Welcome to the Zoo (I)

"So... " Jet said, letting it hang in the air as he walked beside Mitya. "where are we going?"

"You will see soon." Mitya answered, still sounding irritated with him.

Rolling his eyes at the man, Jet said, "It better not be too far, I've been on my feet the entire day, you know."

He didn't get a response for this, but he didn't let this affect him. Humming in thought, he smiled at the idea of how much money he would be making — provided he wasn't exposed for the fake he was — in short order. Jet was always in need of more money, as he had the remarkable habit of losing it as soon as he got it to bills and debts that had stacked up over the years. A steady paycheck would be a welcome change.

"It is not."

A scant few minutes of walking brought them right back to the café that he had just left. Furrowing his brow, Jet asked, "Here? Are you serious?"

"Yes." the man stated and walked along to wall, following it around the corner until they reached a side-entrance. The man opened the door and then stood back, holding it open and waiting for Jet to enter first. Smiling politely at him, he entered and looked around at the hallway that met his sight. There was nothing immediately interesting, but he took off his shoes at the doormat like Mitya did after him.

There were indoor shoes standing side by side on a shoe-shelf just a meter from the door. Smiling in amusement, Jet pulled on a pair while Mitya stared at him intensively until he did.

The walk through the mellow hallway was short, and in seconds they reached a second door passed a corner. Quirking his eyebrow at the sight of a keypad, Jet waited while Mitya typed in his code. By now, it was automatic to remember it.

The room they entered this time seemed like the stereotypical coffee lounge. There were armchairs and sofas, coffee tables, plants placed on surfaces and in the corners. A chandelier — really? what was this, a video game? — hung from the middle of the room and lit it up. There were no windows, but it didn't take anything away from the room's cosy appearance. The walls were colored a light blue, with paintings hanging here and there. Jet took a few steps into the lounge and said, "Okay, I'm impressed."

Throwing a loot at Mitya over his shoulder, he asked, "Now what?"

The man entered after him, and now that he was out of the sun's rays, Jet could suddenly see his features take shape. He looked harsher in person than he did on his ID, but he supposed that that was to be expected. Who knew how long it had been since it had been issued? Jet hadn't seen a date on it.

"I will introduce you to the boss." Mitya said in a no-nonsense tone of voice.

Jet only nodded in response, and waited until Mitya started walking again to follow after him. In the lounge, only two people were gathered. One of them was the nonhuman lady whose fortune he had pretended to read during lunch and the other was an old woman with grey hair that he didn't recognize. They walked passed them on the way to the other side of the room, where he saw yet another door.

Another keypad, and then they were standing in an office. As the door closed behind them and locked automatically, it hit him that he really should have notified someone before he followed a stranger to this place.

They could still be kidnappers.

There was no reason to hesitate. Pulling out his phone from his pocket, Jet scrolled through his contacts, looking for someone trustworthy and discreet, until he tapped on one that didn't hate him. At least he hadn't screwed them over recently. He sent them a quick text telling them what he was doing, then put the phone away again.

When he looked up, he saw the older man with hair that was starting to grey, seated behind the desk in the middle of what appeared to be an office — an immaculate one, not a thing was out of order — giving him an amused look. Not being used to being the recipient of those, Jet shrugged his shoulders and offered, "Sorry?"

The man behind the desk laughed at him and waved his hand, "No worries! I understand that you're still uncertain. So, ask me anything and I will answer you honestly."

"Okay." Jet said and let his eyes wander around the room in thought. "What specie is Mitya?"

"Ah, I'm terribly sorry but that's — wait, he let's you call him Mitya? He doesn't let anybody do that." the presumed boss of the Libra Detective Agency said, looking shocked. "Well, regardless, that's personal information that I'm not at liberty to reveal. Ask the man in question, he's right beside you, if you're so curious. Anything else?"

"That's fair." Jet stated and continued, "Mitya said I'll be getting a monthly salary of three thousand dollars and a ten million bonus if we make it through this mysterious catastrophe. Is that true? You're not trying to lie to me, are you?"

The boss nodded, "It's the truth."

Jet nodded in understanding. "Then I don't have any more questions."

"Great." the boss smiled and gestured to a piece of paper on his desk. "Then just sign this here and we're all good to go."

Jet stalked closer and picked up the paper from the desk. Reading it over, he ensured that he wasn't about to be trapped in something that he couldn't get out of if things went to hell, and then signed it with a fancy fountain pen. He gave it back to the boss and turned around to leave.

By the door, it hit him that he had forgotten something, so before he opened it, he glanced back and asked, "What's your name, boss?"

"Well... " the boss said and smiled at him, the kind of glaringly fake smile that would get him punched on the streets. "That shall forever remain a mystery."

