The sun was unusually quiet that morning.
It had risen, technically, but the light barely reached through the window. A thin grey brightness rested against the curtains without making much effort to enter the room.
I stepped out of the bathroom, still drying my hands.
"What time will the furniture be arriving?" Sadako asked.
I stopped.
"Hmm."
I looked toward the clock.
Then thought back to yesterday.
"Didn't we tell him to have it delivered this evening?"
I began dressing, pulling the shirt straight before reaching for the jacket.
"Oh..."
I paused.
"But we won't be around."
Sadako considered that while tying her hair.
"We could inform the Superintendent."
There was a brief silence.
I remembered the man we'd met yesterday—the person responsible for the building, who had shown us the apartment and explained the arrangements with the patient expression of someone accustomed to new residents asking questions.
"That's a possibility."
I fastened the last button.
"Let's do that."
Sadako nodded.
I adjusted my hair in the mirror.
Behind me, she was already dressed.
"The skirt really suits you."
I looked down at it.
The museum uniform still felt slightly unfamiliar against my legs, particularly after having spent so little time wearing anything like it.
"Thanks."
I glanced toward her.
"And they really match your necklace."
Her hand went instinctively to the bottle at her collarbone.
"Hmm."
Her fingers rested against it for a moment.
The stone was warm.
It always was.
She looked at herself in the mirror and adjusted her tie.
"What's the time?"
I checked the clock again.
"It's... hmm. Ten minutes past seven."
She paused.
"Seven?"
"Yes."
She looked at the clock herself.
Then toward the kitchen.
"Hmm. Okay. We still have time for breakfast."
That was apparently enough.
We went to the kitchen.
There was no time to make rice properly, not if we wanted to leave without rushing.
"No time to cook rice and prepare a side to go with it," I said.
Sadako was already opening the cupboard.
"I know."
She took out the tea caddy and placed it on the table.
"Boil some water."
Then she opened another cupboard and produced bread and butter.
I filled the kettle.
The click of the switch sounded unusually loud in the quiet apartment.
While the water heated, I watched Sadako arrange the bread.
It was a simple breakfast.
Tea.
Bread.
Butter.
Nothing particularly remarkable.
But it was different from what we had eaten before.
Different was becoming an interesting word.
Not necessarily better.
Not necessarily worse.
Just something that hadn't been ours before.
We ate.
"Excited?" I asked after taking a sip of tea.
Sadako nodded while chewing.
"Hmm."
She swallowed.
"Very."
I smiled.
Breakfast continued quietly.
I spread more butter across my bread and looked at the clock again.
We still had enough time.
Barely.
Before leaving, we spoke with the Superintendent about the furniture.
He listened, nodded, and assured us that someone would be available to receive the delivery.
That removed one concern.
Then we went downstairs.
The stairwell smelled faintly of cleaning solution, and our footsteps echoed against the walls as we descended.
Outside, the morning air was cooler than I expected.
The city was already awake.
People moved along the pavement in different directions, some carrying bags, others walking with the determined pace of people who had somewhere they needed to be.
We made our way toward the bus stop.
There were already several people waiting.
Sadako looked toward the road as another bus passed.
"It seems buses are indeed a new form of transport, no?"
I looked at her.
"You say that as though we've discovered a new species."
She ignored that.
I smiled and waited beside her.
The bus arrived with a hiss of brakes.
People shifted forward almost immediately.
We followed.
Inside, the air was warmer than outside, carrying the mixed smells of fabric, morning food and the faint mechanical scent of the vehicle itself.
We found seats.
I was fortunate enough to get the one beside the window.
I settled against it and exhaled as the bus pulled away.
The city moved past the glass.
Shopkeepers lifting shutters.
Workers crossing streets.
Children being led toward schools.
A woman carrying vegetables.
A man reading something while standing at the corner.
Everyone seemed to already know their place in the morning.
I watched them.
Then remembered something.
"Ah."
Sadako turned.
"What?"
"We didn't prepare anything for lunch."
She looked at me.
I don't think she heard properly because the bus had begun moving faster and someone near the front was talking loudly.
I looked back through the window.
"We'll manage," I decided.
The museum appeared before long.
Even after seeing it yesterday, its size still caught me.
The building seemed larger once approached from the street, its stone façade rising above the surrounding buildings with the quiet confidence of something that expected to remain there for generations.
We climbed the steps.
"How come you never visited the museum?" I asked.
Sadako looked at me.
"Visited others. Not just this one."
She sighed.
"You know that."
"I know."
We reached the entrance.
A security guard looked up as we approached.
He was probably in his forties and wore a formal black suit rather than the museum's staff uniform.
"Good morning, ladies. You must be the new employees."
Sadako answered first.
"Hmm, yes. Good morning."
The man smiled.
"May I see your ID?"
I hesitated.
"We haven't received them yet."
He looked at us.
Then at our bags.
Then back at us.
For a few seconds, nobody said anything.
The pause was long enough for me to become aware of my own posture.
Finally, he nodded.
"All right. Please make sure you collect them."
"Of course."
We passed through.
Once we were several steps inside, Sadako exhaled.
"That was stressful."
She chuckled.
I couldn't help smiling.
"Good morning, Ito-san."
We encountered her before we had gone very far.
"Good morning."
She looked at us briefly.
"Hope you had a good night's sleep."
"Yes, ma'am."
She was already walking again.
We followed.
The museum seemed different this morning.
Yesterday it had been a building we were entering for the first time.
Today it was a workplace.
That small distinction changed how I saw it.
