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 Posted: Sun Feb 26, 2017 2:59 pm
Peppermint Coffee hey! pretty open to whatever here. they have plenty similar interests so if you want, they can already be friends/acquaintances? but a fresh meeting is cool too.  You had to wake up early to work at the Hafelle Messenger’s printhouse -- up before sunrise, so that the presses could run by the first light of dawn. Most prentices wouldn’t be big fans of the wake-up calls, but the newspaper kids knew it came with a big plus; when you got all the work done early, you had the rest of the day left to spend however you pleased.
Today was a mild-mannered sort of morning, with a nice breeze in the air and the sun at your back. There were about a hundred things Hiwa could have found to do… but a little birdie had told him that the printhouse’s book-binders (who kept on working after the newspaper-printing was done) had were just finishing up the first copies of Hameena and the Legend of the Silver Wind. This was the latest installment of the best (in his rather well-informed opinion) adventure series around, and he’d be damned if he wasn’t the first one to read it!
It took some sweet-talking to get the book-binders to give in to his demands, but by lunch-time he had, in his hands, one of the inevitably buggered-up copies of the book. Some absent-minded assistant had collated the pages wrong and a couple were upside-down and in the wrong order, but if you kept a careful eye on the page numbers you could easily stay on the right track. With this in hand, he made his way (running, of course, for Hiwa rarely had the patience for walking when there was a book to be read) to the local tea-shop. He snatched up a sandwich from the counter, paid the girl at the checkout and settled down at one of the outdoor tables.
He tore loose a massive chunk of bread and stuffed it in his mouth as he flipped around in search of page 1.
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Posted: Mon Mar 06, 2017 1:15 pm
It was a day when the book repair shop was closed until the afternoon, which meant Kalanc's morning was wide open. His dad was using the time to do things around the house he needed to do; repairing the sink, fixing the gutters, cleaning things. Kalanc asked if he could help, but he was so inept at these kinds of things that he was told no and to 'run along and meet me at the store'. So he was out getting coffee and an early lunch when he spotted someone just settling down. Didn't he work at the printhouse? Kalanc's purple eyes lit up and he made a beeline to the tea place. He ordered a sandwich and some the coffee he'd been wanting before purposely settling down near the green-haired prentice. "Beautiful weather today," he said loud enough to where the other could hear him.
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Posted: Sun Mar 12, 2017 7:26 am
Having found the first page, he was pleased to discover that the next ten or so followed along in proper order. After that, there was an odd skip a few pages forward -- odd, because the printing was upside down. Once he found the pages that were supposed to follow, he came across some that had been cropped off wrong. The last letter of every word on the page was missing, leaving him a rather interesting guessing-game as he tried to puzzle out the missing pieces.
"Beautiful weather today." Someone spoke up beside him. For a half-second, Hiwa glanced up with a flash of annoyance -- couldn't folks see he was reading? But then he realised it was that pretty hybrid from the book repair shop, the one with the fluffy hair, so he dropped the ticked-off look real quick and grinned at the other.
"Hey! You're from the book-shop, aren't you? Betcha you haven't seen a mess like this one."
He waved around his copy of the Silver Wind, then shuffled a half-seat closer to the guy.
"Wanna see?"
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Posted: Thu Mar 16, 2017 2:08 am
Kalanc noticed the fleeting look of anger upon the other's face and mentally winced. He supposed he shouldn't have bothered him when the other was clearly reading, but he couldn't help it. He really wanted to pick the guy's brain. Just as quickly as the look had appeared, it disappeared as recognition clicked onto the other's face. "Yeah, I'm -" he let the other finish talking and then blinked. A mess in the print, eh? Kalanc took the paper with a curious look on his face. Flicking it open to the middle, he saw immediately the upside down print and a look of confusion appeared. "How...? How." He turned the page and saw the cut off words and he just shook his head. "Well that's... yeah, that's a mess. How does this happen?" The hybrid sighed hard and scratched at his cheek as he handed the paper back, scooting closer. "I'm Kalanc, and yeah, from the repair shop."
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Posted: Fri Mar 31, 2017 7:26 pm
"Hah!" Hiwa barked a laugh as the other boy flipped through the book, finding an upside-down page almost immediately. The sigh he let out afterwards was funny, almost like something one of the editors would do if they picked this book up from the binder's table.
