Casual Heroing

So, apparently Lucinda wants me to go to an [Enchanter] in a few days and she even offered to escort me if I let her peak at the spellbook after we discover if it’s going to kill the next person who tries to use it.

“Yo, Lucillus!” I catch the guard filling out some forms while I steer away from the clerks.

“Who—oh, you? You passed the interview, I gather,” he stares at me.

“Yeah, baby,” I slap his shoulder, happy I got to spend all that time with Officer Lucinda, my future wife.

Lucillus looks at his shoulder and then at my hand the same way you would stare at a corpse and the person who just murdered it.

“Can I help you?” he’s cold and distant with me, but I need to find a way to make some money before I’m forced to sleep on the streets.

“Listen, I need someone to introduce me to a job or two. I guess people here don’t like humans that much, but I need some coin to sleep in an inn or something. I can’t keep wandering around all night. I’m more of an inn person, not the wandering type.”

He looks at me and then puts his eyes back to the form he’s filling out.

“Come on, Lucillus, I bet we can help each other! I’m a baker! You know who likes cakes and sweets? Women! And you look like someone who’s not sharing his cakes with anyone, otherwise you wouldn’t be so grumpy, am I right? I can help you get to whomever you need to. Come on, man, come on.”

The tall Elf stares down at me. I’m quite tall myself at 6 feet and 3 inches, but the guy breaks the 6’6’’ easily.

Was Lucinda taller or shorter? God, I didn’t notice!

I see Lucillus hesitate for a fraction of a second and I pounce on the occasion to capitalize.

“I am a great baker, one of the best! And I’m good at decorating! I can make you all the cakes, sweets, and cookies you want if you help me find a job.”

As soon as I see the man sigh, I know I have his collaboration. Tiring out the prey is the first rule of how to get people to help you in life. Once you tread the obnoxious/funny line long enough, you become endearing enough to not get kicked (constantly) and tiring enough that people just want to get rid of your problems so they can get rid of you.

It’s a skill, I’m telling you.

“There’s a bakery that provides rations for when you go out for a day or two and meals for our own mess hall. My cousin works there. If you can wait ten minutes, I’ll submit my report for the day and introduce you to her. If you mess up, you are on your own. My cousin is very strict and serious about her job. Now, just be quiet while I’m doing this.”

I spend the next ten minutes smiling around while sitting at the table with the other guards and Lucillus, completely relaxed. They are all filling some forms. I’d be curious to see their penmanship and the written language, but I’m not going to read any forms, not even if they are someone else’s.

Once my mother asked why I was so afraid of forms that did not pertain to me. It was a good question.

Well, once you see other forms, you might realize you are missing a permit, that something’s expiring, or that you might go to jail because the fire alarm system doesn’t really work.

Now, would you rather spend the last week of your life knowing you are going to jail, trying to fix the unfixable? Wouldn’t you rather enjoy the vacation that is, indeed, life?

Well, my mother would repeat again that I needed a psychiatrist, and a good one at that.

It was always surprising when she said that, considering that my family was very traditionalist and considered mental health a taboo. Well, look at that, I am the breaker of chains, the wind of progress that makes the most skeptic people want to believe that psychiatrists actually work because, if they don’t, they are stuck with me.

I’m always there when mankind calls, baby.

“Let’s get going,” Lucillus grumbles at me.

“So, if she has to both bake for the morning and for the Watch, is your cousin’s shop open 24/7?”

“What’s twentyfourseven?” Lucillus asks.

“I mean, is it open twenty-four hours out of twenty-four?”

He keeps staring at me as if I’m stupid or something.

“You mean 27/9?” he asks.

“What?”

“27/9.”

“27/9?” I am bedazzled.

“Yes,” he stares confusedly at me.

“You mean that we have twenty-seven hours in a day and there are nine days per week?”

“Yes?” my question carries such incredulity that he seems to doubt his own statement.

“Ha. That’s interesting. I’m going to get a massive jetlag, I suppose,” I shrug. “Better than getting burned alive by a Dragon.”

He looks at me weirdly, but this Lucillus does not make any comments.

I guess he doesn’t want to prolong this conversation much more.

“Well, what’s your cousin like? Is she hot?”

For the first time since I got here, he smiles radiantly. He seems rejuvenated by the question, so happy he could cry from the joy he’s currently overwhelmed with.

She’s a massive bitch, isn’t she?

“She’s very hard on her employees. We had to hold her off once because she almost beat a man to death.”

Well, she’s a massive violent bitch.

As expected.

Thank you, Lady Luck.