“Another fear, another customer!” echoes the voice of Mr. Penklinberg in the back Fitz’ mind, as he rounds a street corner.
It hadn’t been difficult to sell Mrs. McGregor on the Falling Satellite Deluxe package; after all there’d never been as many satellites in the earths orbits as today! And who knew, what if that Tesla billionaire actually held up manufacturing standards, right? One of those weird machnies could very feasibly fail and fall down right atop Fitz’ very own head. It’s an almost inevitable reality to be quite honest. Fitz shudders at the thought and recalls how shaken Mrs. McGregor had been, “yeah, me too, ma’am.” Satellites were one of the many things keeping him up at night.

The next house on the list was an equally lavish place as the last and most definitely just as far out of his price range. His tablet tells him, this is being airbnb’d and someone had moved in recently. Who better to inform about the dangers of kidnapping, weddings or haunted houses? No one. It’s important to stay on top of things, after all.

A short while later, after checking his breath, hair, tucked in shirt, shoe laces, contents of the suitcase and his expression (a slight, persistent worry, as usual), twice, he rings the door bell. “Almost sounds like a machine coughing-”, he thinks before the abrupt opening of the door.

“Hello!”, the woman says, “Hello!”, Fitz echoes. After an uncomfortable few seconds staring into each others eyes, with nobody willing to make the first move at introductions, he finally folds: “My name is Rudolf Fitz Meier of the Don’t you worry! Group, here’s my card.” - a practiced and fluid motion - “You can call me Fitz though, everyone does”, he finishes with a smile.

"Hello Fitz, thank you for this gift!" she says and takes the card. She holds it as if it were a precious artifact of some kind. She does not read it. "I'm sorry I don't have a gift in kind prepared."

After a moment her completely impassive face turns into a smile that would have been quite pleasant if the timing had felt less like she suddenly remembered that smiles exist at all.

After a moment of expectant silence she adds "You can call me..." A slightly too long pause. "Selene, of no group in particular."

A plant next to her blows in the wind and she absently puts a hand on it. It stops moving. 

"You seem worried, are you in distress?" Her face adopts gentle empathy.

In the background a muffled door bell goes off, once more. The sound of a running shower is audible.

“Oh Ma’am, I mean, Selene, of course I am worried…,” he replies not missing a beat, “How couldn’t I, given how dangerous the world out there has gotten?” He seems a bit frazzled for a moment, until he remembers to take a deep breath and to release the tension in his lower back, just like his physical therapist had drilled into him three years ago.

Back on track he continues, “So many things could go wrong, when leaving the house, or even, when staying home! Be it natural disasters, other people, or simple bad luck and bad fortune; something will inevitably cross paths with you, no matter where you are and what you’re doing.” He seems serious.

He does not notice the plant’s gentle sway and its slow shift from a warm green to a dark teal. Similarly, a small painting on the wall - a rendition of the Kraken pulling a mighty ship with 7 pearly-white sails down under a stormy sea - shuffling along the wall, as if to “get a better look” at him, completely slips his attention.

He finishes his introductory spiel, leaning into what he knows best: fear of everything and everyone. He adds, “But I am here to help. May I come in?”

Selene listens to this spiel without interrupting, with rapt attention.

"I can see why you'd be worried! Please do come in. Freely offered help is always welcome. I vow to protect you from dangers without and within for the duration of your visit."

There is not a hint on her face that this would be a lighthearted nor superfluous promise.

She takes a few steps back and makes an inviting gesture, followed by leaning on the wall without looking, coincidentally fixing the frame of the kraken painting to the wall with her shoulder and wiping up a few splashes on the ground with her bare feet.

As he enters, he'll notice a hat rack in a gothic style. He may not notice it makes faint sleepy noises when interacted with. There are no clothes on it.

When he's done hanging his coat Selene blinks and stops staring into the distance. "Tea!" she says with some triumph, as if it was a particularly difficult word to recall. "Would you like some tea?"

