A Perplexing Task, Part I (Solo)

[Eridanus]

Day 16, Fall of 511 AV 14th Bell The Orphanage, Sunset Quarters Eridanus stood in front of the only orphanage in the cold self-centered city, wondering why he even decided to be here. He had been in the Castle Commons, checking out the goods various vendors were hawking and looking to see if he could get a good deal, for winter was approaching and there were usually discounts on wares that would do expire by winter or goods that people have no use for by then. Some opportunistic merchants were already selling warm clothes; the types that were available so early usually luxurious fashion apparel that normal people like him have no interest in. It was then when he was approached by a lad no older than fifteen, informing him of a job by ol’ Master Tua. He had called the lad’s bluff immediately, knowing that Tua did not favour such methods and preferred to have a personal hand in everything, and would not entrust important information in the hands of a mere courier-boy. He had demanded the truth, and of course the implied threat of possible violence – which he did not mean, for he learned that intimidation goes a long way in avoiding actual violence – and the messenger-boy spilled everything, handing him a sealed note containing the details of the run. Apparently, the merchant Hurate Gundere whom Eri had a business relation with needed a new job done, and immediately the Vantha was wary, for the last time he did a run for the merchant he almost got killed. Hurate needed him to find a woman only known as Viya in The Orphanage in Sunset Quarters, the slum of the city. He was to deliver a simple verbal message, “The crow has withered”, and the time limit given was three days. The only limitation was that the message was to be delivered personally and no one else must hear it. He considered the possible dangers and concluded that the risk should be minimal, due to the nature of the job, the location and the generous time-limit. After being re-assured of similar rates as the previous job, he agreed, and now here he stood, knocking on the doors of the orphanage. A kindly looking lady opened the door, asking for his business here, for one has to be especially wary especially if children were involved. Eri emulated the charm that his beautiful Ethaefal form easily exuded without effort, and was somewhat successful in gaining entry. Well, at least he managed to make her laugh and glance at him appreciatively. It helped that he mentioned Viya’s name and that he, in no way accidentally, kind of implied some form of understanding between the two. There was no doubt that the roguish charm that he generously threw into the mix – aided by his striking aurora-streaked hair and his constantly color-changing eyes – helped to seal the deal. Successful, Eri nodded, winking at the lady, and entered the courtyard. “Wait here”, she told him, and she left for the main building which probably served as a headquarters and office for the people running the organization. Moments later, she returned, telling him that Viya was busy and that he could either come back later and ask again or occupy his time here with something useful. She winked at him, but he tried to steer the conversation away and told her that he’d love to mingle with the children. “Oh! Do you tell stories? The kids here always love a good story, takes the misery of the present away from them,” she exclaimed. A kid nearby heard her, and he began to repeat excitedly, “stories stories stories!”, attracting other kids to start crowding around the Vantha. The lady patted him on the shoulder, and said that she had to attend to other business elsewhere in the orphanage, and left him to his own devices. Not wanting to disappoint the children, and possibly looking like an idiot, the Vantha wracked his brains to come out with a story interesting enough to hold the children’s attention. He relied on past experience gained from his literature classes in Zeltiva University and he began to spun a tale, working in a bit of the musical Vani accent to mystify the tale, instantly causing the children to stop chatting and laughing and to listen curiously and attentively.

[Eridanus]

