What Could I Do With This Space?

[dwarfgourami]

I have a small fish-shaped hole in my Rekord 70 (19 gals or slightly less). The tank has extra filtration and currently stocks 4 peppered cories (2 males and 2 big females)+ a couple of male platies, slightly undersized. One of the platies has proved himself a bit of a bully towards his own kind in the past, the other one is his hanger-on and henchman. The water is hard and alkaline, the tank is planted and contains quite a bit of bogwood.
So I reckon there is a small space here, 5-6 of the proverbial inches as it were, room for either one centre-piece fish or a small school of something really small. But what? It has to be something that:

is more towards the top

will not scrap with the platy or get picked on by him (I have discounted a honey gourami for this reason)

does not carry a heavy bioload

can cope with a fair old current (though I could turn the top-up filter off)

Have thought of a banded gourami (but then there is the matter of current), moving my peacock goby in there (but don't want him to be mean towards her), using it as a grow-out space for some of my bristlenose fry- but have you got more interesting ideas?

 

[chibi]

A halfbeak would be cool. I don't know how available they are in the UK, though. They stay at the top, don't poo much and won't bug most fish. He may chase smaller (1 inch or less) fish around that venture toward the top, but he'll never hurt them. Guppies tend to stick around at the top, too. Good luck!!

 

[sarahf]

You could try hatchets. They do well in a school, are surface fish, and fit all your criteria. Marbled hatchets are nice, or for a bit of colour influence, albino hatchets are readily available, and look cool.