Matt hung an arm over the window sill, hand splayed to catch drafts that whispered through his fingers. With an eye to the horizon, he watched as the sky blushed sun-kissed pink, white clouds backlit a soft red.
For a few moments, he relished in the sense of peace invoked by the sight. It was soothing. But, alas, duty called.
With a sigh he drew his arm in and reached for meagre belongings, tucking a stiff sandwich and an identification rune into a worn satchel that he then strung about a shoulder. By the door, a set of sturdy overalls awaited. Faded by years of use, the frayed fabrics felt brittle to the touch.
Matt donned the overalls, slipping them over his thin frame with practised efficiency. They clung barely at all, a loose-fit, but reliable nonetheless. He fastened a leather belt around his waist, then with a final glance in the mirror, he plucked a deep blue cap from the door hook and seated it atop his head.
--------------------
A line of weary souls had already begun to form, despite the early-morning hour, awaiting their turn to be whisked away to their respective destinations. Matt joined the queue, eyes held to the ceiling as he shuffled forward moment by moment.
It was a common companion for his sight, the ceiling, and though once it may have left him stricken with awe, now he wished only to have it gone; the lofty thing was grand, high, and decorated with religious motifs of the Father god, who was said to have 'sired reality, space and time'. Not that Matt believed a whiff of the hocus-pocus.
'Don't get how they believe the stuff, I don't; I bet some old crook thought it up in an addled dream.'
Mind adrift, he failed to notice the commotion behind him. Two haggard men in a serious and half-drunken slurred debate, both right behind him in line. They bickered and hemmed and hawed with their words, till the one just behind stepped back into Matt, leaving him bereft of any footing.
Thwacking his head into the next person in line, he fell to the floor.
"I'm telling you," the man continued, unaware. "Gods above, they're making accursed artefacts there. Saw it with my own eyes, I did!"
The other man guffawed, "What? You? Hah! Funniest thing I heard all day I tell you. They won't be, you fool I bet-"
Matt tuned out the debate. He had picked himself off the floor by now and continued his trudge, albeit begrudgingly, after an apology to the man ahead of him. He gave a knowing, tired smile. 'Damn drunks.'
A small while later he wound up in front of the platform official Roger, flashing his rune.
"Hey, Rodge, busy morning eh?" Matt said, tone wry.
Roger pulled a rune scanner, swiping Matt's rune.
"Just go on, son. Too busy as always. MagiFlo institutes, setting off in 5. Next!"
Matt shuffled onto the platform and felt his body squeeze as it worked itself through the TeleportNet to arrive at the Magiflo Institutes platform.
____________________
The air was noticeably colder when he popped back into existence, wetter than it had been. The morning was deeper, too. Matt took a step from the platform, waving to the platform official and making his way to the overlarge doors of MagiFlo Institute.
A frigid draught caught his brown locks and blew them into an askew mess as he crossed the threshold. Runicly warmed air greeted him, a stark difference to the frigid morning air and comfortingly pleasant.
"Hey, Matt!" Hilda called. Matt smiled. Her voice was a greater welcome than the warm air, soothing in just the right way.
Matt flashed a palm in greeting. "Hey, Hilda! Early start today?"
"Yeah, the line for the kids was short today. Gods, they really need another platform for schools," she grumbled.
"Hah, they do, don't they? Anyway, Hilda, I'll be in office 1 if you need me. Starting there today. They had some stay late last night, left a royal mess."
____________________
The sun sauntered well into the sky by the time he was set to clock out, yawning butter yellows over freshly polished marble flooring. The place shone bright, and most importantly, clean. Being a janitor was mundane, boring and often under-appreciated, but Matt could say with a proud gaze and an upturned chin that he did well in it. No scuff would be left unmopped, no toilet bowl anything but sparkling porcelain.
He, of course, had wished to do better with his academic achievements. He had not worked his buttocks off for nothing. But it was all there was available; just weren't enough jobs anymore. Magitech Institutions, such as the one he worked at, used magic and technology to automate many jobs that otherwise required skilled hands. Hell, it was a miracle he hadn't been phased out yet.
Of all the products they'd yet to develop, automated cleaning was one of them.
And... Matt paused, mop in hand, narrowing his gaze. "Is that... the drunk?"
The drunk, haggard as he had been when he had tripped Matt - though considerably more sober - donned a white coat with a hand clasped over a round small glowing circlet. It took a moment for Matt to shuffle through his memories, but it looked to be from a researcher. He recalled them having different identification runes.
As Matt took a swig of water from the bottle in his satchel to soothe his parched throat, the man held the rune to an ID pad by a door, swiftly unlocking and entering through the door. He appeared to be in a light panic and forgot to close the door in full.
Matt found this weird, not for the man's actions, but because he had entered the store room with cleaning supplies. What could leave him in a panic that he would absolve by entering what amounted to be a janitor's closet?
Tucking his bottle of water back, by the sandwich he had yet to touch, Matt strolled towards the door at a leisurely pace bucket and mop in tow. He would have to talk to the man himself.
He did not, however, get the chance. Mere seconds after the man had slipped through the door, a loud clap resounded behind Matt. It was a loud thing, and slammed into and through his ears. Matt stumbled, trying and failing to find purchase on the wall with a hand. He fell. For the second time that day.
And he had had enough of it. Though he could not hear, he stood and turned to face the direction of the clap. It was a battlefield. Spells and bullets ripped to and fro; fireballs, magically charged bullet that left visible wakes in the air at their passage, great tufts of marble torn and flung as if thrown by invisible hands.
"What?" he muttered. It made no sense. Men and woman suited head-to-toe in the greatest Magitech armor had to offer fought and screamed through the lobby with viscious intent.
"What's going on!" he screamed. That earnt a hole through the chest. A roiling bullet of pure dark thundered towards and through him, leaving him no means to pump blood to his brain. He felt himself fading.
On death's final doorstep however, something happened. Something intervened. Everything 𝘵𝘩𝘳𝘶𝘮𝘮𝘦𝘥. The chords that composed his very being were strung by delicate hands and unwound. Transplanted. Matt woke with a start.