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It had been hours but the woman he had seen on the bus this morning still lingered on his mind.

Javier had made it to work before wondering if it was strange the way his heart clenched at her disappearance. It was also, clearly, strange that the woman had disappeared off the bus but Javier had been caught up in his emotions at the time.

Work was simple as usual, with Javier meeting a few suspects, finding them to all be innocent, and sending them off. Everything was normal as normal could be, until later in the day, when Javier had gotten off work and was heading home.

He sat on the back of the bus, a mirror from that morning but this time it was darker out. It's Florida so it never really got dark until midnight, especially not in the springtime, but it was getting there.

The scene was pretty similar to that morning, a few teens in the back, some more elderly riders sat in the front and business folk getting off work sat around the middle. Javier sat beside a taller woman with a sunny disposition, despite being so late in the day.

She smiled at him and, when their eyes connected, Javier felt a strange sort of buzz, like an adrenaline rush/high.

"Hello," Javier couldn't stop himself from saying. "You're not from around here, are you?"

The woman smiled, a bit confusedly, "I grew up around here?"

"But you don't usually take this bus, right?" Javier asked, his internal investigator coming out. "Because I've never seen you here before."

The woman's face dropped, "I take this bus every day, but I've never seen you here before."

Javier froze, "What?"

"I'm Lizzie, what's your name?"

Javier sighed in a monotone exasperation clearly caused by the redundancy in the situation. "My name is Javier," he said. "Are you not at all concerned about the seeming impossibility of the both of us being on the same bus?"

Lizzie shook her head, "Not really. I live outside of Easton, I'm not really surprised we haven't noticed each other."

"I live in Miami?"

"Wait, what?" Lizzie's face screwed up into a confused expression. "But then how are you here in Easton?"

"I'm not, that's my point. I'm in Miami, you're in Easton, wherever that is," Javier said. He stood, his stop was up and thinking about this too much was going to give him a headache.

Lizzie sighed, "Easton is in-"

Javier sighed, "I don't really want to know, okay? I'm just going home."

He turned away from Lizzie and pulled the trigger to stop the bus. It stopped at his stop and Javier turned around to say goodbye to Lizzie but she was gone.

Whatever. He's exhausted and wants to go home, the disappearing lady on his bus wasn't really his top priority.

Javier walked off towards his house.

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Gloria put the drink down in front of the man who sat at the bar and then turned to her co-worker, Bastien, who was busy pulling beers for a group of 20-something boys. "Can we please kick them out?" She rubbed at her forehead as they started feeling the migraine develop.

"You wanna get paid?" Bastien asked, their voice as smooth as butter as they handed over the beers and turned to the next person approaching the bar.

Gloria rolled their eyes. If only their band had made it big when she was a teenager. At least then she might not have to work this god-awful job.

One of the boys, at least Gloria had to assume he was one of them with his ruffled blonde hair and loose demeanour, approached the bar and asked for a shot of vodka. She wanted to raise her eyebrow but refrained, "Sure.

The second she set it down he picked it up and downed it, making an unsavoury face but smiling back at her, though Gloria had been unaware that she was smiling in the first place. "Sorry, it's just been a long day," He said, his accent unfamiliar, he was definitely not part of the group of boys hooting and hollering. He was quiet and his eyes seemed to only connect with hers.

"I understand long days," Gloria said, motioning around herself. "I've been here since 18:00 and I don't get to leave until past 1."

"That's nothing, I worked from 9 to 17," he said, face planting into the bar before looking up at her through his eyelashes. Gloria shrugged, that wasn't too bad. "In customer service." Holy shit that sucked.

Gloria poured him another shot, "That's on the house for your sacrifice."

He downed it with the same loose energy as the first one. "Thanks. I guess."

They looked around the bar and were confused as Bastien was gone, not behind the bar with her but, looking out over the bar they couldn't see him anywhere. "Hey, the guy working with me, did you see where he went?"

"Wait? Cristin? He's over there," The man pointed to the left of Gloria but no one was there, not even some guy she had never met named Cristin.

She stared at the guy for a hot second, "How drunk are you? I really hope that free shot didn't just toss you over the line. Also who the fuck is Cristin."

He stared back. "Cristin works here, he always has. Who are you? Do you work here? Did you just poison me?" He stood up, sort of stumbling back. "Holy shit you poisoned me."

"I did not poison you," Gloria said, reaching forward to try and grab him and stop him from falling but he tripped and it sort of looked like this grown-ass man, fell into the floor. He disappeared. He was there one minute accusing her of poisoning him and then he tripped and then a whole human man was gone.

A hand landed on her shoulder. "Gloria, you good?"

She turned her head spinning. "Um... I think I should probably take my break."

