This story took place before the mission's kickoff happened.

The tender gaze of the sun is caressing the lamp post that's neatly placed upon the side of the road. Shadows from the lamp posts shades some children which are running away from the school, stomping the side walk without care, and mentally tired from today's lesson. They're running wild, racing against each other to the closest point of interest. I can hear one of them shouting to their friends to go faster. The volume of those little angel laughing fades, as my bus drive away from them. I rest my head beside the window with my eyes darting from side to side, trying to focus on an object that passes through my vision. This situation reminds me of a time where I'm on that very same sidewalk, applying to a body of government that I didn't know exist.

I was so happy when I passed the test and got my first interview with one of the agent. The agency felt like a super-secret-club after all, not everyone could pass the entrance test, let alone work there for a living. I was eager to see what's waiting behind that door they called "opportunity". A naive woman with little to no worldly desires, optimistic, and full of fire. My excitement have overflowed my sense of reality, painting the agency as an organization that's made in heaven.

Yet after several years of working here, I've found out that being a stay-home wife might not be a bad idea. Long working hours, the competitive aura of most of the employees, and stacks upon stacks of paperwork weighing my back until it almost break. It's such a disgusting place to be. At least, they're paying me enough to live my life without thinking too much about money. It must also be admitted, that the human resources here are trying their best to make up the flaws of the working environment. They gave us bonuses and benefits, which are very nice to have.

Now that I think about it, maybe it's just me that's too invested in this "woe is me" kinds of mentality. I need to fix that attitude soon. Ideally, I need to scrape some of my free time to have a self reflection moment where I also lay down the choices that's presented to me. Right now, it's either continuing this boring day-to-day work-life balance or married myself to some old timer with a lot of money.

Speaking of self reflection, I do realize the limit of my ability when it comes to work. Mentally speaking, it's easy to realize that I'm not built for this kind of environment. An environment where everyone is competing to be the best at something that I don't even care about. Unnecessary, non-existent rivalry, made true by their stupid circumstances. Like those kids, racing each other on the sidewalk. There's this one time where everyone is trying so hard at doing boring paper work for a drop of compliment from our manager. If I ever want to lick the boot of a person that hard, at least I want him to be my husband first.

My day dreaming is disturbed by a sign, located not far outside of the window. It's a sign made out of metal with white background and dark, very thick font. In capital, the word written on it says, "Kirana Apartment: A Place To Be". That's my cue to stand up from my seat, because I'm not that far from my stop.

After getting of the bus, the sign that I just saw welcomes me like an old friend. I walked past it to the parking lot then goes inside the apartment. Once I got in, a girl in baggy clothes and training pants greet me with a smile. She's my room mate, Agent I. In the evening such as this one, she's often seen near a supermarket buying a woman's essentials. Pads, soaps, and snacks with enough calorie to overfed an elephant.

When conversing in private or undercover, we tend to not use our agent's codename to refer each other. Instead, we use a nickname derived from it. We decided to stick with whatever the other one decides, and I decided to call her "Aya". She also got a bit creative and nicknamed me, "Pim".

Both of us exchanges a smile and call the elevator like usual. The contraption behind this transportation machine is transparent, only for the style value of it all. A bio-luminescent like liquid is seen behind it swirling around within a very thin tube, like cables on an electronic. Those "liquid" of course, are a small amount of mana that's used for powering up the magic script, embedded inside the elevator's floor. Once the doors open, we got inside and pick the floor which our room resides in.

I started a small talk to fill the silence that seems to persist right now.

Pim

So Aya, what have you got there?

Aya

Ah these things? Only the essentials, you know what I mean. I'm going through that time of the month again, it sucks ass. Sure, the snacks could ease it and took my mind somewhere else beside my tummy, but it still sucks. It's like I want to punch someone while saying I love you to them.

Pim

That's... Quite the symptom you got there Aya. Fortunately, I don't have it today. Maybe because my body realizes that I'm not mentally ready to mix the feeling of pain and dread with whatever the hell is going on in my professional life right now.

Her face relaxes with a hint of empathy written on that cute enviable face. Enviable, as in "how is she able to remove every single pimple on her face with just water and routinely going to the shower", kind of enviable. She seems concerned with whatever I'm going through right now. After rustling her bag for several seconds, she pull out a long cardboard tube filled with crispy chips. Beef flavoured of course.

