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(( Sorry. So so long. .__. ))

This was annoying. And quite crazy, actually. How in the world could any one person be the recipient of over ten thousand pieces of mail?

A door slammed.

"Aah, hot damn, by now this should be about twelve thou," the force behind the door, one Lisenia Aleksandar of the Elvaan, blurted out. It was roughly fifteen past the hour, and she had just entered the plain, white room she knew oh-so-well, carrying a large box filled to the brim with envelopes. For these, like the thousands of other letters stacked in columns around her, were to be taken care of. "And just when I thought I would be getting off..."

Frowning, Lise ungraciously plunked the heavy box upon the floor and gave a hefty kick, causing the overflow to spill from each side. All afternoon (well, rather, all week), she had been cooped up in the stuffy, crowded, God-forsaken, and most of all, lonely office space located somewhere within the dregs of Windhurst. And for what?

Mail-sorting.

Yeah, that was Lisenia's job. She was a mail-sorter. It was not the most fabulous of jobs, by any means, but irksome. No little shame was felt when she admitted to be such.

Oh well, she thought, testing out the murky waters of optimism. So Windhurst wasn't all it was cut out to be. So it wasn't some big adventure waiting to happen. Big deal. Things like these happen every day, right? Am I right? Things aren't ever what they seem. Just grow up, Lisenia... grow up...

Lise gave a good, hard glance around her.

Things aren't ever what they seem...

But... no. This was precisely as it seemed. These thousands of letters around her, dwarfing her, drowning her, were exactly what they seemed. Her "life" as a useless prole lost within the masses was pitiful. And to think, she had came to Windhurst for opportunity. What had she gotten herself into? All these years... everything she worked for... and she had reaped nothing but mediocrity. She was a nobody.

Unable to supress her hot temper after this hurtful realization, she threw her newly-sorted stack of envelopes up into the air, and with a fierce swing of the arms, toppled a few piles. She couldn't help but glare as the mail, submissive to its master, gravity, came floating down in a gentle rain all around her. Uggggh...she was so angry she could spit! And it just so happens, she did... right on the towering stack of Fenry's stupid, stupid mail.

It was just then that the door burst open, and another box was thrown heedlessly in by a worker. The sound of box striking the floor was visible to Lise's particular eyes, and the look of it distracted her from the door, until, before she knew it, the door slammed shut.

Again alone, her red gaze narrowed at the door.

Fenrys... whoever, whatever, wherever you are... I hate you.

Seth had never actually used the Great Tree of Windurst, but followed Fenrys' lead, standing on the engraved stone and saying aloud "Fed'ration Postal Depar'ment."

Nothing happened.

"Fed'ration Postal Depar'ment!" He said louder and a bit angrier.

Still, to no avail.

He let out a long sigh? "Please?" He asked with a girlish whine. The tree didn't give into his plea, however.

"C'mon!" He said, a bit more enraged at the tree. Some people were starting to stare at him. The poor male Mithra couldn't seem to get the tree to understand his uneducated accent.

He then sighed, and enunciated more clearly "Federation Postal Department" and was warped instantly to right behind Fenrys, and the Mithra stalked out from behind the man, arms crossed, and sat down idly on a nearby bench, obviously meant for waiting when one's mail was being retrieved.

He wondered, having not heard, how much mail there was, and if the man would need help hauling it back to his house. After all, Seth would probably be of decent aid, and if there were some baubles or items being mailed to Fenrys, he certainly wouldn't miss many of them...

(( I apologize for how long I took for one reply. I thus give any and all of you permission to inflict me with harsh punishment. crying ))

Lise had been inclined to clean up the mess she had made right away, and would have, if she hadn't been rudely interupted by the sound of the door opening, repeatedly. This was doing nothing for her otherwise bad mood. Did someone have to come at this exact moment?