“A long long time ago, in a place far away from here-“ “Is it before the Valterrian?” A boy piped up, followed by several other questions and statements from the other orphans asking him what the Valterrian was or to ask him him to shut up. Eridanus looked at the kid pointedly, and the boy blushed, looking down. “Sorry.” “It’s alright, kid. What’s your name?” Eri asked the boy kindly. “Tim, sir. I don’t know what my last name is. Don’t know who my parents are.” He replied quietly. “Alright. A long long time ago, in a place far far away, there was a boy named Tim.” The Vantha began, earning a bright smile from the boy. “Tim lived in a tiny room owned by a bunch of angry and abusive step-parents. The step-parents had their own son, a fat and plump bully called Jodey, and they spoiled him, buying him presents when his birthday came but not even acknowledging Tim’s birthday when it came. In fact, they barely acknowledged his presence, only feeding him the leftovers of their meal. Tim was living there for he had no other relatives, and he was told that his parents were killed in an accident when the wagon they were in crashed and veneered off the trail.” Eridanus tried to work in some elements that were familiar to the orphans so that they could relate to his tale by making an orphan as the protagonist. “Both went to the same school, but while Tim was hardworking and tried to learn as much as he could, Jodey was only interested in having fun and maintaining his hobby – which was to bully Tim and make his life as miserable as possible. As years passed, Tim also picked up a new hobby, which was to avoid Jodey and his gang of boys, and he grew quick at dodging and avoiding the motley crew. However, he had other troubles, and he was plagued by dreams of a nasty kinds. Many a times Tim woke up in the dark, panting, and the last thing in his mind a flashing green light and screams. “ The area was beginning to become silent as more kids started joining the circle, their absorbed gaze on the Eri, motivating him to continue. “He told his foster family about his nightmares, but they laughed at him and labelled him as crazy. Jodey already managed to make Tim the most unpopular boy in school, and spread the rumor of him being crazy, causing everyone to avoid the poor boy either because they were afraid he was insane, or afraid of being picked on by Jodey’s gang should they be seen talking with him. He was in trouble with the school as well, for sometimes the authorities found him huddled on the roof, not believing him when he said that he was running away from Jodey’s gang to avoid a beating, and did not know how he ended up here. When they tried to maintain discipline by sending him to the barber’s to shave his hair off as a form of punishment, his hair mysteriously grew back overnight and he could not explain to the teachers why he still had an unruly mob of hair. All these caused him to be labelled as a delinquent, and this made him very miserable indeed.” “One day, the family was visited by a courier, passing the usual bunch of notes, but with a surprising addition. The courier announced that one of the notes belonged to a certain ‘Tim Holdstein’, invoking his rarely used last name for his relatives did not like his parents very much. They were related by means of his mother and her sister, who was his aunt, and though they thoroughly disliked his father they tolerated his mother to some degree by virtue of her relationship. Thus, his dad’s family name ‘Holdstein’ was very much a taboo. Before he could reach for the letter, the patriarch of the house, a large and ruddy-faced man by the name of Ned reached forward to snatch the letter from him, reading it only to turn purple-faced and setting it against a nearby candle, burning its contents.” “What did the letter say?”, Tim piped up before being shushed by the assembled crowd. “Thank you”, Eri chuckled at the raw display of innocent curiosity. “As I was saying, the letter was burnt by Tim’s bad uncle, and he couldn’t read it.” “As the days passed, more and more couriers visited the house, announcing letters for young Tim, but the letters were intercepted by mean ol’ Ned, who burnt them in increasing fervour, as if something bad would happen if he did not. Finally, one day no courier turned up but instead their house got flooded by a flow of letters that appeared magically as if it appeared from nowhere.” Eri paused for a moment, as the kids went “ooooh” when they heard the magic word. In both senses of the meaning. “Finally, Ned could not take it and he took the whole family out, summoning a wagon and giving directions for the sea. After what seemed to be a long time, they finally arrived at their destination. It was a port not too different from the docks here in Sunberth, except more well-maintained like Zeltiva’s. He went in, keeping the family in apprehension, and finally came out with a beaming smile that stretched from one end of his face to the other. In his hands were keys and a lumpy package, and he proudly announced that he had rented a ship for a while.” “’Now they can’t get us, especially not in this storm’, Ned announced cheerfully, for indeed a great storm was beginning to gather. It was utter madness, to be honest, to be sailing a ship in such a weather and to view it as a benefit, but Tim was shushed and manhandled into the boat by his larger cousin Jodey. Finally they set sail, and all was calm for a day or two. Ned was visibly cheered up, for which courier would be mad enough to send a message in such conditions?”

[Eridanus]