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Talia Lumiere stood on the white paper and stared into the white lights as the camera snapped. The soft blue dress that enveloped her skin felt like wings and the makeup on her face felt like a mask that separated her from the room.

Her photographer, Gemma Necci, paused. "Talia, can you do something ballet-inspired?" Her Italian accent made Talia smile for a half-second before she nodded and stepped back before jumping up in a sort of jêtê that made the dress flow in the air.

By the time the photos had been taken, Talia was back down on the ground. She did a few sitting and lounging shots in the outfit and then went to her dressing room to change into the next ensemble.

It was an empty room with the outfit that the stylist had already shown Talia how to wear.

"Wow. That's an outfit," a rough voice said. "Not sure if it's something I would wear but whatever."

Talia froze. This was supposed to be her personal space during this shoot. "Who are you?"

She stood up, her hair was cut short in a blunt bob and Talia loved the way this woman wore her turtleneck and her long woollen coat. "Alyona. Who are you?"

"Talia," They said. Trying to keep their voice calm but this was unnerving, especially since she had had a few stalkers before. "This is my dressing room. Were you aware of that?"

The woman's eyebrow raised. "No, actually. I was not."

Talia tried to nod. But it felt forced, most things would feel forced when there is a strange woman in your room. "Well now that you are, can you leave?"

"From my point of view you're in my office and that is a little strange," Alyona said, her hair waving as she moved her head with her words. "Either way this is uncommon. Because you are in your dressing room and I am in my office but I can see you and you can see me. Correct?"

"Yes," Talia said, feeling so confused and uncomfortable. "But why is your office a dressing room?"

Alyona shook her head, "No. You're clearly not getting it. I am in my office, you are not, you are in your dressing room and I'm not. It's some sort of hallucination. It has to be."

"Right, I'm imagining you telling me that I'm imagining you." Talia turned and began pacing back and forth across the carpeted floor. "That's insane. I'm going insane. Did I drink enough water today? Probably not."

They looked up, to where Alyona had been standing but there was no one there, the hallucination must have dissolved. Which is probably how those work. Maybe. Talia Lumiere was not a psychologist. How was she supposed to know what her brain was doing?

A knock on the door interrupted her as her manager asked how long she would be.

"Just a few minutes," Talia said, before grabbing a water bottle and downing it.

She was probably just dehydrated.

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Henry Stone stood outside a large brownstone. Sure, it was his apartment building and he had just returned from a run but it was more dramatic sometimes to pretend it was a stakeout. Sometimes it's easy to remember that Henry was 21 and sometimes his paranoia would peek out and you would remember that he was a CIA agent with many missions under his belt.

He opened the outer door and unlocked his inner door and, when Henry pushed it open, there stood a man. He was Asian, maybe Chinese, wearing a black hoodie and cargo pants and he stared at Henry, who was itching to reach for the handgun he kept in the drawer by the front door.

"Um, hi?" The man said, seeming confused as to why Henry was there. Which was weird because this man was standing in Henry's house. "If you're a Mormon, I'm not super interested in joining any churches. I'm not a very religious person."

Henry blinked, "I'm not a Mormon. What are you doing in my house?"

"I'm not in your house." He said, leaning against the doorframe, his hands comfortably in his pockets. "What are you doing outside my house if you're not a Mormon?"

"It's my house," Henry said, pushing past the man, who pulled his hands out of his pocket and tried to grab Henry, to keep him out of his own house. Henry expertly evaded the hands and grabbed the firearm out of the side table he kept by the door for his keys. He pointed it at the man, squinting his eyes to aim.

"What the fuck," The man said. "Uh, what the fuck. What do you want? You can take anything. Just not my cat. I really love my cat."

"I want you to get out of my house," Henry said, his eyes narrowed and his heart racing.

The man looked like he was hyperventilating. His chest rose and fell in an aggressive fashion as his eyes darted back and forth. "Is this some kind of hate crime? Holy shit I'm being hate-crimed."

"This isn't a hate crime," Henry almost yelled, frustrated. "Just get out of my apartment."

"Apartment?" the guy asked, his eyes darting between the door to his left and... the door to his right? A door that didn't belong in Henry's house. One that hadn't been there when Henry rented the apartment or when he left that morning for his run.

Henry wasn't really thinking about protocol, his training, or even what the logical thing to do would be, but his hand lowered the pistol and his other one lifted up to run a finger along the stark white door frame that did not match any of the darker wood frames in the building. And then Henry remembered the other man's existence but, as he turned back to the front door, no one stood there.

And there was no door.

And Henry Stone, CIA, stood alone in his house with a firearm in his left hand and his right hand tingling with the sensation of touching the wood that didn't exist.