Jet laughed and nodded, "Sure. To each his own."

Mitya opened the door in front of him and they left the office. Then he was standing back in the lounge, which was now full of six people, including Mitya. All of them were seated on different surfaces and he was admittedly a little shocked to see that the bored cashier was one of them.

Following behind Mitya, he sat down on one of the sofas and examined the people around him. All of them were very obviously nonhumans, they all sat with that strange sort of confidence that came with having access to magic and supernatural abilities. A few of them gave him looks as he sat down, clearly examining him as well. Jet just smiled at them.

Aside from the teenage cashier and the lady that he had scammed — successfully, or she'd be punching him right now — there was a pair of sisters, close in age to him, if they aged anything like humans. They both had snakes for hair, tanned skin, and sunglasses covering their eyes. It wasn't hard to realize that they were both medusas. In addition to them was the old lady, who ignored him completely and spent the time playing games on her phone, dressed in a neon pink sundress. Jet couldn't even begin to guess what she was.

Eventually, it was one of the medusas who broke the silence. "Dima, who's the newbie?"

"Jet Flynn, fortune-teller." it wasn't until Mitya responded that he realized who the woman meant. So they called him Dima? Well, Jet had already gotten used to calling him Mitya in his head, he wasn't going to change it.

"I've told you, we don't need one." the same medusa insisted harshly.

Mitya just answered, "Boss' decision."

The sunglasses were light enough that he could see her rolling her eyes behind them. "How do we even know he's the real deal?"

"Don't worry, Calista." it was the same lady who he had scammed earlier that reassured the woman. "I've checked him out myself, he's good."

"And how do you know that for sure, Hali?" Calista retaliated.

"I don't." Hali answered calmly. "But the boss has already made his decision, and the paper's have been signed. There is nothing that we can do to change it. And we need a fortune-teller to help us figure out what exactly it is that's coming."

Calista sat back down on one of the armchairs that decorated the lounge and glared at Jet. Jet was very glad that she was wearing sunglasses, or he would be stone right now. "Well, I'm not going to accept him." she stated and glared at him some more. Jet was starting to think that she harbored some kind of grudge against him.

If that was truly the case, that could be a problem.

Leaning back against the sofa, Jet asked Hali, "Was that a test, by any chance?"

"No." the golden-haired woman answered simply.

Seeing that she wasn't going to elaborate, Jet turned his attention to other things. Like staring at Mitya. Now that he could actually make out his face, it was downright startling how handsome he was. It was such an inhuman handsomeness that it was almost unnatural. Jet supposed that the face was just so symmetric it went against what his very human mind labeled as real.

Tilting his head to the side in thought, Jet observed the contours of the man's face. Was this what it felt like to be in the presence of a celebrity?

It should be.

Still, there was only so long that he could stare at people before he got bored, so eventually, after minutes had passed by, Jet asked, "What do you do for fun around here?"

He didn't get a response.

Pulling out his phone, Jet clicked on a game and sighed in boredom while it loaded. Really, nobody was going to answer him? Were they that unhappy with his employment? It had seemed like Mitya had been pretty desperate when he had offered him the job, but maybe that was just him. Maybe the other's didn't take the "catastrophe" seriously.

Well, Jet was still getting money out of it, so he didn't care if they disliked him. But they could at least make an effort to be welcoming.

"Hey, Mitya." Jet said. "It was an actual soothsayer that told you all about this catastrophe, right?"

"Yes." Mitya answered.

Jet hummed in acknowledgement. "Then why is she so opposed to me being here?"

Mitya breathed out deeply and turned toward him for the first time since they sat down. "It is because medusas don't get good endings, due to Athena's curse. Because of this, they do not like anyone that speak the words of fate. You do not need to take it personally."

When Jet shifted his eyes from Mitya to the people still gathered around them, he rose an eyebrow at the shocked looks that were being directed at him. "What?"

It was Hali who responded, "Dima let's you call him Mitya?"

"Yes." Jet stated. "What about it?"

She seemed to be suppressing a smile when she answered, "It's just, he doesn't allow anybody to do that."

"Isn't that a good thing?" Jet asked her and continued when she looked confused back at him, "That just means I'm special, right Mitya?" he directed the last statement to Mitya and when he didn't hear any denial, he just smiled smugly, pleased.

"I suppose so." Hali agreed. She stared at him, her bright blue eyes roaming over his whole body like she could see into his very soul.

And who knew, maybe she actually could.

He could see her thinking something over, contemplating some piece of information that he didn't have access to. He wondered what was going through her head.

She nodded more to herself than to him and said, "Special? That might be it."