A young part timer was helping his colleague move a few set pieces. The middle aged man patted his shoulder.

  “Be careful with your back, you won’t be able to work long that way !”

  The part timer smiled.

  “Yes, I will be careful !”

  He put down the fake pilr to catch his breath and wipe the sweat off his forehead.

  “Still, it’s quite impressive… I mean, everybody knows Manon Sarmer, but seeing the set of one of her music videos is something else !”

  A big warehouse had been emptied and rearranged, half of it was as good as new, completely cleaned up and polished, and the other half had been artificially worn down with rust and scraps, windows broken and gss shattered on the ground. In between, as if to mark the passageway to another dimension, fake marble pilrs were aligned aside a mirror road. It was quite impressive, even without the lights set up and the editing effects.

  The part timer took a deep breath and lifted another pilr, grunting with the effort, when someone spoke to him.

  “Let me help you.”

  He quickly turned his head to see an imposing woman, probably a head or two taller than him, helped by her heeled shoes, looking down on him. She seemed menacing somehow, her aura of elegance and cold beauty didn’t let any emotion slip through. She was in light clothing, easy to move around, yoga pants that fred up at the bottom and a cotton shirt, with long wavy brown hair tied up in a high ponytail.

  The part timer shook his head.

  “No, it’s okay, how could I ask you to do something like this ! Don’t worry, I’m okay…”

  But the woman didn’t let him finish.

  “This wasn’t a question.”

  Without as much as breaking a sweat, she easily lifted the fake pilr and walked away, leaving the young boy stunned. His colleague came running to him.

  “How could you let Mademoiselle Cyrielle do this kind of thing !”

  “I told her not to but she didn’t listen to me !”

  The middle aged man sighed.

  “She is too nice for her own good… With the amount of work she has, why is she still helping others ? I can’t understand her at all…”

  The part timer scratched his head.

  “Her amount of work ? Isn’t she just a singer ? I mean, I saw her in a few magazines so I think she models and designs too, but nowadays she isn’t in as many covers…”

  His colleague hit him in the shoulder.

  “How can you be so uninterested in your own job ? She doesn’t only sing in this song we are shooting for, she helped compose it, she is the artistic director who imagined this set, she designed and created the outfits, and she even storyboarded the whole video ! You see those fake pilrs ? She is the one who crafted them too !”

  The part timer opened his eyes wide.

  “She did all that ? No, that’s not possible…”

  “She is not possible. But she is here. So show a bit of respect.”

  The young man looked a bit confused, and tensed up even more when he saw Mademoiselle Cyrielle come back towards them, and smile elegantly at his colleague.

  “Fabrice, you did a good job, it looks exactly like I had imagined it.”

  The middle aged man ughed.

  “How could I mess it up ? Your sketches were so clear ! Honestly, it’s much easier that way, some clients only send a few words and tell us to make it work, it’s great when we have clear directions !”

  “I’m gd you think that way. Concerning the schedule, this afternoon we’ll shoot the second part and I would like to add a few gss shards here…”

  The young man observed the both talking, his mouth agape. When Mademoiselle Cyrielle finally walked away, he turned to his colleague.

  “Do you know her ? How are you able to talk to her so casually ?”

  Fabrice smirked.

  “Finally interested in your job ? Well, to be honest, I don’t know her at all. She just wanted to talk a bit about the set yesterday and we ended up conversing for a while. She is too nice, I tell you !”

  On the other side of the warehouse, Cyrielle opened the door leading to her dressing room. Julie was looking at her with a disapproving look.

  “I told you to take it easy ! Why are you going around moving things ? We already have people to do this !”

  “I’m not doing anything too hard, don’t worry.”

  ‘I can’t possibly tell her that I received a gift to strengthen my muscles st week, right ?’

  [At this point, she probably wouldn’t believe you.]

  ‘Yes. But it’s great that I was rewarded because of the music video, right ?’