"Happens more often than you think, y'know." He nodded knowingly, brushing his hand through his hair. "One or two of the printers will have a late night, go out drinking or something... then of course you've got to be up first thing in the morning, to print the paper. And by the time the paper's done and it's time to move on to the book run, they're just toast! Brains as blank as empty barrels. They do the dumbest things. It's not so bad, of course. I get to take all the rejects. They're still readable, anyway. Just got to keep a sharp head about it."
Kalanc. Ok. He'd noticed the guy before, of course, maybe said a couple of things to him in the book-repair shop. But he hadn't known his name, not 'till now.
"I'm Hiwa, from the Messenger. We print these books after the morning paper is done. But you'd know that, I guess. You get all sorts of books over at your place. D'you like books, d'you read?"
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Posted: Sat Apr 01, 2017 12:25 pm
"They really don't need to be working after they've been drinking," he said with a sigh. Kalanc shrugged and just handed him the paper back. Drinking was honestly something he couldn't get behind. Then again, the hybrid was young. Who knew where the path of life was going to take him. For now, no liquor touched his lips. "Hiwa. I remember you," he said with a grin. "Uh. Yeah I read a lot actually. I read a lot of fantasy. Sometimes it's good to escape your own boring life." He stretched his arms above his head slowly and just twisted himself around to pop his back. "I've seen you a lot as I stalk the paper. I say stalk but.. Really I'm trying to figure out how to approach the paper and see if they need anyone.. like.. needs an intern? I'm not asking now!" He put his hands up after he realized how much it sounded like he was begging for a job now. "I have a job! I just want to get to know how it operates and things. Curious mind you know."
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Posted: Thu Apr 20, 2017 4:42 am
"Prolly not, yeah." Hiwa snickered about the drunk press operators. "But adults are always like that with drinking and stuff, aren't they? They'll do it even if it's the absolute worst idea in the world. I don't get it. I mean, I'm no saint, but I don't set out to ruin my own mornings."
Especially when the mornings in question started several hours before the crack of dawn.
"Ugh, I love fantasy. And mystery. And adventure. I dunno, anything really. But yeah, it sure would be cool to have a life like that. Like in this book -- have you read any of the Hameena books? -- in this book she goes around and finds treasures and outsmarts bandits and such. It's exciting. And I bet her hands aren't blue!"
He wriggled his fingers at Kalanc. They were, in fact, stained with blue dye.
When the hybrid explained his interest in the paper, Hiwa's eyes lit up. As much as he dreamed about swashbuckling adventures... he was proud of his job, and he sure did like to talk to people who were impressed by that sort of thing. "Well," he started, flicking back his teal hair in mock-nonchalance. "Working at the paper is pretty sweet. As long as you don't mind early hours, that is. It's mostly a family thing, but if you show up ready to work they won't turn you down. I mean, of course it's one thing getting a job hauling papers about -- it's a whole other thing trying to get in on the writing and the editing and the like. They're much pickier there. I've been trying to wriggle my way up there since I started on the floor. It'll take time."
He shrugged with obvious pride, despite the fact that his job really just involved washing out blocks of type.
"I can show you 'round the print house if you want. There's nothing going on this time of day."
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Posted: Sat Apr 22, 2017 6:26 am
Had been slightly confused about the blue hand comment until blue hands appears on the other. Kalanc snickered a few times and just shook his head. "I can't say I've read 'em. Or even heard of the Hameena books. Now I'm going to look into them. Could always read about more female adventurers. After a while the ones about the guys start sounding the same." Then the talk about working at the paper started to get deeper and the hybrid made a quizzical noise in his throat. He didn't want to haul papers, but if it got his foot in the door, you better believe he wasn't too high and mighty for that. This guy was living it up though, so proud of his job. Hiwa's confidence in speaking about it made Kalanc grin wider. "Well maybe I'll just show up one day," he muttered to himself, mainly. "Yeah, sure! I'd love a tour of the print house! It's fascinating. I mean, sometimes the books brought in for repair are fascinating, but most of the time they're boring history documents." He wasn't one for schooling. Not really. Stereochrome Are we still doing this one?
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