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Post by Minor NPC on Mar 7, 2012 16:52:11 GMT -5
She was cold.
She shouldn't have been - not with the lights and the machines and the heat of moving bodies that made the city a beacon in the desert night. She most certainly should not have been cold, with the way she was driving so fast, the combustion engine roaring not three feet in front of her.
But she was freezing. Her blood felt stagnant, and her heart was beating in a most irregular pattern. The half-crumpled piece of paper on the seat next to her caught the light at odd angles as she passed streetlight after streetlight. She almost clipped a homeless man as she took the corner too tightly. A backwards glance to see he was alright was all she could spare.
She passed the address with a swear, and one foot hit the floor with such speed that she was thrown several inches forward in her chair. The seatbelt tugged painfully at her stomach and neck. The pain registered as an annoyance. The realization that she could have smacked her head across the wheel and knocked herself out - that never came.
The car jerked out of the center of the road at her command, and the car was barely in park before she was off the seat and skating towards the door. Her fist hammered upon it as rapidly as if she was being chased by some invisible death.
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Post by Rei Eckhard on Mar 7, 2012 17:39:27 GMT -5
BAMBAMBAM!
BAMBAMBAM!
BAMBAMB- "Stop banging! I'll be right there!"
Rei slowly pulled himself out of his bed, tumbling to the floor in a daze in nothing but his underwear. He sat there for a few seconds leaning against the bed before slapping his face his face several times in an attempt to keep himself awake. He was about to drift back into peaceful slumber when he heard the banging against his door once more. Grudgingly he stood up, grabbing the nearest pair of pants, a pair of cargo shorts, off of his clothes-strewn floor.
He then proceeded to head downstairs, passing through the upstairs living room and coming out of a door on the left side of the back wall in the business room. He sighed, passing through the almost barren business room, passing around the two grey sofas and oak table into the waiting room. All the way up to this point he kept hearing the banging against the door, which was beginning to work up to his last nerve. Without stopping his stride he moved to the front door, lifting up his right leg into a kick that banged loudly against the door. Without missing a beat he put his foot down and opened the door.
"Look, we're closed. It's the middle of the night and I would like some sleep. However all your banging woke me up, which I do not appreciate. When we're closed it means don't bother us and we're not accepting work. So whatever you have for me to do better be urgent."
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Post by Minor NPC on Mar 7, 2012 20:11:10 GMT -5
She hit the door. His claims of being right there fell through as he took his good-natured time about arriving there, before the door hit back. A startled noise slipped from her voice as she took a wary step back.
The annoyed wolffolk was intimidating, but that probably had nothing to do with the haunted, pasty look on her face. He cleared a few inches higher than her, making her neck bend slightly back as she looked up at him. The pace of her breath kept its heated pace as nerves refused to abate.
Her eyes stayed staunched throughout his irritated speech. The paper in her hand crumpled as her grip tightened more severely.
"Are you the mage? The Odd Jobs mage?" she asked insistently, speech coming out rapidly. Her tone was just shy of hysterical, holding up the crumpled paper like it was a magic voucher instead of just a list of mages-for-hire services. "Can you find people? I need you to find my daughter! We had an argument and - and she's gone! She's gone!"
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Post by Rei Eckhard on Mar 7, 2012 20:28:31 GMT -5
Did this lady just not hear what I said?
He shook his head in exasperation. The woman was obviously distraught, to the point where it seemed like she might pass out.
"Yes, I am a mage and yes I can find people. However, unless you can give me a reason why I should but my nose into your business you should probably take this to the police."
This was not normally how he would have acted. In any other case he would have sat there and listened to her politely, then decide whether or not to take the job. However, he was grumpy and not in the mood. He would have preferred to be in bed rather than standing in the front door shirtless.
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Post by Minor NPC on Mar 7, 2012 23:14:19 GMT -5
"I already called the police," she insisted, her excited nature pushing her forward a few inches without realizing it. "There wasn't a note or anything. She's not officially a missing person yet, so they wouldn't send anyone out to help me search."
"Please," she said, her tone on the edge of begging as her eyes welled up. "I don't know where to look! She was hanging out with bad people and I wanted her to stop! I wanted her to be safe! I just wanted -" the pressure over her eyes finally broke down the dam, triggering small streams down her face that seemed out of place without a rain cloud.
"I just wanted her to be safe," the mother repeated, and her hands wrung the paper more tightly. "Please help me, please help me, please, please help me…"
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Post by Rei Eckhard on Mar 7, 2012 23:34:55 GMT -5
Sob stories, he had heard enough of them. Always used to try and get him to do the work for them. Still, he couldn't completely ignore this. From the sounds of it this might be going into something deeper and his curiosity couldn't resist.
"I don't have a rhyme or reason to help since if she doesn't return in a few days she would be considered a missing person anyway. However, I am interested in whats going on, so that's the only reason why I've decided to help you at all."
He turned around, kicking the door opened wider as he turned on his heel. He began to walk off towards the business room.
"I'm going to need you to sign a contract saying that you have paid for my help and that I will be payed in full. It also states that you will pay for any injuries I take because of the job. Normally for a job I would demand half up front, but it seems like we don't have time to negotiate for that. I'm going to need you to tell me who she was hanging out with, in as much detail as you can describe. The more I know the faster I can get my contacts to find her. I'm also going to need a picture so I can identify her and I need to know if she can use magic. There's a bunch of other details I would ask but I have a feeling you have no idea."
By the time he had finished the last sentence he was sitting on the sofa closest to the stairs heading upstairs, pulling out a copy of the contract that he commonly used for his jobs and placing it on the table along with a pen of black ink.
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Post by Minor NPC on Mar 10, 2012 19:10:54 GMT -5
Her hands, once fidgety and occupied with that metaphorically magical piece of paper, were a sudden flash of motion as she threw her name on the contract. It felt like one step more in the right direction. Buyer's sense would have had her second guess what she was doing, were it not for mother's obligations standing right behind it to deliver it a whack upside the head.
The nervous voice, slightly more controlled now that she was getting somewhere, rattled off the requested details about her friends. She didn't have their names - and she only knew a few of their nicknames, pretentious as they were: "Barthandelus", "Nightshade," "Mistress Dark," another "Nightshade" and "Bocaj." They dressed entirely in blacks and reds and wore metallic jewelry.
A picture pulled from her pocket displayed the group with pasty white faces, black eyeliner, and long black nailpolish. The girls preferred red.
"And everything was 'Death this' and 'Vampires that' and 'Stop being a platypus'. I don't even know what that means. I've never even seen a platypusfolk. It wasn't healthy! She was obsessed! They were all obsessed, but when I tried to put my foot down, she said they were going to run away and find a vampire, a real vampire."
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Post by Rei Eckhard on Mar 10, 2012 21:01:54 GMT -5
He raised his eyebrows at the sudden haste as she wrote her name on the contract, not even bothering to glance over it. She truly must have been desperate to find her child, but still, money is money.
She soon began to list off all the names as well as what they wore. It sounded more like a goth band was going to be started than an abduction, and when she showed him the picture, he was more sure of that then ever.
These kids look more like they're struggling with themselves than anything. At least, that's what I've read this behavior shows. Still, she signed it.
"Alright, I'll take over from here on out. I'll let you know when I've found he," he said as he grabbed the contract and went upstairs to begin preparing, leaving the woman on her own in the business room.
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