The school of swordfish are stunning. In that moment, gazing at the way their silver scales reflect the light of the midday sun like a giant fish-based disco ball, it seems like very little matters.
It doesn’t matter that no one else can see these fish; it didn’t matter he’d just fumbled his way through another job interview; and it certainly doesn't matter that swordfish are not schooling fish, although that is the thing that bothers him most. Mika gazes at the way they dance in the air in open defiance of gravity and their own gills and begins to approach, noting the singular building they all circle.
When he arrives, the directory reads simply: Nightwatch: 8F. He stops, suddenly realising he has no plan whatsoever. Immediately, the wonder turns to panic. He tries to calm down, to take deep breaths, but as he feels it begin to build in his chest, he hears a voice call out.
“Hey, are you okay?” A concerned young girl, no older than seven, with a black backpack and a red dress, calls out to him as he stands idly by the entrance of the building.
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The voice snaps him out of it, jolting him out of his head and back to reality. He nods, grateful, pushing into the lobby to escape the embarrassment. He walks past the empty reception desk and towards the lift lobby, takes a deep breath and gets on board.
A young girl sits on the rooftop of a building across the street. She watches Mika enter the lift and smiles, her legs dangling out into open air. Behind her, the heat of the midday sun is abated as a figure behind her casts a shadow looming over her.
“It is unlike you to interfere directly, Atropos,” the figure observes.
“Hey Sis! Stories have to begin before they can be allowed to end, don’t you think? Besides, you need the boy too,” the girl smirks, still looking into the street below. There is no reply to this, but a moment later the girl’s brows furrow.
“Atropos? Does that mean-?”
“Yes, our sister has requested our presence,” the figure answers.
The girl smiles. “Finally! I was starting to get bored,” and with that she hops off the roof and both her and the figure are gone.