I replied simply.

Mira didn’t reply for a long while, until suddenly she just said. “That fucking selfish bitch.”