“Little did he know that he was wrong, for a few days after that decision, little Tim was lying on the floor, not being able to sleep as he stared at a clock in the background. The reason was that it would be minutes till his birthday, and while his foster family were snoring away not caring about him, he wanted to at least give himself some attention and sing a birthday song to himself. As the clock approached twelve, he started to sing, ‘Happy birthday to me... happy birthday to me...’, just as he had for the past years as far back as he could remember, for he did not remember his parents at all, having been delivered to his abusive relatives when he was a mere baby.” “Suddenly, there was a loud crack of thunder, and the boat shook. It began to vibrate unnaturally, and not in sync with the rolling of the waves outside. Ned began to wake and he looked around suspiciously, taking out the item in the lumpy package which was a large and rusty, but serviceable, mace. He gripped it, hands visibly shaking in nervousness, and faced the door silently.” “Gong! The clock struck twelve, and immediately the door to their cabin slammed open, but they could not see the environment outside for their view was blocked by the wide gerth of an unearthly huge man. He was almost two times the size of a regular human, and in his hands he held a tiny umbrella. Tim noticed the usefulness of having a tiny umbrella in such a heavy storm. Which was none. Still, he did not say anything, and waited for his uncle Ned to do something. The strange thing also was that although the door was open, the expected gust and rain of the raging storm outside was not felt, as if they could see and hear the storm, but not feel it.” “’I must warn you, I am armed and not afraid to use it’, Ned quivered, waving his mace trying to look threatening but failing. ‘Ah I’m not afraid of yer puny weap’n’, the huge man replied cheerfully, reaching forward to grab the mace and easily bending it into two. Ned squeaked quite unseemingly and he retreated to where the rest of his family was, trying to preserve what pride he had by looking like he was protecting them.” “’Ah, Tim. I’ve bin lookin’ fer yer’, the man declared, looking around before settling on the cuddled boy. The giant stared at him, his features softening as he murmured, ‘Yer have yer mom’s eyes, yer know that? Her beautiful eyes.’ Stepping forward to the dramatic clap of thunder, he reached into his coat and retrieved a cloth-wrapped package, handing it to the surprised boy. ‘Happy birthday, Tim’, he said simply. ‘I’ve been tryin’ ter get this to yer, but yer nasty uncle been burnin’ them letters’, the giant explained to Tim, throwing Ned a dirty look as he did so. ‘Yer been invited to Zolrich Academy of Magical and Technological Wonders, an’ my name’s Gorgovich and I’m the caretaker of the school’, the giant declared as he withdrew another letter, similar to the ones that have been flooding the house not too long ago.” The children have been hanging on to his every word, completely absorbed in the tale. He did not notice that even the domestic animals around were curling up in the area and Tim was absent-mindedly stroking a ginger cat, for the Vantha himself was also engrossed in spinning the tale as he made things up as he went along, unleashing the Vantha’s natural racial flair for story-telling. He glanced at the time-keeping gadget at the corner of the room and realized that three bells have passed by without knowing. He decided to call a pause, in order to check on when Viya could attend to him and also to parch his parched throat. Some of the children and animals left the area in search of refreshments, and the lady who granted his access walked in, looking at him appraisingly. “Never have there been someone who could enthral the children for so long. We even did our work so efficiently when almost all the staff are freed up from having to tend to the kids and the absence of the usual noise”, she scratched her chin thoughtfully. Eridanus gave a sheepish smile, also surprised at his own ability to do so. Perhaps in his past life he was indeed some sort of enchanting yarn-spinner and he was merely channelling the ‘essence’ of his past life, or whatever strange reason it was. “Viya is quite occupied and she cannot see you today. However, she is quite pleased by your efforts and desires you to come here again tomorrow.” Eri began to protest, but the lady held up a finger and continued, “She promises that she will attend to you tomorrow.” He sighed, and gathered his things to leave the room after announcing that the session was over. It was met by quite a few groans, and soon the usual noise and activity of hyper-active children began to occupy the building. “Yup, back to normal”, she quipped as she walked Eri to the door. “So I’ll see you tomorrow?” He strode out into the street, glanced behind and said, “You bet”. Today was a strange but unexpectedly fulfilling day indeed.

[Eridanus]

And so ends this thread that goes in a completely different direction compared to a usual word-runner job thread. For NaNoWriMo I included a generous dosage of Oracle's NaNo Prompts, which was to include a "modern movie reference" which did not contradict Mizahar's lore and setting. I hope that yall enjoy the Mizaharian twist to this story, and kudos if you knew what the reference was from the moment Eri opened his mouth ^.^

[Archelon]

Thread Award "..." And the Results!!!!: Eridanus : SkillName 1-5 How/why? Story-telling 3 Yes it exists! D: 3 to start you off XD Seduction, 2 2... Just 2 ! XD Intimidation, 2 poor little messengers Interrogation 1 Childcare 3 Lores: The Orphanage(Basic) Would you like some extra turtle sauce ? : I should beat you for where you got that story from Eri! D: Next time turtle will turtle smack you XD! No Hairy Plodder in mizahar you garulous gallifree gallute! XD.