"Come back tomorrow," she said with stone-cold eminence, refusing to so much as look at the visitor. Let them get worked up over that, she thought. She'd sure show 'em, whoever they were, just how much she wasn't in the mood to deal with them. However, rather than the sound of the door shutting and they leaving - and despite her warning - the sound of evenly-spaced footsteps advancing towards the desk greeted Lise's acute ears. Did no one listen to orders anymore?

She knit her darkly colored yet thin eyebrows closely together in exasperation, and spoke up once again, however still refusing to look at the stranger. "Did you not hear me? WE'RE CLOSED." Of course, they weren't closed, but Lise just needed time to clean up the place from the envelope bath she gave it...

But still, the footsteps persisted. Ugh. Fuming, she flung herself around to finally face who she now considered an intruder, and opened her mouth, looked at the man's eyes...and... froze. In all honesty, she didn't know why, but it was the first glance of the hume that did it; for he had silenced her, and not for any one reason, really. Perhaps, it was the particular way he carried himself... very dignified. Or perhaps, it was the apologetic look... But what ever the case, his appearance shocked her and, for a moment or two, left her peering at him, dumb and wide-eyed.

"Uh, hi. Fenrys Mystblade coming for my........eleven thousand pieces of mail."

Lise swooshed her hair back haughtily and cleared her throat before speaking.

"Aaah, Fenrys. Well, you've come to the right place," she remarked as dryly as possible; though, secretly, she couldn't help but admire the particular lovely way his voice had sounded. Well, anyways, pleasant voice or no, this was Fenrys, in the flesh, and her bitterness against him had yet to subside. Meticulously, she gave a jestful motion to the strewn envelopes all around them. "As you can see, I've been swimming in it for the past few weeks."

((I didn't mention it in any of the opening posts, but the currency of Vana'diel is called "gil" which is the same, both singular and plural. Also, the dialogue makes my eyes bleed. I apologize, but it's necessary to set up interactions between all the characters present. You can't complain, I'm putting off paper writing for this =D))

Fenrys tried very sincerely (very briefly also, but still very sincerely) not to chuckle at Lisensia's plight. Once he'd failed spectacularly in that endeavor, he remarked "Yes, well I hope you didn't intend for me to read any of it. I'd never get around to anything else. Anyhow, if you can do me this one more favor, I can probably see to it that you never see a piece of my mail again."

Turning to face Seth, Fenrys spoke again "Unless I am very much mistaken, that is one of the aptly named Fletcher children. Every Treasure Hunter that uses a bow gets them custom crafted by her father. Arrows too. He's a genius of his craft, and this particular child of his has grown immensely since last I visited. Now if I've quenched your curiosity, I'm about to show you why I led you here." he paued briefly, turning back to Lise "I need my mail to be sorted into two categories. Any non-message items, like arms, armor, food, monetary tributes, and gifts, are to be given to my assistant here. I'll take anything else....and probably dispose of it." He turned once more, with a stern eye on Seth,it was the sort of facial expression that indicated that Seth was in for considerably more than he bargained for. "Now, I am more than happy to give you all those items, which I assure you I do not need, and you are free to do with them as you please. However, they are worth a considerable sum of money, and as such, I will be enlisting your services as a thief. To put it bluntly, I want you to become a Treasure Hunter. You will work as I see fit, and I will see that you are fed, sheltered, and outfitted, if you don't like this arrangment, feel free to leave here, empty handed and hungry. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go wade through my mail." And without another word, Fenrys hopped (quite nimbly, considering he was still wearing his armor) into his errant piles of mail.

"... Wh--who are...?"

Tryph paused, taking a moment to see if she could recall the tall paladin who recognised her (apparantly). She wasn't surprised that he knew of her father, as he was a highly sought after as a craftsman--after all, it was what her family had been named for--but her? She wasn't anyone special.

She was grateful for his intervention, as odd as it seemed to her. It meant she didn't have to talk to the other Mithra... well, at least not immediately. She took the moment to glance around at the omnipresent piles of mail... by the looks of things, she wasn't going to get her package anytime soon.