Pim

You seem to not enjoy things anymore this last few days, it's making me worried. Do you want to talk about it over Ms. Taters right here? I know its your favorite. Thought it'll help your anxiety or whatever things that you've been holding back right now.

The elevator starts to grinds to a halt, with the number of our floors illuminated near the metal door that's protecting us. Our room is not far from here, just a few steps away from where we are right now. As we approach the door, I grabbed my key and told Pim to not worry too much about it. Despite saying that, I really want to tell her everything that's weighing down on me right now.

It does makes me think about the consequences of opening my heart out though. No such person in this world would want to hear another woman's problem, especially when you have an annoying pain around your stomach. Because of that, this mouth is then kept shut, never to say anything about any personal problem ever again.

At least, until we opened some chips then bawled our eyes out. Screeching and crying about how deplorable our life is, disregarding my notion to stay shut about anything that could be considered personal. These tears then got clogged and pushed away by the flakes of chips, smothering our mouth with artificial beef particles that gets everywhere. With a stuttering and wet voice, Aya told me her work experience.

Aya

... and then... Then he gave me this vwery beeg... ASSignMENT!

C-C-Can you believe it?! Weeeee arree engaged now!

Yet he DARES to give me this s-s-stupid... No... It's not stupid, but you get what I'm saying don't you?!

How can he be so cruel to me... I mean, I need to go to twelve different departments that's on each side of the island. T-T-THROUGH TWO DAYS WORTH OF TRAFFIC! Just for some lump of papers that I...

do not need!

You know what he said to me when I put this documents on his table? Do you?

She put her hands on my arm, pressing against it while shaking me violently like a hopeless child. Looking at it up close, I can see a thin black eyeliner dripping down her face. The tears remove most of the elegance of the make-up and made her into a goth-like person. I try to finish the chips on my mouth and swallow it, while I'm shaken from front to back. After a second or two, she stops doing it and stare me deeply, as if asking for an answer. I answer it with a horizontal head shake, and her reply is rougher than what I was expecting.

Aya

This bastard that I love, gave me only two words.

"Thank you", he said.

"Thank you".

EVEN MY AUTISTIC NIECE KNOWS BETTER THAN JUST SAYING THANK YOU AFTER I GIVE HIM A COOKIE!

A stooooopid "thank you" with no expression, then he proceed to work on some mission stuff. It amazes me that I choose to pick this guy over literally anyone else in this country.

We are living in a country that we call, The Republic. It's located on the south west of a super-giant floating island that we simply call Ha. In The Republic, there is at least five hundred thousand men and there's a big minority among them that are yet to be married. I don't really care about the "Mr. Right Guy" and spiral myself into the statistics of "what if" and "what if not", because I know another person that have gone into the same exact way of thinking. She doesn't end up a happy person until her death, despite leading a nice and relatively conflict-free life.

Aya

You know what, P-Pim? I do not care about this marriage thing anymore. Where's the trash can...

This thing need to go into that trash can!

Without further thinking, I know what she's referring to. Its about her engagement ring that she got about a month ago. I picked myself up and run up to Aya before she did anything stupid. Her fingers can be seen centimeters away from the trashcan.

Pim

Stop it Aya! You need to relax and not get your emotion overflows!

Look, let's solve it together ok, I'm sure there's a variable that you've yet to see here. Come one Aya, sit beside me.

The ring is off of her finger right now. I grabbed it as soon as I saw it and let her sit beside me. Aya cried for a bit with my shoulder as her support. Her eyes starts producing this watery, clear, liquid that soaks my clean shirt thoroughly.

I can literally feel her sadness right now. The feeling of confusion, unspent frustration, and regret. All of those expressed through sobs and rant of the past. She almost cost herself a marriage, and I don't want that to happen because of some chips.

To be quite honest, most of what she's saying is unintelligible to me. Most of the time it's just grumble and moan of a sad woman. As she talks without any good syllables coming out, I can see her lips are filled with a mixture of saliva, snot, and tears. It doesn't smell bad or anything, which surprises me because I'm disgusted by my own breath. Maybe that's a personal thing.

As I was thinking the kind of toothpaste she is using, I started to realize something. Shouldn't I be the one who's crying right now? I mean, she did gave me some Ms. Taters, isn't that her original plan for me?

Aya

I'm sorry Pim. Sorry for being a useless woman. I mean, I can't even process these documents right, then have the audacity to moan at the slightest inconvenience. Must've been hard for you to handle me.