  When she had come to the meeting, Manon Sarmer had loved her storyboards and the sketches she had made of the set thanks to the ‘Home and Garden Design’ ability. In fact, the red haired singer had loved everything Cyrielle had brought, to the point it seemed strange. And when the stack of paper was handed to her team to review it, suddenly Cyrielle had seen a message.

  [Your image is getting imprinted into more people’s heads, and their beliefs have changed. It is a great achievement ! Path of Destiny rewards you with a gift.]

  The wheel didn’t give her much, only a silver ‘Moderately better strength’, but it was enough for Cyrielle to be stronger than most people. She couldn’t send someone flying with a punch, but if she wasn’t careful she could probably crush a hand while shaking it.

  “I only helped a little so that we could start the shooting earlier. After all, the warehouse is only rented for two days and we need to leave it in its original shape, which means changing the gss on the windows.”

  Julie sighed.

  “I know. Well, start preparing if you want to shoot earlier, you aren’t even in your outfit !”

  “Okay.”

  Two hours ter, a white figure was standing under the moonlight, a long frilly dress dragging behind her on a clean concrete floor as she walked in the empty warehouse, singing a slow song in her angelic voice. Suddenly, she heard something and turned her head towards a few sparkles that seemed to lead her to something. It was a low voice echoing her own, coming from the middle of the warehouse. There was a void devoid of any light, a bck ball of nothing that pulled her towards it. Touching it made a road appear, a long mirror path that reflected her moonlight lit white dress and her shiny red hair. The pilrs seemed to distort, moving closer and farther away as she walked on the path.

  “Cut !”

  Cyrielle lifted her eyes from the monitor after hearing the director's scream. The sparkles and the void would be added while editing, but even without that, she had been fully immersed in Manon’s performance. Next to her, Julie nodded.

  “She is a true professional. It only took three takes for it to be perfect ! But are you not nervous ? It’s your turn next !”

  Cyrielle smiled elegantly.

  “Don’t worry, I have nerves of steel.”

  Before hearing Julie’s answer, she walked towards the gss path. Next to her, Fabrice was grumbling.

  “Be careful, there are gss shards everywhere ! Seriously, what did you think, walking barefoot…”

  “It’s to mirror Manon’s scene.”

  “But her side of the warehouse isn’t that much of a mess ! If I knew, I would have refused to break the windows !”

  “Don’t worry, I will be fine.”

  After soothing the middle aged man, she stood in front of Manon, with the director instructing them.

  “Don’t forget, there will be something between you, like a gss panel that we’ll add in post prod, so you must not move closer than this, and you need to mirror each other’s movements as much as possible. I fully expect this to take a while so I prepared a few hours. Do you need to try it for a bit ? If you are not perfectly in sync, it won’t look good.”

  Before Manon could answer, Cyrielle shook her head.

  “It’s okay, I’m ready.”

  The director seemed skeptical, but he walked towards his chair in front of the monitor. Manon smiled.

  “Are you sure it’s okay ?”

  Cyrielle nodded. And as soon as she heard the A of ‘Action’, she activated ‘Acting’ and prepared ‘Mind and body linked’. Now, she was ready.

  Manon started to sing the chorus, slowly moving her hand up while staring at Cyrielle, and without missing a beat she imitated her. Next to the monitor, both the director and Julie froze.

  ‘Wait, something is strange…’

  As if cwing at an invisible surface , Manon had both hands in front of her, but the only thing present was Cyrielle’s hands, exactly one centimeter apart. Julie was sweating.

  ‘No, but how is it possible…’

  Manon lowered her head, and so did Cyrielle. Everybody was watching with bated breath.

  ‘It’s not only her movements, even the way she blinks, the raise of her shoulders while breathing, Cyrielle is copying everything ! But that's not all…’

  Manon took a step back and grasped her heart as if in pain, mirrored by Cyrielle.

  ‘How is she copying every move but also making it seem as if she is a disjointed doll ? All her actions seem erratic !’