The entrance opens into a grand lobby with a spiral staircase. She leads him past a door from which the shower noise eminates, into a lounge with a dining table that has a view into an open kitchen with a kitchen island. There are plants and closets and cupboards, a few ornamental statues, fine rugs and a bombastic flower as a centerpiece in front of the far wall. The entire space has a liminal feeling.

She gestures an invitation in the direction of the dining table with a soft smile.

“Ah - yes, tea!”, Fitz yelps. The sudden exclamation had knocked him out of his ruminations about what exactly she meant by “freely offered help.” He is getting paid after all!

Following past the presumed bath on the left and entering the next room, a dim resemblance of IKEA showrooms and apartment showings washes over him. Stepping on - or rather through - the thick rug feels a little like quicksand, but Fitz is too occupied with his visual assessment to notice.
“Orderly,” he decides mentally and adds it to his tally of possible character traits while sitting down.

“So, do you live here alone? The place feels… a little big for just one person,” he inquires under the guise of small talk.
To Fitz this apartment certainly seems big enough for a family of three or four, even including a pet or two. (Maybe she’s open to pet insurance? Or “regret of not owning a pet” insurance?)

While waiting for tea and response, his gaze wanders across the room. First the statues; weirdly arranged so they’d look exactly at the head of the table, where Fitz is seated. Second the table itself: large, solid oak, undoubtably expensive, and absolutely spotless. No signs of regular use, yet not even a hint of dust either. “Very orderly,” he thinks, “must be freshly sanded and oiled?” The rug is sticking to (pulling on?) his shoe, but his attention is hijacked by the large flower.

Spiral patterns seemingly interweaving, passing under and over each other, moving, reaching? Asking … permission??! Fitz’ head starts spinning in tandem with the flowers enigmatic emissions. Lines in the wallpaper quickly join the mesmerizing motion.
A few seconds in, slight tremors grab hold of his left hand; usually a surefire indicator of “Doom is heading your way, Fitz!” His superstitious mother always called it premonition, his therapist regularly calls it a nervous tic.

In the overwhelming circulation a slow realization forms:
It wants an answer.
Now.

From a singular point of light in the fog, a barely audible voice says

"fitz... Fitz... Fitz."

Expectantly, the patterns spin and spiral and keep building to something final. Everything that matters is following the flower. To accept. To invite. To submit. All he needs to do is to answer.

And then suddenly, right next to his ear, softly, yet with authority.

"Fitz, say no."

"NO!" Fitz yelps automatically.

And suddenly, he finds himself back in his seat with a very fuzzy recollection of the last few moments.

He turns to his right and is suddenly face to face with Selene, who is leaning in close to his side, well within his personal bubble.

Fitz inhales sharply when he notices how close she is, "Sorry, what did you say?" he stammers. Is that a smell of.. kelp..? from her hair? It smells odd, yet somehow pleasant.

"I said, most people like Earl Gray, no? Is that something you enjoy too?" Selene says.

She realizes she's very close for an interaction with a human- er, for polite company, and justifies it by presenting the bag of tea so that Fitz can smell it.

Do her eyes have irises that... gently rotate? He looks away on impulse and rubs his eyes. Irises don't rotate, that must be in his head.

"Earl Gray is great! Haven't had that in a while..." he trails off.

And then she is across the room in the kitchen searching for a pot in the cupboards, moving like a dancing fairy.

With some relief, Fitz' gaze again wanders across the room. He sees a large flower for the first time. The placement is that of a centerpiece of the room, but while it looks big and imposing, it also looks... disappointed somehow.

On the wall to his left he sees a painting of the Kraken pulling a mighty ship, which seems familiar somehow. 

While his head is turned, Selene has interrupted pouring water into teacups to use hand gestures to silently argue with something hairy in a cupboard. Then she smoothly closes the door as Fitz turns back, and finishes the tea.

She sits down on another chair at the table and sets one of the cups in front of Fitz. She produces the card she was given, and places it in a central position on the table, leaned against a set of abstract table decoration in incredibly dark black. After appreciating the card for a moment, she sips the scalding tea casually and gestures to Fitz.

"Now, tell me more about why you're here! How can we help each other?"