The corridors had destinations now.
The doors had departments behind them.
People passed us carrying folders, equipment, trays of documents.
Ito-san began explaining our work as we walked.
How to guide visitors.
What could be said openly.
What should not be said.
The difference between the public explanation and the fuller version.
Most importantly, how to recognize when a visitor's questions were approaching the boundary between those two versions.
She explained it without making it sound complicated.
"The trick is knowing what the visitor actually needs to know," she said.
She paused beside a display.
"Not everything that is true needs to be said."
Then she continued walking.
I looked at the artifact behind the glass.
That seemed like a useful principle in more ways than one.
Ito-san continued.
"You might need to do a little reading, though."
"Understood."
"And visit Fujimoto-san's office for your ID and passbook."
I nodded.
Then our paths divided.
Sadako was placed in charge of guiding a school group.
Ito-san looked at her for a moment before explaining.
"You already know how to handle children in an educational context. Those skills transfer directly. It'll give you immediate competence while you learn the rest of the role."
Sadako's mouth curved into a small smile.
She didn't need to say anything.
She had understood what Ito-san meant.
Teaching was something she knew.
Something she was good at.
And now she had been given an opportunity to use that ability somewhere new.
She followed the group toward the public galleries.
I went in the opposite direction.
My work was cataloguing.
Back-of-house.
Assessment.
The artifacts that required attention before they could be placed before visitors.
It suited me.
Perhaps too well.
I found something interesting almost immediately.
Of course I did.
I had barely begun before my attention caught on an object resting beneath the careful light of a work station.
An old sword.
Or perhaps a dagger.
The metal had been cleaned in some places but remained dark in others, its surface marked by age.
I waited for instructions from the man working beside me.
"Do you have much knowledge of the world's history?"
Mr. Nicholas asked.
He was carefully cleaning what appeared to be a dagger, holding it at an angle beneath the light.
"No."
I thought for a moment.
"Just recent history."
I was drawing on Sadako's memories.
What she knew.
What I knew through her.
Nicholas smiled.
"That's okay. I'm learning myself."
I leaned slightly closer.
Perhaps too close.
My interest had already taken over.
The object label caught my attention.
I read it aloud.
"Death... pretty face."
I frowned.
Then looked at the rest.
"From the Age of Gods."
I paused.
The phrase meant something.
But not enough.
"Interesting, isn't it?" Nicholas said.
He smiled as he continued cleaning.
"Yes."
I looked at the object again.
"I'm not aware of an Age of Gods. Do you mean the age of demigods and city-states?"
Nicholas stopped.
For a moment, his cloth remained against the blade.
Then he shook his head.
"No. It's correct."
He hesitated.
"The Age of Gods has archaeological backing. Or so I heard..."
He laughed suddenly.
It was a strange laugh.
Brief.
Almost embarrassed.
He covered it with a smile and returned to the artifact.
I watched him.
"Hmm."
I didn't press.
Instead, I moved toward another section.
There was a photograph of markings at an excavation site.
Random symbols.
At least, they looked random.
I stared at them for longer than I intended.
Something about them bothered me.
Not because they were frightening.
Because I couldn't tell whether I had seen something similar before.
I filed the thought away.
Things that will become clear.
That file was becoming rather large.
By midday, Nicholas dismissed me for lunch.
"You can eat at the café."
"Okay. Thank you."
I left.
Sadako was still working with the school group.
The café was busier than I expected.
I found a seat and ate without lingering.
The food was ordinary.
Good enough.
Nothing worth making a note about.
When I finished, I returned to the work area.
The afternoon passed in a rhythm of cataloguing, recording, cleaning and checking.
The work was repetitive in places.
It was also strangely satisfying.
Objects had to be handled carefully.
Records had to be accurate.
Dates had to match.
Descriptions had to correspond to what was actually present.
And occasionally something didn't quite fit.
Those moments were the interesting ones.
By the time I realized how late it had become, the light outside had already begun to soften.
Evening had arrived.
Our first full day had disappeared almost without asking permission.
After waiting a bit for Sadako who was putting something away we left the museum together.
The air outside had cooled.
Sadako adjusted her bag as we walked.
"How was your first day?"
"Really interesting."
Her pace quickened slightly.
"I was discussing Zoë Windsor of present-day Velkar and her wedding to King Antonik Timothy."
She paused.
I could see the moment she realized she was becoming too enthusiastic.
I smiled.
"The marriage that was said to turn the Dukes against him?"
"Yes."
Her expression brightened.
We stopped at a vendor along the street.
Sadako bought some pork and handed over the money.
The vendor counted it before placing the food into a paper wrapping.
"How about you?" she asked as we resumed walking.
I adjusted my bag.
"Mostly paperwork."
Then I remembered the artifact.
"But I learned about the Age of Gods."
Sadako turned toward me.
"Don't you mean the age of demigods?"
I smiled.
I had expected that response.
"No. The Age of Gods happened long before the Demigod Epoch."
She slowed.
"Oh."
For a moment she considered this.
"Interesting."
Then she smiled faintly.
"Good to know you like it."
I didn't answer.
Because that wasn't quite what I was thinking about.
The city moved around us.
People passed on either side.
The paper wrapping in Sadako's hand was still warm from the vendor.
And somewhere behind us, inside a museum that looked perfectly ordinary from the street, an old object carried a label describing an age I had never heard of.
An Age of Gods.
I had spent one day cataloguing things I didn't understand.
Already, I wanted to know more.
And that was probably the first real problem.