Not that she wanted to. The Elvaan woman at the desk was more than a little intimidating: she sounded cold, she was sarcastic, and she was definately not in a good mood. Plus, Tryph hadn't seen many Elvaan before, so she wasn't sure how this one would act.

((Short and bad, since I gotta leave. >.>))

Fenrys fished through the pile of mail (most of which, was hatemail, regarding his inability to act as a world leader), opening a few, and holding onto them, but after a couple moments of this exercise he finised, turning back to the rest of the room. He first answered Tryph speaking casually, "I'm Fenrys. Fenrys Mystblade. I'm not surprised you don't remember me. You were much younger when last I visited, and I'm sure all the faces that come and go, vying for your fathers services, begin to blur together after a while."

It was when he said this that he noted the Gradian, whom he recognized. The freedom of a Gradian was controversial enough news in Bastok, but a second problem had arisen that had many politicians frightened. Citizenship. Gradians, being creations of people, were never truly considered citizens of Bastok, nor did they have to be, as Gradians "belonged" to people, and were generally protected under laws regarding property. However, true Bastokan citizens are given the right to vote, such being the way in a republic, but the issue with Gradians was still too new and confusing for any decisions on the matter. Chief Engineer Cid, creator of the first Gradian, shared Fenrys' view on the matter, in believing Gradians were both sentient and citizens, but this was not the popular view held by the public. Fenrys didn't comment, but he was staring long enough to make his interest apparent.

When he regained his senses, he said to Lise "Excuse me, but I'm afraid you're the only person in the room whose name I'm not familiar with. I'm afraid I'll need it if I'm going to relieve you of this unfortunate duty."

(( Now Val, please realize that even though your character /did/ speak to me, he wasn't mentioned in this post because, well... he's being completely ignored. biggrin ))

Lise paid careful attention to what Fenrys said to her, drinking in his words and not enjoying it much, at that. Not only was he practically flaunting the fact that she was relatively unknown to this town; but relieve her? Rescue her?

What did he think she was?

Some charity case?

Like that needy Mithra he just took under his wing?

No, she screamed inwardly, violently.

No no no...nonononononoNO!

However, outwardly, she remained a very eerie calm.

"My name," she began very sweetly, radiating a particular feminine gist to her tone that gave a warm appearance of amiability, "is Lise." And then suddenly, as if out of nowhere, "And I DON'T need your help with anything!" she stormed, throwing up her hands and bursting the silence with a surprisingly impassioned claim. "Nothing - anything, you hear? Now. If you'd please excuse me, I have those who are in need of my assistance."

Turning swiftly - and perhaps even a little too swiftly, as if she were trying to hide something - she commanded her complete attention towards the Gradian. "Fine, fine, our mail service is just fine. Why wouldn't it be? I'll be needing a name if you want your package, though, miss..."

She looked Chime up and down, and corrected herself.

"Eer, I mean...Gradian..."

While Lise vented her ire at Fenrys, Chime occupied herself with watching the curious little Mithra that had been given his run of the mail. A scavenger, she mused to herself, by the way he was rapaciously devouring everything with little respect for its contents. An interesting one, nonetheless, though the Gradian couldn't help but be curious about the contents of the letters Seth was throwing away unread.

She moved slightly, a fluid and efficient gesture, catching the letter that had been deprived of its necklace. A few flicks of her red eyes were all it took to read the text, before she folded it in one hand and turned to face Lise as she was addressed. "Chime," came the brusque reply. "Please ensure that it is not damaged; the condition of your office has left me in doubt of your handling of such things."

She looked down at the letter once more, before folding it up into a small, neat square. It was promptly tucked away in a hidden pocket on the sash around her waist; one never knew when one might have a drought of business, and the Mithra was discarding so many interesting things.

Another letter caught, Chime flipped it open, ignoring Lise now that she'd given the Elvaan the information she needed.