My head swing left and right, telling her that it's not true. She is definitely not a baggage to me, not now, not ever. I caress her back, hoping it would soothe her emotion. While doing it, I pick a leaf of tissue and start to clean the snot that's dangling on her nose.

Pim

Look, I know that you're in a middle of a very complicated problem right now. Emotionally speaking at least. But let me tell you something, how about we clear our heads by doing something relaxing instead?

She rotates her eyes up to my face with an unintentionally cute puppy-dog-eyes and replied with a sore voice.

Aya

What kind of relaxing thing are we going to do anyway?

Pim

You will see. Now, put some casual clothes on, we are going somewhere near here. Let's just say, it's one of your favorite activity.

Within ten minutes, we walked into an establishment that I hope would give her some clarity of mind. It's a medium sized room, located within the confine of the apartment. The entrance itself is nothing grand or fancy, just a lone door with a plaque that reads, "Open For Business". We feel a gaze coming from behind that door. All I see is a pair of eye, placed upon an obfuscated face, thanks to the sanded glass that's covering most of the door.

After several seconds, that person finally let us inside of the establishment. She's an old woman in her 60's, with smile comparable to a wise maid from the ye-ol'-eras. I noticed a name tag on her black and white outfit that says, "Morgana".

Morgana

Ladies, please come in. Welcome to the "Morgana's Spot". My name is Morgana, the lobby-lady, at your service. May I ask of your needs, ma'am?

Pim

Thank you Morgana. I would like us to be treated as usual please.

Morgana

You word is our command, Miss Pim. Please walk through the hall and enter room number twenty seven.

She let us walk to our designated room and leave us at the lobby.

I can't say anything about the interior of this establishment without using some hyperbole. The lobby itself is larger than expected, which doesn't include the area inside of those rooms. As far as I know, there's at least 30 rooms here, ready to be used by their customer. Also, the 180 degree turn of style if compared to the door entrance, the drapes of expensive carpet covering these hard ceramic floor, atmosphere made in heaven filled with artificial relaxant, faint-orange mood lighting everywhere, and every other detail that I can't enumerate silently tells us that this is a place to relax.

"Morgana's Spot" or just "The Spot", is the one of those place where the business thrives just by words of mouth alone. They don't advertise their business with placard or pamphlet, yet there's at least fifty branches of "Morgana's Spot" located all over the country. Inside of an apartment, right down the main road, or even near a school, they are everywhere. This is a business that operates based on a woman's need to chill and forget this week's problem. A spa day experience, for the weary workers and stay-at-home mothers.

Another employee welcomed us in with the door open. Inside, we see a small room decorated with dim green light and two small bed for us to use. We are served by two young woman that looks professional in their white, nurse-like outfit. Both of them are using the same name tag as the one that greeted us back at the lobby. White, decorated with a thin black bar made of metal, and coated with a smooth layer of plastic. Confusingly, each one of those tags are written with the exact same name, "Morgana".

Morgana

Welcome back Miss Pim. I assume she is your acquittance?

One of them nods at Aya with a sleek, trained, smile. On her hands, is two layers of neatly folded garb. I've worn them before, it's an unassumingly white robe that you wear on yourself and tightened by a string made out of linen. She gave it to us and points on the general direction of a small room, covered with thin yet opaque curtain. Anyone would be able to feel the sleekness of those curtains just by looking at the light which bounces off of it. A tiny symbol made out of wood is glued on the side of the entrance to that room. It's a pictogram of a person that's taking off their clothes. This is without a doubt, a dressing room, meant only for us.

Morgana

Dear Patron, please undress yourself and wear the robe that we've given to you. But before that, I would like to confirm something, Miss Pim.

Pim

Yes, Morgana?

Morgana

Both of you are going with the usual, correct?

We nod confidently and starts to walk towards the dressing room.

Once inside, I took off each article of clothing that sticks to my skin. Not a lot actually, because some of them are already off once I got inside my apartment. Also, I wear nothing special when coming into places where you would take off your clothes anyway. A hoodie, plain white shirt, dark skimpy jeans, and a matching undergarments.

Of course, it needs to match the color of both the top and bottom part of my body. No it's not because I'm expecting anything at the office, but because I value myself and appearance. Even in my lonesome.

I put all of my clothing into a brown bag, made out of kraft paper, with rope like materials embedded on each side acting as a handle. You could see a small, very distinctive logo printed on each side, placed near the bottom of the bag. It's the insignia that represents Morgana's Spot, which is just a cursive writing of the capital letter "M" and "S", overlapping each other loosely.

