Chapter Text
‘This is a message pebble - pop it in your ear and we'll be able to keep in contact throughout the event.’
Steve tried to avoid any brushing of his fingers against his boss's palm as he took the small grey stone. He'd worked so hard to get to this position, he didn't need something ridiculous like his sweating hands to let him down now.
‘I appreciate you coming on at such a late stage in production, but we still have a lot we need to get done. The contractors are coming tomorrow to construct the pavilion but you need to chase up the tent hire to have everything on site two hours before then. The oven shipments should be arriving in an hour and the fitters will need at least 6 hours to complete the rituals to connect the arcane engines to the ley lines…’
He could hear a creak of tension in the voice of his new boss as he threw out a list of instructions, tasks and sundry complaints that Steve dutifully collected up into his notebook.
‘...and once again Steve, my personal thanks for stepping into this role on a temporary basis. I know Noeldred recommended you for the assistant production assistant role, but I really do hope we can find you a more permanent place here at Purple Worm Productions, once we've navigated the current crisis’.
Steve avoided looking his new boss in the eye, but couldn't help catching a glimpse of his warm, almost genuine smile.
‘Thank you sir, I appreciate it.’
‘Please,’ said the mouth with the dimple just forming in the corner, ‘call me Steve.’
‘Fuuuuuuuuuuuuck’ thought Steve, as he jogged through the streets of Uthodern in his smart, shiny, professional, unsuitable-for-jogging leather shoes.
The reason he thought this was twofold. One fold was an item on the list in front of him: ‘20 sunbird eggs, extreme secrecy!’. 20 sunbird eggs? Extreme secrecy? Sunbirds, the uncommonly rare and famously territorial creatures that each lay one egg every 2 years? Yeah sure, he could find 20 sunbird eggs by tomorrow without having to name drop his employer. Easy. No worries boss. Anything for you, sir. I mean Steve.
Ahhh there, the second fold. The lanky, swishy haired, message pebble wielding, origami of ‘Fuuuuuuuuuuuuck’ inspiring boss. At the sight of him striding across the field with the swagger of a man accustomed to wielding a clipboard, Steve had known to avert his eyes immediately. What you don't perceive can't hurt you. Or do anything else inconvenient. Just the memory of that vision pulled Steve up short, which he converted into something of a lean against the wall to catch his breath. Gasping for air, he took a minute to contemplate the ethics of developing a crush on your boss who also happened to have the same name as you. Didn't sound great. He resolved not to do it.
Stretching out his hamstrings and his stitch, and reassured that only his job was on the line, he jogged resolutely off towards the Dwarven Dairy.
When Noeldred had shown him the job description, it had said ‘assistant production assistant/runner’, and Steve was quickly starting to realise that ‘runner' should have had top billing. ‘Dress for the job you want, not the job you have!’ his mum had always said, so he'd arrived today in the blazer, white shirt and shiny leather shoes he envisioned for a regional production assistant. Once he invested in a pair of trainers, he would be so close he could taste it. Three more days of this shitty job, then Steve's dimpled smile would be the one to say the word ‘promotion’. ‘Permanent position’. ‘Annual leave allowance’. Maybe even ‘flexi-time’. Steve could have swooned in the street, but he'd fought too hard to get these sunbird eggs to put them at risk with an ill-timed fainting spell. The wispy elvish woman who sold him the eggs had at one point whipped out an actual magnifying glass to assess him for ‘purity of heart’, which was a grocery buying first for him. She'd been painfully insistent on finding out what he needed the eggs for, even though he’d sworn blind they were for a quest, and he’d had a horrible static prickly feeling the entire time he was in her shop. The eggs had also cost an unconscionable amount of gold, and he’d considered asking to have the receipt laminated. He was never going back there. The eggs must be protected at all costs.
‘Steve this is Steve,’ the message pebble buzzed, ‘you’re needed back at base, there’s an issue with the water mephits’. He turned on his formal leather heel and ran back down the street.
‘An issue’ was a poor description of the chaos that lay in front of him. The puddle was so large that it seemed to have developed its own tidal system, although it was hard to tell what was lunar gravity and what was impact waves from the mephits diving in and out. Steve blew nobly on the arcane whistle that was supposed to control them, which instead seemed to excite them intensely, and they began splashing even more vigorously. He shrugged off his blazer, soaked within seconds of entering the splash zone and mopped ineffectually for a moment. He knew in his heart what was necessary, but his mind needed a moment to accept it. Manfully, he threw his blazer to the ground, and rolled up his sleeves. The mephits could not be summoned. Therefore, they must be caught. Leaping across the growing pond, he crashed into two at once, stowing them both under his arm and wrestled a third, saying the magic words to banish them back to the water plane for safe keeping. He stalked the next one like a shark through the water, snatched the fifth from above like a desperate gull. Slowly, he returned each tiny elemental to the realm from which they came, cursing each time at the feckless artificers who’d supplied the faulty waterworks. Left eventually with just a still pond, undisturbed by broaching, spouting or canonballing, he took a moment to survey what he had wrought. Then he saw the time, and dashed for a mop.
As soon as he heard the latch of the cleaning cupboard click behind him, Steve knew what had happened. Half heartedly shaking the handle of the clearly locked door behind him, his other hand was already reaching into his blazer pocket for a cigarette.
‘Steve, this is Steve,’ he buzzed on the message pebble, holding down the lump in his throat, ‘I have a problem.’
Fifteen minutes later, when the cleaning cupboard door finally unlocked, Steve tried to focus on Steve’s ever present smile, but even that seemed to flicker as he took in the soaked shirt, crumpled blazer, and overall dejected presence of the assistant production assistant sat on the floor in front of him.
‘Ok!’ he said, clearing his throat after a beat, presumably having let the tragic scene in front of him sink in. ‘Well, great job on the mephits, and if I’m not mistaken, in that bag is those sunbird eggs, so that’s great,’ he carried on brightly.
At the mention of the eggs, Steve’s head sank into his hands. The unreadable waterlogged shreds of the extremely expensive sunbird egg receipt seemed to hang in the air as he dropped them to the ground. None of the treasures of his inside blazer pocket had survived the mephit ordeal. The tiny cupboard flooded with the sound of a pause, then the scribble of Steve’s pen on the clipboard.
‘Thanks for coming to get me,’ said Steve, managing to pull his gaze from the puddle that surrounded him on the floor. ‘Any chance you can sub me a smoke?’