After changing into the white robe, which I didn't tie and let loose as if it's an open jacket, one of the Morgana greeted me by taking the bag out of my hand. Our hands grazed each other as I gave the bag to her. It's smooth and oily, the hallmark of an experienced employee. They've massaged and treated so many people to the point where the property of their massage oil is embedded unto their skin. Only from that, it's natural to conclude that we're at the hands of an experienced masseuse.

We lay down ourself on the bed that we saw earlier. I close my eyes and try to not listen towards the rustling of the masseuse, trying to grab oils and such. They starts the service by applying our backs with a nice smelling oil. It's hot on the body, but not too much for it to burn your skin.

Aya seems to be enjoying herself as she gets messaged up and down her worn down body. She looks very relaxed with not a frown on her face. I hope this place could bring some peace of mind for her.

After a while, they starts to use a contraption that I always wonder how it works. It's a white sheet with a complicated magic code on top of it. A magic device that have serviced me for some time. Morgana placed it upon my back and pour a little amount of mana. After a second or two, I could feel a relaxing vibration that goes into the front of my stomach. If I could compare it to something that's a lot more analog, it could be the same as getting messaged by a very tiny hands that knows exactly where your relax points are.

While getting messaged, Aya asked something to one of the Morgana. I assume she's talking to the one closest to her.

Aya

Morgana, this thing on my back is really relaxing... Felt like a cold piece of paper at first and then gradually became hot and vibrating.

If I may ask, what is it?

Morgana

It's a magic device ma'am. We crafted it very carefully so it could make our patrons relaxed and have some benefits too. One of them is stress and back pressure relieving effect that we have researched upon.

Aya

Well give my thanks to whomever researched this magic device. It helps my back somehow and my problems seems to eased away because of it.

While she is talking to the masseuse, something annoying catches my attention. A muffled voice of man and woman, conversing. One of them seems to be a bit mad about something. Their voice seems to be leaking in from outside of our room.

After a bit of back and forth between both of them, silence ensues. Even both of our Morgana seems to slow their activity down, as if waiting for something to happen. Lucky for them, it did.

Three very distinct knocks catches the attention of the Morgana that's currently handling Aya. She politely bow and remove herself for a moment to response to the knocks. Morgana opens the door and seems to be talking for a brief moment with a man in dark clothing. She grabs a piece of paper from him and directs her gaze towards my eyes.

Morgana

Miss Pim, the man outside seems to be from your workplace. He said that you need to read this as soon as possible.

I change my position to a sit and read the given paper carefully. It was crumpled up and dusty, as if coming from the hands of a that's holding a handful of pencil lead. There was a poorly written text that's incomprehensible to read. I need to partially close my eyes to get an extra detail or two, to build more context around this message. The message is as follows.

bOSS OFfIECE tOMMOrrOW

All that drama for a single paper that told me to go to "his" office tomorrow? Well, that's anti climatic.

We are now at the office. About 15 minute before lunch and 2 seconds after I heard his voice. The weather was nice as seen in the window behind him. Bright with a hint of cloud, occasionally dimming the sun's light above it. Although I described it as a great day to run about the park, it certainly isn't a good day for me to be called into office.

Pim

Ok let me get this straight. You disturbed me on my spa day. Sent me a male agent to an obviously female establishment. The same male agent who you knew couldn't write a simple sentence without stumbling himself into a pit called "league of shitty writing". And you send me this guy because you're running an experiment?

Authoritative Voice

It was a test run okay. I've got myself some new blood that doesn't have any work yet, and without-

Pim

ON.

MY.

SPA DAY.

The news that you're about to give me better be good, or I am going to personally burn this agency down.

After I said that, his face turns from a joyful boy who just got caught stealing candies to a solemn man that's about to announce something serious. His hand went down his table, still glaring at me with intent, without his head ever moving. He took out something from his drawer, a piece of glossy paper. The paper is upside down, with just a very clear written letter "L" on top of it.

Suddenly, I remember why I'm called to his office. Today is the day. I agreed to this several months ago. Was it at the end or the start of the year, I'm not so sure. A contract that I signed because of the pay check and benefits. Not just any benefits, but something that I've been wanting to do for quite sometime.

This is it. The person in that picture will be my husband. And somehow, I'm okay with that. But why?